Under Fire (Elite Force #3)(12)
Author: Catherine Mann

Photos of her with her mom that she’d been meaning to scan into the computer and somehow never found the time.

A shoe box of memories from when she’d dated Caden, so little to commemorate a love that had filled every corner of her heart.

Her eyes slid to Liam. Tears clogged her throat. Her hand drifted to the top of her sleeping dog’s head, resting between the two seats. Liam covered her hand with his. A sprinkling of blond hair on his arms glinted, lighter than the dark blond hair on his head, cut short to military regulations. For some reason she’d remembered it longer before, but then she’d heard rules differed for special-operations warriors. And how funny to be thinking of his hair right now, but it was as if she needed to soak up every detail, reassuring herself again and again she’d chosen right.

“It’ll be all right. We’ll find Brandon Harris,” he said, sounding totally undaunted by everything that had happened.

“How can you be so sure? Someone burned my town house to the ground. I don’t give a crap about the contents, but the people who were hurt, what could have happened… That’s eating me up inside. I should have been more persistent. I should have made someone listen sooner.”

He squeezed her fingers before holding on to the steering wheel again. “All we can do is focus on the now. While you were loading the dog up, I went ahead and called my friend in the OSI. I passed along Brandon’s name. Someone’s driving over to pick him up now. That may be why he didn’t answer.”

He’d placed his call when she wouldn’t hear? Why? What had he said that he didn’t want her to know? Liam was so charming and he’d told her how much he cared about her. She’d trusted that, even if she wasn’t a big believer in the longevity of his “love.” She’d tried to be up front with him in return, because she honest to God didn’t want to hurt this incredible man.

What if she was wrong and Liam had been feeding her a line?

God, she hoped she’d done right by Brandon. He was already so suspicious of anyone military. Her stomach roiled just thinking of how freaked-out he might be. “And you trust this guy, your friend in the Office of Special Investigations? You trust he’ll be careful with Brandon and keep his traumatized state in mind?”

She’d come to Liam because of his air force special-operations connections, but now she wondered if those same ties would work against her. Not that she thought he would betray his country for even a second. But if he gave the wrong people the benefit of the doubt, she could be in even more danger. Brandon could be in danger.

Liam adjusted the rearview mirror, the three garters swaying. “I trust her completely.”

Her? “But you still didn’t tell her everything about what Brandon said, I hope.”

“Not over a cell phone, no. I can’t be sure of privacy until we’re in a secure room. Even talking out here could be risky, so why don’t we save the rest for when we get there.”

She looked sharply from the water to the man, headlights from oncoming cars streaking across his face, just as quickly gone, leaving him in shadows. The light and dark flashes reminded her of the two sides of Liam. At one moment he was the charmer who wowed her with his smile and wit. And in a flash he became the honed professional, a military man in charge of his universe.

She’d sought him out because of that professional side of him… not because she hadn’t been able to forget him for even one day over the past six months. Right? She fingered the tear in the Jeep’s ragtop. “Tell me more about your friend in OSI.”

Where had that question come from?

From the part of her that liked his smile and that almost quaint way he had of squeezing her hand.

“Not much to tell,” he said. “We’ve been stationed together a couple of times, deployed together once. She’s helped with intel on a few missions, always sharp, always right.” He shot a quick glance her way. “I answered your question, and now I have one of my own. Why did you choose Florida for your big move?”

Her heart flipped. Because she’d heard Florida and thought of him? “The rescue group in D.C. that works with pairing shelter pets with vets identified this area for expanding the concept. The timing was right for me to move. I accepted the challenge for a change.”

“That’s a pretty radical change just because you’re burned out on work. Most folks would opt for a vacation rather than another emotionally draining career field.”

“I’m following dreams I’m passionate about.” She shrugged, the wind lifting her damp hair and reminding her of the moment Liam burst into the bathroom. “I have no family entanglements. There’s nothing to stop me from picking up and relocating if I wish. I guess I’m a lot like a female version of you—without the trail of ex-spouses.”

“Fair enough. But why? You were damn good at your job.” His praise reached across as tangibly as any touch. “More than that, you seemed intense about your search and rescue work.”

“Too intense. I told you I burned out in the Bahamas and I meant it.” Her emotions had felt all the more close to the surface with Liam around. She’d hoped returning to D.C., staying away from him, would bring balance back to her life.

No such luck.

“So you decided to work with PTSD patients? Sounds like a real party.” He snorted.

“Okay,” she said, half smiling along with him. God, he was so wonderfully irreverent. “I can see why it wouldn’t seem the logical choice, but after so many failures in the Bahamas, so many dead people… dead children… I needed to do some saving.”

His smile faded. “I get that.”

Of course he would. She sometimes forgot how he’d once told her that he’d been an Army Ranger before shifting to the air force. Even now, there had to be unbelievable stress in his job, and somehow he’d managed to continue the grind for over a decade. “How do you hold tough through the ones you can’t rescue?”

“I can’t quit. There’s always another one who needs me,” he said simply, steering the Jeep steady on. “It’s the only way I know to be.”

Palm trees whipped past one after the other in perfectly spaced rhythm, leading toward a distant bridge like going from one rescue to another, week after week, month after month, until years passed. Lives were saved and still no life had been built.

How did a person go about building a life that wasn’t wrapped up in the calling to rescue people? A calling that consumed a person until there wasn’t time left for anything else. “What about retirement?”