When
Kevin had been alive, she’d kept his secret because it was his choice to make. She didn’t understand why he felt he couldn’t be a father, but that was his call to make, not his teenage sister’s. Guilt gnawed at her gut as it had from time to time that her parents never knew their grandchild. No, not their grandchild. Kevin had essentially given his child up for adoption. Annie had to accept that—and
she had, until Drew put a name in her head.
She closed her eyes as the small jet made quick work of the landing. When Drew squeezed her hand, she cracked her eyelids just a slit, heart thumping, and watched as they taxied toward a waiting black SUV.
After what felt like a lifetime as the lights flickered and the engine noises cut out, the pilot came out of the cockpit, nodded to them and opened
the door. A ground crew was waiting with a mobile set of stairs, but Drew didn’t move to the exit, he just stood there, arms casually braced against the seat, watching the vehicle. Waiting. When the door opened, and a blond man stepped out, Drew cracked a wide smile. “Come on, sugar, let’s go.”
They met in the middle of the tarmac, two Greek gods reuniting in common purpose. A rough handshake
turned into a back-slapping hug, but their expressions remained stony.
“Annie, this is Rik. Man, I wasn’t expecting you to personally meet us here.”
“I was already in the city last night. My wife, Calli, likes to dance.” Their host turned his gaze toward Annie, his eyes softening. A soft accent cut into his fluent English. “Come, we must hurry. But it’s lovely to meet you, Ms. Martin.”
“Annie,
please,” she murmured as he guided her to the car.
Drew shifted closer, his hand in her back. “She’ll ride in the back with me.”
Rik nodded. “Of course.”
They didn’t talk as they sped away from the airport. It wasn’t until they pulled into a marina that Annie asked about their destination.
“It’s...well, I’ll let Calli explain.” The other man parked, then twisted in his seat to glance at them.
“Ready?”
Hell no
, Annie thought, but she’d come this far. What was a little adventure at sea?
Rik led them down a wooden dock, past sailboats and small yachts, stopping in front of a smaller power boat. Small being relative, she realized as they stepped down the thin walkway alongside the motor craft. At the back, there was seating for at least eight, and in the middle of the gleaming white
and polished wood space stood a beautiful woman with mahogany hair and a beaming smile.
“You found them!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands.
“Calli, I’d like to introduce you to Drew Castle and Annie Martin.” Rik offered his hand to Annie as she stepped into the boat.
The heels of her boots clattered on the deck, and she winced. “Nice to meet you, Calli. I’m sorry I’m not dressed appropriately.”
The other woman shushed her and pointed to the small cabin door beside her. “Don’t worry about it. I’ve got some things laid out for you in there, if you’d like to change.”
Annie glanced at Drew who nodded. Not like she needed his permission to get dressed, but just to check in. He offered her a quick half-smile. “Go ahead. I’ll help Rik push off.”
She ducked below, again surprised to find more
space than she was expecting. A small kitchen space, a bathroom and cozy sleeping nook. Hanging on a hook was a long sundress that wrapped around in the middle—and would easily fit most women, a thoughtful touch from her hostess. On the shelf beside that was a basket overflowing with flip flops of varying colors and sizes. Annie shucked her boots, jeans, and blouse, stacked them in a neat pile,
and pulled on the lighter outfit. She felt the engine fire up, then a bit of a jerk as they slipped away from the dock. A turn, then they picked up speed. Bracing herself on the bathroom counter, she freshened up, and as she re-emerged onto the open deck, they were pulling out into the open sea.
She paused, breathing in the salty air. Hard to wrap her head around hurtling into the Atlantic Ocean
when just last night she’d been driving south along the Pacific. And she hadn’t needed to buy a ticket on Expedia or pack a suitcase...any minute now she was going to wake up and go to work. She wiggled her shoulders, trying to shake her disquiet. Kevin had gotten all the adventurous genes.
“You okay, sugar?” Drew’s voice slid over her skin at the same moment his body pressed into hers and one
hand wrapped around her waist. She wanted to melt into him, but she couldn’t walk that same line he could. Be all touchy-feely without wanting more. She could feel the hot branding of his palm on her hip. One of his fingers rested on the elastic edge of her underwear, easily felt through the lightweight fabric of the dress, and that hot, itchy feeling returned.
“We’re heading out to sea,” she
whispered.
“Rik has an island.” His voice was thick and rough, and she wondered if it was fatigue. Or if his mind drifted to the same place hers did. Would a few hot Caribbean nights lead to more of what almost happened on the plane? She’d never done anything like that before, and the thrill of a time-limited affair made all her nerve endings stand up and take notice.
On the other hand, Drew
probably slept with all the damsels in distress he rescued. Maybe this air of resistance was part of his playbook. She didn’t really believe either of those thoughts, but layered on top of her innate wariness they spilled enough doubt into her otherwise molten core to give her the strength to push away. “Right. Calli was going to tell us about that.” Without looking over her shoulder, she wiggled
out of his grasp and carefully moved across the open space to join the other woman on one of the bench seats.
“Annie,” Calli reached out and touched her hand. “I understand this is an unexpected trip for you.”
She didn’t know how much to share, so she simply nodded and smiled politely. “Thank you so much for the dress.”
“I’m sure I can scrounge up anything else you need once we get home.”
“Which is where, exactly?”
Calli laughed, a rich peal that Annie couldn’t help but find infectious. “I call it Camo Cay, although that’s not its original name. Rik claims to have retired, but we have enough hulking men around most of the time for it to be confused with a military base.” She took a sobering breath. “It’s a private island on the far side of the Bahamas. Well protected and completely
anonymous.”
“And you just come and go like this? What about Customs?”
“We sometimes go through the official channels. Today isn’t one of those days.”
Because of her
. “If I get you in trouble...”
“Oh honey, have you seen my husband? There won’t be any trouble.” Calli tipped her head back, soaking up the late-afternoon sun. “And your shadow looks pretty formidable as well.”
“He’s not my...I
just showed up on his doorstep last night and made my problems his problems.”
Calli looked over at Drew, who’d procured sunglasses from a pocket in his backpack, and was leaning lazily against the opposite railing. But his attention seemed trained on them, reflective mask notwithstanding. “He doesn’t look like he wants to be anywhere else.”
“I guess.” Annie rubbed a fresh crop of goose bumps
off her arms. This adventure was entirely his idea. She didn’t need to worry about his motivation to help her. And the sooner they got to the bottom of the call, the quicker she’d be out of his hair. A yawn took her by surprise, then another, and before Calli noticed, Drew was standing.
“Come on,” he said quietly, his hand outstretched.
Her head ached, heavy with fatigue just now catching
up to her. They’d been on the move all day and she hadn’t rested at all on the plane. Too tired to resist, she took his hand and let him lead her back into the cabin.
“It’ll probably be a couple of hours before we get there and Rik can give us his full attention.” His voice filled the small space even though he spoke quietly. A gruff edge caught her attention, but the need to sleep pushed that
observation to the side. “Are you hungry, or would you rather have a nap?”
“Nap,” she whispered.
He pulled her toward the bunk, and for a second she thought he was going to lie down with her. Her heart leapt into her throat as he cupped her chin in his hand, but he just brushed a soft kiss to her forehead. “Lie down.”
Stay with me
, she wanted to say.
Keep me warm and safe
. A terrible, wonderful
idea that she knew better than to voice. Asking opened the door to rejection, and she wanted him too much to hear he didn’t want her. She closed her eyes as he draped a soft blanket over her body, and gave in to the muzzy weakness, letting a dreamless sleep carry her away before he even left the cabin.
— —
He couldn’t bring himself to leave her alone. He should head up top and talk to
Rik, but instead he sat on the tiny bench in the kitchenette, watching Annie sleep. Worried she’d have another nightmare, he told himself, but it felt like something more base. Something selfish.
He waited for Kevin’s voice to interject, but his buddy wasn’t going to cut him off this time.
Because he didn’t need to be cock-blocked. He could do that all by himself.
He wasn’t noble. Fuck, no.
He wanted to strip Annie down to her birthday suit and feast on her body. It wouldn’t be one-sided and he’d feed her soul in the only way he knew how. But making it good in the moment wouldn’t be worth anything in the cold light of morning.
And after a few nights? It would be too damn easy to pretend their connection wasn’t a cruel combination of chemistry and adrenaline and nostalgia.
For
a few minutes on the plane, Drew had lost sight of that reality.
But he just didn’t have the capacity to love inside him. To serve? Absolutely. To protect? With his life. To love? He didn’t even know what that would look like. But he was pretty sure it wasn’t possible with a guy who could get on a plane and disappear for six months without a backward glance.
He knew what it was like to be
abandoned. He’d never want to do that to someone he cared about. And since leaving wasn’t optional--that was his life--attachment couldn’t happen.
He’d keep her safe until she could return to her life of innocent scholarship. And until then...it was time for some distance. Polite boundaries. And a cold shower or three. Because he couldn’t—wouldn’t—be this mopey guy.
Not even if being with Annie
made him feel bigger, stronger than he had in months. He wouldn’t use her like that, and he couldn’t risk the flip side of that attachment. Emotional entanglement and Drew Castle didn’t mix.
Twenty minutes passed by the time he joined Rik, who wisely kept the conversation focused on the threat.
“While you were in the air, I transferred what I’d already discovered this morning to our secure servers.
I have a guy--”
“Rik, I trust
you
. I don’t know your guys.”
“I’d trust Trent McTavish with my life. With Calli’s life. He was SAS for ten years. Has a younger brother with significant medical expenses, so he went private. But he’s one of the good guys. He and Jackson Sutter make up the--” He raised his voice to grab his wife’s attention. “Calli! What do you call Jackson and Trent?”
A trill
of laughter carried toward them. Instead of yelling back, the dark haired beauty stood and sashayed over. Drew watched as she wound her limbs around her husband. She was warm and gracious toward Drew, but her voice took on a unique huskiness when she answered Rik. “The dynamic duo. They’re like oil and water, a Scotsman and a Texan, but they’ve bonded like brothers.”
Drew couldn’t keep the surprise
out of his voice. “You know them, too?”
“Sure do. My living room is command central.” She stroked Rik’s jaw. “I’m the chief sandwich-maker.”
“And she mediates disagreements about sporting events and whiskey superiority.” Drew watched with increasing discomfort as Rik patted his wife on the ass, their casual and open intimacy making him unexpectedly uncomfortable.
These people need a room
. “As
I was saying, Trent will have a full portfolio on Rob Harris when we arrive, and Jackson and my brother Mats will have started to work up some action plans.”
“Whoa there, Rik. We’re not taking action against an American senator.”
“The nice thing about working with me, Drew, is that I’m happy to take all the glory. Or blame, as needed. But in this case your patriotism is not misplaced. My initial
research suggests Annie’s being used by an international force as a pawn to somehow hurt Harris. Would his campaign really be derailed by a paternity scandal?”
Drew shrugged. Probably. Not his area of concern.
Rik shook his head and made a disappointed sound. “How ridiculous. In my country—in most countries—it would be a non-issue.”
On that point they were in agreement. “I don’t care about
any of that. We just need to neutralize however this involves Annie.”
“Then that is what we shall do.”
— SIX —
The sun was setting as Rik changed direction, steering toward a small island like many they’d already passed. He maneuvered the Donzi into a covered boat house at the edge of a protected bay. From the landmarks they’d passed and Drew’s estimation of their speed, he was pretty sure they were somewhere in the Exuma island chain. A canopy of dark green, a mix of leafy trees and scrub
brush, masked the space between the beach and the buildings in the near distance, but the raw beauty of Camo Cay still made itself evident. White sand, a craggy bluff to the south, and a quiet stillness that promised the small island was in fact a private paradise.
Annie had woken thirty minutes earlier, but after a glance in his direction as she stepped into the open, she’d taken a seat next
to Calli. Drew had resisted the urge to join them. Now he leapt onto the walkway and helped secure the craft before extending a hand to the women, helping them out.