Maverick (Elite Ops 2)

“I worry about this op,” Noah stated. “I’d like to get home before the baby is born, if you don’t care.”

Noah’s wife was carrying their first child. The wife he had nearly lost because of his own stupidity, his own pride. Being away from her didn’t sit well with him. But it was his hand that had signed on to the Elite Ops; it was his decision that had placed him with the teams when he could have easily walked away from it all to be with Sabella.

That pride thing. He’d learned his lesson, he had his Sabella back, but he was still a member of the team and would be until the day he died.

“You signed on, you take the heat.” Micah shrugged as he laid his arm along the armrest of the door and watched the traffic closely.

“One of these days,” Noah muttered, almost to himself.

Micah was a hard bastard, there was no doubt. What the hell made him think he was the best man to charm a woman who knew nothing but fear where men were concerned, Noah hadn’t figured out yet.

“One of these days your wife will do us all a favor and shoot you with your own gun,” Micah grunted as his gaze continued to watch the traffic closely. “I hear she threw you to the couch last month.”

Noah frowned. How the hell had Micah found out about that?

“Hell,” Noah growled. “She told Kira, didn’t she?” Kira being the wife to one of the ex–Navy SEAL commanders Micah would be having dinner with that night.

The members of the Durango team had all officially resigned their commissions with the SEALs over the past three years, though none of them were actually free of their covert status. They were the Elite Ops backup team, though Elite Ops was using backup less and less for the smaller operations.

“Maybe she didn’t tell anyone,” Micah stated. “Maybe I was testing your home security and saw you sleeping on the couch. I could have sliced your throat in your sleep.”

“Dream on, asshole.” Noah grinned. “Admit it. Sabella told Kira and she blabbed like the little minx she is. You didn’t pass my security and we both know it.” Wasn’t possible, he had made certain of it.

Micah didn’t so much as smile.

“Look, I’m serious,” Noah sighed. “You go into that club looking like you’re ready to kill and that kid is going to go running for the hills.”

“She isn’t a child.”

Noah paused at Micah’s statement and flashed the other man a curious look.

“She’s not exactly an experienced, worldly woman, either,” Noah assured him. “She’s twenty-six years old, Micah, and all but a virgin.”

“She is a virgin still.” Micah’s tone never changed.

“She was raped.” Noah felt as though he were talking to a brick wall. “She’s wounded, man. You can’t show her the killer face and expect her to trust you.”

Micah turned to look at him now. “The killer face?” he asked evenly.

“Yeah, that icy Mossad façade you’re wearing right now,” he growled. “Ease up, man. Practice smiling or something.”

He flashed Micah a glare as the other man turned his head once again.

“I’ll worry about her reaction to me; you worry about getting us to the club in one piece.”

Noah almost gritted his teeth in frustration. Hell, he still remembered the night he had helped rescue Risa Clay from Diego Fuentes’s cell. She had been like a broken little doll. Vacant-eyed, shuddering from the drugs pumped into her, and fighting the reaction from them with every breath in her body.

She had been such a damned tiny thing. Naked and bruised, blood had marred her thighs, and pain had filled her eyes. Traumatized was a kind word for the state that kid had been in.

“Micah,” he began.

“Noah, you want to stop now.” Micah’s voice hardened, and Noah hadn’t thought that possible. “I know how to deal with Miss Clay. This is a meet and greet, nothing more. A chance to gauge her reaction to me, and therefore her reaction to the plan we intend to put before her tomorrow afternoon. Rest assured, I know how to treat a woman.”

He m

ight know how to treat one, Noah thought, but he sure as hell might not know how to present an unthreatening demeanor.

“Hell, what was Jordan thinking giving this op to you?” Noah questioned his uncle’s decision roughly. “You’ll terrify her.”