Broken Honor (24 page)

No doubt she had a point, but as worried as he was about her and the baby, he’d be useless to the team. When Jean-Luc had called for a medic and he’d glanced over to see Mara pale as bone and on the verge of passing out, his heart had all but slammed to a stop. He still wasn’t sure if it had started beating again.

He should tell her all that. Should let her know in that moment, when he’d thought she was injured or ill, he’d never been more frightened in his life. But the words sounded ridiculous in his head and felt hollow on his tongue, so he kept his mouth shut. She’d needed water, so he had to go boil some and—

“Travis.”

He closed his eyes. Christ, he loved the way his name sounded when she said it—even when she was clearly exasperated with him. He opened his eyes again and faced her.

“Go help your team,” she said.

He shook his head. “I need some downtime.”

“You’re a horrible liar.”

He scratched at his jaw. Winced. “Uh, I’m usually pretty good at it.”

“Not with me, you’re not.”

And that should terrify him. It didn’t. In fact, he liked that she could see through his bullshit and wasn’t afraid to call him out on it. And again, he should probably tell her that, but the words wouldn’t come.

After too many minutes of silence stretched between them, Mara sighed. “So are you just going to stand there, or are you going to come over here and hold me like we both want?”

Thank Christ. He’d been aching to wrap her up in his arms but hadn’t known how she’d react, or even how to approach the subject with her.

He sat down and pulled her onto his lap, securing her against him with his arms around her and her head tucked under his chin. He wrapped a blanket around them both to keep away the chill of the concrete floor.

Tension seeped out of his muscles, and like that, he could breathe easily again. He kissed the top of her head. “I wish I could send you away from here.”

“If you could send me safely away, you’d be going with me.”

“Yeah, I would. In a heartbeat.”

He felt her lips curve into a smile against his neck. “Where would we go?”

“Oh, man. Someplace warm. I don’t want to see snow again for a while.”

“Same here. I’ve always wanted to go to Costa Rica. I’ve heard it’s beautiful. We could visit Gabe when he gets better. I’d like to meet his wife.”

A cold pit opened up in his chest. Was Gabe alive? Or had Jace Garcia simply dumped him off somewhere to die before running away like the two-faced coward he was? Fuck, he hated having to trust the pilot with something as important as Gabe’s life.

Did Audrey know yet that her husband had been shot, or was she still whiling away the hours at their beach house, waiting for his return?

Mara’s hand cradled the back of his neck and she lifted her head to look up at him. “Travis?”

“Uh, yeah. It is beautiful.” His voice came out rough, and he cleared his throat, kissed the tip of her nose. “Costa Rica, I mean. The beaches are amazing. We could sit there in the sun with those fancy umbrella drinks—”

“Except I can’t drink,” she reminded.

“Okay, I’ll drink yours, too. I’ll need that and a few more to get use to this whole daddy thing.”

She gave the short hairs at the base of his skull a playful tug. “You’ll be better at it than you think. And, dammit, I want that umbrella drink, so let’s fast-forward things a bit. We’ll both enjoy drinks and help the baby build a sand castle.”

Christ, he could picture it so clearly. Mara and a mini version of her—because the baby had to look like her, right?—playing in the sand on a sunny, tropical day. And he wanted it. Wanted umbrella drinks and sand castles and both her and the baby in his life forever.

Yeah. Nice fantasy, but they couldn’t run away together. They might not even live through the next twelve hours, so there was no point in dwelling on the what ifs of the future when now might be all they had.

And right now, he wanted nothing more than to kiss her.

Lowering his head, he claimed her lips, keeping the kiss soft, drugging, needing some way to show her the feelings he couldn’t put into words. She returned the kiss with so much passion and raw emotion his body began to stir. He wished he could make love to her again, once more, in case it was their last chance to be together. But the team was right across the room, and this was no time for sex. The kiss was the best he could do, and he infused it with his heart and soul.

When he finally broke the contact of their lips, he met her gaze. Tears cascaded from her eyes. This was the woman he’d fallen in lust with the moment they met, the woman he’d fallen wildly in love with he didn’t know when, and the soon-to-be mother of his child. Holding her gaze, he leaned over and kissed her belly. He wasn’t good with words, couldn’t vocalize how much she and the baby meant to him.

All he could do was show her and hope it was enough.

Chapter Thirty

At eleven o’clock, one hour before Liam’s deadline, every light at the Belyakov farm flickered and died.

Mara tigh
tened her hand on Travis’s as the room plunged into darkness. Everyone had abandoned the cellar, which would essentially be a concrete death trap once the siege started, and again gathered in the kitchen. Since it was the heart of the house, it was the best spot from which to make their stand.

“It’s okay,” he whispered next to her ear. “They only cut the electricity. We were expecting this.”

A flame sparked to life in the center of the room, and Jean-Luc set a candle down in the middle of the table.

Outside, an electronic screech split the night.

“Quinn!” Liam’s voice echoed through the house and sent chills racing over Mara’s skin. She again t
ightened her hand, afraid to let him go. “Have you made your decision? You only have an hour left before everyone in that house dies—including your girlfriend, Marisol.”

“Fuck,” Travis said under his breath.

Mara felt him tense beside her and let go of his hand in favor of wrapping her arms around him. She didn’t trust that he wouldn’t offer himself up as a sacrifice.

“Yes, I know her name,” Liam said. “Marisol Escareno, but she prefers to go by Mara. I’ve spent the last few hours reading up on her. Seems you knocked her up, and her stepdad didn’t like that very much. You still have…fifty-four minutes. If you’re not standing in front of me by midnight, I promise you I will put a bullet in her head like you did Rachael’s.”

“Quinn,” Jesse said and leaned over the table. “You better not be thinkin’ ’bout goin’ out there. He will kill her either way if he gets the chance. We stick to our plan.”

Travis’s teeth ground together, but he nodded.

“What exactly is the plan?” Mara asked the room.

Lanie picked up one of the AK-47s on the table and checked it. “Basically, we’re going to shoot them so they can’t shoot us.”

Mara glanced from one grim face to the next, waiting for someone to elaborate further. Nobody did. “Wait. Do you mean that’s it? I thought y’all had a real plan.”

“This is a real plan,” Jesse said.

“A real shitty one,” Ian muttered.

“Yeah, but all we got.”

Oh, God. They were all crazy. They had to be to go up against these men with little more than a handful of bullets, a few bombs, and a prayer. “What happens if we run out of ammunition?”

Travis extracted himself from her arms and also picked up one of the guns. “Hopefully we’ll run out of targets first.”

“And if not?”

He met her gaze. “You don’t want to know the answer, Mara.”

She exhaled hard. He was right about that. She really didn’t want to know. “Okay. What can I do?”

Travis set down the weapon again and accepted the bulletproof vest Jesse handed him. But instead of putting it on himself like the rest of the team was, he slid it over her head.

“No!” she protested.

“Yes.”

“You need this more than me.”

“What I need—he leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to her mouth—“is for you to be safe. I want you to stay in here, in the corner behind the
soba
with Valentina and Nadejda.”

“What about Rustam?” She spotted the Russian man with one of the AK-47s and gasped. “Oh, no. He’s not fighting, is he? He’s too old!”

“It’s his home, remember? Good luck trying to stop him from defending it.” Travis gave a small smile and rubbed her chilled arms. “He’ll be okay. We all will.”

He didn’t believe that. She could see the truth of it in his eyes but didn’t call him out on the lie. Maybe he’d needed to say it as much as she had wanted to hear it, even if it wasn’t true.

He finished securing her vest, then gave her shoulders another quick squeeze before returning to the table, where the rest of the team was talking strategy. From the sounds of things, the conversation grew heated when Travis joined in, but they might as well have not been speaking English for all she understood of it.

What a mess.

She tried to distract herself and Nadejda by teaching the girl some more English and Spanish words. And it worked for a few minutes…

Until she realized the men had gone quiet.

She glanced in their direction. Jean-Luc passed Travis a small makeup compact and he dipped his fingers into the gray paint. Using the handheld mirror in the compact, he smeared the paint over his face.

Wait. Face paint?

Mara cut through the crowd and positioned herself in front of Travis with her hands on her hips. “Where are you going?”

Several of the men shared a look that said
uh-oh
and promptly backed away with their hands raised in supplication when she glared daggers at them. Ha, afraid of a pregnant woman. Some warriors they were.

Travis kept working with the paint, dabbing streaks of white over the gray base coat.

“Where are you going?” she demanded again. Didn’t take a warfare genius to know that he wouldn’t need the face paint if he were planning to defend the house from inside like the other guys.

“Most of our team is wounded,” he said matter-of-factly. “And we’re up against at least two SEALs that we know of. I don’t think there are as many men out there as Liam would like us to believe, but it only takes one determined SEAL to dispose of seven injured men and a seventy-three-year-old winemaker.”

Mara shivered at the ice in his tone and had to wonder how many men he’d
disposed
of in his career. Probably more than she cared to know about. “So, you’re going to…what exactly?”

“Even the odds.”

“You’re
not
going after Liam by yourself.”

“Liam’s not the real threat here. He’s dangerous, yeah, and plenty crazy, especially if he’s still into the coke. But it’s the SEALs I’m worried about, so I’m going after them.”

Was that supposed to make her feel better? Because it didn’t. At. All. She turned to her cousin. “Jesse, you told him not even ten minutes ago that he had to stick to the plan.”

“Yeah, but I also knew it would come to this. You were right to be worryin’ about our ammo situation, Mara. It’s not good. Even with the help of Ian’s bombs, we’ll run out of bullets long before we run out of targets unless something is done.”

“I know the two SEALs,” Travis added. “I’ve trained with them, know their strengths and weaknesses. So what’s the best way to make a gun safe?”

Mara frowned at the non sequitur. “Uh, you…take the bullets out, I guess.”

He nodded. “And I’m going to take the bullets out of Liam’s gun.”

She caught her breath. “Are you going to kill them?”

“If I have to.”

“But…” She bit back the protest she’d been about to speak and glanced over her shoulder at the rest of the team. All of them tried very hard to pretend they weren’t listening, but their ears were tuned in to every word. Travis probably wouldn’t appreciate her announcing to his team that he was unwell. At the same time, she couldn’t bear the thought of him going out into the snowy darkness and lapsing into another fugue. If Paulie came back, he could get lost and freeze to death. Or, worse, be captured by Liam. That wouldn’t do any of them any good. “Why can’t someone else do it?”

“I’ve had arctic warfare training.”

“And they haven’t?”

He shook his head. “Not enough. Gabe was the only other guy with the skills to take on a mission like this, and he’s not here.” He lowered his voice. “Besides, look at them, Mara. They’re all injured.”

Her gaze traveled over each of the men. Even in the flickering candlelight Ian’s complexion was ashen, and a makeshift sling held his arm against his body. One of Seth’s eyes was so swollen he couldn’t possibly see out of it, and he moved in stiff, measured steps. Dry blood caked a cut on Jesse’s lower lip, and the shadow of a bruise colored his jaw. Yes, it was true every one of the men was injured in some way, but…

Mara turned back to Travis, cupped his painted face in her palms, and kissed him lightly on the mouth. When she drew away, she murmured for his ears only, “So are you.”

His lips tightened, but he said nothing in response, only pulled out of her grasp and faced his men. “Are we all good with this new plan?”

“Yes, sir,” they said in solemn unison and Mara was half surprised they didn’t snap into salutes. Then again, maybe not. Although they had been well trained by Travis and Gabe and they were the most honorable men she’d ever known, at the end of the day, they were still a raggedy, headstrong bunch of mercenaries.

And in that moment, she both admired and hated every one of them.

“You’re really going to let him go out there by himself?” She aimed the question directly at Jesse.

He stared at Travis for a long time, then nodded. “I don’t like it, but we don’t have any other choice.”

“Don’t give me that. You should go with him.”

“He’ll only slow me down,” Travis said at the same time Jesse shook his head and said, “I’ll only slow him down.”

Mara crossed her arms and glared at each of them in turn. Finally, she gave up on Jesse, who appeared even less apologetic than Travis. Typical Jesse, stubborn as ever. She focused the full force of her glare on Travis, but he didn’t look all that much more apologetic. She flung her hands upward in frustration and, honestly, fear so deep she felt the ache of it in her bones.

“Fine. Go play war and get yourself killed. See if I care.” The statement lost some of its punch when she choked on the last few words.

“I know what I’m doing, sweetheart.” Travis hesitated only a beat before pulling her into his arms again for a hard kiss. “I love you.”

With that, he let go of her, took the rifle that someone held out to him, and ducked through the door.

Chest heaving with surpassed sobs, Mara stared after him. She couldn’t explain it and was too terrified to analyze the sensation closely, but she experienced a sickening, sinking dread as the freezing night swallowed him up.

She should be happy. He’d said the words she’d wanted to hear from him since their very first night together.

But, God, why would he say those three amazing, heart-rending words to her
now
of all times?

Deep down, she knew exactly why, and as the realization bubbled up from her subconscious, she pressed her hand over her mouth to keep from getting sick.

He’d told her as a kind of deathbed confession.

…

The look of shock and horror on Mara’s face…

Yeah, not exactly the expression he’d hoped for after dropping the L-bomb. Then again, he hadn’t handled the situation well. Those three words had popped out of his
mouth without his conscious consent, and it had scared the living hell out of him to hear himself saying them. So instead of manning up and facing the consequences, good or bad, he’d made like a ghost and vanished. Just like he always did when it came to Mara.

Fucking coward. Not honorable. Not even close to worthy of her, but fuck it. He was a selfish bastard, and he was done fighting his feelings for her. Didn’t know how, but he’d make their relationship work. He’d give Mara the man she deserved and that baby a daddy to be proud of.

A chill shot down his spine and nailed him in the ass. Christ. Even now, the thought of being someone’s dad freaked him out. He sure had his work cut out for him, but for the first time, he thought he might actually be able to do it. He might even be a good father if he looked at it like a mission.

Be advised, your objective is to raise a child from birth to adulthood so that she is a productive member of society. Minimum casualties.

Copy that
, Quinn thought, then shook his head at himself and stopped moving, taking cover behind the Belyakovs’ chicken coops. He sucked in a deep breath. His newfound determination in regards to fatherhood was all well and good, but he couldn’t let it distract him now. If he did, he’d never even see the baby. He’d never be able to apologize and make it up to Mara for screwing up his confession of love so badly.

Focus on tonight’s mission first. The rest he could deal with later.

Quinn sucked in a breath, let it out slowly through his nose, and slipped along the chicken coop until he faced the concrete wall surrounding the house.

If anything, this was the most dangerous part. He was completely vulnerable as he pulled himself up and over the wall—but nobody bothered him, and he landed on his feet on the other side without incident. Weapon in hand again, he low-walked through the short open space between the wall and the tree line of the forest. He found a tree trunk wide enough to offer cover and ducked behind it. Listened.

Nothing.

It was looking more and more like Liam didn’t have as many men at his disposal as he’d wanted them to believe. Either that or he did have a platoon of men and they were all waiting at the front gate to storm the farm.

Nah. The first possibility was much more likely.

But that didn’t mean these guys were any less dangerous. Whether he had ten men or a hundred at his command, Liam wouldn’t tolerate anything less than brutal efficiency.

But still, shouldn’t he be hearing…something? Up until now, between the taunts through the loudspeaker and the occasional potshots at the courtyard, Liam and his men had made no secret of their presence.

Why go stealth all of the sudden?

Unless they knew he was out here with them. And if that was the case, he might as well bend over now and kiss his ass good-bye. The element of surprise was about the only thing he had going for him.