Forged in Smoke (Red-Hot SEALs #3)(51)

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

Seth Rawlings is not your problem. His problems are not your problems. Let it go. Let him go. You have enough problems of your own without taking on his.

With luck, her immediate problem would be resolved today when Wolf arrived with the refill on her meds. Of course, that still left her newest problem unresolved. While she’d only experienced the one attack, it made her nervous not knowing what she was dealing with, or when it might strike again. Not that there was anything she could do about the situation. At least not until she identified what the episode had been. Her best hope at the moment was remaining calm as she tracked down the new symptoms so her old nemesis tachycardia didn’t swoop back in to wreak havoc.

Hence the tea, and the soothing ritual of cooking—breakfast this time.

The loud thud of boots on the front steps leading up to the lodge provided a welcome distraction. She turned to face the command center’s entrance as the door flew open. Rawls entered the building at a dead run, the door banging shut behind him. He slowed to a jog. Intense blue eyes swept the room and fixed on her face. Surprise locking her in place, she simply stared back. Apparently he was bringing his problems to her . . .

Barely breaking stride, he headed for the desk tucked in the corner of the main room and snatched up the satellite phone, tucking it beneath his waistband at the small of his back. “You get Mac’s message?”

“What message?” she asked.

His face was hard, tight, yet somehow seething with tension. She didn’t realize she’d taken a step back until she felt the edge of the kitchen counter against her back.

“On the radio.”

He swept her frame as he strode toward her, as though he were looking for the walkie-talkie, which he wouldn’t find since it was sitting on the dresser in her bedroom.

“I’ll explain on the way.” He beckoned her forward, the motion urgent.

“On the way? On the way where?” As she pushed slowly off the counter, her gaze was drawn down to a series of ruddy smears glistening on his shirt and jeans.

Glistening as in wet . . . and ruddy as in . . .

“Is that blood?” Her voice rose as her pace picked up. “Are you injured?”

His face tightened even more. “We have a situation. I’ll explain on the way.”

“On the way where?” she asked cautiously, slowing her pace to a crawl.

He didn’t sound like he was in pain. He sounded impatient. And urgent. She studied the ruddy smears again. They hadn’t gotten any bigger or wetter, so he must not be bleeding. In which case the blood must be someone else’s . . .

Whose?

Her feet screeched to a stop. “Uh, Rawls, whose—”

He was on her before she finished the question. A huge hand clamped over her mouth. She was too stunned to struggle as his mouth dipped toward her neck. The quiver that shook her as his warm breath tickled her ear had little to do with fear. At least until his words registered.

“The camp’s surrounded. We need to get into the tunnels now. No questions. We may have unwelcome ears listenin’ in.”

They were surrounded? By whom?

Stupid, stupid question, Faith.

She nodded her understanding and he released his grip on her mouth, transferring it to her arm. He towed her forward, along the outside of the kitchen counter, heading toward the hall at the back of the lodge. As the log walls flashed past, she glanced at the ruddy smears streaking his chest.

It had been pretty clear for days that something was misfiring in Rawls’s brain. Something like hallucinations, if his teammates’ hunches were correct. She wanted to discount his urgency now, discount his insistence that the camp was surrounded, convince herself that he’d imagined whatever he’d seen . . . except.

Except he was smeared with blood—blood that didn’t appear to be his own.

Which meant something must have happened out there.

Her heart skipped a beat and then made up for it with a few seconds of double time. She groaned beneath her breath and worked to calm her breathing and nerves. She only had one Cordarone tablet left. If the camp really was surrounded and Wolf couldn’t land, that one tablet might have to last her for a long time. She’d best save it for when her heart rate got completely out of whack. As her heart settled back into its normal, strong rhythm, she breathed a sigh of relief and glanced at Rawls, relaxing even further to find his attention fixed on the far end of the hall. At least her momentary health scare hadn’t distracted him.

He drew her to a stop in front of the last door on the right, its security panel glowing red. She’d been given the grand tour of the lodge as well as the cabin she and Amy shared when they’d first arrived—so she knew about the tunnel system beyond this door and how to gain entrance to it. While each of the individual cabins had its own entry into the tunnels, the access panels shared the same security codes. On the other hand, while each cabin had its own stash of weapons in case of an emergency, the only building with access to the main weapons locker was the main lodge. From the weapons locker, one could enter the tunnel system.

Wolf had given her the code to the security system within hours of their landing, even made her recite the encryption repeatedly until he was satisfied that she’d remember it during an emergency. She repeated the numbers silently as Rawls punched them into the panel. As soon as the click sounded, indicating the lock had released, Rawls dragged the door open and propelled her inside. The door swung shut again, sealing behind them with another slight tick.