Final Target (SEAL Team Blackout), page 14
Just a little bit farther until they reached freedom.
Sparrow unfolded the paper Teigen had taken from the scientist. He stared at it for a long minute.
“What is it, boss?” Lachlan asked.
“It’s not intel. It looks like…it’s useless,” he spat in a hard tone.
Teigen jerked, her back stiff. “It looks useless?”
“Yeah.”
“Can I see it?”
Sparrow twisted to hand the paper to her. She took and flattened it on her thighs. Crew heard her soft intake of surprise.
“It’s not useless.”
The air in the vehicle seemed to ripple.
She looked up at Sparrow. “It’s in code.”
FOURTEEN
Sweat rolled down Teigen’s spine. She was used to working under pressure, but all these big men staring at her while she worked out the letters of a complex code in Arabic was really laying it on thick.
Letters floated through her head. She mentally scratched some out and replaced them with others. She wasn’t getting far enough fast enough, and her frustration was mounting.
Next thing she knew, Crew laid a hand over hers. Belatedly she realized the vehicle had stopped.
“This is where we get off, angel. We’re boarding a helo.” His eyes burned into hers with a new light in them. She got trapped in the steely depths for a long heartbeat.
He moved to take the paper from her, but she snatched it up and folded it, tucking it close to her chest as they climbed out of the vehicle that had zoomed past barricades and closed routes, through hostile territory to reach this small rendezvous point.
From here she could see the water and the port city spread out behind it. She couldn’t even remember when she stopped hearing those funeral drums, she’d been so caught up in her work.
“Come with me.” He grabbed her by the arm and led her across the dirt plot at a jog. “Duck your head!” he called above the whir of chopper blades.
She clasped the paper tighter, afraid if it were ripped from her hand that all hope would be lost. And the legacy Sophia had tried to leave behind would be forever stolen.
With a boost from Crew, she was in the helicopter. She hardly noticed when he fastened her into the seat and they took off because she spread out that sheet of paper and set to work again.
Before long, he transferred her to a jet and it wasn’t until they were in the air for several minutes that she processed what happened.
She looked around at the interior of a plane. Not commercial, but not one of those military carriers either. Something in the middle. Crew sat next to her, that gleam in his eyes again.
“Where—” Her mouth was so dry, she had to pause to swipe her tongue over her bottom lip.
He handed her a bottle of water. She uncapped it and swigged. The cool water felt like heaven in her parched mouth. She was so far into this code, yet not nearly where she wanted to be. She’d also lost all track of time and space.
“How did we get here?” She faintly recalled another jog to a waiting plane while her head buzzed with cyphers.
He let out a low chuckle, the kind that woke up her body and told her to get ready for a night of searing, no-holds-barred pleasure.
Her nipples prickled, and she looked at him harder. Why would he laugh like that? Surely he couldn’t be thinking the same lewd thoughts, not when there were codes to crack and they were in a jet hurling across…Europe? The ocean? She looked at the window but it was shuttered.
Lowering the bottle from her lips, she met Crew’s stare. Oh yes, he was thinking about doing naughty things to her. Maybe even planning how to execute their dual fantasy to join the Mile High Club.
A knot tugged in her core, but she didn’t have time for such things. Not now. Not when there was so much on the line.
“You’ve been pretty occupied with that piece of paper.” He nodded toward her lap where she held the item. “You’re like a dog that dug up a prized bone.”
She made a face. “I don’t really appreciate being compared to a dog, Crew.”
He chuckled again. This time the sound dragged invisible fingers up her inner thighs. One more of those and she’d have her legs wrapped around his waist and her lips on his.
She sucked down more water. The bottle crinkled before she lowered it again. She stole another sidelong look at her husband. Yes, her husband. The man she fell so deeply in love with she couldn’t bear to wait another day to marry him. Neither of them had ever looked back with a single regret.
She still didn’t.
She just had no idea how to move forward on this new road they were on. People were dying around her.
“I wish you’d stop looking at me like I’m a snack,” she whispered to him.
His perfectly hard lips cut upward at one corner. That super-sexy smirk seduced her panties right…off…every…time.
He ran his fingertip over the back of her hand. “I’m amazed that this is what you do.”
“Amazed?” Her brows shot up.
He nodded. “And terrified.”
She gulped.
He went on, “You’re so fixated. So intense. Not at all like the woman I know. But then again, I can see how it’s who you were all along.”
She swallowed. “I don’t know what to say.”
When he withdrew his touch from her hand, she missed the warm, callused feel of his fingertip gliding over her skin. “Keep working, codebreaker. When you come up for air next time, I’ll be here with food and drinks and…” He nudged his fly and the very evident bulge there.
She sucked in a breath and bit down on her lower lip. She forced her mind back to the task at hand and soon fantasies of riding her husband at ten thousand feet faded.
Her brows furrowed at one line of text. She picked up a pen that had magically appeared on the fold-down tray in front of her and started scribbling on the notepad next to it. She muttered a few words and then stopped.
Throwing herself back into the unknown language that no one had ever taught her and few people had probably ever read before, she was swept under a deep wave of panic.
Oh, god. This can’t be.
She froze, pen hovering above the paper. Then she wrote down part of the message in blocky letters.
When she looked up at Crew, his stare was fixed on the letters.
A place.
WASHINGTON, DC
Her heart took off at a wild clip. “The next attack, Crew. They’re coming for DC.”
“Again?”
“We have to alert someone!” She started to unfasten her seatbelt, already searching the faces of the other passengers for Sparrow.
Crew put a hand on her thigh. “I’ll get him. Keep at it. We need to know what they’re planning.”
She gave him a jerky nod of reply and forced herself back into the zone where only words, numbers and several variations of the alphabet swirled in her head.
When she looked up again, she’d written out all of it, and Crew, Sparrow and Bishop were all gathered around her.
She dropped the pen to the tray and lifted a shaky hand to her brow. “They’re planning a big attack. Bigger than 9-11.” She let out a whoosh of air, pitching forward in her seat in an effort to escape her own panic.
Sparrow nodded. “I’ve already sent ahead what you wrote out, Teigen. National Defense has been alerted. We’re on full-scale military alert.”
“Will we get there in time?”
“Blackout Charlie’s already in the US, ready to roll, along with every other platoon on land, air and sea.”
“But you’re not there.” She slid her gaze to Crew.
“We land in a couple hours, angel. We’ll get there before the attack.”
“I’ll never understand why they write this all out or meet in person for intel exchange. Why risk the information falling into the wrong hands—like Sophia’s?” Her voice wavered.
“Transmitting it online, even on the dark web, would alert every agency in the world of their plan. They weren’t going to take that chance,” Crew said.
“It’s likely they were going to use the cover of the funeral and a grieving city to slip the note to the person who would get this all rolling. We’re ahead of the game, Teigen—because of you.” Sparrow eyed her with nothing but respect.
Stunned that the hard looks and blame aimed at her were behind them, she gave him a slow nod. “But what if we’re wrong about all that? What if the attack is going to happen sooner than we think?”
“Like the code itself is coded?”
“I don’t know…” She stared at the scribble on the paper. “Maybe.”
“Keep working at it. Please. We need your expertise. Let us handle the fight,” Sparrow said.
She gave another nod, already swept up in second-guessing everything she just deciphered.
She had to get them all out of this. The prospect of an event just like this had spurred her to jump into this dangerous line of work. She had people to save.
One of them was Crew. No way was she letting the man she loved walk into an attack blind.
* * * * *
The flurry of activity at the front of the jet had Crew shifting in his seat so he could stare up the aisle. Sparrow and Bishop crowded together, speaking in clipped, hushed tones.
Though Crew couldn’t make out the words, he’d heard similar enough times.
Something was going down.
He glanced at his watch and calculated the estimated arrival time in DC. They’d land in mere minutes.
Slender fingers wrapped around his wrist just above his watch. He looked up at Teigen’s beautiful face, and his heart flexed.
Unable to wait another minute—they might not have another minute to spare—he cupped her delicate jaw.
“I love you, angel. Know that above anything else.”
“Crew, you’re scaring me.”
“Don’t be scared. We’re both strong. Whatever is about to happen, we’re going to need to hang on to that. Understand me?”
Fear ticked her eyes open a bit wider. She slid her gaze over the seat to the front, where Sparrow and Bishop were still in a deep, urgent discussion. When she returned her stare to Crew’s, she nodded.
He dropped his hand from her face and got up. When he navigated the aisle to the front of the jet, he tuned in to Sparrow and Bishop’s voices.
“Resistance—”
“Border—”
He stopped beside them, and they stopped talking, both eyeing him with serious expressions.
“I sense some shit’s going down,” Crew said.
“You sense right. National Defense has the US borders closed,” Sparrow told him.
Crew stared at him. “They can’t deny us entry.”
“They can.”
“We need to be in DC before anything happens. We can stop it.”
“Charlie’s already in position.” Sparrow’s jaw clenched into a sharper angle. “It’s out of our hands. We might not be there to defend during an attack if it comes to that.”
“Fuck!” Crew grazed his fingers through his hair.
Just then, a gruff voice projected from behind Crew. He swung around to see the copilot making his way to them. The man was older, with salt and pepper at his temples. He was probably riding out his final years of duty by pond-hopping with a bunch of SEALs.
Sparrow gave the man his full attention. “You have news?”
He nodded. “They’ve agreed to let us land. But I should warn you about what you’re walking into. It’s a war zone down there. Traffic’s backed up for miles outside of DC in all directions. I can get you a vehicle waiting on the airstrip, but I can’t guarantee you’ll get to headquarters.”
Sparrow digested this. “Don’t worry about us. I’ll call for a helo. Just set this bird on the ground.”
The copilot tipped his head in agreement and returned to the cockpit. Crew looked between Sparrow and Bishop.
“At least we know what we’re facing. And it’s as bad as we thought it would be,” Crew remarked.
Sparrow went into tactical mode. “Locking down a nation is bound to be messy. Bishop, find us a chopper. The minute we touch down, I want it waiting for us.”
“Got it.” Bishop whipped around, phone in hand.
“Mustang, you need to know when we get in that helo, your wife won’t be with us.”
He stared at his commanding officer.
“You know it’s right. We can’t be responsible for her. She’ll be safe on the ground until it’s all over. Then we’ll send for her.”
His chest burned at the thought of leaving Teigen behind, but he knew Sparrow was right. “I’ll tell her now.”
When he headed back to the row where Teigen sat, she twisted to look at him.
He dropped to the seat beside her and took her hands. “We’re facing some crap once we land. Sparrow’s got a helo coming for us…but you’re going to remain at the airstrip until it’s safe for me to send for you.”
She issued a low rasp. “No, Crew! I don’t want to be separated from you. I’m sorry for everything—absolutely everything. After today I realize I never should have kept what I was doing from you. I never should have told you it was over, because I love you so damn much. You’re my world.”
That was exactly what he hoped to hear from his wife. Heart tripling in size, he wrapped his arms around her and yanked her close. The confines of the cramped row made it difficult to hold her the way he wanted to, but he’d have time enough once they took care of this threat.
Pressing his lips against her forehead, he murmured, “The minute I get you alone, I’m finishing what we started back in that safehouse. But it’s going to be in a bed. With you tied to it, taking every inch of my cock.”
She let out a soft laugh that sounded like it was tinged with tears. “Then we can talk about our future.” She pulled back enough to meet his stare. “Because I want one with you, Crew.”
“I want one with you too, angel. I never stopped.” He thumbed a stray lock of hair off her temple and gazed into her beautiful eyes.
The plane tilted in descent. Crew took the only chance he’d get for a while to kiss Teigen. Really kiss her.
He slammed his mouth over hers, angling his head to deepen the caress with a swipe of his tongue. She opened to him and returned each thrust with her own. As some of that throb in his chest moved to his groin, he knew it was time to stop.
He broke the kiss. She stared up at him, love in her eyes. “Go be a hero, Crew. I’ll come when you call me.”
The landing gear touched down. Before they’d rolled to a full stop, Sparrow had the team on their feet. The plane taxied for a short distance then came to a halt.
Crew threw one more look at Teigen, who stood to watch him go. Their eyes locked.
One by one the guys were exiting the jet in a stampede to the helo. The throb of the blades in the air mingled with the jet engines that were whirring to a stop.
A hand came down on his shoulder, and he realized he was still staring at his wife. Her beautiful face etched deep into his soul.
He twisted to the door. Air rushed against his face.
And a bright light flashed on the ground in front of where his team was gathered.
“Incoming!” someone bellowed.
In a blink, he took in the small craft speeding over the airstrip on a return pass to drop more explosives on them.
“Get back! Fuck, it’s an armed drone. They were waiting for us to land!” one of the guys yelled.
Crew swung his weapon up. “I’m on it! I’m taking the shot!”
“I’m on it too!” called Ramsey. “Taking the shot!”
Crew unloaded on the machine. His bullets, along with Ramsey’s and five others who all had their weapons at the ready, blasted the craft. The drone wheeled in a wide, out-of-control arc before dropping out of the sky. It crashed to the airstrip.
Crew didn’t wait for another strike. He pushed his way back into the jet. Teigen ran down the aisle to him.
He dropped his pack and ripped open the top. He located a spare bulletproof vest and threw it at her. “Put this on.”
“What happened out there?”
“They were waiting for us. Someone is close enough to be watching. They flew an armed drone at us.”
Her expression blazed with fury. “They knew we were landing!”
“My guess is they expected us to get the nod to land. They only had a few options for airstrips. For all we know, they’ve got more drones at other sites. I’m not taking any chances leaving you behind, angel. Get that vest on fast and come with me.”
He threw a look over his shoulder to see the rest of the Blackout team had exited the plane. The chopper was whirring louder.
Teigen heard it too and rushed to slide the vest over her head. He didn’t even want to contemplate why she knew how to put on the armor, but he was damn glad she didn’t need instruction. There wasn’t time.
He grabbed her by the hand, and with his weapon in the other, he stepped out of the plane with Teigen in tow. They hustled into the waiting chopper. He gave her a shove up and into the opening and threw himself in behind just as the thing lifted off.
Gripping the doorframe, he swung into the closest vacant seat and landed next to Lena.
“I’m not surprised that you’d take the risk and turn back like that, Mustang,” she called loud enough for him to hear over the noise of the helo.
As they zoomed through the sky toward the next threat, Crew looked at his team. What he saw in their eyes spoke loud and clear.
He wasn’t the only man who’d turn back for the woman he loved.
In that moment, he felt the team rally around him in a way he’d never felt before.
His stare landed on Teigen where she was crammed between two of his huge teammates. Love poured out of her eyes.
Everything was going to be all right—after they found Abubakar. His reign of terror ended today.
FIFTEEN
Okay, first Teigen was kidnapped. Next, she was tortured for information she didn’t even have. Then Crew suffered captivity and more torture.
Now drones were coming out of the sky and shooting at the Blackout team on the ground? This was not what Teigen signed up for.
