“Which is why we need to teach you how to fly one of these suckers,” Devon replied from the pilot’s seat. “To free me up to shoot.”
“Or he could spend more time at the shooting range with me,” Sera added. “Practice makes perfect.”
“I don’t know about that,” Whit drawled, looking at Hadley. “When’s the last time you were at a range?”
“Seven months ago.”
Those three little words held so much nostalgia. I needed to ask her about it later when we were alone.
“See!” Whit crowed. “She was damn near perfect without a hint of practice in almost forever. I was at the range last week and couldn’t have made the same shot she did. My point has been made, practice doesn’t always make perfect. Natural ability factors in and Boss’s girl was born to hold a gun.”
“Enough,” I barked out, feeling Hadley’s muscles tense. Whit, Devon, Sera and I had each killed during our time in the military. Some of us more than others, something Whit took for granted since the body count from his explosives was damn high. But Hadley was a civilian, an innocent twenty-two-year-old woman. Based on her trembling, I was certain her onlyprevious experience with guns had been firing at paper targets. She’d proven herself to be incredibly strong with how well she’d held up over the last day and a half, but killing a man was another thing entirely. After her kidnapping, her time spent with her captors and her escape, this very well could be the straw that broke the camel’s back for her.
“Don’t be a dipshit,” Sera hissed, gesturing at Hadley.
She tugged on Whit’s arm to move them to the side of the aircraft opposite of us, giving Hadley and me a small degree of privacy. I yanked our comms units out of our ears and gripped them in a fist, settling us on our side until my back was against the wall of the chopper and Hadley was seated on my lap facing me. I lowered my head, my mouth settling above her ear to ensure she could hear me over the noise from the chopper’s motor.
“It was him or me, precious, and I for one am damn grateful you took the shot that saved my life.”
She pulled back, staring at me with tears filling her pretty green eyes before she leaned up to answer me. “Me, too. I think that’s the hardest part, knowing I don’t regret taking a life. Not even a little bit. I know if I hadn’t done it then you’d be dead, and that’s something I couldn’t live with.”
When she was done speaking, her head dropped onto my shoulder and sobs shook her body. I held her close, running my hands down her back trying to soothe her as she cried for the rest of the long flight to the airstrip where a private plane waited for us. The chopper had been borrowed from the army base in Honduras, thanks to the General. Once we made contact with him, someone would be sent to pick it up from the airstrip since it was a short drive from the base.
The plane belonged to my best friend. I’d helped to save Morgan’s woman a while back and he was happy to return the favor when I’d called him to see if he could help with ourtransportation on this mission. I hadn’t wanted to trigger any red flags with our arrival, and he’d arranged for the flight into Honduras under the guise of business purposes, listing Devon as the pilot, Whit as the co-pilot and Sera and me as the only passengers—only we hadn’t flown in under our own names and had used Morgan and his wife’s credentials. It was risky, but the General had pulled some strings with his military contacts to make it work.
He’d also arranged for a military log to show Sera as flying into the base yesterday. The plan was for her to fly back with us on her own passport while Hadley and I entered the United States as Morgan and Angelica, who would meet us at the private airport when we had our “emergency landing” and exchange places with us before the plane was “repaired” and continued on to the final destination where Customs would board the plane. The plan was risky because I wasn’t sure if the fake passports I’d had made for Hadley and I would hold up if we weren’t able to make the switch, but I didn’t want anyone to know she was back in the States.
I also didn’t want her captors to connect Hadley to me or my company. Not until I was able to pinpoint who’d been the one to order her kidnapping. Then they wouldn’t need to link us together because they’d be too busy trying to stay alive to worry about Hadley. I’d collected a lot of contacts during my time in the military, made friends and saved lives. Many favors were owed to me, and I’d call in every single one if that’s what it took to ensure her safety. A message needed to be sent— Hadley was off limits—and I was the man who’d make sure it was received loud and clear by anyone who thought to use her as a pawn in the future.
Even if it turned out that her father and the General were in bed with the bad guys somehow, Hadley was officially out of this mess. She wasn’t her father’s responsibility anymore. She wasmine, and I’d do whatever was necessary to keep her safe and happy, right where she belonged. With me.
As I led her from the chopper and across the airstrip to the plane, it was as though she was in sync with me. She asked a question directly in line with what I was thinking, the perfect question for me to be able to keep her by my side.
“Where are we going? Is there anywhere in the world where I’ll be safe?”
“Yes, Hadley. There’s most definitely somewhere you can go to be safe. You’re coming home with me.”And that’s where you’ll stay once this is all over, too.At least I was smart enough to only think the last part and didn’t blurt it out and scare her half to death.
10
HADLEY
Brecken wanted me to go home with him.His words kept replaying in my head as we all transferred from the helicopter to the plane. Brecken and I took the seats in the back of the plane. Sera sat near the front, and Whit and Devon went into the cockpit. I gripped Brecken’s hand during takeoff. After going through hell, my fear of flying seemed silly but it was still at the back of my mind. Then a miracle happened, something which had never been in the realm of possibility during any of my previous flights, the motion of the plane lulled me to sleep. I woke up to the sound of the landing gear going down and found myself with my head in Brecken’s lap, his fingers running through my hair. The feeling was incredibly soothing, but I jerked up when the plane landed with a bump.
“We’re safe and sound in the States now, Hadley,” Brecken reassured me.
“But what about Customs?” I worried aloud. “I don’t have any paperwork with me. Nothing to prove who I am, let alone that I’m an American citizen.”
I heard the screech of brakes and then Sera jumped up from her seat and got to work at opening the plane door.
“No need,” Brecken answered, undoing my seat belt and tugging me behind him as he strode down the aisle between the seats. By the time we made it to the door, the stairs were down and a hot guy with a beautiful younger woman was climbing up them. “We’re getting off here.”
“It’s good to see you made it back without damaging my plane,” the guy joked, slapping Brecken on the back as he moved past us.
“Oh, stop it, Morgan,” the girl scolded, flashing me a quick grin. “We both know you couldn’t care less about the plane. Even if you did, it wouldn’t matter since you owe him a debt which can never be repaid.”
I wondered what Brecken could have done for this man to be in his debt to such an extent that the loss of a private plane would be negligible. Morgan pulled the woman into his lap as he sat down in the aisle seat in the front row. The love in his gaze as he looked at her was evident to anyone seeing them together. “You’re right, Angel. Without him, I wouldn’t have been able to save you and all the planes in the world wouldn’t come close to the loss that would have been.”
Mystery solved then. Brecken had helped save her life, just as he’d done with me. If I was lucky, maybe he’d come to look at me the way Morgan gazed at his Angel.
