His mother stared back. One arm rose, a perfectly manicured hand gripping a black semiautomatic that was pointed right at Benicio.
“You brought danger to our family. I loved you. I pleaded for your life. And this is how you repay me? By betraying us?”
Cate’s eyes darted toward the tree line. Should she bolt now or—
Camila pulled the trigger.
Holy shit. The woman had just shot her son in thehead.
And as Benicio’s lifeless body crumpled to the dirt, Cate realized she wasn’t going to be able to get out of this alive by merely running.
Without another conscious thought, she raised her own gun and fired, but the first shot went wide to the right. Fuck. She fired twice more in rapid succession and her second and third shots struck Camila in the shoulder and chest.
The older woman stumbled backward, her hand clutched to her chest, her gun falling to the ground.
Before Cate could pull the trigger again, an animalistic roar blasted through the air, like a lion in the Serengeti. Then a stocky figure shot out of the shack Camila had first emerged from, careening toward Cate in a blur of limbs and dark hair and wild eyes.
Mateo Rivera.
Chapter 34
Ash watched through the scope of his rifle as Rivera ran toward his wife.
Finger hovering over the trigger, he nearly took a shot, but the drug lord didn’t lunge at Cate like Ash had expected; he raced past her, ignoring the body of his son and the two dead tangos, and threw himself on the ground next to Camila.
Even from a hundred yards away, Ash could hear the man’s cry of agony.
“Leaving my post,” he muttered into the comm. “Cate needs backup.”
Nobody objected to that.
He felt weak in the knees as he left the safety of the tin structure he’d been holed up in. A pretzel of fear had been lodged in his gut ever since he and the others had left the hangar and tailed the Land Rover to this no-name village west of Guatana City.
They’d hung several car lengths behind, tracking Cate electronically, to see how many other cartel members would follow. It was a good thing they had, because two Humvees had swiftly fallen in behind Cate and Benicio. Ash and the team hadn’t taken them out until the Humvee crew had stopped to rendezvous with a few other Rivera foot soldiers on the outskirts of the small village.
Despite his shaky legs, he felt comfortable emerging out into the open. Morgan’s team had already neutralized the heavily armed guards they’d found on the perimeter of the village and Benicio had made their job easier by killing the two goons in the clearing. Ash had been seconds from taking out Camila when Cate had done it for him.
Cate’s blue eyes widened when she spotted him. She still had her pistol trained on Rivera, who was now cradling his dead wife in his arms, but that didn’t stop her from releasing a choked sob at the sight of Ash.
“Oh my God, I’m so happy to see you,” she blurted out.
“I got you, babe. You’re safe now.” He came up beside her, his sniper rifle replaced by an AK that he trained on Rivera.
“Camila,” the man was whispering, his voice thick with tears. “Mi amor. Please.” He hugged the lifeless woman tighter, the word please leaving his mouth over and over again.
Ash wasn’t sure what the man was begging for her to do. Open her eyes? Come back to life? Either way, Rivera was completely oblivious to the two weapons pointed at him. He was inconsolable, his face wet with sorrow, his stocky body trembling wildly.
When Rivera finally registered the threat hanging in the air, he raised his head. Weakly, as if it was a strain to do so. His black eyes locked on Cate but there was no malice in them.
“You killed her,” he said quietly.
“I killed her,” Cate confirmed, her voice equally soft.
Ash slid his finger over the trigger. The world would be a better place without this asshole. One shot was all he’d need. One shot to make Cate safe.
But the man on the dirt posed no threat to Cate. Rather than spew violent promises, taunt her the way he’d done over the phone, condemn her for shooting his wife, Rivera simply dipped his head again and held his wife tighter.
“Mi amor,” he whispered.
Swallowing, Ash lowered the gun to his side.
Fuck. The man was grieving over his wife, and Ash couldn’t bring himself to kill him. They could dispose of him later. It didn’t feel right—
A shot rang out right next to him, making his head jerk back.
Ash watched in shock as blood bloomed in the center of Rivera’s chest, the viscous liquid spreading until it mingled with the stains on his wife. He hugged Camila tight and then slumped over her body.
What the . . . ?
Ash turned to find Cate lowering her pistol.
She looked up at him with tears in her eyes. “He would have come after us.”
His throat tightened. Jesus. She’d just killed a man in cold blood, and yet Ash couldn’t say he disagreed with what she’d done. He’d allowed Rivera’s grief to touch him, but the Marine in him knew that delaying the inevitable would’ve been a mistake.
“You’re right.” He cleared his throat. “That was the smart and brave thing to do.” Then he tugged the gun out of her hand and lifted her shaking body into his arms. “Come on, sugar. It’s time to get the hell out of Guatana.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Agreed.” Her voice didn’t sound at all steady as she began babbling. “If I ever see this place again it’ll have to be by force. I’m avoiding all places starting with G. No Greece, Georgia, or Grenada. No London because they have the Greenwich meridian. No Galveston, but I hate Texas anyway. It’s too hot. No . . .”
He let her mumble about more G places until she eventually passed out from shock and exhaustion in the car ride back to the airport.
* * *
There were two jets waiting on the runway. One was going back to Costa Rica. The other would fly the team members who didn’t live on the compound down to Florida, where they’d all board different charters headed for their various homes.
Ash . . . well, he’d be on the plane to Florida, where he’d decide what he was going to do with the rest of his life. Hire his gun and skills out to another mercenary group, he supposed.
With Gran dead, there wasn’t anything in Tennessee that he wanted to see. The only place he wanted to be was next to Cate.
He wasn’t sure what her plans were, but she hadn’t said a word about going back to the compound. Morgan definitely wouldn’t be thrilled about that, but Ash hoped the man learned a lesson from all this. Cate had lived through a harrowing experience and she’d survived. She’d proven that she was all grown up. That she deserved to make her own choices. That they couldn’t try to force their own expectations on her.
And while every atom in his body wanted to clutch her tighter to him, spirit her off to some cabin in the woods where they’d live by themselves forever, he forced himself to loosen his grip around her sleeping body.
“How’s she doing?” Liam asked, twisting around in the front seat of the SUV.
“I think she’s had better days.” Ash smoothed a bit of hair away from her forehead and eased her into a sitting position.
“You should tell her how you feel, brother.”
Ash’s eyes flicked up to meet Liam’s. After a beat, he said, “Your family is important to you, isn’t it?”
It wasn’t a fair question. Everyone knew Liam had a huge family in Boston that he loved dearly. The other man nodded. “Yeah, they are.”
“Well, Morgan is all Cate has. I’m not going to come between that.”
“Rookie—”
He cut Liam off by giving Cate a tiny shake. “Time to wake up, sugar. The plane’s ready.”
But Liam spoke anyway. “Morgan isn’t all she has. She has you, doesn’t she?
”
“I’m not enough. For anyone.” He laughed ruefully. “I appreciate the pep talk but the best thing for me to do is to let her go.”
Liam gave a frustrated look as he got out of the car. Ash figured from the tension between him and Sully, Liam had his own issues to work out.
He turned back to Cate and smoothed his thumb along her cheek. “Wake up, sugar.”
“Ash?” She blinked slowly. “What happened?”
“You saved the day and now it’s time for your hero’s reward,” he teased.
“Did I pass out in the car from shock?” She sat up and looked around in dismay.
“Maybe?”
“Oh my God! That’s so embarrassing!”
Chuckling, he opened the door and gestured for her to hop out. “Come on, time to go.”
“Well, that was a baller way to finish the day, wasn’t it?” she grumbled as she exited the Rover.
“Shock is a normal response to what you just went through,” he said roughly. “Don’t beat yourself up over it.”
Cate glanced around the tarmac. “Why two planes?” she asked warily.
He hesitated. “One is taking the Costa Rica folks home and the other is headed for the States.”
“Oh.” She nodded as if that made sense to her. Then she held out her hand. “Come on, then. Let’s go home.”
He stared at those slender fingers that were steady and waiting for him to take them. Clearing his throat, he said, “I’ll call you.”
Her eyebrows knitted together. “What the hell does that mean?”
Beside him, Liam made a disgusted sound. Ash had totally forgotten he was even there. It was hard to notice anything or anyone else when Cate was around.
“Ash?” she demanded when he didn’t reply.
He shifted reluctantly.
“Ash.”
To his annoyance, Liam answered for him. “Ash isn’t allowed to come home. Your old man said if he allowed you to be part of this op, he wasn’t welcome back.”
She gasped.
“Fuckin’ A, Boston. I told you that wasn’t any of her business.”
Cate whirled on him, her eyes blazing. “You’re not allowed to go home?”
“It’s more like I got fired,” he mumbled, trying to downplay the whole thing.
“But it’s your home! You’ve lived there for how many years?”
“Four,” Liam piped up.
“You’re not helping, man,” Ash warned with narrowed eyes.
Liam grinned. “The hell I’m not.” He gave Ash a lazy salute and walked over to the Florida plane, where Sully was smoking a cigarette and chatting up the Reilly brothers.
Ash swallowed his discomfort as Cate continued to glare at him.
“Where do you plan to go?” she said tightly.
“I hadn’t thought that far ahead. The plane is dropping everyone off in Miami. I figured I’d get a hotel and start a job search.”
She raised her arms in exasperation. “You’re ridiculous, you know that? Ridiculous!”
“No. I was unaware.” The more she yelled at him, the lighter his heart got. He felt a grin starting to spread.
“Well, you are. Talk about stupid. Do you have anything but rocks in that head?”
The smile broke the surface. “Doubt it. I think I need someone around to tell me what to do.”
The indignation in her eyes dissolved into something warm, gentle. She took a step closer. “Is that right?”
“Yup. And since I’m out of a job, I was thinking I could hire on to a magazine as a camera helper. What are they called?”
“Assistants. That’s what they’re called.” Cate looked like she was trying not to laugh.
“No special job title?”
“Nope.” Her lips twitched. “Do you have one in mind?”
“How about”—he pretended to think it over—“‘Cate Morgan’s man’?”
Her breath caught. “What?”
“You heard me.” And suddenly he couldn’t last any longer. He closed the distance between them and scooped her up in his arms, burying his face against her smooth, delicate neck as the wave of emotion inside of him spilled over. “I love you and I don’t care what your father has to say about that. I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry I was going to let you get on that plane without me.”
She tugged on his hair to jerk his head up, then gave him a teasing look. “There. Was that so hard?”
He blinked.
“For you to say,” she clarified at his confused expression. “I’ve been waiting years for you to get your head out of your ass and say those words to me, David Ashton.”
“Aw shit. You’re double-naming me again?”
“I wouldn’t have to do that if you weren’t so dumb. I think you do need me around. And of course you love me. Duh.”
Duh? He professed his love and got a duh in return? Fuck, he loved this woman.
Her small hands cupped his cheeks. “I love you too, Ash. I’ve loved you since I was seventeen and I can’t imagine ever stopping. I kept that stupid pen, didn’t I?”
His smile was so wide, he wondered if his face was going to split from happiness. “You sure did.”
Then he kissed her hard, crushing her body against his because he was afraid this might be some sort of sad illusion his lovesick mind had conjured up. But no, she was really here, and her mouth opened beneath his, her tongue attacking him with the same fervor that he felt in every pulse of his body. It wasn’t a dream. It was all very real. Too real maybe, he had to acknowledge as his hard-on throbbed in his cargo pants.
He broke away from her mouth reluctantly. “As much as I love kissing you, sugar, you know what happens to me when my tongue is in your mouth, and I don’t think the folks on the plane want to watch while I take you on the tarmac. So we better stop now.”
Her lips curved into a naughty smile. “Who knows? Maybe they’d enjoy the show.”
“I thought we hated Guatana.”
“Oh we do.” She wiggled out of his grasp and took his hand. “But I can wait a few hours. Can you?”
Not really, but he’d try his damned hardest.
* * *
Ash couldn’t stop holding her hand on the flight to Florida but somehow he found the strength not to kiss her, touch her, fuck her. At the airport, they exchanged hasty good-byes with the team and checked into the nearest hotel, and only then did he allow himself to lose control.
He had her shirt off before the door had even closed behind them. “I can’t wait another minute,” he growled as his mouth ravaged her neck.
“Then don’t,” she growled back, her fingers already tearing at his clothes.
They fell to the bed in a tangle of naked limbs. When he reached between her legs and thrust two fingers inside of her, he found her wet and hot and willing. A motherfucking dream. Her inner muscles tightened around him and Ash immediately imagined his cock in the place of his fingers and nearly came.
“Next time, I’m going to fuck you for hours,” he rasped. “But right now, I gotta be inside you before I come in my pants from just fingering you.”
She moaned against his lips. “I love knowing how much I turn you on. Fucking. Love. It.”
“You have no idea. Just watching you walk around makes me hard.” He took himself in hand and positioned himself at her entrance. “And when you look at me like that . . .” He trailed off, the emotions thick in his throat.
Cate drew a hand over his face, down his cheek, to stop at his mouth. Her fingers hung on his lower lip. “When I look at you like you’re my world?” she supplied. Her voice was just as hoarse as his. “It’s because it’s true. You’ve always been in my head, no matter how hard I tried to drive you out of it.”
“I love you,” he whispered, then ducked out of her grasp to kiss her as he sl
id home.
It didn’t matter where they stuck their bags, parked their shoes, hung up their coats. Nothing mattered as long as he could have her, like this, his cock inside her tight channel, her arms around his shoulders, her essence seeping into all his cracks and crevices, healing up those painful empty spaces.
She threw back her head and arched into his embrace. Her hips rose to meet his thrusts, and Ash threw himself into fucking her, wedging himself so deep that a crowbar wouldn’t have been able to separate them. Nothing would separate them. Not Morgan, not terrorists, and most of all, not himself.
He whispered his promises of love and she gave them right back, until the sweet agony of release swept over both of them. And when it was over, he picked her up and carried her to the shower, where he paid homage on his knees and lapped at her pussy until she was too weak to stand and he had to hold her up with his shoulders and arms. Even when she begged for him to stop, he couldn’t. There were years of want built up inside of him and he couldn’t get enough of her.
“You’re going to kill me with all these orgasms,” she mumbled hours later.
Their last bout found them back on the bed. The sheets were on the ground, the blanket crumpled beneath their sweat-soaked, sated bodies. It wasn’t the least bit comfortable, but Ash didn’t give a shit because Cate was beside him.
“Nah, I’m filling you with life.” He grinned at the ceiling and waited for her smart-ass response.
“Is that what we’re calling it? Because I’m pretty sure your soldiers are dying on my thighs.”
“It’s an honorable way to go.”
She snorted and then laughed, the mattress vibrating with her mirth. “Speaking of honor . . .” The humor in her voice faded into a far more serious note. “You never told me why you were dishonorably discharged from the Marines.”
He gave her a wry smile. “Technically it was a discharge other than honorable, but it means the same. You did something wrong, something very bad.”
He flopped onto his back and stared up at the ceiling. Fuck. Nothing killed the mood more than talking about ancient history. Especially when that history sucked balls. “It’s a shit story, sugar. Wouldn’t you rather fool around?”