That was becomingly painfully obvious. Hidden survival skills, hijacking abilities, a mystery brother, and a not-so-dead boyfriend. The woman in front of him was turning out to be nothing like the one who’d quietly worked for him all these years. As Jake glanced around the camp she’d set up without a bit of his help, he couldn’t help but wonder what other secrets were hiding behind those pretty blue eyes.
And just what the hell kind of trouble that meant was waiting for him down the line.
Marley turned her head in the darkness to look toward Jake, but all she could see was the outline of his shadow. “You really should let me look at those cuts on your hands.”
“My hands are fine,” he muttered next to her.
She smiled up at the roof of the shelter they’d built with her banana leaves. Mr. Moody was back. And this time she knew he was pouting because she’d surprised the heck out of him by setting up camp, catching and cooking dinner, and not being the needy and whiny female he expected her to be.
She really wanted to say, I told you I could be an asset on an op, not a liability, but held her tongue. She’d made her point. Rubbing it in now would just be overly satisfying.
She folded her hands over her belly, sighing as she listened to the bats and howler monkeys in the canopy above. After they’d finished eating, they’d laid Jake’s palm fronds as bedding under the tarp. They were currently lying next to each other in the shelter, both of them quiet and lost in thought.
“Why the heck didn’t I know Mason Addison has a son who was a soldier?”
Okay, maybe he wasn’t quite as lost in thought as she’d assumed. “Ronan told you he was in the military?”
Jake crossed his arms over his chest beside her, his thick biceps straining the thin black T-shirt he’d changed into just before they’d left Puerto Asis. “He didn’t have to. Once a soldier, always a soldier.”
He recognized the stance too. That made sense. “The reason you didn’t know is because he’s not my father’s son. We’re half siblings. Through our mother.”
“I thought your mom was dead.”
“She is.”
“Sorry. That was blunt. I meant—”
“I know what you meant.” Marley’s good mood took a nosedive. This was not a story she enjoyed rehashing, but since Jake was here, helping her when he didn’t need to be, she decided there was no reason not to tell him.
“Ronan’s a year younger than me. Omega Intel was just a fledgling company back when we were both born. My dad’s whole focus was building it up, gaining contracts, making a name for himself. He was gone all the time. Off running secret covert ops through different contracts with the government and private clients. My mother was lonely. I don’t blame her. I mean, I know what it’s like to live in this world. It’s stressful and secretive and isolating at times. And he didn’t make it easy on her. She was stuck on the outside looking in because my father didn’t tell her anything. Maybe he thought he was keeping her safe that way, I don’t know.
“Anyway, I was just a baby at the time, so I don’t remember any of this, but according to my aunt Ginger who passed away from cancer a few years ago, my mother was in Nashville at the time visiting a friend and met some guy. My dad was somewhere in Africa at the time on this long mission—four months, I think. She hit it off with the guy and, well, got pregnant with Ronan.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah. Ouch. Kinda hard to pass off a surprise pregnancy when your husband has been gone that long. She stopped seeing the guy in Nashville, but my dad didn’t want to have anything to do with her. He kicked her out. The divorce got ugly, but he had a much better attorney and got custody of me. She moved in with her parents and had Ronan, but the guilt of it all got to be too much for her. She killed herself when Ronan was only a year old.”
“Oh man.”
“My dad never talked about her. For a long time I thought she’d died of cancer when I was a baby. It was only when I was in college that my aunt filled me in on the whole story. I didn’t even know I had a brother until then.”
“That must have been a shock.”
“A good shock. I always wanted a sibling. I went and found him. He, as you can imagine, wasn’t thrilled to see me. Unlike me, he knew all about my family. He was a pretty screwed-up kid then—raised by his grandparents, his dad was never in the picture, and he had a lot of anger—but I was persistent. Didn’t let him push me away.”
Jake chuckled. “Yeah, I can totally see you doing that.”
Marley smiled in the darkness, remembering how resistant Ronan had been to her friendship at first. He still acted like he never wanted her around, but she knew it was all a façade. He wouldn’t have hopped on a plane to help her if he didn’t care.
“Just what did you say to him to get him to leave anyway? Ronan never would have left me in Colombia alone if you had threatened him.”
“Yeah, well.” Jake shifted on the tarp beside her.
“Yeah, well what?” She turned to look at his shadowy outline again.
He exhaled. “I just told him he didn’t need to stick around.”
No, there was more. She sensed it. “You recognized him, didn’t you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Marley looked back up at the makeshift ceiling. “I’m not stupid. I know SEALs run missions with DELTA guys now and then. You don’t have to pretend as if you don’t know who he is.”
Jake was silent a minute, then said, “It just surprises me you’d turn to someone like him for help instead of asking me.”
There it was. The frustration she knew had been at the root of his moodiness since the moment he’d stepped foot in Colombia.
She tried to figure out how to answer and came up empty. Because deep down she wasn’t exactly sure why she’d been so adamant he not help her. It was more than the fact she didn’t want to listen to his opinion. It had to do with the complexity of their relationship—more than colleagues, not quite friends, and the weird sexual tension she’d been feeling around him the last few months.
She cleared her throat. Crossed her ankles. Really wanted to put distance between them because her skin was suddenly tingling, but knew there was nowhere to go. Not knowing how else to answer, she finally said, “Ronan is not what you think. There’s more to the story about how and why he was discharged than you and your SEAL buddies know.”
Jake turned his head in her direction. She didn’t have to see his get real expression to know it was there. “You know all guys say that, right? It’s not what you think?”
“In this case it’s true.” Marley didn’t want to talk any more about Ronan. What he’d been kicked out of the military for was pretty nasty. He’d been lucky he hadn’t been court-martialed, but his judge advocate had gotten him off due to mishandling of evidence. He’d still lost his commission, and it had pretty well fucked up his life, but these days he seemed to be doing okay even if he was floating around South America doing mercenary work she didn’t want to think too much about.
It wasn’t worth her time or energy to try to convince Jake of that fact, though. No matter what she said, his rigid by-the-book ethics would make it impossible for him to agree with or understand the things Ronan had done.
“Where did he go?” Marley asked, changing the subject.
“I don’t know.” Jake looked back up at the ceiling. “Just threatened me if something happened to you.”
Marley smiled again in the darkness. There was the protective little brother she knew and loved, even if he rarely showed it. “He knows who you are. He must have felt comfortable leaving with you here. Otherwise he’d have stayed.”
Jake huffed, lifted his hand, and slapped a bug on his bare forearm. “Maybe he just didn’t want to trek into this beautiful jungle to be eaten alive by mosquitoes.”
Marley chuckled.
“O
r maybe he knew you were being evasive about this so-called boyfriend and didn’t want the headache.”
Marley’s smile faded. So they were back to Gray. She knew their respite from this topic had been too good to be true.
“Why didn’t your father want you dating the guy?”
She was not in the mood to talk about this tonight. Especially when she was already so conflicted about Gray in the first place. And considering the odd tingle in her belly just from being close to Jake, she knew he was the last person she could talk to about her ex.
Rolling away from him, she rested her cheek on her hand and blew out a long breath. “I’m tired. We’ll talk tomorrow. Night, Jake.”
He sighed. Muttered, “You bet your ass we’ll talk tomorrow.” Then louder said, “Night, Marley.”
And though she knew she was off the hook for the moment, she didn’t have a clue what she’d tell him in the morning.
Jake blinked several times as he stared at a tree root inches from his face. Rolling to his back, he looked up at green banana leaves above. He was in the shelter they’d built in the jungle. The events of the last few days rippled through his mind, forming waves of consciousness that slowly sank in.
Man, he had to admit, Marley had shocked the hell out of him with her hunting and gathering skills. And she’d not only caught an iguana—which wasn’t an easy task for anyone, him included—she’d skinned and cooked the bugger.
A slow smile spread across his lips as he thought back to the way she’d built a fire, cut and dragged banana leaves back, and set up camp without anyone’s help. Did he know another woman who could do all that? Especially without a single complaint?
He couldn’t think of any. Most of the women he knew didn’t even like to kill a spider. And forget cooking. The last woman he’d dated—Karen, Kallie, no, Krista—hadn’t turned on her stove in at least five years.
That awe came floating back. He shifted his head to the left, expecting to see Marley sleeping beside him in the shelter, but the tarp was empty.
He pushed up to his hands and looked out through the opening of the shelter. Rising to his feet, he stepped outside and glanced around the dimly lit jungle.
A bird cawed high above. The fire had died out, and the forest floor was damp from the drizzle they’d gotten last night, but it was still muggy and hot as hell. He moved past the fire pit and stepped into the trees, searching for her. “Marley?”
A howler monkey screamed somewhere off to his right, the sound echoing through the forest like an eerie premonition. Jake’s pulse picked up speed. He scanned the forest but saw no sign of her.
“Addison!” he called, listening as his voice echoed through the rainforest. But there was still no response. His adrenaline spiked, and the same fears he’d had last night when he’d seen that fire through the trees came rushing back.
He darted back into the shelter and grabbed his Glock. Yeah, she might be able to set up camp on her own, but there were all kinds of dangers in the rainforest just waiting to strike. Not only were guerrillas and paramilitary troops wandering around out here, but snakes, jaguars, cougars, and poisonous plants and insects lurked everywhere.
He holstered his gun at his thigh and picked his way through the brush, cursing every time a thorny vine caught on his clothing and scratched his arms and hands. And he told himself if he found her alive—Please God, let her be alive—he was going to shake some ever-loving sense into her.
The splash of water echoed off to his right. He stilled, listened, squinted to see through the thick brush. When it happened again, he turned in that direction and shoved palm fronds and vines out of his way until he stepped into a patch of sunlight and stared dumfounded at the sight in front of him.
Marley stood under a waterfall across a small pond, her eyes closed, her hands brushing her wet hair back from her face while water sluiced down her naked body. The waterline hit at her waist, but Jake was too shocked to notice much more than skin and splashing water.
“Just what in hell do you think you’re doing?” he asked.
Marley’s blue eyes shot open. A tiny yelp slipped from her lips just before she dropped down into the water.
“Hey,” she managed after several seconds. “I, uh, didn’t know you were awake.”
He stepped closer to the edge of the water. “Get out of that damn pond.”
An amused expression crossed her dewy face. “Why? You got something against being clean, Ryder?”
“What? No.” His brow wrinkled. Why the hell was she smiling like that? Didn’t she know what could be lurking in that water? “You need to get out because there could be snakes or alligators or eels or God knows what else in there.”
Marley laughed. “They’re called caimans in South America, not alligators. And there aren’t any here. I checked. Look down, Jake. If something were to swim up to me, I’d see it.”
He glanced at the clear blue water, then to the waterfall that dropped from a rock face fifteen feet above. The edge of the pool was nothing but sandy loam. No reeds, no water lilies, nothing for snakes or alligators—correction: caimans—to hide under.
A little of his anxiety eased. But his irritation kicked up once more when Marley slapped her hand against the surface of the water, sending spray all over him.
“Hey.” He jerked back and held out his arms. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Not a thing. Take your clothes off and get in. The water’s great. It’ll ease your grumpy mood.”
“I’m not grumpy.”
“Oh. My mistake. It must be caffeine withdrawal.”
His eyes narrowed. He couldn’t quite read her. Her smile was one of ease. And there was a playful glint in her eyes he hadn’t seen in a really long time. “Are you trying to get me naked, Addison?”
She rolled her pretty sky-blue eyes. “As if. No, I’m not one of your groupies. You stink, Ryder. I should know. I had to sleep next to you last night. If I have to spend the next few hours with you in this sweaty jungle, I don’t want to smell you.”
He shot her a look, which only made her laugh again. She turned her back. “I won’t watch. How’s that?”
That was good. Though a tiny part of him was disappointed that she’d turned around. Which totally made him frown because this was Marley. Not a woman he was the least bit attracted to romantically.
He glanced over the jungle, then looked at the pond and waterfall. She was right, it did look refreshing. And he was hot and sweaty and, yeah, grumpy as hell. And they did have a good long hike in front of them. A quick dunk would do wonders for his mood.
His frustration slid to the wayside. He bent over and unlaced his boots. “I don’t know how I let you talk me into this shit. If I get eaten by piranhas or a Komodo dragon, you’re in big trouble, Addison.”
“Komodo dragons live in Indonesia, not South America. But if one happens to miraculously bite you here, I’ve got a first aid kit.”
God, she was a smartass sometimes. But as he kicked off his boots and socks, tugged off his T-shirt, and reached for the snap on his pants, part of him was amused instead of annoyed. His gaze slid to her bare shoulder. Her toned, tanned, really sexy bare shoulder. “No peeking.”
“Don’t worry. I have to work with you every day. I don’t need to be scarred for life.”
He dropped his pants on the ground and waded out into the water, the silty bottom squishing between his toes. She was definitely right. The water was cool and felt damn good. He turned around and sank into the water backward, letting the clear liquid rush over his skin and bubble above his head.
When he came back up and shook the droplets from his hair, Marley was treading water feet from him, a wide smile on her pretty face. “See? Told ya.”
Had he ever thought she was pretty before? Probably. When she wore a new blouse to work, or did her hair differently, or when she really smiled, like she was
doing now. But for the most part he tried not to notice. Though her filing system aggravated the hell out of him, and she rarely did what he wanted at the moment he wanted it done, she managed the ops with precision, she could hold her own with each of the guys in the company, and she rarely complained—at least not about the job. He’d never wanted to mess up their working relationship by noticing something as silly as her looks, so he’d never really tried.
Except, he couldn’t deny those looks now. As she dunked under the water and came back up, swiping her wet hair away from her face, he couldn’t stop looking. She wasn’t exotic like the last woman he’d dated, wasn’t flashy like most of the women he went for. She was pretty in that girl-next-door way he’d told himself he was never interested in. And as he watched the water slide down her temple and inch its way toward the corner of her plump pink lips, something in his belly heated.
She opened those sky-blue eyes and smiled his way. “Nice, huh?”
Jake drew in a sharp breath and inched back from her. “It’s okay.”
What the hell was wrong with him? Noticing Marley’s looks? Being turned on by her? Not good. Especially not with his history.
He turned around, glanced across the pond again, checking the edge of the pool and the water for any creatures. That, at least, kept his mind focused on something important and off the fact she was naked only inches away.
“So how is it you spent eight years as a SEAL and you’re afraid of the water?”
He glanced over his shoulder and huffed. “I’m not afraid of the water. Sea, air, and land. Kinda had to get used to all three during SQT.”
“What’s that?”
“SEAL qualification training.”
“Ah. Got it. But you clearly don’t like the jungle.”
He eyed the edge of the water. “I don’t have a problem with the jungle. It’s everything in the jungle I have issues with.”