Hot SEALs: SEAL's Ultimate Challenge (10 page)

“Take care of her.” Dustman nodded toward O’Connell’s closed door. “She’s hauled our rangy asses out of more than one hot situation.”

“I know. I’ll keep an eye on her,” Reaper promised.

The team left Reaper standing in the hall, watching as they walked toward the bank of elevators. They looked strange in the clean, white, sterile hallway, their broad shoulders stretching across the corridor. His heart hurt all over again. One damned explosion had taken away so much. His arm, his career and, most of all, his family. God, he’d miss deploying with them. He’d miss the pranks they played on each other and the camaraderie.

Reaper pushed through the door into O’Connell’s room. He couldn’t focus on what he’d lost. He’d miss them, but he’d get on with his life, even if doing so killed him. Leigha had gone through a similar situation and come out with a new purpose to her existence. She was helping others. If she could do it, he could, too.

“Cory?” O’Connell hit the button to raise her head a little.

He hurried forward and pulled a chair up to the side of her bed. “Feeling any better?”

She nodded. “A little. We need to talk.”

“We can wait until you’re up and running circles around me. I’ve got all the time in the world.” As long as he could leave with Leigha tonight when she got off duty. He took her hand in his. “Ladies first.”

She stared at his face, the tracks of tears still evident on her cheeks, her eyes red-rimmed. “Remember when you asked me if I felt anything when we kissed?”

He nodded, his belly clenching. He’d been about to tell her he couldn’t marry her.

“I lied.” Her gaze slipped to where he held her hand. “I didn’t feel anything.”

He frowned. “Then why did you lie?”

Biting her lip, she looked away. “You were in a bad place…I didn’t want to upset…Hell, Cory, I love you.”

The noose around his chest contracted, making it hard for him to breathe. How could he tell her he couldn’t marry her when she had just professed her love?

O’Connell squeezed his hand and stared into his eyes. “I love you like a brother.”

He sagged over her hand, the air filling his lungs in a whoosh. Relief danced through him.

“Cory?” She tugged his hand. “Say something. Please, please, don’t hate me. I promised to marry you, and if that’s what you really want, I’ll go through with it. But I don’t love you like you deserve to be loved.”

He lifted his head, a chuckle rising up his throat that he couldn’t contain. She didn’t love him. A heavy weight lifted, and he looked up, his gaze meeting hers.

She glared. “What’s so damned funny?”

“I was going to tell you the same thing.” He lifted her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to the back of her knuckles. “I love you, too, O’Connell. Like I love Tuck and Big Bird, Nacho, and Fish. You’re one of the guys, a great friend, someone I can count on to stand by me. And you can count on me to stand by you.”

She lay back, closed her eyes, and smiled. “Thank God.”

“So, you never loved me?” he asked, thinking back over the past months.

Her eyes opened again, and she shook her head. “Not like you wanted me to love you.”

“I thought I loved you, but I think I was more in love with the idea of getting married and having someone to come home to.”

O’Connell snorted. “Like that would ever happen. I’ll never be a typical housewife. I’m lucky to call any place home for more than a few months at a time. Anyone who got involved with me would have to take a backseat to my job.”

“Same goes for a SEAL.” He shook his head. “All the time we were engaged and neither of us knew how to break it off.”

“So, what made your realize I wasn’t the one for you?” She raised her brows and then squinted. “Have you found the right one?”

His first thought was of Leigha, her petite, naked body stretched across the bed, her legs parted, her blue eyes smoky, beckoning him.

“You don’t have to answer.” She smiled. “I can see it in your eyes and the way you smile when you’re thinking about her. Who is she? I have to meet the special woman who captured my fiancée’s heart while I was away.”

He shrugged, suddenly glad for someone to talk to about Leigha. “I’m not in love with her. We haven’t even been out on a first date. But I feel different when I’m around her.”

“How different?”

“More determined. She makes me want to be a better person.”

“You’re pretty awesome already.”

“What about you? How did you know I wasn’t the guy for you?”

Again, she looked away and tugged on the hem of the sheet.

Then the truth hit him. Tuck had practically bit his head off the day before the mission that ended Reaper’s career. He’d told Reaper O’Connell wasn’t the right woman for him. “You’re in love with Tuck?”

She didn’t look at him, but the real tears welling in her eyes and spilling down her cheeks was confirmation enough.

“Oh, babe. Have you told him?”

“No.” She reached for a tissue but couldn’t quite grab it.

Reaper lifted the box and laid it on the bed beside her. “Why not?”

“I was too busy saying
yes
to another man’s proposal.” She sniffed and a fresh wave of tears spilled from her eyes. “Now he’s gone on some stupid mission without any of his teammates to cover for him.” With a shaky hand, she pressed the tissue to her eyes. “What if he doesn’t come back?”

“Are you kidding? Tuck’s a cat. He’s got nine lives. I don’t think he’s gone through but maybe two, tops. He’ll be back.” Reaper prayed he was right. He hated being the reason his two best friends hadn’t gotten together yet. “Hey, the doc’s gonna skin me alive if he finds you crying. You should be recovering, not blubbering like a baby.”

She glared through her tears. “I’m not blubbering.”

He handed her another tissue. “Then wipe the snot from your nose and get well soon. You have to look better than you do right now if you want Tuck to notice you. He’s got an eye for
pretty
blondes.”

She gave a half-hearted, weak attempt at throwing the tissue his way. “Whoever your new girl is, she’s lucky to have you, despite your lousy attempts to cheer me up.”

“I know.” He winked and rose. “What you need is some sleep. Let your body recuperate. I have something I need to do. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Cory?”

He stopped at the end of her hospital bed. “Yeah, babe.”

She gave him a crooked smile. “Thanks for understanding.”

Reaper smiled. “We’re just two messed-up people, aren’t we?”

“Yes, we are.” She laughed.

His heart lighter, Reaper headed back to his room to shower and change into clean jeans and a T-shirt. He planned on taking Leigha home that night in his truck. Whoever had planted the explosives the night before in her Jeep wouldn’t know to do the same to his truck. He’d get her safely to her place and hopefully send her brother home. He had Leigha’s six and would make sure whoever had it out for her didn’t touch her.

Chapter Eight

THE PATIENTS WERE gone and most of the therapists had departed for the day, leaving Eric and Leigha to do the last walkthrough before turning out the lights.

Though she’d told him she would call a security guard to walk her to her rental car, Leigha had been watching the door for the past thirty minutes, waiting for Reaper to appear. So far, he hadn’t. Didn’t he know the center closed thirty minutes early on Friday? The extra time gave the staff and patients a fighting chance to get home before the big evening traffic jams hit.

Oh, well, Eric was still there, he could walk her to her car. Not that she needed him. As an ex-cop, she could take care of herself. Or so she kept telling herself. Yesterday had been a real eye-opener. If Reaper hadn’t been there, they’d have been piecing her together, if she didn’t die from the explosion. A shiver rippled across the back of her neck.

“Ready?” Eric asked with his hand poised on the light switch.

“I am.” Leigha stepped out in the hallway where a janitor had gotten a jump on the nightly cleaning and was running the floor polisher, the sound echoing off the walls, making conversation difficult. “Did you turn off the light in your office?”

Eric frowned, his hand on the doorknob, ready to pull it closed. “I think I did. Hell, I’ll be right back. I can’t remember if I did or didn’t.”

Leigha slid her purse up her shoulder and smiled. “No hurry.”

“Don’t go anywhere. I’m walking you to your car.” He shook his head. “I still can’t believe someone stood out in the parking lot and wired your car with explosives, but no one saw him. I’m just glad you weren’t injured. It blows my mind.” He pointed at her. “Stay.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” she assured him.

The janitor in his coveralls worked his way backward toward her, sweeping the machine back and forth across the wide hallway.

Leigha glanced toward the other end of the corridor, still hoping to see Reaper headed her way. She moved closer to the wall as the janitor came abreast of her position. The machine shut off, and Leigha turned to greet him with a smile.

Her heart slipped to her knees when she looked into his dark eyes and recognized a face from her past.

Jamal Clayton sneered and pointed a pistol at her belly. “I’ve waited a long time for this.”

Leigha took a step backward, running into the wall behind her. “How did you get in here?”

“Walked right in, carrying a box of cleaning supplies I stole from the back of a van.” Clayton laughed. “No one stopped me. No one checked to see what was in the box.” He waved the pistol toward the exit. “Let’s go.”

She shook her head. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“Have it your way. I sure hate to make a mess of the floors I just waxed.” He shrugged and aimed the gun at her chest. “I was going to give you a chance to run, a chance you didn’t give my brother.”

Her chin jutted upward. “Your brother was about to kill me after he’d already shot me in the knee. He wasn’t running, because he was coming back to finish me off.”

A shoulder lifted then dropped. “That’s not how I saw it.”

“Well then, you saw wrong.”

His lip curled back. “Shut up, bitch. He was my brother. You broke my mother’s heart.”

“You and your brother did that to your mother by your actions.”

“Leigha, you were right. I hadn’t turned out—”

“Get back, Eric!” Leigha shouted and swung her purse at Clayton. But she missed.

Clayton turned and fired.

Eric’s eyes widened and he clutched his middle, and then he dropped to the floor.

Anger ricocheted with adrenaline through Leigha, and she kicked with her new knee, her heel hitting Clayton’s wrist. The gun flew from his hand, landed on the slick tile floor, and slid toward the wall.

Leigha dove for it, landing hard on her stomach, and skidded toward it. She almost had it when Clayton grabbed her ankle and jerked hard, pulling her away from the gun.

She rolled to her back and would have kicked him, but he landed on top of her before she could cock her leg.

Clayton straddled her hips and grabbed her throat, squeezing tight.

Her air cut off, Leigha swung her fists, catching him in the chin, the neck, anywhere she could, but her arms were shorter than his, and her blows weren’t enough to convince him to let her go. She bucked and thrashed, but the lack of oxygen made her vision blur and the lights above fade. Damn it, she couldn’t let him win! She had to get help for Eric. She wanted more time with Reaper.

This couldn’t be the end.

Clayton jerked to the side, rolling her with him, his hands loosening enough for Leigha to thrust hers up between his arms and knocked them away.

That’s when she saw why Clayton had been thrown to the side.

Reaper towered over the bastard, his face a mottled vision of rage.

Clayton swept his feet to the side, aiming for Reaper’s ankles, in an attempt to knock him off his feet.

Reaper stepped back in time and landed a kick to the man’s side. “It’s over, Jamal. You’ve just earned a one-way ticket back to jail.”

“Fuck you.” He rolled to his knees and launched himself toward the gun.

Leigha beat him to it, snatched it from the ground, and aimed it at his chest. “You’re done.” Her actions were steady and sure.

“I’m going to kill you,” he said through his teeth. “Like you killed my brother.”

“Not today, you’re not,” she said, holding the weapon steady.

Clayton started to his feet, his muscles bunching.

Reaper grabbed the man’s arm, yanked it up behind his back, and shoved him face-first against the wall.

The man hit hard, nose-first, blood gushing out, spraying across the white tile floor.

Reaper leaned his weight against the man, holding up his arm between his shoulder blades. “You’re not killing anyone. Not tonight.”

“Can you hold him?” Leigha asked, her gun still pointed at her attacker as she moved toward Eric, lying on the floor in the open door of the rehab unit.

“Do what you have to,” Reaper said. “He’s not going anywhere.”

Leigha pulled her cell phone out of her purse and dialed 911, reported the incident, and requested medical support stat. Then she knelt beside Eric.

“I don’t think I’ll be walking you to your car this evening,” he said, holding his hand tight against the wound. Blood stained his fingers.

“Don’t worry about me. I have another bodyguard on standby.” She shot a glance at Reaper. “Let me take over here.”

“I think he’s ready to graduate from rehab,” Eric said.

Leigha applied pressure to the wound. “I’d like to transfer him to another therapist when you get back to work.”

“Why’s that?”

“I’ve committed the ultimate sin.”

Eric nodded and gave a weak grin. “Fell for him, didn’t you?”

“I didn’t plan on it.”

He chuckled. “It happens.”

The police arrived and took Clayton in custody, reading him his rights as they led him away.

Two paramedics entered behind the police and took charge of Eric’s care. They applied a pressure bandage to the wound, slipped an oxygen mask over his face, and established an IV. When they had him stabilized, they moved him to the waiting ambulance.