Heart Strike (17 page)

Duane sat quietly in the rearmost seat, guarding their backs while he and Melissa flew. The other three had remained behind in Venezuela.

Once back in Maracaibo, the woman had wordlessly handed a second envelope to Melissa and walked away, declining the offer of a ride.

It was sunset as they gathered once more in the hangar. A last flight struggled aloft through the hot Maracaibo twilight. The hangar smelled of rust and hot engines.

“Great, so we just made the CIA fifteen grand,” Chad complained. “What else did we do?”

“Only eight grand,” Richie estimated. “After fuel, landing fees, and ten hours operating time allocated to the Twin Otter's next service, it's only eight grand. Maybe eighty-five hundred, and that doesn't account for the pilot's time which—”

“And we achieved what?” Chad aimed the question at Melissa like a dagger.

Richie was about to step in between them, but Melissa never gave him a chance.

She went toe to toe with him. “Because, asshole…”

So much for the polite Canadian
, Richie thought. Melissa angry was an impressive sight and once again, her Delta-ness, which slipped out of mind so easily when looking at the beautiful woman, stood front and center and her name was Fury.

“That woman is not just an expediter of fish. Haven't you ever heard of a test? We just had a test and got paid for it. The next load will smell less and be worth far more.”

Something Richie hadn't figured out until they were well aloft, but Melissa had seen at first glance. Melissa wasn't a phony; she was too good. And she'd told him that she knew Colonel Gibson—he wasn't the sort of person that people knew about unless he wanted them to. During his own passage through the Commander's Review Board at Delta Selection, the man hadn't spoken a single word.

Chad shook his head like a bull balking a step before a red cape, his face going dangerously blank.

Carla swept an arm through Melissa's and tugged her back out into the fading sunlight, probably because it was clear the Melissa and Chad were gearing up to go head to head, a very bad thing between Delta operators.

All Richie had seen when the man and woman had arrived was an idiot who'd spent fifteen hundred dollars on a fishing pole that wasn't significantly different from a two-hundred-dollar one. A true pro might notice the difference, but likely not their rich boy from Jackson, Mississippi. And if he was a true pro, he'd probably be fishing with the Shimano Stella 10000…not that Richie had ever fished, but he'd read an interesting review while waiting for his last physical.

And then to spend fifteen grand on an airplane to ferry the fish to Miami. You couldn't even mount a saltwater fish's actual skin. What the taxidermists did was cast a mold and build a hand-painted fiberglass copy for the guy's wall, which was…nuts. Richie's own family was very well-off, Dad was a top salesman, had the plane (mostly paid for by IBM), and they lived in the nicest neighborhood Poughkeepsie had to offer. But they weren't stupid about it.

Then Richie refocused on what had just happened here.

“Hey, Duane.”

When his friend had joined him to help stow the plane, Richie whispered to him, “What's up with Chad?”

Duane readied himself to lean into one of the landing struts to roll the plane back into the hangar. “Woman gives him an itch.”

“Well I don't want him asking her to scratch it.” Even as he said it, he knew he was wrong, was missing something. But Richie still didn't want Chad anywhere near her.

“Different kind of itch, buddy. More the kind between the shoulder blades.” Duane slapped Richie right on that spot. “I don't see it, but you know Chad and women. Let's get this plane put away. Hungry and tired doesn't begin to describe it.”

Chad's opinion surprised Richie to no end; it wasn't at all what he thought was going on. But the jealousy angle hadn't fit after the confrontation at the hotel. He'd thought about nothing else for the whole flight to Colombia and back, barely remembered the flight, and was just glad he hadn't crashed them while he'd been so distracted.

But this? It made perfect sense…even if it didn't make any sense at all.

He tried to see where Carla and Melissa had gone, but they were out of sight.

It was foolish to ignore that kind of itch coming from a Unit operator, but Carla's reaction was quite the opposite. Carla had clearly decided to befriend Melissa, and based on Carla's initial reaction, it wasn't because Melissa was also a woman.

Richie trusted Carla implicitly, but he also trusted Chad just as completely.

But Chad's opinion that Melissa was trying to take over? It didn't make any sense at all. Which left Richie having no idea what to think.

Damn it! He was right back where he'd spent the whole flight, chasing his own tail in circles and feeling stupider than when he started. On top of that, he'd punched one of his teammates in anger. That too was new territory for him. Neither the Richie Goldman that he knew nor a Unit operator functioned from a place of anger.

Chad strolled by him and Richie stopped him.

“Sorry for the, uh…” Richie rubbed his own chin.

“Nothing but a love tap, bro. Sorry for busting up your fun.”

Richie shrugged.

But he could see that Chad was still on the lookout.

Until he figured out what to think, Richie would be as well.

* * *

“Why did you stop me?” Melissa barked at Carla as she was escorted around the end of the hangar and out onto the dry grassy lot beyond the hangars.

The grasses were brown, the bushes low, and the dirt showed through in bare patches. It was about as attractive as the worst sections of Fort Bragg, which was a pretty low standard. Fort Bragg—the home of The Unit among many others—was generally acknowledged as one of the ugliest Army bases anywhere.

“Because I don't know how good a fighter you are, but I'll bet Chad is better.”

Melissa tried to jerk her arm free, but Carla was far stronger than she appeared.

“Look.” Carla towed Melissa right along by her arm. “I don't know what's going on with you two, but Chad is the most lethal fighter we've got. He didn't earn the nickname The Reaper by being Mister Nice Guy.”

It rankled. It was another thing that Melissa knew she wasn't. She wasn't the best shot or the most dangerous fighter or the super-geek or… “What the heck am I doing here, Carla?”

“How the hell would I know? Someone decided you were supposed to be here on this team and—”

“Gibson.”

Carla stopped cold as if she was the one who was suddenly Elsa the Ice Queen and now frozen in place.

“He's a Delta Colonel.”

“Michael”—Carla blinked like an owl—“Gibson. Damn the man.”

“He's the one who saved me and helped recover my brother's body five years ago; I only just found that out during OTC graduation. He's the reason I went Army and eventually Delta, though I didn't know it was him.” Yet another thing she hadn't had time to think about yet. That list of things she hadn't had time to absorb was getting longer by the second. Gibson, the new team, Chad hating her, stolen planes, drug running, and that mixed look of need and wonder in Richie's eyes that had felt like a miracle but now was nowhere to be seen.

“And Gibson is the one who sent you to join our team?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Did he say why?”

Melissa lowered the tone of her voice. “‘I have recommended that you be assigned to our top South American team.' That's all he gave me. And he said he was sorry he hadn't been able to save my brother, who was dead the moment he fell into that crevasse.”

Carla let go of Melissa arm and strode away, kicking her way through the thick clumps of grasses but clearly headed in no particular direction. Then she kicked her way back.

Melissa was tempted to follow her. She could think of several things she wanted to kick right about now.

“Well, he always was a deep one. If he sent you to us, there must be a reason.”

“Because tall, blond Canadians blend in so well with South American drug runners?”

“I'm guessing that's not it.” Carla's half smile showed in the distant runway lights that were finally overtaking the last of the day's light. “So what's special about you?”

“Nothing. Trust me on that. I'm a good enough soldier to make The Unit, which has to say something.”

“Says a lot,” Carla agreed, which helped Melissa to calm down a little.

“But they never gave me a specialty. I often led the teams, but not the way Kyle does—he makes it look so damn easy that I often can't see him doing it. The primary attribute the training cadre always mentioned was that I was the
second
woman to make Delta. And just so you know, I totally despised Carla Effing Anderson the entire time.”

Carla's laugh was bright and merry. “God but you are Canadian. From now on it's Carla Fucking Anderson to you.”

Melissa rolled it around in her head for a moment before replying, “I don't know if that's going to work for me.”

Carla's repeated laughter made her feel a little better. “No specialization, huh?”

“Not that I know about. Not breacher, not sniper, not candlestick maker.”

“Well then, my friend”—Carla slipped her hand around Melissa's waist as if they'd been friends forever, or maybe sisters—“we'll just have to wait and see what we discover. At least we know one thing.”

“What's that?” They started strolling back to the hangar arm in arm.

“You're the face of this charter company from now on. You picked up on that woman way ahead of any of us; I was on the verge of booting her narrow ass. And you did that negotiation perfectly; you couldn't have played it better. That was well done. Really well done.”

Melissa felt a little like the Incredible Hulk, flickering back and forth between the Ice Queen and a Delta Force heroine.

It was both hopeful and giddy…and a little nauseating.

Then it registered how completely that was a Richie image. Oh god, the man was rubbing off on her.

* * *

“What's up with you and Chad?” Not Richie's most subtle approach, but the angry heat between Chad and Melissa at dinner—now that he knew what it was—was palpable.

“Can't we just drop it?” Melissa had flopped back on the bed the moment they got to the new hotel.

Kyle had decided that Melissa had been right and they needed to look a little more desperate. They'd shifted to a sunbaked hotel close by the airport.

Melissa looked as exhausted as Richie felt. The overnight into Colombia and then Miami and back, a busy day on top of a busy night. That was at least one thing that SEALs got right:
The only easy day was yesterday.
An unofficial motto that spoke pure truth.

She lay there with one arm flung over her eyes. In sharp contrast to the Bahamian resort, the cheap bedspread that might have once been white but was now an uneven beige made Melissa look washed-out rather than vibrant. The whole hotel felt that way and had been chosen for that reason. No chair, desk, or phone. A bed, a spot to drop luggage, and a couple of cheap lamps with battered shades.

“Uh, sure.” Maybe dropping the topic was best. “Do you want a shower?” That should be a safe subject change. When she didn't respond, he considered whether or not to offer to wash her back again. Would that be a good move or a bad one? He glanced into the bathroom and decided it was more on the bad side; the shower was the kind you used flip-flops in.

“I'd rather kill Chad Hawkins.”

“Whoa!” Richie had one foot in the bathroom but turned back to face Melissa. “Say that again.”

“Oh, come on, Richie. He's a complete bastard. Surely you guys have seen that?”

Was that her angle? Was that the itch that Chad had felt? If Chad was right, then she really might be a threat to him…but that didn't work in Richie's head any better than the jealousy angle.

“Are you here to break up this team?” He could feel his voice hardening, his stance shifting as if readying for a sparring match. Sometimes you just asked the damned question.

She uncovered her eyes and raised her head enough to stare at him. “You've got to be kidding me.”

“About what?”

“You're going to stand there and defend that asshole? Just yesterday you planted a punch on his jaw that would have killed most men.”

“He's saved my life a half dozen times.” But that Melissa said “asshole” rather than “jerk” only emphasized how completely she believed what she was saying.

“And how many times have you done the same for him?”

Richie shrugged. “About the same. It all works that way in the field. You'll see. Once we get back in the field, everything will be fine.”

“No, it won't, Richie.” Melissa sat up.

The geometry of the room placed them almost knee to knee. He could so easily lean down and kiss her. Lose himself in—

“I go out in the field with him and I'm going to catch a bullet in my brainpan just like a training dummy. You check it out. It will match his gun.”

“Shit, Melissa. You can't think he'd actually do that.”

She buried her face in her hands for a long moment. Then she dropped her hands in her lap but didn't look up.

He waited her out.

“No. I suppose he wouldn't, but I sure wouldn't put it past him to nudge me out in front of someone else's shot. I'm too tired to deal with this. I'm going to sleep now.” And she moved to the far side of the bed, close beside the yellowing wall that might have once been blue. She curled up with her back to him, and Richie stood there at a complete loss.

Everything made sense when he was alone with Melissa, but those times never lasted more than moments. Right now, not even that was working. And even just today, he, Chad, and Duane had worked together easily, shifting the plane back into the hangar and making sure it was all ready for an immediate flight if needed.