Hold on Tight

Thanks to everyone at Bantam Dell who helped make this the best book possible, cover to cover—from Jessica Sebor, who always goes above and beyond to help; to the art department, who rock my world with their awesome covers; and to Pam Feinstein, for being such an amazing copy editor.

Special thanks to Boone Medlock, Bryan Estell, Doug Simmons, and J.D.—all of their military insights and personal stories were invaluable.

Thanks to authors Lynn Viehl, aka PBW, and Holly Lisle, for giving so much of their time to mentor and share their own experiences with so many writers via their blogs. I can’t tell you how much this helped me.

Finally, last but never least, thanks to my fellow authors whom I’m proud to call friends, Lara Adrian, Maya Banks, Jaci Burton, Alison Kent, Amy Knupp, and especially Larissa Ione, for all their support in ways too numerous to list.

He floated in and out of consciousness, mainly because the doctors kept waking him up, which was really starting to get on his last fucking nerve.

He’d been a SEAL for eight years, long enough to know that complaining never did anyone much good. But inside his head—man, he was bitching up a storm and a half.

Someone had shoved his iPod earbuds in, and until the battery died he’d been slightly contented listening to AC/DC’s
Back in Black
album in a continuous loop.

He woke himself up singing the chorus of Creedence’s “Green River” out loud. The nurse was staring at him as if he was crazy and normally he’d be all
Oh honey, I could give you some of this crazy if you’d just lay yourself down here
.

But not today.

Because even though she was pretty, with a kind face, he realized on some level that his mind could take longer to heal than his body if he didn’t start dealing with what had happened. Sex wasn’t the answer.

Still, the nurse was so intent on staring at his eyes—the two different colors tended to do that to people—that she’d forgotten about the needle she was supposed to inject into his IV tubing. Now the drug that had kept him foggy hovered in his periphery.

He was slower than normal, but still pretty damned fast. The nurse called for the doctor, but it was too late. He’d yanked the needle out and held the IV pole like a weapon, since they’d confiscated all of his.

“Son, it’s all right—you’re on a U.S. military base infirmary in Djibouti. The nurse was trying to give you your pain meds but we can talk about it first.” The doctor spoke slowly while Chris stared at him, willing himself to believe that, but his body was still reacting—his hand held tight to the IV pole in a fight-or-flight response, and since flight wasn’t an option, he was going to bash whoever came near him with the damn pole.

“Chris, come on, man—put that down before you fuck someone up.”

It was his CO’s drawl, heavy like thick syrup, which meant Saint was as tired as Chris felt.

“No more drugs,” Chris told the doctor while he continued to retain possession of the
I won’t take any more drugs
pole.

The doctor looked at Saint, who said, “If he needs them, he’ll ask.”

The doc relented, motioned to Chris for his arm, which was bleeding all over the place, and Chris reluctantly let go of the metal pole.

“Sorry, ma’am,” he told the nurse as she put a bandage on his arm.

“You’ve got a great voice, Chief,” she said with a smile. Saint rolled his eyes because normally one comment like that could make Chris a one-man concert. But even though the music was still playing in his head, all he did this time was say, “Thanks.”

He remained seated at the edge of the bed once he and Saint were left alone, struggling to get his equilibrium back. He stared down at his bare feet and felt a sudden urge to rip the hospital gown off his body. Which he did promptly, throwing it on the ground while asking, “How long have I been here?”

“Twenty-four hours. You made it to the helo on your own steam.”

He didn’t remember that fully. The memories were there, but the edges blurred, bleeding into the bigger, slow-moving picture like he was attempting to see clearly underwater.

Cam
. His teammate’s face was the last thing he remembered seeing before he surrendered to the safety of unconsciousness. “Where’s Cam?”

“Already in Germany—he stopped by to see you before he left.”

“I remember, thought I was hallucinating.”

“You’re getting transported there yourself at 0500 for evaluation before they’ll take you home.”

Chris took stock of the various bruises and contusions on his body—a few stitches here and there, but nothing major. His head, however, was a different story. There was a definite aching throb behind what was left of the narcotics. “Concussion?”

Saint nodded. “No fractures. You’re pretty banged up, but you should’ve been hurt a hell of a lot worse. They held you here so they could run some tests.”

Chris closed his eyes for a second and said a silent prayer to his momma, who he was sure was responsible for this one. “Do Jake and Nick know about this?”

“It’s been all I could do to hold them back. They’re calling every hour on the hour. They weren’t going to tell your father but—”

“He knows.” His dad always knew when things went wrong—it was next to impossible to hide anything from a parent with second sight. His brothers would’ve found out by the more traditional routes and were, no doubt, freaking. Not that he would’ve been any different had one of them been in his position.

“Are you awake enough to answer some questions for me?” Saint asked.

It wasn’t really a question, since Saint had already pulled up a chair. His CO had remarkable patience, but Chris could tell it was wearing thin.

He didn’t relish this conversation one bit, thought about Jake and Nick and wished his brothers were here with him now.

He wondered if he’d make it through this without throwing up.

It wasn’t every day that you had to tell a man how his best friend died. Their team was close, for sure, with so much history tying all of them together. This was the first tear in the fabric. “Yeah, I’m awake enough.”

“What’s the last thing you remember about what happened with Mark—what did he say?” Saint stared at him steadily, searching for some kind of answer before Chris even began speaking.

“He told me he was going in, against Josiah’s orders. He told me to stay put. I tried to talk him out of it, but he pulled rank. And I don’t remember him going in, Saint. I remember every other fucking thing … but all I remember is Mark’s hand on my shoulder and then …”

And
then
Josiah, the FBI member of the Joint Task Force Team and the man in charge of the Op, was arguing with them, angry that Mark had gone in against Josiah’s direct order to stand down. Chris and Cam insisted on going into the embassy—which was already taking heavy fire—but they were at least fifteen minutes behind Mark for the hostages. Inside was chaos; they both heard Mark yelling down the hall but they couldn’t get that far without leaving the ambassador in greater jeopardy.

“We made a decision to get the ambassador and his wife out and then go back in for Mark,” Chris said. “Everything was happening at once and we had a split second.”

“Don’t second-guess it.”

Chris nodded, swallowed hard. “I was just outside the building, Cam was maybe twenty feet ahead of me, with the ambassador and his wife and their kids close behind. I was backing him up.”

“Were you alone?”

Chris thought hard. “No. Josiah was with me.”

Chris and Josiah were providing cover, with Chris ready to go back in for Mark, when the explosion rocked the building. He’d been thrown hard, woke up maybe half an hour later, ears ringing and still looking for Josiah and then for Mark.

“And then they killed him,” Saint spoke quietly, his voice tight with anger. “The rebels killed Mark and took him away from there so they could have an American trophy rather than leave him in the building to die in the explosion. There are already reports that have the rebels claiming they killed a U.S. Navy SEAL after they’d gotten him to give them some classified information about anti-terrorism initiatives.”

“There’s no way Mark would’ve given intel.” The rebel soldiers might have killed him in the most inhumane way imaginable, but they’d never broken him. Chris was sure of that.

“His body still hasn’t been found.” Saint spoke quietly, stared at the white wall of the hospital room, a tinge of disbelief in his voice that this was really happening. His jungle greens were fresh, his blond hair damp, as if he’d just showered, but there were circles under his normally bright blue eyes, his mouth pulled into a tight, grim line.

Saint and Mark had come up through BUD/S together, had served in Coronado and had come to Virginia to take charge of Team Twelve.

To leave Mark behind in this country left a knot in Chris’s stomach that no amount of IV drugs could take care of. No body meant no closure, signified a failure. “I’m sorry, Saint.”

“Don’t give me that sorry bullshit, Chris. Mark died doing what he loved. You did everything you could, so fuck the guilt. He’d kill you for it.” Saint’s words were more than ironic, and more than true, and still Chris knew it would be a long time before he was able to let any of this go.

“They’ll keep looking?”

“If they don’t, I will. I already told the admiral that.” Saint stood, looked toward the small open window, jaw clenched for a second before getting back to business. “You should get some clothes on. There’s an FBI agent who needs to hear what you’ve got to say in more detail.”

FBI. Jamie
.

And he didn’t bother to ask Saint if it was her coming to question him, because he could sense her, in the hall, maybe right outside the door.

He caught himself rubbing the fingertips of his left hand together lightly.

“Yeah, it’s her,” Saint said, catching the familiar, pensive sign that meant Chris was processing something important.

For as far back as Chris could remember, he’d been different, stood apart from everyone but his momma and dad, because he knew things.

Over the years, he’d attempted to convince himself that he was only dealing with a sharper, more refined intuition, that he’d merely honed an ability others never took the trouble to do. His brothers called it
psychic Cajun bullshit
even though they knew, the way Chris himself did, that there was much more to it than that. More than he wanted to think about right now, and so he forced his palm flat against the sheet as Saint asked, “Are you ready?”

Chris wondered how long Jamie had been here, if she’d questioned Cam before he left. She hadn’t come in to see him before this—he’d have to be dead not to remember that. “You can let her in.”

The Joint Task Force Chris had been a part of on this mission had consisted of himself and Mark; Josiah Miller, a hostage negotiator for the FBI; a Force Recon Marine named Rocco Martin, whose specialty was languages; and a Delta operative named Cameron Moore who had extensive knowledge of the kidnappers as well as the area.

It was a relatively straightforward mission—rescue the four kidnapped UN peacekeepers, the American ambassador and his movie-star wife, who worked as a Goodwill Ambassador and visited many war-torn countries, and their two adopted children. Africa was her newest project—hence, the massive publicity when she and the ambassador arrived in the Sudan.

That was never a good thing in a country like this.

As of today, the ambassador and his family were safe, the UN peacekeepers had been assassinated and all of the men on the Joint Task Force were dead except for Chris and Cam.

Chris reluctantly pulled on a pair of sweats that Saint had brought him, the pain coming on stronger now. But the pain was good—he needed to feel that after days and days of numbness. The burning hot grief was as fresh as if time had stood still while he was out cold.

Nothing was ever going to be the same, especially not after Special Agent Jamie Michaels walked into his hospital room. Her stride was confident, more than necessary, as if trying to hide her hesitancy in seeing him again.

He couldn’t blame her—he’d walked away from her two months ago in the DRC and hadn’t gotten in touch with her since.

To be fair, she hadn’t exactly been knocking down his door either.

“You know Agent Michaels,” Saint said, acknowledging the elephant in the room as he pulled his own chair closer to Chris in a show of support.

“How are you feeling, Chief Petty Officer Waldron?” She was all business, addressing him formally, although there was an edge of softness to her tone that only Chris could discern. He’d heard that same softness when her naked body had pressed against his.

“Let’s get this over with.” He slid back into the bed and yanked the covers roughly over his bare chest, more as a shield than for any particular modesty, and out of respect for the job she was here to do.

To have to talk about this, time and time again, was hard enough. To have to share every last vulnerability in front of Jamie made every primal instinct in him scream.

It’s not Jamie—it’s Special Agent Michaels standing there watching you
.

He rubbed his cheek, bruised and tender from where he landed after the embassy exploded in front of him, remembered cracking his nose back into place on his way to the helo.

She remained standing, nearer to the window than to him. She had a pad on the sill, pen in hand, and she kept her eyes focused on his. “Can you confirm that your team could not save the UN peacekeepers?”

Chris’s hands fisted the sheets tightly. “Do you think you’d be here asking me these questions if the mission had gone well?”

“Are you going to answer the question?”

“You don’t want to fuck with me now—if you’re not going to ask real questions, get out.”

“I’m trying to make this easy on you, Chief Petty Officer.”

“Well, thank you for that, Agent Michaels. I sure as shit appreciate it.” His voice was guttural and Saint shot him a warning look. But he ignored it, too busy watching Jamie.