Chapter 8
CHAPTER 8
Jacin sized up Bill. They were about the same height, although the new CIA recruit had at least ten more pounds on him. He glanced at Rafe. They had the same idea.
Rafe slugged the unsuspecting kid then caught him before he could hit the floor.
“Jacin, get in the shower and get cleaned up,” Harper ordered. “There’s no way in hell we can sneak you out of here looking like that or with your bare ass hanging out of the hospital gown.”
“Harper and I will strip him out of these clothes and get him into the bed.” The two of them had the man nearly naked by the time Jacin stood on the cold tile floor. Bill started to rouse when they lifted him onto the bed, so Rafe punched him one more time. The newbie CIA agent wouldn’t come to anytime soon.
Starting with the heart monitors, Harper quickly ripped the small sticky discs off Jacin’s chest. Taking more than a few hairs with her, she placed them in the same position on the young man in the bed. She turned off the flow in the tubes then carefully removed the tape over Jacin’s IV before she extracted the long needle.
Jacin was feeling better by the minute. Freedom and the need to save Melina had given his life purpose.
Harper cleverly taped the now-useless tubes to Bill’s hand to make it look as though it was connected.
Once Jacin was free of wires and tubes, Rafe pushed him toward the small bathroom. “Make it quick, but don’t shave. The scruff helps cover the yellow and green of the bruises.”
On unsteady legs, Jacin shuffled into the tiny bathroom and closed the door. Leaning on the sink, he forced air into his lungs before looking into the mirror. His face didn’t look as bad as he thought it would. Somewhere underneath the slightly swollen eyes was the man he’d once been, and wanted to be again.
“You okay in there?” Rafe called through the door.
“Yeah. Just peachy.” Perhaps old bananas would have been a better comparison.
“Hand out that gown so we can get it on this guy,” Rafe ordered.
When Jacin shoved the flimsy garment the hospital provided out the door, Rafe handed him the dress shirt and pants. They would do.
His eyes dropped to a small ugly black bag on the back of the sink. His own shaving kit, a hand sewn leather bag Melina had given him for his thirtieth birthday, was no doubt the prized possession of someone else high in the Cali cartel by now. When he unzipped the generic bag, it was filled with his favorite brand of necessities. He smiled, realizing Melina had bought this for him. She was always doing things like that, knowing what he needed before he did. She was an amazing woman.
As he stepped into the hot shower, his favorite body wash in hand, she was all he could think about.
The first time he’d ever seen her, she had on a red dress cut low enough over her large breasts to just hint at the hidden temptation. The material clung to every curve of her luscious body and stopped mid-thigh. Every man in that Irish pub in Georgetown wanted her…except him. He was on a mission to extract information from a Russian Embassy staffer.
She had also been on a mission…her first…to seduce Jacin. Oh, how the CIA fucked with agents in training.
Jacin squeezed the small black bottle filling his hands with the fragrant gel. He rubbed it into his hair and scrubbed, wincing when he pressed too hard above his right temple where he’d been hit so many times he’d lost count…and consciousness.
He wondered if Melina had been beaten off camera. Valez had hit her hard enough she probably had a concussion. But she was tough. She’d make it through. She had to.
The day after Melina had failed to seduce him, Jacin ran into her at the Langley training center. Realizing they’d both been duped, they’d struck up an unusual friendship. He’d kept it in that zone on purpose. Melina was perfect…always. Her delicate hands were so soft, her nails flawlessly manicured. Never a hair out of place, yet it wasn’t sprayed down into a helmet. No, it felt as though he was running his fingers through the finest silk. Every time he’d see her around CIA headquarters, she wore business attire. Before her, he never thought straight skirts that fell almost to a woman’s knees and low-heeled black pumps were sexy. Her appearance screamed high maintenance. Not his kind of woman.
Christ, was he wrong.
A few years later, when he reported to Colombia to check out a new emerald mining operation for the CIA, she was established as his handler. He was all set to hike the Andes by himself to try to find the new mine that was producing some of the largest natural sapphires, rubies, and emeralds the market had ever seen. There were even rumors this new mine had found a vein of diamonds.
Melina had insisted Jacin take backup with him. The registered mines were heavily guarded, but poachers protected their secret locations with trigger-happy guerrillas. When he showed up the next morning at the designated location, Melina had been decked out in fast-drying shorts, a cool tech tank, and well-worn hiking boots. The duty belt with knives, guns, and extra magazines had been the clincher. It wasn’t a fashion statement. It had been experience. She’d impressed him again as she loaded his gear into the Land Rover, efficiently packed with everything two people would need for several weeks in the backcountry.
Jacin had rarely regretted anything, but he distinctly remembered chastising himself that morning for never taking Melina to bed when he had the chance back in D.C. He’d underestimated her just as any man would do. No doubt the reason the CIA had recruited her.
As he stuck his head under the hot water and rinsed the soap from his hair, he wondered if he would ever feel the ecstasy of sliding into her body again. Could they return to a completely professional relationship like they had those first days wandering around Eastern Colombia, backtracking the black-market gems?
Sitting beside her every day as they traveled farther and farther away from civilization, then sleeping next to her under the stars, each in their own bag, he’d grown to like and respect the woman.
An hour after the sunset on the fifth day of their Andes mountains journey, they’d finally made their way to the tiny village a few miles from the mine. Melina had looked at the dirty and tired children as they stumbled home beside mothers looking equally haggard, and she’d cried. It was as though she could feel their hopelessness and despair.
Her tears had broken him. When he took her into his arms, felt her body shake as she emotionally fell apart, he’d known in that moment that he loved her and would the rest of his life. That night, as they bedded down outside of town, she thanked him with a kiss.
He’d refused to let it stop there. He’d kissed his way down her neck then traced the curve of her breasts with the tip of his tongue. Running his hands up her back, he released the snaps of her bra before he yanked it and her shirt over her head. The first time he’d seen her breasts bared to him the sight had been seared into his mind, next to the salty taste of her nipples that he’d licked and sucked that night, and many others afterward. When he slid his hand over her wet sex, parting her soft lips for the first time, she’d broken their kiss to gasp.
Jacin smiled as he squeezed another dollop of shower gel onto his hand and rubbed it across his chest as he started to wash the rest of his body. He closed his eyes and remembered the way she touched him that night, lightly running long, soft fingers through his chest hair, discovering his flat nipples, which until that night he’d never thought were erogenous. He brought the soap suds down to his erect cock, remembering the way she touched it so gingerly the first time. With the memory of sliding into her tight, soft channel as fresh as though it were yesterday, he stroked himself and exploded almost immediately, just as he’d done inside her on the side of a mountain so many years before.
“You okay in there?” Rafe’s question interrupted one of the best memories of his life.
“Yeah. Just using muscles that hadn’t been stretched in a while.” Then he reassured Rafe, “I’ll be out in just a minute.”
As he toweled off, Jacin thought about the gems he’d purchased the next day in the tiny mountain town. They had posed as American buyers offering a new conduit for the rough rocks. Using his own money, Jacin acquired several additional diamonds and emeralds. One extremely large, very clear emerald he’d had cut and made into a ring he’d given Melina a year later as a constant reminder for her of their time together. She’d worn it every day since.
Part of his agreement with the elder who seemed to be the grandfather of the entire town and acted as the negotiator included additional money that would be used to send several children to the United States for schooling. Jacin had worked with international children’s foundations previously and had since personally funded ten children from that tiny mining village to be educated in the States.
He’d also purchased several more diamonds since that initial meeting, including one that had been exquisitely cut into 2.25 carats. It waited for him in a safe deposit box in Washington D.C. He’d always intended to have it adorn Melina’s left hand.
Since Rafe was truly out of her life, Jacin had a chance to make that happen. Right after he saved her from Valez.
“Stop.” Jacin called five minutes later from the back seat of the rental SUV a mile from the hospital. “Can you pull into the PX? I want my own clothes.”
Rafe wheeled into the parking lot of the military-run department store. “Harper, you’re the only one with a valid military ID.”
She smiled at Rafe. “Come on, you two. I’m sure I can talk our way past anyone who dares to stop us.”
She was right. Fifteen minutes later, Jacin had a bag full of clothes, a small suitcase, a pair of military boots, and a pair of running shoes. He changed in the back seat while Rafe drove the few short miles to a two-story, yellow brick building that looked like all the others on the base. Before he jumped out of the vehicle, Jacin popped four ibuprofen into his mouth and swallowed them down with a power drink. He stuffed the bottle into a side pocket of the green cargo pants Harper had paid for since he had no money until Langley could issue him new identification. With great confidence that she could make that happen soon, Harper had bought him a new wallet, too, and gave him a few hundred in cash.
“I’ll be right there.” Harper pointed toward the ladies’ room.
Rafe stopped a few feet down an adjacent hall. “I want you to know, I never would’ve touched Melina if I’d known she was married. I had no idea she was your wife.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Jacin was in shock. Melina was married? To who? He wasn’t sure who he’d kill first, her or her husband. Then it hit him. Rafe thought he and Melina were married. “I’m not married. And if she is, that’s news to me.” More lies. When it came to Melina, he wasn’t sure what was real and what was her planned deception.
As they entered what could only be described as a war room, heads turned as he and Rafe strode toward a tall Latino.
“Alex Wolf, this is Jacin Torres.” Rafe slid him a glance. “Up until thirty seconds ago, I would’ve told you this is Melina’s husband. I’ve just been informed they’re not married.”
“Not yet, but I’m working on it.” Jacin’s comment seemed to ease the tension of both men beside him. “I need to be in on her rescue.” To emphasize his point, he took half a step closer to Alex. “She’s the most important thing in my world.”
The corners of Alex’s lips quirked up. “I understand better than you will ever know. This is a combined task force. I’m in charge.” He pointed to the group of men dressed in night camouflage with enough ammunition to start a war…or end one. “They all work for me at Guardian Security. On occasion, like this one, we help out United States. Pablo Valez has been designated a terrorist and an immediate threat to the United States government. USSOCOM and the CIA are active members of this task force."
“Why don’t you sit down before you fall down.” Alex shifted his gaze to Rafe. “Go see Bret Reed to handle cleanup at the hospital.” He nodded his head toward the man at the end of the conference table surrounded by three computer screens in front of two computers.
Jacin let out a long breath as he shook Alex’s hand before slumping into a chair. “I’ve seen the video from Valez. What’s been done to find her?”
“A few updates have come to light since Rafe and Harper left for the hospital. We’ll have a complete briefing as soon as the witness arrives.” Alex’s words caught the attention of the few people in the room. He grinned. “Not only did a woman witness the kidnapping but she also took video of it.”
“Thank Christ for Americans’ obsession with their cell phones,” Flynn O’Rourke from the Guardian team declared.
Alex sat down beside Jacin. “I understand you and a few cartel lieutenants had a disagreement about a week and a half ago. Bruises look like they’re healing. How do you feel? Don’t you fucking dare lie to me.”
“It’s been a full two weeks, and I’m good to go.” Half of what Jacin said was true and he’d do whatever needed to be done to get Melina back in his arms.
“I need you to have a clear head.” Alex went on to clarify, “I let you on this team because I didn’t need another unknown element, especially a rogue former SEAL with an agenda. This is my team. You’ll do exactly as I say, when I say, or you’ll find yourself in the brig if I don’t get pissed off and shoot your sorry ass first. Is that perfectly clear?”
“Crystal.” Although it had been years since Jacin had been ordered around like that by an American, he immediately trusted that Alex and his team could rescue Melina.
The door opened and Alex stood. “Seats,” he bellowed to the room.