Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
Rafe opened the glass door to his shower and stepped out onto the plush mat. Droplets of water fell down the length of his body as a billowing cloud of steam rolled past.
Reaching out, he grabbed the clean terrycloth towel from where it hung on a nearby hook. He brought it to his face, letting his eyes fall shut. As he stood there, pressing the soft material to his freshly washed skin, Rafe took in several deep, cleansing breaths.
She’s going to be okay.
His daughter had made it through surgery, and her doctor assured them she was going to be okay. It was the same reminder he’d been giving himself every few minutes since leaving the hospital an hour earlier.
He pulled the towel from his face and began drying the rest of his body.
When he was done, he tossed it onto the double-vanity’s marble countertop on his way into the adjoining room.
Like most of the rooms in his Civil War-era home, the master suite was a mixture of historic preservation and modern style.
Period-appropriate paintings hung from its sage green walls. Restored wooden flooring had been stained to match the dark mahogany furniture positioned around the room.
The king-sized bed was centered between two of the space’s four floor-to-ceiling windows. Directly across from that was a fireplace that had stood the test of time. Its stonework, mirror, and mantle were all original to the structure. A piece of history all its own.
Too wired for sleep, Rafe went straight to his dresser where he retrieved a pair of boxer briefs and his go-to sweats. It was late, and he lived alone, so he didn’t bother with a shirt.
He turned and padded barefoot across the quiet room before making his way down the elaborately curved staircase. When he got to the bottom, he moved through the home’s grand entrance toward the short hallway a few yards away.
The narrow corridor housed his home office, a half-bath, and a linen closet too narrow to be of much good. At the far end was the entrance to Rafe’s favorite room in the house. A massive, up-to-date kitchen befitting a five-star chef.
The modernized space had been fully gutted and remodeled to fit his personal preferences. Commercial-grade appliances. Steel counters. A giant island in the middle with more than enough space to do his thing.
Cooking was a hidden passion of Rafe’s. Not only because he appreciated good food, but because it was quiet. Peaceful. In here, he could create something enjoyable while working through his thoughts.
Sometimes he would decompress. Other times, Rafe would process or plan. But mostly, it was his means of escape. This was where he came when he needed to get away from the harsh realities of life.
A life he’d built for himself and his daughter.
My sweet Alice.
Full breaths were a challenge as he went to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of beer. Rafe shut the door, popped off the metal top, and immediately took a long, gulping swig.
He was in no mood to mess with cooking tonight. He was too wired. Too worried.
Too scared.
Slade was at the hospital. Rafe needed to keep reminding himself of that. Slade was there, and Rafe had no doubt the man would do everything in his power to keep his precious girl safe.
The former SEAL had more than proven himself as a capable protector, and Bones and the others were taking shifts keeping watch outside her door. But knowing those things did little to ease the ache in his worried heart.
He tipped his head back and finished the rest of his beer. He set it on the counter and went for another. One more and he was going to call it a night.
The top popped free. He dropped it onto the steel counter. Rafe lifted the bottle toward his lips, and then—
He froze.
There was a shift in the air. A subtle change that had the tiny hairs on the back of his neck standing on end.
Someone’s here.
Every instinct he possessed said he was no longer alone. Rafe didn’t let on, of course. There would be no benefit in giving away his knowledge of the intruder’s presence.
Instead, he moved casually, taking a sip as he’d first intended. After that, he removed a single plate from one of the upper cabinets as if he were preparing to fix himself something to eat.
The drawer directly in front of him came next. The one with a pistol hidden inside.
Rafe grabbed the knob and pulled the drawer open. Moving slowly, he slid his hand inside. A rush of adrenaline punched through his veins a moment later when he heard a familiar female voice coming from behind.
“Don’t worry, Rafe. I didn’t come here to kill you.”
He remained still, keeping the gun within reach while keeping his back to her. “If that’s true, then why did you break into my home when you could have simply knocked on the front door?”
“Now, where is the fun in that?”
After a beat, he slowly turned around to face her. “Hello, Lena.”
Angelina Price sent him an unthreatening smile from a few feet away.
“I’d apologize for bypassing your security, but given the situation, I felt it was best to stay as far under the radar as possible.
And this way, you know where the weak links are in your system.
” She flashed him a grin. “You’re welcome. ”
He gave nothing away. “There’s a situation?”
Lena’s hazel eyes held his before glancing around the low-lit kitchen. Rather than answer his question, she asked one of her own. “Is there someplace else we can talk? I’ve had a long day, and no offense, but those stainless-steel bar stools of yours don’t exactly scream ‘comfortable’.”
Rafe held back his demand for an explanation as to why she was here. Agents like Lena didn’t pull this kind of stunt without there being just cause.
Maybe she knows something about the shooting.
Either way, the woman hadn’t gone through the trouble of breaching his virtually unbreachable security system to simply say hi. If Lena was here, she had a good reason.
“My office is just down the hall.”
“Perfect.” She unabashedly took in his bare chest before her gaze landed on the bottle still gripped in his fist. “You have another one of those for me?”
Rafe grabbed another from the fridge, popping off its top for his unexpected guest. He handed her the bottle. “My office is the first door on the right. I’ll meet you in there.”
He didn’t wait for a response before turning away and taking the set of stairs leading to the second floor from the back of the kitchen. Minutes later, he was crossing the threshold of his home office in a pair of jeans and a plain gray t-shirt.
Lena was waiting for him, just as he’d asked. Rafe found her standing in front of one of three walls of shelves. Most were filled with books, but there was also the occasional snapshot or other personal memento. Windows offering whoever looked inside tiny glimpses into his guarded past.
“This place is great, by the way.” She picked up one of the three-by-five frames, bringing it in for a closer look. A smile that warmed his heart spread across her pretty face. “I can’t believe you kept this after all this time.”
Rafe crossed the room, coming to a stop next to where she stood. Neither said a word for the next few seconds as they became lost in their memories from the captured moment.
In the picture, he, Lena, and the other three members of the unit they’d worked with in Syria were smiling back at the camera. They’d gone to a local café for lunch that day while posing as a group of American humanitarian missionaries.
“Do you remember the server who took this for us?” A breathy chuckle escaped from her dusty pink bow-shaped lips. “Man, that girl seriously had the hots for you.”
“Oh, I remember.” Rafe couldn’t help but grin.
“She couldn’t take her eyes off of you.” Her smile grew a bit wider, as if she were seeing a recording in her mind from that day. But then that same smile fell with a soft hitch of her breath.
“Why are you here, Lena?” He took the frame from her hand and put it back in its rightful place.
Please tell me you know something about the person who went after my baby girl.
Instead, the intriguing woman tod him, “Caleb and Sabrina are dead.”
“Dead?” The surprise he felt sent both brows arching high. “Both of them? What was it? A job gone wrong?”
“Officially, it was motorcycle versus tree and an undiagnosed birth defect of the heart.”
“And unofficially?”
Lena abandoned the bookshelf and turned his way. The sadness and anger filling her sullen gaze was impossible to miss.
“Alexei Kozlova is back,” she announced, rather than answering his question directly.
Rafe’s spine grew stiff at the unexpected news.
“Kozlova?” He frowned. “I assumed the man was dead.”
“Me, too.” She blew out a breath while sliding her hands into the front pockets of her jeans. “We all did, and who could blame us? It’s been almost thirty years since the guy went dark.”
“What makes you think he’s resurfaced?”
She reached back, retrieving her phone from her back pocket. A few swipes of the screen later, and she was turning the device around for him to see.
“A surveillance team for an unrelated op picked up his image during a routine scan.”
Rafe made a move to take the phone from her hand. When he did, their fingers inadvertently brushed together. He schooled his expression, ignoring the electric jolt that was created from the innocent touch.
It wasn’t the first time he’d felt a heightened sense of attraction toward the other woman. He would’ve had to have been a blind man not to see it the first time they’d met.
But back then, just as he had every other time, Rafe ignored it and moved on.
“Where was this taken?” He studied the slightly blurred image frozen on Lena’s screen.
“Turkey. More specifically, a compound outside Harran.”
“His?”
“No.” Lena gave a quick shake of her head. “It belongs to a current, high-level target named Rami Najjar.”
“Arms dealer?”
“Among other things,” the sexy spy confirmed. “From what we’ve been able to find so far, Kozlova has apparently spent the last decade or so teaching Najjar everything he knows about the business.”