WAR: Opposition: (WAR Book 3) (33 page)

Seth laughed. “That’s my girl.” He kissed her on the mouth—briefly, so as not to be tempted to make love to her again—then sat up and picked up his phone. “The battery is low, but there should be enough power for you to call your brother back, as long as you keep the call short. You need to put the poor guy out of his misery.” Now Seth didn’t need to hear from Dr. LaSalle. He could hand Kirra off to her brother, instead.

She glanced at the time on the LCD display. “It’s early yet, not quite five.”

“Trust me, he won’t care. He’s desperate for reassurance that you’re alive.”

“All right.”

“Once you’re done, we’ll search for the diamonds.”

She nodded, then climbed out of bed.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m sorry, but this is my big brother. I’m not talking to him while I’m in bed naked with a man. I’m getting dressed and calling him from over here.”

Being a big brother himself, he couldn’t fault her logic. He was certain he’d know if his sister called him from the bed of her lover.

A fist of regret squeezed his heart. His sister was a single mom now. Seth had never had a chance to meet her husband. The man had been killed in Afghanistan a few months before Seth’s niece had been born. Between raising her daughter and working full-time, he doubted his sister had much time to date.

He should be there for her. Not that he knew much about kids, but he was certain he could handle one small girl for long enough to let his sister go out on a date if she wanted.

Instead of assistance, he’d brought his blackmailer’s hit man into their lives, putting them all at risk.

Kirra swore, jerking his attention back to the immediate problem. “The phone started to dial, then died.” She handed it back to him.

“Dammit.” Now how was he supposed to hand Kirra off to her brother?

Kirra shrugged. “That’s okay. Dev would probably only lecture me anyway.”

He hated the dejected look on her face. Why couldn’t the world have left them alone for a few more hours?

“So. How about we find those diamonds?” He got out of bed and pulled on the shorts he’d been wearing earlier. He kinda liked them. Then he lit the lantern and brought in the one from the kitchen to give them extra illumination.

“I honestly don’t think the diamonds are here,” Kirra said as she set her backpack on the bed. “It’s not as if this is going to be a tiny package. Depending on the size and clarity of the stones, we’re probably looking for a bag big enough to overflow the palm of my hand.”

He raised his brows. “I thought you stole mostly finished jewelry.”

“I did. But some of the people we did business with also handled uncut gems. A few of them would talk to me while I waited for their appraisal on my jewelry.” Kirra frowned and rubbed her forearm.

“What?”

She hesitated. “Franz didn’t like it that the leader of the gang of thieves trusted me to go alone to the fence, but always sent an escort with Franz.”

“He took it out on you?”

“Not physically. But yeah, Franz always said something to make me feel stupid and out-of-place.”

“Did he try to blame you for the attack while he was beating and cutting you?” Seth asked, his voice deathly quiet.

She froze. “I don’t—” Her teeth dug into her lower lip and she stuck her hand in her pocket. “Maybe. I…I think I remember him saying how it was all my fault. But the memories of the attack are still pretty spotty. They mostly hit me out of nowhere. The doctors don’t know if I’ll ever regain full memory, and honestly, I’m not sure I want to remember.

“The few memories I do get are horrible. None of those near death experiences of white light and peace that some survivors talk about. Instead, I see Franz and the knife and—” Her voice cracked. “I remember pain. So much pain and fear.”

The fury that shot through Seth threatened to incinerate his common sense. He couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. Once again he was lost in a red haze of absolute hatred and the need for revenge.

Because of her asshole former boyfriend, Kirra had died. Fucking died. If she hadn’t been strong enough to hold onto life, Seth might never have met her.

His heart cracked wide open. It hurt unlike anything he’d ever felt. He might never have had a chance to know Kirra. To hear her sing. To watch her eyes light up as she teased him. To argue with her and to love her.

She’d brought light and laughter into his life and he would cling to those memories and let them warm him as he faced the assassin.

His soul howled at the injustice of finding love when he had no hope of a future.

“Shh, Seth, it’s okay,” Kirra murmured. Her hand lay warm and soothing on his forearm. “I’m alive.”

“The bastard and his friends better hope they never get out of prison,” Seth growled. “Because if they do, I’m going to kill them.”

Kirra stroked her cool hand down his face, across his neck, and over shoulder until it rested over his heart. “No, you’re not. You’re better than that. I’m better than that.” She met his eyes. “I survived. I learned that my life has value, which was a lesson a long time overdue. So no, you’re not going off on some killing spree. Because the man I love isn’t a cold-blooded killer. And because hurting Franz and the others isn’t going to change what happened. Nothing can change that except a time machine, and I don’t think even you can fly back that far.”

A growl erupted from his chest. He knew she was right, but every instinct in him told him to fight for her, to punish those who’d hurt her in order to prevent anyone else from trying a similar attack.

His muscles demanded movement. He wanted desperately to dash out of the room and run off his tension. But he didn’t want Kirra to think he was rejecting her. Worse, he didn’t want to scare her. Or—worst case—lose his shit and accidentally hurt her. So instead, he focused on calming his breathing. Then he pulled her into a tight hug and just held her.

And cherished the idea that she thought she loved him.

A long while later, Seth pulled back. He wanted to tell her that he loved her, but it wouldn’t be fair to her. So instead, he brushed a kiss over her forehead and murmured, “You’re amazing.”

She grinned at him. “Damn right. Now, let’s look for the diamonds so we can go back to bed.”

While Kirra took everything out of her backpack and examined each item thoroughly, Seth examined the frame. “Nothing,” he announced.

“Seth,” Kirra said, her voice vibrating with excitement.

He glanced over. “You found them?”

She nodded.

“Where?”

She pointed to a small zippered case holding feminine hygiene products. “That’s the one item I haven’t touched since I left home, because I haven’t started my period yet.” She pushed aside a sanitary pad to reveal a black velvet bag.

Seth laughed. “No wonder the rebels didn’t find them. They wouldn’t look past the first layer of feminine products. In fact, I guarantee that the guy who opened the bag couldn’t wait to zip it closed.” He reached over and plucked out the bag. “Let’s see what all the fuss is over.”

He poured the contents onto the bed. Rough-edged rocks the color of dirty snow spilled out, forming a fist-sized pile. Seth whistled. “That’s a good stash.”

“Rather ugly aren’t they?” Kirra said. “Yet they’re more interesting to me than the glittering perfection of a polished diamond.” She stirred the pile with her finger, put them back into the bag, then jiggled it.

“Seth, who do the diamonds belong to?”

“Whatever you’re thinking, forget it. They were on their way to an arms dealer named Jonathan Morenga. He’s set himself up as the de facto leader of the more moderate rebels. I’ve worked for him and he’s not a man you want to cross.”

“But he doesn’t know we found the diamonds. Why couldn’t we use them to buy off your assassin?”

K
irra had expected
Seth to at least show a glimmer of excitement at her suggestion. Instead, he shook his head and paced away, coming to stop in front of the window.

“I thought about that,” he finally admitted, keeping his back to her. “But the assassin isn’t the type of guy to give up a target for monetary gain.”

“I think it’s time you told me why he’s after you. Does it have something to do with what happened in Southeast Asia?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay.” She perched on the bed. “Before you stomped off in a snit—”

Seth snorted.

“—you’d just told me that you’d flown back to base and been arrested.”

“Right. They finally pulled me out to interrogate me.” A gust of wind threw rain hard against the metal roof and he waited until the noise died down. “I was furious. I demanded to know why my team was shot at without warning. I couldn’t understand why the other squad hadn’t told us we were under arrest, rather than firing on us without provocation. According to the special agent in charge, they hadn’t sent any helicopters after us. In fact, the helicopters I claimed had pursued me back to base hadn’t shown up on their radar.”

“Who sent them after you, then?”

“Had to have been the general. He must have known the investigators were closing in and wanted to eliminate anyone who might not testify in his favor.”

Kirra nodded.

“As far as the CID agents were concerned,” Seth continued. “I’d only returned to the main base because of my co-pilot’s injuries. They believed I was lying about what happened in order to cover my ass.” He gave an angry shake of his head. “I told them exactly what had happened, but they didn’t want to hear the truth.” His voice was weighed down with a familiar hopelessness and despair.

“They’d already made up their minds about you. It hurts, doesn’t it?”

Seth turned and met her eyes. “Your parents?”

“Yeah.”

It was hard to keep her gaze on his, but if she wanted him to be emotionally honest with her, then she needed to accord him the same level of trust. “Too often my parents and Dev refused to accept my account of things because they were blinded by their belief that I was flighty, irresponsible, and didn’t care about others. They’d already made up their mind regarding my guilt. Regardless of the facts, in the end I was blamed.” She shrugged. “I know it’s not the same as being betrayed by the military you’d devoted your life to serving.” That deep a betrayal could send a man into a dark, dark spiral.

“Doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt you,” Seth said. He reached out as if he wanted to touch her, but didn’t move to close the distance between them.

His obvious need to distance himself from her made her heart ache.

“The account I need to settle with your brother just keeps getting bigger and bigger.”

She dredged up a crooked smile. “What makes you think I can’t fight my own battles now?”

He shrugged. “You can. Doesn’t mean the impulse is going away.”

“Thank you.”

Their eyes held a moment, then Seth once again turned his back and stared out the window. “I was still in the interrogation room, verbally fighting with the special agents, when the base came under attack. A team of shooters burst into the interrogation room, firing at my seat.”

“How did you survive?”

“The two special agents were playing good cop, bad cop. The bad cop had me pinned up against the wall while the good cop pretended to talk him down. So we weren’t in the initial line of fire.” He flattened his hand against the wall next to the window.

“A team of MPs who’d been hard on the heels of the attackers showed up and helped take down the shooters. Then mortars hit the building. We barely made it out before it collapsed.”

“And people think I have bad luck,” Kirra muttered.

“It was clear that the attack had been going on for some time and that our forces were being overrun,” Seth continued. “The special agents, the MPs and I ran for a helicopter and managed to escape.”

“They let you fly it?”

“Yeah. At gunpoint. I did some fast talking, because one of the agents thought I’d set them up to be killed. The other one, though, had seen the attackers enter the room and realized that I’d been their target. When I insisted that I could prove my innocence, that they needed to talk to my teammates at the secret base, the agents eventually agreed.”

“Didn’t the attackers try to stop you from flying away?”

“A couple of guys shot at us halfheartedly, but they were too busy trying to gain control of the base to pay us much attention.”

“So you flew them to the secret base.”

“Yeah.” Seth’s hand formed a fist and beat against the wall. “We…ah…saw the smoke first. The base had been firebombed and was still burning. I flew as close as I dared, then I set the helicopter down and raced toward the fire. You know how it is in the movies when the hero runs blindly toward his ruined home? That was me. It never occurred to me that the fire was still too hot for me to search. I was too desperate to find out if anyone had survived. But…”

He fell silent for several minutes. When he finally resumed, emotions thickened his voice. “A wall of heat forced me to stop, but I could see into the parade ground. Bodies covered every inch of the area, as if they’d been called to assembly and then gunned down. I don’t remember exactly what happened next. All I remember is feeling a sense of panic and wanting desperately to discover that my teammates weren’t among the dead. Later, one of the special agents told me that I tried to run through the flames, but the MPs pulled me away. Apparently I fought them until we were shot at.

“One of the MPs was killed, along with the ‘good cop’ special agent. The rest of us bolted for the helicopter, but the attackers hit it with an RPG. So we fled into the jungle on foot, with the attackers hot on our heels. We eventually eluded our pursuers, but by that time the remaining MPs were dead and the special agent had been shot in the shoulder.”

“What about your wounds?”

Seth shrugged. “Not bad enough to slow me down, although I did have some burns on my hands and arms. The special agent and I eventually reached the outskirts of a town and found a place to hole up. I patched him up the best I could. By this time he’d admitted that he believed I was telling the truth. He called someone he trusted, intending to ask for help. When he couldn’t get through, I called an MP on another base who was a close friend. He told me that the main base had been attacked by members of the local drug cartel, who’d eventually blown the base up. Everyone was presumed dead. I explained our situation and asked for protection. He told me to call back the next day.

“That night, we were attacked in our hotel room by a group of cartel members. The special agent was killed and I barely escaped. When I finally found another safe place and called my friend back, I learned he was dead.” Seth drummed his fingers against the window sill.

“The same scenario happened twice more. I reached out for help. At one friend’s suggestion, I even emailed a video statement to him. But even though I warned my friends of the danger, and I know they would have taken precautions, they were all killed after talking to me.”

No wonder Seth didn’t think she was safe with him.

“By this time, I’d picked up a tail. A man I recognized as being part of the general’s personal protection detail. A skilled sniper. So I ran, only staying in one place long enough to catch an hour or two of sleep before moving on.

“Eventually, though, I ran out of energy. I’d never received treatment for my wounds and one of them was becoming infected. I needed a doctor, but I didn’t dare expose myself with the assassin on my trail. So I set a trap for him. And I killed him. He didn’t see me. I waited until he was in range, then shot him in the back. In cold blood.”

Her heart ached so much, she couldn’t bear it.

“I didn’t sign up to be an assassin,” Seth said so quietly she almost couldn’t catch the words. “Killing because it was necessary for my own survival, rather than to protect my teammates, my country, or our allies—” He shook his head. “It changed me.”

“Of course it did.” Now it was perfectly clear why he’d tried so hard to convince her he was a bad man. She stared at his back in despair, realizing just how difficult a task she had ahead of her. Because she didn’t know what it would take to convince Seth that despite all he’d done, he was still a good man at heart.

“I left the body floating face down in a stream. Then I disappeared into the nearest large city and found someone to treat my infection without asking questions.” He shot her a look over his shoulder. “I didn’t have any money with me, so I stole enough to keep myself alive and to pay the doctor. A couple of days later, I met a guy in a bar who was former military and working for a group of mercenaries who protected NGOs and scientific expeditions. He offered me work. I accepted, but gave him a false name.”

“Michael Hughes?”

“You said Sankoh called me that?”

“Yeah. He showed me your ID as proof that he held you prisoner.”

“Ah. No, I used a different alias at that point. My intention was to reach South Africa, where I wouldn’t stand out as a white man. Then I’d make my way back to the States and connect in person with another friend I thought might be able to help me. You have to remember, at this point either the military thought I was dead, or AWOL. I knew the special agent would have been keeping his superiors apprised of his progress. So it was likely that if I showed up at any U.S. military facility, I’d be arrested.

“I worked for the mercenaries for a couple of months until I felt secure that no other assassin was on my trail. Then the group helped me get into South Africa and hooked me up with a forger. That’s where the alias Michael Hughes was born. Michael for my teammate who died when the general’s men shot down his helicopter. Hughes because they make helicopters.”

Kirra watched Seth standing at the window and noticed how his thumb flicked against his index finger. Her heart ached. “You didn’t choose the name merely as a tribute, did you? It’s a constant reminder of what you see as your failure to save your men.”

He jerked his shoulders up, but didn’t answer.

He appeared so alone, she couldn’t take it. So she stood and walked over to him. Resting her hand gently on his back, she asked, “If you killed the assassin, then who’s been shooting at us?”

“Another military assassin. I saw him in the market the other day and actually thought for a terrifying second it was the same man. They look an awful lot alike. Then I recognized the differences, and realized that I’d seen this man once on the main base, coming out of the general’s office. He’d been part of an elite unit of snipers just off a mission and his cold stare had freaked me out.” Seth shrugged. “I don’t know if he was sent by the general or by someone else in the military. He must not have been on base the day of the attack. I have no idea how he found me. Only—”

“It doesn’t make sense that neither one of us is dead.”

“Yeah. He’s toying with me and I don’t know why.” He shot her a look. “Everyone around me ends up dead.”

“Don’t you think the two of us, together, are strong enough to elude your assassin?”

“It doesn’t matter. Once we have enough power to make a call, we’re contacting your brother. He can pick you up, while I work out a deal to get the diamonds into the proper hands.”

She clutched at his arm. “No. Seth, please. I want you to take me to the concert. I want more time with you.”

He looked at her with regret. “I’m sorry, Kirra. I don’t have that kind of time.”

“
T
his entire situation
is a complete mess.” Wil shifted his satellite phone to his other ear. Each day Seth Jarrod remained at large was another day he might be killed, but Wil didn’t intend to let the guy die on his watch. He wanted the man to have a chance to tell his story to the CID team.

Of course, now Jarrod had not only Bureh’s rebels and the American assassin on his tail, but Sankoh’s men as well. Plus Dev and Rio. Yet somehow, with all of those groups in pursuit, Jarrod remained free.

“No wonder Kris has been going stir crazy if this is the kind of shit he’s had to deal with,” Wil muttered.

“Aye.” Lachlan agreed. “What are we going to do?”

That “we” was the reason Wil kept his association with WAR, despite the political dangers. Because the guys at WAR treated Wil and his team as a full partner. Unlike the American military establishment, who’d written off West Africa as a lost cause and would prefer to have Wil’s team fail, so they could justify eliminating them altogether.

Wil would take WAR’s assistance any day over the backstabbing and career-sensitive behaviors of too many of his recent overlords. One of these days everyone in command would wake up and realize that West Africa was on the brink of becoming the next Terrorism Central. Then, finally, Wil’s team would receive the backing it needed to do their job and fully protect the military bases and remaining diplomatic missions.

“Wil?” Lachlan prodded.

Crap. Wil rubbed between his eyes. He knew better than to let such thoughts crowd in while he was on a business call. If he wasn’t careful, he’d slip up when talking to someone in Washington and the consequences would be brutal.

Dammit, he wished Kris was here. He could use the other man’s strategic thinking right now. More importantly, Kris always knew how to talk him down off this ledge of anger, bitterness, and sheer frustration.

“I agree that it doesn’t make sense to continue to try and find Jarrod. There’s too much jungle for him to hide in,” Wil finally said. “Since it appears that he’s still heading north with Dev’s sister, tell Dev to stake out the concert venue. Maybe the girl can help Dev convince Jarrod to come in without a fight.”

“And if the rebels arrive on their heels?”

“I warned the concert organizers and the national government. Whether or not they’ll actually beef up security I can’t say. You’d likely know better than I. What does your wife say?”

“She said they’re talking to the government about having soldiers provide additional security. Obi says that the security team the concert organizers hired for their primary protection has a strong reputation. The employees are mostly former military men known for being both skilled and ethical. Else Helen wouldn’t be participating.”