Avenged (Hostage Rescue Team Series) (Volume 5) (5 page)

All too soon she unlocked her arms from around his neck and eased back to stare up at him. Nate let her go, stuffing his hands into his jeans pockets so he wouldn’t be tempted to reach out and touch her smooth cheek. He wanted so badly to trace his fingertips along the thin scars marking the left side of her jaw that extended halfway down her neck. He knew there were more on her back, her ribs, and down her arm. And there wasn’t a day that went by when he didn’t think about what had put them there.

Taya smiled up at him, tiny laugh lines creasing the skin at the outer corners of both eyes. He thought they were endearing, and hoped she’d had lots to smile about since he’d last talked to her. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

He couldn’t stop drinking in the sight of her. “I live down in Quantico. When I heard about what happened at the airport, I made a call to find out where you were and drove straight here.”

Her smile disappeared as quickly as it had formed and he felt bad for mentioning the airport attack. “Oh. You’re with the FBI now?”

He nodded and searched her eyes, unable to look away from that penetrating gray gaze. She had seriously beautiful eyes. “You look great, but are you all right?”

“Yeah, I’m okay.” She lowered her gaze. “Just a bit shaken up.”

“No kidding.” He glanced at Celida, who was now standing beside Travers. Both of them were watching him with interest. He could all but hear the gears in Celida’s clever head turning, trying to piece together the mystery of what had happened to him and Taya on that fateful CSAR mission.

He shifted his focus back to Taya, doing his damnedest not to stare when all he wanted to do was drink her in. “Here, sit.” He gestured toward her chair.

He took the one across the glass coffee table from her, leaving Celida to sit beside Travers. Taya had a plate of fruit and a bottle of water in front of her but he noticed she hadn’t touched either. He spoke to Celida. “Have you talked about her security team yet?”

“Briefly.” She watched him a second longer before clearing her throat and addressing Taya. “We’ve gone over the most important things we needed from you already. Agent Travers and I have other sources to look into, and considering your security team’s on its way here and Nate knows both guys personally, I think we’ll leave you two to catch up for a little bit. Your meeting with the prosecution is still scheduled for five. You okay with all that?”

“Yes, that’s fine,” Taya answered, her voice and demeanor completely calm despite what she’d been through little more than an hour ago. That air of tranquility she projected was damn near spellbinding.

He’d seen glimpses of it before, during the long, grueling days when they’d been awaiting rescue deep in enemy territory. Even back then, when she should have been at her worst, Nate had recognized that stoic inner core she drew from. Looking at her now, it was even more evident. How the hell had she managed that with everything she’d gone through?

Celida murmured something to Travers, who was still staring at Nate, then gave him a nod and left. Travers followed a moment later, leaving him alone with Taya.

Watching her across the small table, Nate set his palms on his thighs. “So what happened today?” he asked, strung too tight inside at the moment to even attempt small talk. He knew the main details of the attack but he wanted to hear it from her point of view.

“Whoever the shooter was, he wanted
me
,” she replied, one hand picking at the fruit before her. “He was looking right at me and yelling in Pashto. He shot one of the marshals who was there to meet me.” She met his eyes again. “Agent Morales told me he’s going to be okay, but the shooter died. They didn’t get the chance to question him.”

Nate nodded. That was pretty much the story he’d been told too. “But you’re okay?” Of all people, she knew she didn’t need to pretend with him.

“I’m okay.” She didn’t look away from him as she said it, didn’t fidget or give some other “tell” that indicated she was lying. But while Nate could see she was physically okay, he knew emotionally it was impossible. That attack had to have dredged up memories of the hell she’d lived through already. There was no way it couldn’t have.

He spread his fingers out, gripped his lower quads. “I’m sorry it happened at all, but you’ll be safe now. The guys assigned to be your security detail are two of the best, and they’ll make sure nothing happens to you. And after today, security surrounding this whole trial will be tightened even more.”

That steel gray gaze of hers traveled over his face, his chest, down to where his fingers dug into his thighs, then back up. “How long have you been with the FBI?”

“A few years.”

“And the guys coming to guard me—how do you know them?”

“I work with them.”

She gave him a measuring stare before continuing. “Agent Morales said they’d be FBI SWAT members. But something tells me they’re not regular SWAT members, are they?” She tilted her head slightly, her expression curious. “And I don’t think you are, either.”

There was no reason to lie to her and she already knew exactly what his background and skillset was, since she’d seen him in the field firsthand. He couldn’t help but smile at her perceptiveness. “No, you’re right. We’re all members of the Hostage Rescue Team.”

At that her eyes widened in apparent recognition. “Oh. Wow, that’s…good for you, Nathan.” A little smile tipped up the corners of her mouth. “I’m not surprised you made it, though.”

God, he loved the way she said his name. She’d always called him by his full name, never Nate. And her faith in him was so damn humbling. “Thanks.”

“And you’re not allowed to be part of my detail because we know each other personally?”

“Technically.” Sort of. He hadn’t asked DeLuca to be part of the detail because he knew he was essentially on probation and he was afraid that his impartiality was shot to shit where Taya was concerned. He owed her too much, was too attached to her in ways he didn’t want to examine that closely. “But the guys assigned to you are great, I promise. I trust both of them with my life.”

“Well then that’s good enough for me.” Another soft smile, just for him.

Having her look at him with such trust and affection pierced him. He wasn’t sure he deserved that look. He’d been the one to let contact fizzle out between them, and if he was honest, he’d done it because he felt like his head was messed up where she was concerned.

Looking at her now, he could all but feel the ghostly memories swirling in the air between them. Seeing her again brought all his demons to life in full fucking Technicolor. How could it not be the same for her? How could she sit there, so calm and serene even after the attack today, when his heart was thudding like crazy and his palms were damp, his mind trapped back in what they’d been through, what they’d lost?

“So, how’ve you been?” she asked him, reaching out to pluck a grape from the plate before her. “I always regretted that we lost touch, but I got the sense you felt it was best we stopped talking, even though you never came out and said as much.”

Nate barely resisted the urge to rub a hand over the back of his neck. It shook him a little, to know she’d read him so easily. They hadn’t known each other very well, even back when they’d been e-mailing each other.

Except we knew each other in all the ways that matter
, he reminded himself. After four days on the run with her in the unforgiving mountains of the Hindu Kush, he knew the most important things about her. She was strong and loyal. Determined. Deeply caring, despite what they’d done to her during her captivity. It broke his heart.

He forced his mind back to the present. “Yeah, I just thought it was better to let go, you know? For both of us.” Christ, did that sound as lame to her as it did to him? “Try to move on, put everything behind us. Hopefully forget, in time.” It had seemed easier that way at the time.

She nodded, a knowing glint in her eyes. “And how did that work out for you?”

It didn’t.

Not by a long shot, and now he wondered what the fuck he’d been thinking back then, to imagine he could ever forget her.

He shrugged, forced a smile to avoid answering because he couldn’t sit there and lie right to her face. “And to answer your other question, I’ve been good. Busy.”
Busy getting laid every chance I get lately, that is. Mostly to try and forget you and what happened out there.
“How’s your family?” He could do this. Sit here and shoot the shit, pretend he wasn’t way more psychologically and emotionally attached to her than he actually was.

Her hand paused with the grape halfway to her mouth. “My dad had a heart attack a few weeks ago.”

He hid a wince. She and her dad were super close. Nate had spoken to the man over the phone only once, at Joint Craig theater hospital at Bagram after she’d come out of surgery. It was the one thing she’d asked of him on the tense flight back to base, and no matter how beat up he’d been or how heavy his heart, there was no way he could have denied her that simple request. “I’m sorry.”

She nodded, popped the grape in her mouth and chewed. All that did was draw his attention to her sexy mouth and make him wonder what it would feel like beneath his, or moving over his naked skin. He felt guilty as hell for thinking it, but man, he’d fantasized about her plenty over the past five years.

“It was bad,” she continued. “Nearly lost him. He wanted to come with me but he’s still recovering, so my brother, Kevin, is there looking after him. I had to order him to stay put, otherwise he’d have been here with me too.”

“And how’s he doing?” He knew Kevin was slightly older than Taya, and that he was a wounded combat vet.

“Good. Well, better than he was, anyway. Hasn’t been easy, but we’ve all stuck close to each other and managed to do a lot of healing together over the past few years.”

Nate nodded, a sudden tightness squeezing his throat. That was the difference he sensed in her now, he realized. That calmness she exuded came as a result of healing, something he hadn’t even begun to do. Not really. How had she managed it?

The peacefulness that surrounded her was damn near mesmerizing. Even now, tangled up inside and tamping down a dozen emotions rolling around inside him, he could feel it reaching out to him. A warm glow he wanted to wrap himself in.

She lifted her shoulders in a slight shrug. “It’s a process, as I know you’re aware. Without my family I’m not sure what I would’ve done once I came home,” she admitted with another gentle smile. “What about you?”

His thigh muscles twitched beneath his hands. He didn’t want to go there. “What do you mean?”

She gave him a look that said she saw right through him. So wise, way beyond her thirty-four years. She was only six years older than him, but when she looked at him like that he felt like a damn kid in comparison. “I mean, was your family there for you? After Afghanistan? Or when you got out of the Air Force?”

She couldn’t know that was a sore spot with him, and a topic he never talked about. “I don’t have contact with my family. Not since I was eighteen and enlisted.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

Nate wasn’t sure if she was sorry for asking, or if she felt sorry for him. He hoped it was the former, because he couldn’t stomach the latter. “It’s all right. It’s for the best, believe me.” His white trash upbringing was something he was still embarrassed about. Not because he’d been poor, but because his mother and half-sister were drunks and master manipulators of both people and the system that gave them their welfare checks every month.

Cutting ties with them had made him a better person in the long run though. He’d vowed to himself at thirteen to leave that kind of life behind him and never look back, and he’d done just that.

Taya plucked another grape from its stem and popped it into her mouth before picking up the plate and offering it to him. He shook his head and she set it back down. “Sounds like there’s quite a story there. Maybe you’ll tell me about it sometime.” The way she said it, without pressure or judgment, eased the tension gnawing at him.

“Maybe I will.” It would be easy to talk to her. Her quiet sincerity made him wish they could spend hours and hours together alone so he could just be in her company. She’d seen him at his lowest point and still admired him. He felt safe enough with her that he knew he could tell her he
wasn’t
okay, because she’d understand.

Part of him desperately wanted to do just that. The saner part made him keep his mouth shut.

Despite everything she’d gone through, and a lot of that shit had been far worse than what he’d been subjected to in SERE school, Taya had clearly dealt with the past far better than he had. He didn’t want her to see what a fucking mess he’d become. Bad enough that DeLuca and Tuck and maybe some of the other guys could tell he was slowly unraveling. If Taya knew it too, the shame alone might kill him.

He eased back in his chair, thought about all the things he’d wanted to tell her over the years. “I’ve watched some of your speeches online. You’re an incredible speaker.” Her quiet strength, her resolve while on stage as she recounted her ordeal in Afghanistan, had floored him. So many times he’d watched the video clips and ached to reach out to her, re-establish communication.

But he’d known it was selfish to even think about it, so he’d left it alone. He was too fucked up and fighting a daily battle to not let it show. She deserved better than to be tainted by that.

Her gaze lifted to his, surprise clear in her eyes. “You watched me speak?”

He shrugged. “You told me in one of your e-mails that you were going to do some speaking engagements for Amnesty International. I looked you up.”

She smiled again, this one brighter than all the others, making her eyes crinkle adorably at the corners. “Well, then, I’m flattered.”

Nate shook his head in admiration. “Man, that took guts, Taya. After all that, getting up on stage, traveling all over the world to talk about what happened? Seriously brave.” He was in awe of her ability to overcome things that would have crippled most people.

Her gaze lowered to the table. “I can see how you’d think that, but the truth is I did it as part of my healing process. Every time I got up on stage to speak to an audience, I was scared to death but I knew the story wasn’t just about me. I thought about the other girls, about Hassan. I was doing it for them.” Her lashes lifted and she gazed directly into his eyes. “And I did it for you and O’Neil, too.”