Heated Pursuit (Alpha Security #1)(57)
“They know the risk, and they’re willing to chance his wrath if it means stopping him once and for all,” Rafe said somberly, looking more tranquil than worried about a Fuentes appearance. “But there’s no reason for him to come back here. He’s already ripped apart their families, and they’re close enough to the base to make even a cocky bastard like him uncomfortable. So we’re staying—at least for the time being.”
“But—”
“Don’t argue with me, Red.” There was no mistaking the gleam of stubbornness in his eyes. “I nearly lost you once already and that was one time too many for my liking. You can glare, pout. I don’t give a hot damn. Until you’re able to get out of this bed and kick my ass without staggering on your own two feet, we stay right the hell here.”
“Then maybe you should go without me.” She nearly choked on her words, but she trusted him with her life and with Rachel’s. “You wouldn’t have me dragging you backward. You could make contact with the team and come back for me when you got the chance.”
“I’m not leaving you behind,” he growled softly.
“Damn it, Rafe.” Her curse held no power. “We’ve already wasted three days.”
“And we’ll get them back. You can argue with me until you’re blue in the face, sweetheart, but I’m not changing my mind. Your energy is better spent getting well.”
*
After three days of being cooped up, Penny stepped onto the hut’s front porch and tilted her face to the sky. Both the warm pound of the sun and the simplistic beauty of the village worked wonders on the soul. It was a dusting of civilization nestled on the edge of the Patuca River, a mixture of minimalism and complexity with clapboard structures housing entire families.
Off to the left, a handful of women gave her a friendly wave, and huddled on the porch of the next hut, two elderly men gave her nearly toothless smiles. No one could tell by the looks on these people’s faces that their lives were forever altered by Diego Fuentes.
Penny smiled back with a small wave and let her self-appointed mother hen, Carmencita, gently tug her toward a gaggle of giggling children. With a tiny finger, the three-year-old instructed her to sit beneath the shade of a Yucca tree before she toddled off to join the activity. Back and forth, up and down, the children chased after their tallest playmate with a flourish of laughing squeals.
The sight of a tattooed ex-Delta operative playing forward in a miniature-person’s soccer game was more entertaining than watching the World Cup. The children shouted eagerly, all calling for Rafe’s attention with a cry and wave. Little Carmencita howled in innocent laughter when the ball bumped her bare feet. But Rafe was right there, sweeping the doe-eyed beauty into his arms and tunneling them both toward the goal line.
Easy laughter and slick, loose smiles replaced the hard lines of his whisker-stubbled face as he carefully aimed the ball toward some of the youngest players. At that moment, he wasn’t a soldier. He wasn’t a seasoned Alpha operator. He was a two-hundred-pound child…and Penny couldn’t take her eyes off him.
He claimed to be the type of man to never settle down, but she didn’t doubt for a moment that he would excel at it—all of it—protector, husband, and father. Images of dark-haired children with vivid blue eyes and warm, tan skin chiseled their way into her mind, taking her breath away.
Her heart heavy with what-ifs, the weight of Carmencita climbing into her lap brought her back to reality. She wrapped her arms around the little one and savored the sound of her sweet giggle.
Even from thirty yards, Rafe’s eyes missed nothing. Their gazes collided, his scanning her from head to toe, no doubt calculating if she was well enough to be out of bed. She squirmed on the spot, her body growing warm. If her libido could be revved by a cross-country stare and in the presence of screaming children, she was most definitely on the mend.
Emotion flickered across his face, and with each flash, a new one was painted into place. Desire. Need. Concern. And something else that made her heart skip a beat the moment he took his first step in her direction. He only made it three when the pack of children literally brought him to his knees. Carmencita leaped up to join the fray just as he turned on them with a mighty roar that had the kids shouting in glee.
There was no sense in denying it anymore.
Tattooed ex-Delta operators were exactly her type. It didn’t jibe with what she wanted from life, but it was true. From beneath a mountain of children, the smile and wink Rafe sent her blasted its way through her walls of resistance.
She loved him, was in love with him. And now she needed to figure out what to do about it.
Eight hours later, standing in front of the buffed tin mirror in her newly acquired quarters, she still hadn’t figured it out. She stared at her reflection and looked for the change she’d felt happen. A round of nervous nibbling left her bottom lip swollen, and a week’s lack of appetite had made her face a bit thinner, but her eyes were still green and her hair shone the same dark shade of red. On the outside, she was the same military brat with a penchant for getting into tough scrapes.
The change was internal, embedded so deeply that extraction was impossible. She was in love with Rafael Ortega.
Thoughts of maintaining a physical distance from him made it difficult to breathe. She didn’t know if it was worse to love and lose, or to never experience the thrill of love at all.