6
Mack shieldedher body with his. “Anybody get a direction?”
Merc was closest to them, flat on the ground with his weapon raised and ready. “It was coming from the east, less than a klick out. They’re tracking us.”
“Could be the other side, too.” Ranger rolled over from his back to his stomach and got to his knees. The thick vegetation shielded part of his body. “We gotta get out of here, boss.”
“Roger.” Mack lifted up, scanning the vicinity. He needed to get a beat on their surroundings and map out a trajectory for their evacuation, but the thick foliage seemed like an endless tangled spider web of green leaves and vines.
There was a sharp report, then a bullet zinged within a few feet of his head, slicing through the grass with a sharp hiss. Mack dropped back to the ground and Marley let out a cry when she took the full weight of his body on top of hers. Damn, that had been close. Too close.
Keeping to the ground, Ranger bellycrawled toward Mack. “That came from the east.”
Mack gave a grim nod. “I gathered that.”
Although Hoyt had gotten a good look from up above and they had been able to map out a path, his team was still basically working blind. And they were fighting an enemy on foreign territory, an enemy who would undoubtedly kill each of them on sight. Marley squirmed again, inadvertently pressing her more than abundant breasts to his chest, and Mack’s body responded. Dammit.
She froze and her brown eyes widened, her reason for alarm different from the guerrillas slowly tightening the noose around them. But before she could eke out a protest, Mack covered her mouth with his hand and said with his mouth next to her ear, “Stop squirming.”
Why the hell he was responding to her in that way was something he’d have to ponder later, after he got her ass out of another sticky situation.
At least she had the common sense to obey his command. Now if he could just focus on anything other than the way her heart was hammering against his chest.
Scanning their surroundings, Hoyt did a circle with his finger in the air. Mack nodded, and Hoyt, using his elbows to guide him, began to silently edge away from the group.
Marley tapped on Mack’s chest and irritation replaced attraction. “What?”
“Can’t breathe.” Mack’s feelings rotated to guilt as he lifted up onto his elbows. He was easily twice her size, almost two hundred pounds of solid muscle, and she couldn’t weigh more than about a hundred.
Marley sucked in a deep quick breath. “Thanks.”
Mack stared down at her. There were flecks of gold in her brown eyes. Now, why in the hell was he noticing that? “Just keep quiet.”
The gratitude in her eyes dissolved to anger and Mack went back to studying his surroundings and doing his best to ignore Marley and her soft curves and her pretty eyes. There was a slight wrestling a few feet away and Hoyt emerged from the camouflage in front of them, still on his stomach.
“They’ve got us on both sides. About twenty total, packing heat. Mostly automatic rifles and handguns.”
On a normal day, his men could take down twenty hostiles in their sleep. But Marley threw a wrench into the equation. Even though Marley had gone through combat training, he didn’t want the first test of her knowledge to be a confrontation with bloodthirsty guerrillas in the Congo. If she were injured . . . the thought turned his stomach.
For whatever reason, he couldn’t seem to turn off his emotions like normal and pretend she was just another soldier or someone who needed protection.
She had a daughter, too—she’d said so earlier while blasting them for suspecting her. He had to admire her gumption. There weren’t many people, men or women, who could face down a special operatives group without trembling in fear, let alone have the balls to chew them out.
“I want to evade. Let’s see if we can’t move out of here and avoid gunfight.”
He could practically feel his men’s questioning looks scorching into his shoulder blades. As if on cue, Marley said, “I hope that’s not for my benefit.”
Of course it was for her benefit. “Marley, we’ve all just been through the plane crash. Engaging in a gunfight in unknown hostile territory is not a smart move.”
No matter, he itched to take out his frustration on their assailants.
“Hoyt, can you get to the rest of the men and let them know to evade?”
Hoyt didn’t say anything, just gave him a quick nod before moving off quietly and efficiently.
“Now that your man’s gone,” Marley said, “I’m going to come out and say it. You’re running to protect me.”
She practically glared at him again and Mack’s irritation sparked. “No one questions my orders.”
She jutted her chin, a move he was coming to seriously dislike, and managed to pull off the whole affronted feminist look even from her position on the ground beneath him. “I’m not one of your men.”
Mack leaned in until his nose was only an inch from hers, intending to tell her exactly how he’d discipline her if she were one of his men. Then he caught another whiff of her scent—fresh, like spring flowers, but sweeter than the perfume his wife used to wear.
Mack suddenly found himself wondering if her lips tasted as good as she smelled.
“Colonel, the men are ready.”
Mack glanced up into the closed-off expression of Hoyt Crowe. He’d closed in on him without Mack even noticing. Shit. He must’ve gone too long without a lay. That was the only explanation for his irrational behavior. For this out-of-nowhere attraction.
He rolled off Marley a little more abruptly than intended. With any luck, some damned distance would cure him of his . . . distraction.
