Avenged (Hostage Rescue Team Series) (Volume 5) (4 page)

The hot, cramped apartment smelled musty and of last night’s fish dinner that Jaleel had cooked on the hotplate. All the threadbare blinds were pulled over the windows, creating deceptively cooling shadows. He shut the door and strode to where the ancient TV sat in the corner of the main room. The tattered, stained couch cushions sagged beneath his weight as he sank onto them and turned on the news. They couldn’t afford cable but using his tech skills Jaleel had been able to piggyback a connection from the apartment below them.

The breaking news headline was at the bottom of the screen, and he recognized Dulles airport in the background.

Gunman killed in apparent suicide attack at Dulles International
, it read.

Ayman shoved upright and stared at the screen, heart pounding as the reporter detailed what had happened. FBI agents were on scene to investigate and the airport was still on lockdown. The lone gunman had been killed by security agents.

Lone gunman? There should have been others. At least three more, from what Ayman had heard. Even though Ayman hadn’t known the dead man personally, he felt a pang of sadness and said a silent prayer for him.
Peace be upon you, my brother. May Allah welcome you into paradise with your fellow warriors.

The reporter droned on and on about what was happening at the airport. All outgoing flights had been suspended, and all incoming ones grounded until further notice. Ayman shook his head in annoyance. Who cared? What about the woman the gunman had gone there to kill?

After five more minutes and no mention whatsoever of any other casualties besides one security agent, Ayman got his answer. She was still alive.

He shut off the TV and rubbed a hand over his face. Now what? Ayman had memorized everything from the file The Brethren had assembled about her. His network had been plotting Taya Kostas’s death for weeks now, and even with the help of an insider their attempt had failed. They’d held off on targeting her until she arrived in D.C. for the trial, wanting to coordinate the attack as close to the others as possible.

We should have killed her when she was vulnerable at home.

The burner phone he’d picked up two days ago rang in his pocket, startling him. He was surprised to see the number on his display. The elders had never contacted him directly before. “Hello?”

“Did you hear?” the man, an elder at his mosque, asked in Arabic.

“Yes. Just.” He pushed out a frustrated breath. “What do you want to do now?”

Mahmoud gave an impatient grunt. “Find her and the others. We already know where both men and one of the women are. Now that the whore is in the city it will be even easier to find her.”

“But now they’ll have more security on her,” Ayman pointed out. Federal agents.

“That doesn’t matter. Our people aren’t afraid to do what must be done, regardless of the threat. Unless…
you’re
afraid?”

Ayman frowned at the man’s tone, the threatening edge to it. Mahmoud was not a man who took disappointment well. Ayman was fully prepared to take this on and had no intention of crossing him. “I’m not afraid.”

“Good. Find her. Let me know when you do.”

The line went dead. Ayman set the phone down on the battered table in front of the sofa. So The Brethren had already located both male witnesses—both former mujahedin who had fought with and then for Qureshi before betraying him. They’d agreed to testify against him to spare their lives after the Americans had captured them in a massive raid in New York State a few months ago.

Mahmoud had said they knew where one of the other women was too. All witnesses’ days were numbered now, just as the whore’s were. Ayman and the others were all acting on direct orders from Qureshi himself, funneled through his network from the high security prison he was in, and his instructions were clear. Kill the people who would dare to testify against him in the upcoming trial, and free him at any cost.

Ayman was skilled with weapons, but he needed help on this one.

He got up and grabbed his thrift store leather jacket on the way out the door. His feet ached after a ten-hour shift at the restaurant but he had to begin hunting and he couldn’t do it alone. He’d go to Darwish for assistance and have Jaleel use his hacking skills to find out where the whore was staying in the city.

That American bitch had been married to the traitor who had cost Qureshi everything. He was long dead of course, ironically killed by his own at the end, in a friendly fire incident during the botched rescue attempt five years ago.

His widow was unfortunately still alive, but not for long. She would pay dearly for daring to speak against Ayman’s hero.

Nate entered the hotel lobby and strode straight for the stairs, unwilling to lose even the few seconds it would cost him to wait for the elevator. He held his phone to his ear as he jogged up the first flight, anxious to get an answer. Even still, he was somewhat surprised when Celida Morales, the FBI investigator engaged to Tuck, answered after only one ring.

“I’m kind of in the middle of something here, Schroder,” she told him, her voice dry.

“I’m on my way up,” he said without preamble.

A surprised pause filled the line. “Did DeLuca assign you to her?”

“No.” Not officially, anyway. “But he assigned Cruz and Vance. They’re on their way over.”

“Okay. I’ll tell security you guys are coming.”

She disconnected without asking anything else and he was glad, because he didn’t know how to explain himself without sounding crazy. Being here probably wasn’t the best idea, but right now he didn’t give a shit about protocol.

When the story about the shooting at the airport had broken, he’d been on the treadmill at the gym. The details coming in had been sketchy and he wouldn’t have thought much of the incident except Taya’s flight had been due in shortly before the incident had taken place. He knew exactly what time her plane had touched down, because he’d checked online.

Immediately he’d shut down the machine and called DeLuca. Within fifteen minutes his CO had called him back with the response he’d been dreading—Taya had been targeted. She was unhurt at least, and that’s the only thing that kept him sane as he raced up to the seventh floor.

Outside her room, two agents wearing FBI windbreakers stood flanking the door. One of them called out to him, hand resting on the weapon holstered at his hip. “Show me your ID.”

Nate slowed his pace a little and held out his open wallet, showing his badge and ID. “Special Agent Nate Schroder. Agent Morales is expecting me.”

The guy who had called out to him gestured for him to approach. When he got a good look at the ID, he nodded. “Go ahead.” He stepped aside while Nate moved in front of the door and knocked twice.

Inside he could hear faint voices and his heart thudded hard against his ribs as he waited. Taya was in there. The first time he’d ever seen her was that morning long ago at dawn, when he and the rest of the quick reaction force had rendezvoused with Hassan, the man they’d been tasked to go in and rescue from hostile forces. They’d been told he might have his wife in tow, but nothing else.

Nate would never forget his shock when he’d seen her frail form struggling toward them over the harsh terrain. When she’d finally removed the veil of her Burqa he’d been stunned to see her fair skin and gray eyes, hear the pure American accent with just a hint of the South in her voice.

An American woman, held captive for many months by Qureshi. Married off to Hassan against her will.

It still filled him with fury.

The rescue op had been a total disaster, to say the least. But she’d survived. He’d worried about her afterward, thought about her way more often than he should have ever since. As incredible as it seemed, in just a few seconds he’d be seeing her face-to-face for the first time in five years.

The door swung open to reveal Celida standing in the threshold. She was dressed in her usual business attire, signaling she was here as an investigator rather than in a security capacity—a gray pencil skirt and suit jacket. Stepping back to let him inside, she raised one dark brow, the scar from a bullet graze on her right cheek pulling slightly with the movement. “Hey. Care to tell me what this is all about?” she asked in a low voice as she shut the door behind him.

Nate looked past her toward the back of the suite. From the entryway he couldn’t see who was there. But with Taya literally just feet away from him now, seeing her was all he could focus on.

“Nate.”

Celida’s tone was calm, but it was definitely a command. He wasn’t getting past her to see Taya until he explained himself. And if it had been anyone else but her, he knew he wouldn’t have even gotten inside the room, HRT member or not. He shifted his gaze to her and drew a deep breath. “I know her.”

She nodded and folded her arms. “I gathered that. How?”

Her not knowing surprised him. “Tuck didn’t say anything to you?”

“No. You know how he is with that kind of thing. If he considers it someone’s private business, then that’s the way it stays.”

Yeah, that sounded like Tuck. And that strong sense of integrity was just another reason why Nate admired the guy.

Celida was going to find out about the botched rescue op soon anyway, once she started digging into Taya’s past more. He’d rather give her the abbreviated version in his own words. “I was part of a CSAR mission five years ago, back when I was still in the Air Force. She was one of the principals we were sent in to extract.” Sounded so tidy and benign when he worded it like that.

She searched his eyes for a moment before speaking. “Is that it?”

“No,” he admitted. “There’s more.” The official version was far less pretty, and if he knew Celida, she’d be looking into it as soon as she left the hotel.

“And it’s personal,” she guessed, narrowing her eyes in suspicion.

He nodded, not bothering to deny it.

“She must be pretty important to you, given the way you raced up here. Have you had contact with her since the op?”

“Not really. A couple e-mails here and there for a bit. But I haven’t talked to her since I joined the FBI.” Four years ago now. He’d stopped communicating because he’d thought it was for the best, for both of them. Given the traumatic circumstances of their ordeal behind enemy lines together, he’d wanted to prevent either of them from forming an unhealthy psychological attachment to the other.

You mean you were afraid the feelings you had for her were as fucked up as you are
, a snide voice in his head whispered.

Celida nodded thoughtfully, oblivious to his inner turmoil. Or maybe not. “Okay. So if you haven’t talked to her in years and you’re not here as part of her detail, why exactly do you want to see her?”

Good question.
He was wrestling with the answer to that himself. All he knew was that he’d never met a woman like Taya, and that no one had ever affected him as much as she had. A dozen different emotions swirled inside him as he thought of how to answer. Guilt, grief, loneliness. And…a yearning he’d failed to conquer. “I just need to see her.”

Her interest sharpened. “Let me guess, it’s complicated?”

“Yeah.” Very. “Look, I just want to see her. To make sure she’s okay. She’s been through a lot already.” More than anyone should have to endure, let alone a female civilian who’d survived the kind of hell she had. God, she was amazing, to rise above what life had dished out to her.

Celida’s expression softened a little and she sighed. “Understood. All right, wait here. I’ll check if she’s okay with seeing you.”

Nate kept his mouth shut as she left him. He understood and agreed with the protocol, but it had never even occurred to him that Taya might not want to see him. If she didn’t, he’d have to leave. And then he’d go nuts.

He heard female voices murmuring around the corner. A minute later, Celida reappeared. “All right, you can go ahead.” She gestured for him to follow her.

Letting out a relieved breath he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding, Nate strode for the back room, bracing himself for the sight of the woman who’d haunted him for the past five years. He could hear a man speaking in the other room, and when he rounded the corner was unsurprised to find Agent Greg Travers sitting there. The middle-aged agent turned in his seat and acknowledged him with a nod but Nate barely glanced at him.

He stopped in the threshold, his gaze immediately locking on the woman across the room. Long, dark brown curls, bronze skin, gray eyes. Seeing Taya again was like a punch to the diaphragm. In that instant the five-year gap since he’d last seen her fell away, leaving his heart raw and bleeding.

A weird sensation filled his chest, as if his lungs were suddenly both empty and yet too full at the same time.

“Nathan!” Her face lit up, her eyes wide with what seemed like delight as she shot out of her chair and started toward him.

Nate had only a second to steel himself before she was right there in front of him in a long, stretchy blue dress that hugged curves he couldn’t help but admire, and reached her arms up to twine around his neck. Ignoring everyone else, unable to stop himself, Nate wrapped his arms around her back and hugged her. Hard.

Oh, Christ.

He struggled to hide his reaction but the feel of her in his embrace after all this time was almost too much. He closed his eyes for a moment, fighting back the painful tide of memories rushing at him, and allowed himself to breathe her in. The sweet scent of cinnamon and vanilla filled his nostrils. Her curls pressed against his cheek as she rested her face in the hollow of his throat, her breath hot against his skin.

God.
Nate breathed in deeply, feeling almost dizzy. She was warm and soft and so damn
vibrant
compared to the last time he’d seen her. She’d filled out since he’d last seen her too, her body now at a much healthier weight. Having those womanly curves pressed tight to him filled him with a peace he hadn’t experienced since that final day on the CSAR op when his world had changed forever.