Chapter 2
Celine Latimer hugged her bare knees to her chest, shivering despite the desert heat. She'd lost count of how many days she'd been shackled in this prison of hard adobe walls and cold packed dirt floors, succumbing inch by inch to slow starvation.
A soft sob escaped her and she reached out in the darkness, finding Caroline on her right and put an arm around her friend's shoulders. “Hold on a little bit longer. Your dad will send someone to rescue us. We just gotta stay strong.”
“Don’t know…” Caroline’s words chattered with her teeth, clacking throughout their tiny cell, “…how much longer I can.”
Celine felt her own tremor work down her battered body in response to the hopelessness in her friend’s voice.
They’d been in here who knew how long? With no sunlight to track the time, she had no real clue.
Days? Weeks? Her stomach twisted with a now familiar pain, like she’d swallowed a string of razor blades, and let out a loud growl.
Celine instinctively wrapped her arms around her knees, hugging them to her chest, but no position could help her hunger.
The light pangs from early on in their captivity had seemed so brutal at first, but now she knew they’d simply been the opening act to the full-blown agony that came from starvation.
“I promise you, we will survive this. You’re worth too much money and your father is too powerful. These guys won’t hurt you.” But that doesn’t mean they won’t hurt me.
A small-time hair and makeup stylist from Mercy, Mississippi without a family. Her eyelids shut under the weight of hopelessness.
Caroline gripped Celine’s forearm; her ragged and torn nails digging into Celine’s flesh. “You either. I won’t let anyone hurt you. I bet my father sent Aaron and his whole team after us.”
Celine’s heart throbbed once. “Aaron? Why would he come?”
“Um…let’s see. Because he looks at you like he could eat you for his last meal.”
A harsh laugh ripped from her. “Yeah, maybe at first. But not anymore.” Not after he’d basically dumped her at Caroline’s wedding.
“What do you mean? He couldn’t keep his eyes off you,” Caroline said.
“Until we hooked up.” The most soul scorching, life changing night of her entire life. The curtains had been drawn, his arms around her, holding her tight. His lips…
Caroline gasped, “You two hooked up? As in fooling around or all the way? At my wedding party?”
Her throat closed down on her vocal cords. Could she admit the truth? Why not? She and Caroline might die any second – or at least Celine might – why should she hold back? Because you were stupid enough to fall for a man who only wanted sex.
Another pang and she closed her eyes. “All the way.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because he dumped me right after that.”
“Why would he do that?! Did something happen?”
“Are we playing twenty-one questions?” Celine asked.
“Got some important party you’re late for?” Caroline countered.
Celine held silent, holding the hurt close to her chest. She didn’t want to revisit the memory. She could barely face the facts herself, let alone say them out loud.
She’d given her all to Aaron and he’d turned away.
His rejection after that earth-shattering night had left a hard eggshell of disappointment and broken dreams around her heart.
Caroline’s cold, bony hand covered hers. “Just talk to me. Please. I think I might go crazy if you go all silent again.”
“Fine. We had sex.”
Caro’s gasp bounced off the walls in their tiny cell. “And?”
“And what?”
“Was he good?”
“Good?”
“You know, did you like it?”
“Are you kidding?” Celine countered.
Caroline’s squeezed her hand. “No way. I need details. Give me something good.”
“You have lost your mind.” He’d been earth shattering. Life altering. Wonderful. Delicious… and deadly to her heart.
“Not in the least. We both need a distraction and what else are we going to do? Tell me.”
“Fine. It was great. He was good. And then it was over.” Not on her part though. She’d stupidly thought that taking that next step meant as much to him as it did to her.
“You sound like your describing Thanksgiving dinner, not steamy sex with a hot soldier.” Caroline’s wistfulness made Celine’s lips tug up at the corners.
“Geez, that great. No, he was better than deep fried turkey.” Way better. “But…”
“But what? What’s the problem?”
“His commander walked in on us.” And ended everything for them. She was really starting to hate the military.
Celine gasped. “No, he didn’t.”
“Yep.”
“Were you – “
“Naked? Yep.”
“Oh my God.” Caroline giggled and then a cough took over, wracking her body.
“That’s what I said.” Celine wrapped an arm around her and held her. What else could she do with no water or no other means to care for her friend? When Caro’s coughs finally subsided, Celine scooted over a bit. “See this is why we can’t talk about it.”
“I’m not letting you off that easy. What happened next?” Caro’s gravelly voice evidenced her weakness.
Despite having replayed the scene over and over in her head and telling herself she didn’t care – her heart clenched. “He looked at me like he didn’t know me and walked out.”
“What?!” Caro coughed again, this time the fit lasted longer than the last.
“Stop getting worked up, okay?” Celine forced her voice to relax despite her worry.
“I can take care of myself, I’ve been doing it my whole life.
” Besides, Aaron wasn’t the first man to use and lose her.
At some point, she had to accept responsibility that she needed to quit with the whole white night dream and live in reality.
Celine closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wall, her mind taunting her with images of Aaron Speirs and the smell of his grandmother Noni's homemade fudge. Her mouth tingled, and if she hadn't been so dehydrated she would've drooled.
When he’d asked her to be Caroline’s stylist at her wedding and explained that he needed someone he could trust there, she’d read between the lines into spaces that in his mind hadn’t existed.
She'd spent two weeks getting ready for the wedding with Aaron. He'd been focused on training her on self-defense and she'd been focused on him. Every time he’d touched her, taught her how to handle herself and a gun, she’d been so fixated on him she hadn’t noticed anything else.
By the time the actual wedding rolled around, she’d been so hot her panties should have melted.
Celine lifted her fingers to her lips, remembering the one time she'd taken matters into her own hands.
“So, he just walked out? Nothing else?”
Celine drew in a calming breath, trying to force out the painful memory. “It’s no big deal. I think he was embarrassed by his commander catching us in the act.”
“No big deal? Did he get in trouble for not staying on post? Did he get yelled at by his CO?” Caroline’s quiet voice barely penetrated the hot embarrassment flooding her cheeks.
“I don’t know. I don’t care. All I know is he got one taste and didn’t want anymore. He didn’t have time to waste on useless relationships.” He’d left Celine with the feeling of a rusty nail fermenting in her chest and a longing so intense she shook from the unquenched need.
Caroline coughed. “He said that?”
He’d chosen his Team over her, just like everyone else in her life. “Not so much talking as walking.”
“Doesn’t make sense for him to just ghost on you like that, not after he specifically requested you for my ceremony,” Caroline said.
“So, what does make sense then? He got what he wanted out of me,” she snorted derisively, “and he didn’t even have to work that hard to get me. I was hot and waiting.”
“A man like that, I can’t blame you, but I think it’s gotta be something else.
If his commander caught you two together when he was on patrol,” Caroline clucked her tongue, “You know how soldiers are. They’re so orderly, so strict.
I’d be willing to bet you money his commander reamed his ass and threatened to have him evicted from the mission if he got off task again. ”
Hope, that pesky little bitch, reared her beautiful head.
Something about Aaron Speirs completely flipped her world upside down.
The first time he’d walked into her little salon back in Mercy, Mississippi, she’d nearly sliced off the tip of her finger giving him a trim, her hands had shaken so bad.
He’d never taken his eyes off her, given her his full and direct gaze in the mirror’s reflection, like he could see how wild her heart hammered in his presence. “You are losing it.”
“Are you kidding me? The man was practically drooling on your heels. I’ve been around military my whole life.
My father is head of Joint Special Operations Command.
I know soldiers. I had a huge crush on one of my bodyguards a couple of years ago and tried to kiss him.
The guy nearly went into a full-blown panic attack over losing his job. ”
A trickle of laughter bubbled up inside Celine at the image of the petite Caroline tackling a big, burly guard.
“Exactly. I bet he would have been at your doorstep the minute I married the general…” Caroline’s words trailed off.
“Your father should never have tried to marry you off to that old man just to boost his own agenda.”
Caroline let out a sob; broken and painful to hear. “You might be right, but if I hadn’t pulled a runaway bride, we might not be here. Kate might not be dead.”
Celine squeezed her friend’s hand with all her might. “She’s not dead.”
“We haven’t seen her once.”
“She probably escaped. Of us three, she was the only trained operative. I can just imagine her fighting her way out.” Watching Kate train with Ethan, Aaron’s teammate, the week leading up to Caroline’s wedding had been an absolute treat.
Kate Richards, former CIA operative, had taken the SF soldier to his knees.
“What if…” Caroline’s words trailed off in the darkness.
“What if she did escape and she’s with the rescue team right now, ready to bust down that door and pull us the hell out of here?”