Chapter 1
CHAPTER ONE
CóRDOBA, ARGENTINA (SIX AND A HALF YEARS LATER)
Liam spread his arms wide, slowing his velocity to catch the wind. He was traveling three hundred and five meters every six point five seconds. The dark sky quickly released its embrace of him as he neared his destination.
His team was performing a high-altitude-low-opening, or HALO, jump over enemy territory. It’d been a while since he’d jumped. And ironically, his first op as Bravo Four had been twenty kilometers away from today’s drop zone.
Joining the team was a decision he didn’t regret, and he knew he never would.
All the ops. The lives saved. Every single moment. It’d all been worth it.
He took a few seconds to enjoy the silence, having forgotten how much he loved the feeling of flying, of sailing through the air like man was meant to be there.
Liam spied the green numbers on his altimeter, checked his compass, then pulled the release to his chute.
The parachute filled with air, slowing him down, and he gently tugged on the steering lines to bank into a turn and head toward the landing area. “This is Bravo Four. I’m in position,” Liam announced over his radio to the lead jumper, Asher Hayes.
Asher was Bravo Three, but he often took over for Luke Scott as Bravo One whenever Luke was unable to join operations. At the moment, Luke was on his honeymoon in Hawaii.
Only a few days ago, Luke and Eva tied the knot in Vegas. And at the same time, Bravo Two, Owen, also married the love of his life. And unbeknownst to everyone, Liam—
“This is Bravo Five,” Knox’s voice came over the line, interrupting Liam’s thoughts. “I had a cutaway.”
“You good, Bravo Five?” Asher asked.
“Yeah, I’m good. The reserve saved my ass,” Knox answered.
Liam lined himself up with the target and the rest of the jumpers as they closed in on their position.
The Argentinian government probably refused to green light an American-backed op, so the president had to call in Liam’s people. Of course, if anything happened to them they’d be screwed, but that was the risk they took with every mission, even the ones on their own soil.
Once Liam grounded his chute, removed his oxygen mask, and gathered up his gear, he approached Knox to make sure he was okay. “What the hell happened up there?”
Liam’s mind had been off ever since he’d left the hotel in Vegas after the double-wedding on Sunday. Even now, it was as if the frequencies in his brain were jammed, and static cut through every fifth thought. So, if anyone should have had a bad jump, he thought it would have been him.
“It’s been a long-ass time since we’ve done this.” Knox knelt to check his gear. “I jumped stiff, pulled too early . . . let’s just say when we get home I’ll be jumping from a plane every weekend to ensure that shit doesn’t happen again.”
Knox always owned his mistakes. He didn’t sugarcoat anything, and Liam appreciated that about him.
“Yeah, I should probably go with you,” he replied, even though his mind kept whipping back to what had happened in Vegas. And no matter how many times he’d hit the kill switch, his thoughts had begun to convert from a slow trickle to an end-of-days type of flood.
“I’m thinking we all should get our asses up in the sky after we’re home,” Asher joined the conversation. “Been too long for everyone.”
They weren’t exactly jumping from C-130s with jumpmasters, either. Since their teams didn’t technically exist, they had less to work with.
Liam surveyed the rest of the crew as they gathered to prep for part two: the extraction.
Jessica and their latest CIA recruit, Harper Brooks, waited in position five kilometers away at the exfil site.
He positioned his night-vision goggles until the green hue filled his line of sight. “How certain are we our target is at this compound?”
“Eighty percent,” Asher answered. “Trust me, I’m not a fan of relying on intel from the CIA, but they said she’d be inside. So, let’s hope the CIA’s asset got this right.”
“And we’re not walking into a trap,” Wyatt pointed out.
It wouldn’t be the first time.
Asher held his palms in the air while tilting his head to the side, his way of saying, Shit happens, and if it does, roll with it.
“How many guards are there supposed to be again?” Liam asked.
“Eight to ten.” Asher shifted his NVGs atop his helmet to find Liam’s eyes, which prompted Liam to do the same. “Yo, you sure you’re good?”
Maybe he wasn’t. Shit. He never forgot the details of an op.
“Yeah. I’m fine.” More like six tequila shots past screwed, but he wasn’t about to unleash his feelings on the boys as they geared up.
“Why’d this damn drug lord have to crawl out of retirement?” Knox brought his gloved hands beneath his chin in prayer position. “He get bored sitting by his pool?”
“This fucker would make El Chapo quake in his boots, so heads on a swivel tonight, boys,” Asher said, repeating Luke’s typical line before shit could go sideways and fast.
“No chance Ricco Carballo will actually be at this compound tonight,” Wyatt said. “But wouldn’t it be nice to take the bastard down once and for all? A quick double-tap right in the forehead?”
Carballo wasn’t their target, but yeah, it’d be a nice bonus to bring his head back with or without the body.
“Anyone want to wager on whether CIA intel is actually accurate?” A.J., Echo Two, asked. “Loser buys next rounds for a month,” he added, his Southern drawl winging through his words more heavily than normal.
Harper’s voice popped over the radios, “Aren’t I already on beer duty for a month as the newbie?” She laughed. “I mean, I’ll happily take the bet and relinquish my—”
“A month’s round of beers says CIA intel is wrong,” A.J. interrupted.
“Deal,” she answered far too confidently.
“Brother, you’re gonna lose this bet.” Knox stood and patted A.J. on the shoulder. “All right, we ready to roll out, or do you boys need a group hug first?”
Liam rolled his eyes before placing his NVGs back on. “Let’s do this.” He took a moment to collect his thoughts and then followed the team.
After a ten-minute walk through the woods, which was more comfortable to Liam than a stroll through Times Square during holiday rush hour, he and Wyatt arrived at their destination and set up.
They’d be on overwatch, banging on their long guns so the rest of the team could infiltrate the compound for the rescue.
“Bravo Four, radio check,” Asher said over the line.
“That’s a good copy,” Liam answered and examined the scene. “I have two tangos outside the entrance.”
“Looks like we showed up to the right party after all. You lost the bet, Echo Two,” Wyatt added over the line with a light chuckle. “I have five heat signatures inside the main building at the center of the compound. Two on the post-exterior of that building. One on each side.”
Liam put his crosshairs on his first target and calculated the distance.
He was about one milliradian tall in his scope, which meant he was roughly a thousand meters away.
Liam adjusted for the range, and then noted the wind was currently moving right to left, so he shifted one mil dot to the right and upward by two mils.
With one eye closed, he stared through the scope, but his mind blazed straight back to Emily and their night together in Vegas, even though he had no business thinking about her at a time like this.
When Jessica and Asher had been running through the operational details yesterday and again today—it’d been like a flashbang grenade had gone off in front of him, and all he’d been able to see was red, orange, and purple smoke.
All thoughts centered around Emily—the friend he’d been given strict orders to stay away from by Sam, Owen’s wife.
He’d been drawn to Emily since the day they met last fall when he had to hold her back from knocking the shit out of a guy she’d been dating.
And frankly, the fact that his feelings went beyond physical attraction had scared him enough to behave—well, up until he’d overdone it with the shots the night of the wedding.
Relationships were a fuck-no with flashing red warning signs for him.
And Emily, she was the kind of woman who deserved more than a few orgasms and a thank-you-for-the-lay breakfast in bed.
The morning after Luke and Eva’s, and Owen and Sam’s weddings, Emily had lifted the sheet, taken a look, and with a gasp had quickly clutched it to her body. Her cheeks had ignited into the brightest red Liam had ever seen, and her eyes said it all.
“Did we have sex?”
“Yeah, I, uh . . .” He hadn’t been sure what the hell to say to her as he stood next to the bed.
Her hand had darted to cover her eyes, and he’d lowered his gaze to find himself buck naked. And for some reason, her shyness about that fact had him smiling instead of reaching for something to cover himself with.
“I’m an asshole,” he mumbled to himself off comms. He didn’t need to hear rapid-fire agreement from his teammates over the line. They wouldn’t need a frame of reference to understand his words—they knew his MO.
“Bravo Four. Echo One,” Asher interrupted his thoughts. “We’re in position. Take your shots.”
Liam stiffened and held his breath, which was never good for sniping.
An unusual tremble traveled down his spine, and Liam squeezed the trigger. The tail end of the round caught the wind and—shit, I missed.
Before Liam could figure out how the shot went sideways, Wyatt pinged Liam’s target.
“Both targets down,” Wyatt said.
Liam felt his gaze. Wyatt was probably wondering how the hell he could have butchered the shot.
“Breacher up,” Asher ordered next.
Liam examined the dead guard on the ground through his crosshairs, trying to analyze his error to ensure he didn’t repeat the same mistake on his next shot.
He heaved out a deep breath at the realization he hadn’t accounted for the disparity in elevation, which had impacted his depth perception. The guard had appeared closer than he actually was, and it was a mistake Liam didn’t make.