Mission to Protect (Team Falcon: Agile Security & Rescue Team 2 #6)
Chapter 1
This was supposed to be a mission to buy the team donuts, instead I push through the swinging door, looking for the missing clerk.
The small kitchen wears the marks of a struggle. Spilled ingredients. Erratic footprints in the debris.
Moving quickly, I clear the corners and open supply closet.
“You fucking bitch. Learn your lesson this time. Stay out of business that's not yours."
My focus shifts to the open back door. Temper flaring as I put the pieces together. Woman working, man coming in the back door. A domestic threat.
There's a muscle ticking under my eye as I move toward the exit. Some asshole's about to get a lesson in manners. Courtesy of my big ass fist.
“Ooof!” A woman gasps as she bounces off my front as she barrels through the door. “Who…who are you?”
Her effort to get away from me almost sends her crashing to the floor, but I catch her arm, hauling her upright.
“Easy there, I heard some kind of trouble.”
I pull her further inside, clocking the fact that she’s wearing an angry mark on her face. Not stopping to decode that before I put my six-foot-four-inch body between this small creature and the asshole who scared her.
She’s trembling, deer in headlights, staring at the door.
“He’ll be gone by now. He made his point,” she says, breathless, shaking.
”Stay here, I’m going for a look,“ I push her behind one of the work benches, gently easing her down, as I draw my pistol. ”Get low. I’ll be back.“
She hesitates for a second before sinking down on the floor, holding her knees to her chest. I don’t have time to process what seeing her like that does to me.
I’ve rescued dozens of women all over the world.
Just rescued my teammate’s girl hours ago.
Maybe that’s why I’m kicked hard by the bruises she’s already wearing and it’s only been seconds since the attack.
“I’m coming back,” I choke out over the anger brewing inside me.
Tornados are calm compared to what I feel.
When I scan the area, the son-of-a-bitch hasn’t gone far. A black Mercedes SUV is merging into traffic. Two males inside, partially hidden by tinted windows.
They’re not in a hurry. Like they’ve got every right to be here.
I stand long enough for them to see me and I don’t hide the gun I’m holding.
They’ll know I memorized their tags. And if they’ve got any tactical awareness at all, they’re already aware that I’m locked on and this won’t go unpunished.
“That’s right, take a good long look, assholes. I see you.”
When they’re out of sight, I head back inside. “They’re gone,” I tell her as I flip the dead bolts on the door.
She scrambles off the floor, whiskey-brown hair half out of her ponytail, eyes big as can be in her pale face.
I’m struck immobile for a beat, watching her eyes start to shine with tears. Standing in a bakery kitchen that shows the signs of struggle.
In the next second, I’m moving toward her automatically. “You’re safe.”
She leans into me, and the urge to shelter her is visceral. I draw her against my chest, cradling her head into the crook of my shoulder. “They know I’m here and I made it clear they weren’t getting back in.”
The first sob shakes her shoulders.
The second shakes me.
I’m choking on gravel when I whisper against her hair. “Don’t be afraid. I’ve got you.”
She cries hard. Hands twisting into my shirt, tears drenching my shoulder. Fuck, what has happened to this woman?
“Cry all you need to,” I murmur as I rub her back. Every stroke of my hand making me angrier.
Jesus. Is she not eating?
“Did you call the cops on him?” I ask, forcing my tone even when I am not even close to being calm.
“No.”
More sobs follow and I know she has to feel the anger shaking my hands now.
It takes a lot for me to get blistering mad. Seeing her wrecked and bruised is gasoline to fire.
How could someone hurt any woman like this?
“Let’s sit you over here. I’m going to take a look at your face.”
When I lift her onto the counter by the swinging doors, she won’t look at me.
“I’m sorry,“ she whispers using her sleeve to wipe her face. “I don’t know what got into me. I just lost it when you said that.”
Those words drag a hot knife through my chest.
I tilt her face up. It’s critical that she sees how much I mean this. “You don’t have to explain.”
Any hope in her expression is quickly doused by doubt.
Silent, she searches my face as I inspect the handprint on her face. It’s huge. Nearly the size of my own palm.
It takes monumental effort to keep anger in check.
”You need ice,“ I half-growl, moving my inspection to her arm where another handprint is turning black. “I want to break this fucker’s arm off for hurting you.”
She goes so still, not even breathing, it draws my focus to her face.
For the first time, there she is. Guard down. Trusting me.
We don’t move. Don’t speak. Not sure we breathe. Whatever passes between us might be silent, but it’s loud as cannon fire.
And don’t want to think about it.
“Let me get you some ice.”
She nods. “Okay there are some bags on the shelves. But really, I could do it.”
“No. You can’t. Not with me here.”
Her gaze is on me as I move to the freezer and rummage around until I’ve got what I need. When I return with a bag and a hand towel, she’s sad. Just fucking sad.
“Here, let’s get this iced down,” I press the ice gently to her skin. “Tilt your face up.”
Her eyes drift closed as I adjust the bag to cover most of the bruise and like some goddamned animal I study her beautiful features.
This woman stops men in their tracks. There’s no question.
From the wide, almost too large, blue eyes, to the gentle swell of her lips, to the dimple in her damned chin. I’ve never seen a more striking woman.
She’s like some kind of renaissance painting.
I curse myself. Jesus fuck. The woman’s just been attacked and I can’t keep my eyes off her.
“Do you have a headache or any dizziness?” I force myself into tactical mode.
Those pretty eyes stay closed.
”No, I’m fine, and even if I did, I can’t do anything about it. There’s no one to cover my shift here, and besides,“ she clears her throat. “I’m not in a position to… um pay for urgent care.”
When I stroke my thumb over the cheek that’s not bruised, she slowly opens her eyes and focuses on me again.
It’s not good. Or maybe it’s amazing. I’m confused as hell and I’m never confused.
I’m orderly. Tactical. Prepared.
Until today.
And now with her misty eyes looking up at me, I’m flying blind.
A strange sensation stretches inside my ribcage. It’s new and old. Recognized in some recess of my mind. Like an ancient part of me has come to life.
“You don’t have to worry about work, or paying for urgent care,” I tell this perfect stranger, “I’m going to take care of it.”
At first she looks confused, then within seconds, she’s frowning. Downright perturbed. “You’re kidding, right?”
Clearly, she has no idea what kind of man I am.
“Do I look like I’m kidding?”
After glancing down my body—all six plus feet of carved muscle, scars, and ink, she exhales. “You don’t really look like the kidding type.”
“Good, now you know.”
When I brush back a strand of hair from her forehead, tucking it in with the others, she shivers under my touch.
In the lobby, music bursts to life. That stupid donut song.
I glare at the doorway. “First, did that just restart on its own? And second, you have to listen to that all day?”
“It makes me kind of homicidal.”
“Me too. I almost shot the speaker.”
A ghost of a smile appears on her lips causing a stutter in my heartbeat and a feeling of skidding on ice beneath my feet.
“Please do,” she says.
I take a step back, looking at her too long before I walk into the front of the shop and rip the speaker off the wall.
When I present it to her with a grin, she shakes her head and the ghost-smile brightens. “That’s a different twist on chivalry.”
She has no idea the lengths I would go to for her if she were mine.
“Well, I’ve never been called conventional.”
I’m surprised when she extends her hand to me. “I’m Jade. Thanks for everything.”
“Ryker. Happy to be at your service.”
But I don’t let go of her hand when I should, instead I thread my fingers between hers. “You gonna tell me what’s really going on?”