“I’m heading inadirection. But don’t let it go to your head.”
“Too late.”
“You know this is an impossible situation.” She leaned into his sturdy frame as they continued slowly up the path. “If I’m not running an op somewhere, I’m losing my mind at Fort Bragg.”
“Aren’t we calling that place Fort Liberty, these days?”
“No one stationed there is,” she mused. “Regardless, you’re in Virginia and deployed almost as much as I am.”
“I’m also not getting any younger.” He paused, turning to face her. “I’m closer to forty than I am thirty.”
She opened her mouth, but he hushed her by pressing his finger over her lips.
“In three years, I’ll have my full twenty years in. I don’t want to move up in the ranks. I don’t want to command my own team. This is as far as I’m going, and I can’t do it forever. My body has been beat up.”
“Are you saying you’re going to retire when you hit thirty-eight?”
“I always said if I made it to forty, I’d leave the military and find something else to do.”
“Like what?” Lark asked as an image of Alverez doing his best to enjoy a vegan burger popped into her brain. It wasn’t real. But Alverez was a man of his word.
“A couple of buddies of mine opened a security-type business. They do everything from bodyguard assignments to joint missions with the government,” Kawan said. “I’d go work for them. They have branches throughout Florida and are expanding into other states. I could probably work anywhere.”
“What about Thor? Jupiter? The rest of the team?”
Kawan traced a finger across her jawline. “They’d get their time and most likely follow me there. Thor and Danni have already talked about it. She’s down for relocating. Moose and Shay would move as long as they could take the chickens. The rest of the gang are single… for now.”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out.”
“I have a plan.” He leaned in and brushed her lips with a tender kiss. “One that includes you.”
She patted his chest. “You’re turning into an old sap.”
“An old sap who loves you and isn’t giving up on us this time.”
Each time he said the words, her pulse increased, and her breath hitched. “I need you to lay off on the love stuff until this mission is completely behind us.” She palmed his cheek. “I’m not going to sneak out again. I promise. I just can’t think about it with everything else going on.”
“I can live with that.” He laced his fingers through hers as they continued up the path.
He pulled open the door and waved her inside the small building that the men and women who worked at the Refuge used for personal offices and other business. It was private, not intended for guests.
They navigated the corridor to a small conference room. The hum of computers filled the air. The scent of old coffee, sweat, and fried bacon lingered in the air.
“Welcome to the party,” Ry said, peering over one of the screens. Her fingers never stopped flying across the computer.
“Looks like you all started without us.” Kawan went for the coffee, pouring two cups.
Specs grunted. “Right. Because either one of you knows anything about coding.”
“I tried to teach him a few things.” Jupiter stood, stretched, and strolled toward the mini fridge. “But he barely knows how to work his smartphone.”
“I’m offended,” Kawan said. His eyes narrowed in mock hurt.
Lark leaned her hip on the edge of the long conference table, boot bouncing against the chair leg, eyes glued to the flash drive Specs just slotted into her military-grade laptop.
Kawan handed Lark a cup and watched the screens with the silent intensity of a man ready to launch into action. Specs hunched over the machine, fingers flying across the keys like someone had lit a fire under her ass. Jupiter leaned against the wall, arms folded, chewing on the corner of a protein barwrapper—which Kawan had learned was one of Jupiter’s coping mechanisms.
Ry continued her assault on her keyboard. Her eyes shifted left and right. Up and down.
