"Oh, he's pushing. Just not hard enough to break it. I think he's decided he'd rather have you back alive than have answers that might implicate us in unauthorized ops." Ghost pulled up another chair. "We're officially on stand-down until you're cleared for duty. Pulled from rotation. Sent home to recover and think about our life choices."
"How long?"
"Doc says three to four months minimum before your arm's healed enough for operations. Ribs will be good in six to eight weeks. Leg should be solid in about the same timeframe with aggressive PT." Risk's medical assessment was blunt. "You push it right, stay on top of rehab, you could be back in four months. Maybe less if you're lucky and don't do anything stupid."
Four months. Logan processed that. Four months of physical therapy and limited duty and watching his team operate without him. Four months of recovery. Four months stateside. Four months that could be spent doing something besides just healing. Four months to track down a woman named Mara who'd told him Louisiana and given him a way to find her.
"I can work with four months."
"That's if you don't rush it and make things worse," Risk cautioned. "Bone needs time to heal properly. Rush it and you'll end up with permanent damage. Never operate again."
"Then I won't rush it. I'll do it right." Logan met Risk's eyes. "But I'm not sitting on my ass for four months. I'll be in PT every day. Doing everything the docs tell me and then some."
"That's the attitude," Hawk said. "We need you back. Team's not the same without you."
Joker spoke up from near the window. "Look at the bright side. Four months of being stateside. No deployments. No ops. You could actually have a life for once."
"I have a life."
"You have the teams. That's not the same thing." Joker paused. "Four months is long enough to do something besides just rehab. Maybe actually enjoy being home for a change."
Logan didn't argue because Joker wasn't wrong. Twenty years in special operations. Twenty years of training, deploying, training more. Relationships that didn't stick because he was never around. Family that had stopped calling because he never called back. A life measured in missions instead of moments. But now he had something different. Someone different. A woman with dark eyes who'd come back for him when she didn't have to. Who'd given him her name and told him how to find her. Who'd looked at him like he mattered.
"Speaking of lives," Bulldog said, leaning forward with a grin that meant trouble. "You want to talk about the woman who pulled you out of that cell?"
Logan's eyes opened. "What about her?"
"Just that you haven't stopped asking about her since you woke up. Want to know if she made it out. If her team's okay. If anyone's heard anything." Bulldog's grin widened. "That's a lot of interest in someone you barely met."
"She saved my life. I'm interested in making sure she didn't get killed doing it."
"Uh huh. And that's the only reason you keep bringing her up."
Logan felt heat creep up his neck. Because Bulldog wasn't wrong. He'd been asking about her. Constantly. Every time he surfaced from the pain meds he'd asked if anyone had heard from her team. If they'd made it out clean. If Mara was okay. The word had become a mantra. Mara. Her name. The one she'd given him in the darkness before they'd separated.
"I was half-dead. She was making sure I didn't die. You're reading into something that wasn't there."
Ghost pulled out his tablet. "Actually, I've been doing some research. The team that extracted you wasn't military. Wasn't government. Wasn't any official organization I can find. They operate completely off the grid."
"How do you know?"
"Because I've been tracking communications and trying to figure out who they are. Best guess? Private rescue operation. Probably focused on trafficking victims based on the fact that they were in that compound for Nazari's wife and kid." Ghost pulled up some data. "They're good. Really good. Better operational security than most government agencies. If I hadn't been actively looking, I'd never have found even the traces I did."
Logan thought about Mara. About the way she'd moved through that compound like she'd done it a thousand times. Professional. Competent. Deadly when she needed to be. But it was more than her tactical ability that stuck with him. It was the moment when she'd looked at him in that cell and he'd seen recognition. Not just of his face from the compound, but something deeper. Like she understood what it cost to stay behind. Like she knew what it meant to make the hard calls.
The way she'd steadied him when he couldn't walk. The strength in her hands and the gentleness in her voice when she'd told him to lean on her. The concern in her eyes mixed with determination. The way she'd admitted she couldn't stop seeing his face. Couldn't stop hearing his voice. The way she'd promised they'd figure out what this was. Together.
He'd been attracted to her even through the pain and infection and fog of near-death. Even with his face too swollen to see properly and his body screaming in protest at every movement, he'd noticed her. The way she moved. The way she spoke. The fierce protectiveness when she'd told him he didn't get to quit. The vulnerability when she'd admitted why she'd come back.
"She was beautiful," Logan said quietly. "Even in the middle of that firefight. Even in tactical gear covered in concrete dust. Dark eyes that saw too much. Strong hands that knew exactly how to support my weight without making me feel weak. A voice that could be hard as steel one second and gentle the next." He paused. "Mara. Her name was Mara."
"Oh, you've got it bad," Joker said.
"Yeah. I think I do." Logan didn't try to deny it. "I spent two days in that cell thinking I was going to die. Thinking nobody was coming. And then she walked through that door and everything changed. She came back. Even though she didn't have to. Even though it put her and her team at risk. She came back because she couldn't stop seeing my face."
"Right," Bulldog said. "Which is why you asked about her three times in the medevac. And twice since you've been here. And why you keep saying her name like you're trying to memorize it."
Logan didn't have a good answer for that. Because the truth was he couldn't stop thinking about her. About the way she'd looked at him when they'd separated at the rally point. About the hand squeeze that had felt like a promise. About Louisiana. About finding her when he could walk again. About figuring out if what had started in that compound was real or just adrenaline and chaos.
