Chapter 13
13
Helen stood there, trying to be strong for him.
She had looked up as D-Day passed Taer’s room in nothing but a towel. She’d frowned, noticing that he was all wet, but when her gaze had reached his face, her heart stalled. She’d thought for a moment that he was kicking himself regarding his teammates. She was just as on edge about them out there with two warring factions, and her brother was incapacitated. And she and D-Day were trapped there until they found the triggers. Her heart had lurched at those thoughts, her instinct to help crawling through her like spiders under her skin.
She’d wrestled with herself, looking down at Taer who was still hanging on. The plasma and fluids Zorro had provided were helping to keep him alive, but once they ran out, Taer was going to pass, and Lando was going to lose it.
“What is it?” he’d asked.
“Nothing,” she’d responded. “I just need to take a shower and change my clothes. Would it be all right if I rummaged through your drawers again?” He’d smiled and nodded. “When I get back, we’ll get some more broth into you, and we’ll talk for a while if you’re up to it.”
She went to leave, and he’d reached out and clasped her wrist, his grip surprisingly strong. “I have told my brother if I die, he is forbidden from harming you. I made him promise me, Helen.”
Her throat had closed up. He might have done terrible things, but in the last moments of his life, he was trying to be decent. She’d set her hand against his shoulder and squeezed. “Thank you for that. I don’t know what your brother will choose to do if that happens, but I’m grateful for your intervention on my behalf. I’ll be back in a bit,” she’d promised.
He’d nodded and she’d gotten up, found something to wear, and left the room.
Well aware that going anywhere near D-Day had been a risky move, Helen hadn’t been able to stop herself from reacting to that look on his face.
She’d entered the room with a fresh set of clothes, set them on the bed, and gone to him, simply saying his name.
D-Day’s words had a thread of steel in them when he said, “What are you doing in here? If Lando catches us, he’ll?—”
“Screw him. If that happens, I’ll figure something out.” Taking a deep breath, she caught his head between her hands, her chest so full she could barely breathe. The muscles in his jaw contracted as he tried to swallow, and she tightened her hold on him, willing him to look at her. Finally, he met her gaze, the rawness in his eyes going straight to her heart. “I saw your face when you passed Taer’s room. If you think I can handle not being here for you…I just can’t,” she whispered vehemently, maybe not as strong as she thought she could be. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
Twisting his face away from her touch, he caught her hand, then laced his fingers through hers with a crushing grip. His expression scored with a range of emotions, he closed his eyes and pressed her hand against his mouth, his voice hoarse. “I can’t. I’ve got shit to figure out before I can be straight with you about…”
“About?” She was suspended, wanting to know what was eating at him all this time. What was really keeping him from fully trusting her, from fully embracing what was strong between them? “Drew, please.”
“Everything. But now is not the time for this. We have to focus on the mission and getting our asses out of here once we get those triggers.”
She took a hard breath, fighting against the swell of tears. She tore her hand free and slipped her arms around his neck, a soft sob wrenching loose when he gathered her up in a hard, tight embrace. He roughly cupped the back of her head, a tremor shuddering through him, and Helen yielded to the pressure of his arms, tears of a deep, terrible ache slipping from beneath her lashes. Despite where they were, what they had to do, and all that had gone wrong, this was right. “You’re everything to me, Drew,” she whispered. “You’ve got to know that. So, there isn’t anything you can tell me that will change how I feel about you.”
He drew a deep, uneven breath, his voice raw with emotion. “Are you sure about that?” Moved by the depth of feeling in those hoarsely spoken words, Helen shifted her head, her mouth connecting with his in a kiss that was filled with so much emotion, with such deep, unconditional commitment, that it drove every conscious thought out of her mind. Rising on tiptoe, she molded herself tightly against him as he shifted his hold, bringing her fully against him from shoulder to thigh. She held nothing back in that kiss—nothing, opening her heart and embracing all the emotions that crowded there to be released. And she absorbed the fire in him—the wonderful, hot, all-consuming fire that emanated from his very soul. He was the most overpowering, thrilling, complex man she’d ever met.
He released her, dragging his mouth away, his breathing uneven, his hold almost savage, as he bowed his head. “We all have something we regret,” she whispered softly, but we’re all human, and we all make mistakes or get caught up in terrible things.” Helen wasn’t sure whose heart was pounding harder, but if he let her go, her legs would be like spaghetti. “I had no idea that you were going to change my life. All these emotions I’ve tried so hard to keep at bay for the sake of my sanity, for the sake of the people I need to help seem to be overloading me now.” Her forehead resting against the angle of his jaw, Helen weakly closed her eyes, trying to catch both her breath and her balance, unable to hold in the words she so desperately wanted him to hear. “I’m in lo?—”
D-Day sucked in a deep breath, interrupting her, then dragged his hand up her back, surrounding her in a protective hold, his face contorting with raw emotion. “No, Helen, don’t.” Grinding out a guttural denial, his eyes flashed. “ Goddammit , don’t.” Through the heat of his anger, she saw the shimmer of moisture in his eyes. “Not here .” His voice caught and broke. “Not now in this fucking place.” He grabbed her by the upper arms and dragged her against him.
It was one of the hardest things Helen had ever had to do, to keep those words locked up inside her when she wanted to shout them into his handsome face. Her gut was quivery, a huge load of anxiety working at the last vestiges of her control. She wanted all of this behind them. First, she wanted to get out from under the threat of nuclear detonation, but she wanted more than that, too. Much more. She wanted time alone with D-Day, uninterrupted time. They desperately needed a chance to talk, to sort things out. D-Day might have acknowledged all this trapped intensity, but it was clear he was warring with himself over what he just couldn’t seem to tell her. And the only way they were ever going to get to the meat of the problem was to have time to explore their feelings, to talk about all the things they had stored away between them and all the issues each of them was facing individually. And that was all more than a little frightening.
There was a rattle of the doorknob, then pounding.
“Go,” she said, shoving him inside the bathroom. “Quickly, turn on the shower.” As soon as she heard the water go on, her heart aching for the way they were interrupted, she snatched the clothes off the bed and opened the door.
Lando stood outside, his eyes narrowed slits, his face contorted in rage. “What are you doing in there?”
She lifted her chin, so annoyed by his intrusion. “I had planned to take a shower, but apparently, it’s being used.” He looked around the door, then his lips compressed. She took that opportunity to shove by him. “I’ll feed your brother some broth instead and use it once it’s free.”
He grabbed her by the hair and yanked her back against his hard chest, his voice low and vehement. “Your life is measured by the beats of my brother’s heart. It’s in your best interest to attend to him.” He shoved her away, her scalp burning.
She whirled on him, her mouth curling into a subtle sneer. “How did you lose your soul when Taer kept his? I don’t know, but you are an empty, ugly shell of man with no compassion for anyone. I’d feel sorry for you, but I don’t have any pity for monsters!”
He slapped her so hard, she saw stars, her cheek scalding like live ash. It snapped her head back and her bottom lip split, instantly filling her mouth with the sharp, thick taste of her own blood. Lando had no idea that Buck had taught her how to defend herself, and he’d taught her the most down-and-dirty tricks to get away, to fight, if necessary, to incapacitate when there was no alternative and all she wanted to do right at this moment was to show him every punishing move.
She suffered through his cocky smirk and his dominating eyes, gritting her teeth to keep silent, refusing to let him break her in any way that mattered. She couldn’t fight right now. But when the shackles were off her, she would show him that an American badass midwestern girl from Wyoming knew how to throw down.
She had a job to do for her country and patriotism won over her own sick fury and heartfelt sorrow. She choked down the knot in her throat.
His glittering eyes, as dark as the depth of hell, flashed with triumph as she backed down. “There is most definitely a difference between instant death and being made to beg for death. Your cooperation and my brother’s survival will make all the difference for your fate.”
She turned away without a word, knowing that she could barely hold back the fuck you that was on her tongue. Antagonizing him any further was going to be unproductive, but as she sucked on her stinging lip, it would be so damn satisfying.
She went and asked the sweet woman for some broth. The woman nodded and smiled, and Helen went back to Taer’s room and went back to sit beside his bed. He opened his eyes.
“Helen,” he whispered, “Taer told me just minutes ago that he has the triggers here inside our home. The NPA will be here soon, but he refused to tell me where they are. I’m sorry that I failed you and failed my country.” His voice, anguished and desperate, he expelled air, fought for another breath. Oh, God, she knew the signs. He was dying, and in his last moments. Sharp disappointment for the inability of him to get the answers they needed twisted her heart. There would have to be another way. She swore as Taer’s breath fluttered, his eyes going dazed and glassy, no hope left in them, nothing but resignation. “Fight him with all you have. He will not handle…my death well, and please, save my country, my people.”
His last exhalation slipped out of his mouth, and she swore again, but more softly, much, much more softly.
For the first time in her life, she just sat there, unable to put two thoughts together in her head. She covered her eyes, unable to look at Taer’s face anymore. Dropping her hands, she stared numbly into space, another rush of panic stirring in her middle. This had come too soon—and she wasn’t ready for it. She needed more time.
Her insides churning, Helen clenched her jaw, the panic climbing higher. All her life she had hidden herself in her ability not to react. It’s what made her an excellent nurse. But Taer’s death was pushing them into the next, highly dangerous part of this mission. Their plan of getting the whereabouts of the triggers, stealing them, and then running for it, was gone. Swallowing hard, she closed her eyes. Reality had just jerked the rug out from under them.
Suddenly, the door opened, and the woman came in with the broth. Helen got up quickly and took the mug from her as the woman’s eyes darted to the bed. “He’s sleeping, but I’ll get some of this into him.” She lied so smoothly, even her voice sounded normal. Thank God. This would buy her some time until she could speak to D-Day and let him know that Taer was dead without any way to get at the triggers.
“Yes, missy,” the woman said and backed out of the door.
Apparently, her ploy hadn’t worked because Lando appeared in the doorway, his face twisted with suspicion. He looked at the mug in her hand, then at his brother on the bed. When his eyes flicked back to her, she knew that she couldn’t bluff her way out of this, dread beating in her chest. Facing him was going to be terrifying, and her insides curled up just thinking about it. But her time had run out.
Cold to the core, she gestured toward the bed. The longer she put it off, the worse it would be. With dread climbing her throat, she couldn’t speak for a moment.
“What is going on?” he bit out, starting toward the bed.
Expelling the air out of her lungs to try and clear away the sick flutter, Helen worked at staying calm. Willing down the queasy feeling and trying to keep her voice from trembling, she said, “He’s gone.”
He roared, “No!” as if the power of his denial was enough to breathe life into his brother. The word shook with the fierce power of his agony. He rushed toward the bed and knelt on his haunches, gathering his brother’s body to him, and just sat there, his body shaking with his grief. “ Maliit na tigre ,” he whispered softly, over and over, an obvious beloved nickname, his voice breaking on the words. Little tiger . The monster had a heart, but only for his twin. There was not going to be any mercy for her. She backed toward the door, not sure what she was going to do, running would be futile. His men were outside, and she would never get away. Besides, she wasn’t leaving D-Day.
The dread came back with a vicious rush, and Helen’s stomach dropped away to nothing. Her hands suddenly clammy, she braced herself with a deep breath.
D-Day—she had to get to him.
But before she could move, she heard the bed squeak, and Lando set his feet on the floor, tension in every line of his body. His eyes were strange, empty, dark, evil, and all of it murderous, remorseless, and completely out of control. He lunged at her, and she threw the hot broth into his face. He howled with pain and stopped moving, and she darted into the hall, but he caught her, tumbling with her to the floor.
She shrieked in anger and pain, and twisted out of his hold, lashing out with her feet, kicking at his knees, shins, any part of him she could hit.
She scrambled to her feet and backed up. His lips pulled back against his teeth in a feral snarl, and he was up, rushing toward her, the back of his hand exploding against the side of her face, snapping her head to the side, bringing another bright burst of stars behind her eyes and the split lip started bleeding again.
For a moment, she took gasping breaths, as his chest heaved with his righteous fury. His fury! For what ? Her constant, unrelenting subservience to a dead man when he left Greg out in the jungle, wounded, all alone to die. Her only consolation was that D-Day, her brother, and Zorro had been there when he’d taken his last breaths. Those last breaths used to send them to her rescue.
Lando had no humanity, and all that black morass of rage, sorrow for not only Greg but for her team, who had been murdered at the hands of such a man as Lando, bubbled to the surface like a swamp beast. Their screams filled her head like the echoes of ghosts. Their pain clawed at her. Their panic rose in her throat.
Pushed to the limit of her endurance, she covered her stinging cheek with the palm of her hand. Something broke open in her, all the grief, sorrow, the restlessness, recklessness, the wildness rushed out on a wave of loathing for such a contemptible person. He stood between her happiness and the end of her life. He stood between the man she loved beyond reason and the agony of loss, and he stood between the living, breathing life of the Philippines, and devastating annihilation. He was the trigger, the linchpin, and the designer of Armageddon.
And she wasn’t going to let him get away with it.
Adrenaline pumped through her in a strengthening rush, driving her forward instead of away. She punched him in the face, slashed his throat with the side of her hand, and he coughed, clutching his windpipe, and backed up from the sudden, brutal blows.
Then she kneed him in the groin, and as he cried out, incapacitated from what looked like excruciating pain, the heel of her palm connected solidly at the base of his nose with all the force she could muster. He staggered back and fell to his back, his hands around his nuts, blood flowing from his nose.
A heavy object crashed against the back of her skull, spinning the room around her, as she struggled for balance. She staggered to the wall to keep herself from falling. Catching a glimpse of Lando’s housemaid, she worked at staying upright.
She stilled automatically as the blade of a dagger glinted. Helen’s heart drummed, impossibly hard, impossibly loud, as the blade came nearer and nearer to her face. It was slim and elegant, like the hand curled around its golden hilt. The blade was polished steel that had been ornately engraved from the guard to the tip. Beautiful, deadly, like the man who held it.
“You fucking bitch,” he growled, blood flowing from his nose, his eye red and swelling from her fist. “I’ll cut your heart out of you.”
“Wait,” she said desperately, knowing that she had seconds to live as the blade traced down her chin, down the center of her throat to the vulnerable hollow at its base. The dagger rested in the V of her collarbone, the point tickling the delicate flesh above. The sensation made her want to gag. She swallowed back the need, felt the tip bite into her skin. Every cell of her body was quivering. “Don’t you want to know what Taer said before he died?” she whispered, seizing her anger and hate and using them as shields to beat back the terror. “Don’t you want to know what his last words were for you?”
Lando froze, his muscles still taut, but she felt the change in him, the ravenous need for some shred of information that would soothe him. She was sure he despised his weakness, but there seemed to be no way he could handle killing her with his brother’s words unsaid.
“What did he say? Or I will gut you right here.” He was on the very edge of murder, and the relish in his voice made her stomach roll.
She took a hard breath. “He said that you shouldn’t mourn him, that he reaped what he sowed, and he was thankful that his last act on this planet was to save me from those drugrunners,” she said, fighting for her life with the only thing she had left—her words.
“You’re a lying bitch,” he spat venomously.
She didn’t respond to his deranged tone. “He said he hoped that you would see the light and save your country the terrible, utter devastation that only you could prevent. He said that he loved you and always would.”
Lando choked up, the sound of his distress a hot stream of heat and moisture against the back of her neck.
“I think I might have a satisfactory compromise.”
The sound of D-Day’s voice made her eyes fill, but she held back the tears, held back the hysteria, grabbed her sanity with both mental hands, and hung on as D-Day’s next words made her stiffen, an effective reaction on her part to what he suggested. Lando spun around, and she found D-Day not far away, dressed in only a pair of white flowing pants, his hair still damp from the shower.
He was a talented actor, and she was surprised by the lack of feeling in his voice. He sounded completely without remorse, completely devoid of conscience. Emotionless, soulless. It was clear from the expression on his face that there would be no appeal to his sense of mercy or humanity.
“Let me have her… She embarrassed me in front of my guys, and I feel the need to teach her some respect.” He grabbed his crotch and hefted it, then he smiled with a lazy, dangerous grin that would have left any woman in terror if he wasn’t putting on a show to save her life. “Let me give you something valuable for such a useless whore,” D-Day said without even an inflection of emotion in his thickly accented words.
“I’d rather be gutted,” she hissed, playing her part.
D-Day smiled at her, truly pleased and the knife at her throat slackened. Lando was contemplating the offer.
“What would you bargain for this lying, tempting, traitorous bitch?”
He dipped his hand into the pocket of his pants and brought out the pouch Lando had given him. He spilled out its contents into his palm, the sparkling gems catching the light and glittering like stars.
He took his time browsing through the diamonds, then he chose the biggest one of the bunch. He held it up and it winked, the prisms looking both beautifully cut and exceptionally flawless.
“Catch,” he said, as he tossed the diamond. It made an arc in the air, and Lando had no choice but to push her toward D-Day, just as her wily SEAL planned, and he snatched the gem out of the air, looking down at it, his face fierce.
D-Day caught her against him, in what looked like a brutal hold, but it was anything but. How he held her so gently, yet gave the impression he was hurting her was masterful. She winced and cried out for effect, his body hard, powerful, and safe against her. Her relief was almost unbearable, but she dropped her head on a soft sob to hide anything that might have slipped through.
“Please, don’t do this,” she pleaded.
D-Day leaned close, bringing his face down next to hers, rubbing his cheek against hers. His beard stubble sent a tingle of goosebumps over her skin, his cheek warm against hers. “We’re finally going to get to know each other very well,” he murmured. She struggled, and he chuckled. “Go ahead and fight. I like it when they fight.”
She made a soft distressed sound in her throat, and he laughed again.
He looked up at Lando. “Dagger,” he said, and that was how he disarmed the idiot. Helen realized that D-Day was the most dangerous man in the room, and she shivered, adding some more realism into this farce, but it had nothing to do with fear. The only reason Lando was alive was because D-Day was uncertain if Taer had spilled the beans about the triggers, and he couldn’t take the chance that he had failed, leaving Lando as the only person in this godforsaken place who knew.
He turned the handle toward D-Day and pressed the ornate grip into D-Day’s hand.
Dragging the dagger down between her breasts, where her heart pounded beneath the thin fabric of Taer’s T-shirt, a slight motion of his wrist directed the point to nip into the cotton and nudge her breast, but his skillful handling of the blade didn’t even break her skin. “I am your salvation,” he whispered. “I hold your life in my hands. There’s no escape for you to find, Helen. You’re mine. The only law is my law.”
She screamed as D-Day sliced violently downward with the blade, opening the fabric from neck band to hem. Instinctively she bolted back, colliding with his thickly muscled body. His left arm snaked around her middle and held her there as he ground against her butt with a guttural thrust of his hips. “I’m going to fuck you until I wear you out, then I’m going to fuck you some more in so many delicious ways until you break.”
He started to drag her toward the bedroom, but Lando said, “Wait. You can only have her on two conditions,” he said, his eyes going over the tantalizing bareness of her body between the ragged T-shirt that barely covered her breasts. “One, I get to watch, and two, you give me to her when you’re done.”