Fight By The Team (Team Fear Book 2) (2 page)

P
resent day
.

Debi tiptoed across the rough carpet with her boots in one hand and car keys in the other, searching for the exit in the dark. A slim line of light signaled the door in the no-tell motel where they were staying. She reached for the doorknob and hit solid mass.

“Where do you think you’re going?” The deep male voice zipped out like a Taser, striking her chest and spiking her nerves.

“Crap.” She stumbled back, tripped over a dining chair, and landed on her ass. Pain shot up her spine, and then a dull throbbing started where her backside hit the concrete floor. The anemic carpet did nothing to break the fall. “You scared the crap out of me.” The man shouldn’t move without a whisper of sound. He was built like a Humvee, so he ought to make some freaking noise. She put a hand to her heart to soothe the raging panic that threatened to burst the erratic organ from her chest. “What are you doing, sneaking around this time of night?” She had no idea what time it was.

“Could ask you the same thing.”

“I wasn’t—” She cut herself short. Honesty, she owed him as much honesty as she could afford. “Of course I was sneaking around.” Why else get dressed in the dark? “As much as I enjoy your protection services, a girl needs time alone.” The truth was a little more mortifying than that.

Rose flipped a switch and one of the side lamps turned on. The light stinging her eyes, so she blinked away the pain. When her vision cleared, she saw the most ripped human being she ever laid eyes on. Abs and biceps and whatever the hell was not so discreetly hidden in his boxer shorts. All of it hard-packed flesh. Male perfection. That right there was why she needed out. Twenty-four/seven with a man built like Thor made her as anxious as a horse at the starting gate. She had to get away or jump his muscular ass, and as fun as that sounded, adding sex to the wreck of the last week was a seriously bad idea.

They were on the run from a rogue military group who wanted to eliminate Rose and the rest of his former Special Forces team. For all anyone in their cozy little group knew, Debi was collateral damage in a fight that had nothing to do with her, but the psycho from Team Echo had said Debi knew more than she let on, which was scary true. The stress of it had her jonesing for a nicotine fix, and she really didn’t want the beautiful man in front of her watching her suck poison into her lungs.

“Help me up.” She lifted a hand and Rose yanked. The man didn’t know his own strength so he nearly lifted her off her feet. She landed against his chest. Solid contact, and God help her, the man was built. She swallowed and stepped away from his tempting flesh.

The team had three rooms down one side of the dusty motel. Debi’s best friend Lauren and her husband Ryder had one room, the soldiers in one, and Debi in the middle with the bodily perfection of Sergeant Rose as a bodyguard. He was the kind of soldier who made you want to enlist in whatever games he wanted to play. He turned to double check the locks, exposing the shadow of a drawing. The tattoo was the last thing she needed to see. Tattoos and muscles were as far from academic as she could get. Rose turned to face her, a look of disapproval flexing in his strong jaw.

It was time to put some serious space between her lusty thoughts and the ginormous tattooed man in front of her. He stood as the perfect foil to her ex. Damnit all to hell. On the run was not the time for fun and games. “I really need to get out on my own.” Her voice came out breathy. A pulse jumped in her neck.

“If you need feminine products, I don’t mind running to the store, but you’re not going out alone.”

Heat burned her neck and face. The big guy was offering to buy tampons. Good God. She couldn’t meet his gaze. Instead, she turned and yanked the covers over her tangled sheets. As accommodating as he was, good money said he would draw the line at making a cigarette run. The clock showed it was shortly before sunrise. She’d never get to sleep now, not that she’d gotten much since the run-in with the men from Echo. “I don’t need any help in that department, thanks.”

“We’re not sending a woman out alone.” Rose walked around and straightened the covers on the other side of the bed. Half-naked man, tangled sheets, and crazy chemistry. A flush simmered under her skin, and it had nothing to do with embarrassment. She needed sex or a smoke, and right now, the cigarette was less dangerous.

“Relax, Rosie.” The silly nickname helped put emotional distance between them, because they were squared off on opposite sides of the bed and her imagination had her bridging that gap. “I’m not going to chase down the psychos from Echo on my own. I just...” The quiver in her voice pissed her off. She fluffed a pillow and slammed it against the faux wood headboard. “Need. Out.”

He stared at her like he saw straight to her soul. “Explain.” He sat on the poorly made bed, his blue and green boxers clashing with the orange bedspread.

She tried to keep her gaze above his shoulders. Tried. Really hard. “I’m not used to so many people in my space.” She paced away to keep her wandering eyes from seeing more than she should. Her fantasies were realistic enough without all the details fleshed out. “I have zero time or space to myself. I’m not the kind of girl who stays home all the time. I’m out, doing things. I have a business—” She cut herself off to reorganize her thoughts. “I have business to take care of, and I can’t simply walk away from my responsibilities. There’s food in the fridge at the ranch that’s going to rot, I have a job and a life, and sitting in this tiny room, listening to you guys plot strategy has me one step from turning into a raging witch.” Too many unfiltered words spilled from her mouth.

“Cabin fever?”

The laugh bubbled up, half hysterical. They had checked into the motel four days ago, and that was four days too many. “God, yes.”

“That’s a half truth. You’re hiding something. Why don’t you tell me the rest?”

The attack by Team Echo was the living embodiment of the anxiety that had defined most of her life. She was quite possibly going crazy. On the run, she hadn’t had time to think—thank God—but four days in this ratty motel room freaked her out. Too much time to think. Too much time to add fear to the mix. “I’m terrified,” she answered. It was simplistic, but the best way she could possibly explain.

“That’s normal.”

She snorted, and she was so far gone, she didn’t mind him seeing the unladylike reaction. Beat the heck out of him witnessing a panic attack. The last man who saw her freak hadn’t bothered with a follow up call. The fear was ugly, no doubt. At the thought, her breath panted out, her heart raced, and, despite the cold leaking inside from the crappy motel door, sweat slicked her skin. She wanted to keep pacing, away from him, but she needed to get a grip before he saw a full-blown attack.

She dropped into the dining chair and let her head hang between her legs. The look she aimed for was mopey. Mopey was one of the Seven Dwarves, right? Mopey sounded better than Fearful. “God, I could use a cigarette right now.”

“You smoke?”

“Quit. Two years ago.” The day her father had kicked her out of his life.

“Why start back now?”

The list was long. “Psychotic killers, drug dealers, and medically enhanced soldiers.” And that was just the beginning.

“You survived all that with flying colors. You don’t need a cigarette now.”

Oh, she definitely needed one. “Obviously you’ve never smoked.” She reacted to all tension with a need for a cigarette. They calmed her when little else did.

The bed squeaked and moments later, a hand the size of a platter rubbed between her shoulder blades. “What’s going on?”

Her hands shook, so she braced them against her thighs. “Not a thing.”

“Looks like a thing.” He settled into a rhythm of caressing her back. “Pulse is high, breathing erratic, and you haven’t used sarcasm in the last ten minutes.”

A laugh tried to bubble through the panic. She took a halting breath.

“Sweetheart, you’ll feel better if you tell me what’s going on.”

“What’s going on is some real psychos are chasing us.”

“And they’re nowhere around. So whatever is trapped inside, let it out. Yell, scream, cry—”

“I don’t want to cry.”

“But do you need to?”

She needed to do something. Sitting around had only made the panic worse. She focused on his touch until the panic eased.

He kneeled in front of her and braced his hands on her thighs. “Better now?”

It was a testament to how messed up she was that she didn’t try to sneak a peek at his assets. Tears threatened. She didn’t want to talk about it, so she nodded her head. “I’m fine. You should go back to bed. Get some sleep.”

“Is that what the people in your life do?”

Talk about a landmine. Crap, he was hitting every one of her triggers. “Honest to God, I don’t want to talk about what just happened.”

“Ok, what happened is off the table.” He nodded his head, all agreeable like, which was definitely suspect. “When’s the first time you remember having a panic attack?”

See, she knew that agreeable nature was a lie. He wasn’t going to let it go. “Most people ask why.” And they assumed some defect inside her.

“I’m not most people.”

That was the unadulterated truth. “I need some space,” she said. She’d studied panic attacks and fear until her mind was numb with it. Most people wanted comfort after an attack, but she’d found little comfort from those closest to her. Distance and denial were the true heroes. Rose stepped away, taking his heat with him. Moments passed before the bed springs moaned and he’d taken his seat back on the bed.

He’d done exactly as she asked, and she felt cold.

A rhythmic squeak filled the silence and she wondered if he was rocking on the bed. Minutes passed before she realized she was the one rocking out on the four-legged chair, arms wrapped around her middle. He didn’t say a word and his infinite patience wore her down. “I was still in grade school. I was at my father’s condo.” The slick marble floors and granite counters were unreal, unlike anything in her mother’s house. Debi had raced through the condo in her stocking feet, screeching with delight at the speed, gliding on the polished floor like she was skating. “I fell, split my head open.” One minute she was upright, the next her face planted on the marble. “Blood flew everywhere.” Her father had gotten her a towel, and then spent more time cleaning the floor than assessing her injury. He hadn’t explained that she was going to be okay. The white kitchen towel had soaked with her blood, and the less he talked to her, the less she could breathe. “The attacks are a weakness.” The words cut through the silence in her head.

Knock it off. Tears don’t change anything. There’s nothing to be afraid of.

But she had been afraid, afraid of her father, afraid of the attacks, afraid of... Everything. It was the last time she’d seen her father before she applied to the university as an undergrad. “I don’t like blood.”

“You’ve seen more than your share these past few days.”

She nodded as any response caught in her froggy throat.

“Want to know what I think?” he asked.

Her chest ached.

“Sweetheart, you held it together in the townhouse when Echo kidnapped you. It’s only now that you’ve had a chance to think about it that your brain gets in the way. As long as you stay busy, you’re fine.”

She peeked up through her hair. No judgment marred his strong features, and she saw the truth in his eyes. He didn’t judge or hate her. And he made a good point. “So you’re saying that staying here is bad for me.”

He laughed, the warmth of it dispelling the remnants of fear. “That’s a pretty fair rationalization.”

“One that works for me.” As did sarcasm.

“I have an idea for getting out if you’re interested.”

“Is that a trick question?”

“Look at me.”

The focus in his intense eyes was absolute. Crossing her arms over her chest, she returned his gaze, hoping her thoughts weren’t written all over her face. “What do you have in mind?”

“It’s mission related, and there are rules.”

“Military men and their rules.” She’d agree to anything that got her out of this small torture chamber. “Do you have a job for me that doesn’t require cooking and cleaning, Rosie?”

He barked out a laugh that softened his lips and brought a full-out smile. Devastating. The little quirk of his lip lit up his eyes and weakened her knees. “Have I done something to make you think I’m a chauvinist asshole?”

The opposite, actually. He’d acted like a gentleman from the moment he’d barreled into her life, literally, when he tackled her into safety after members of Team Echo had tried to infiltrate the ranch. “I know your type. Me man. You woman.” She grunted like a caveman. “Where’s my dinner?”

The smile on his face grew until he flashed white teeth that glinted against his tan face. “Is it all military men or just me?”

Her pulse jumped in reaction to the smile. “What are you talking about?”

“That you hate?”

“I don’t know what you mean. You and the rest of the team are the only military men I know.”

“All men, then.” He said it as a statement, not a question.

“I don’t take orders and I don’t sit in the back seat.”

“Have I asked you to walk three steps behind me?”

Debi leaned back on her heels. “Not yet, but you have all kinds of rules.”

“For your safety.”

“And there’s that.” Debi pointed an accusatory finger at him. “You’re overprotective, overbearing, and bossy.” The topic was much safer than her attitude toward men, so she grasped it. “Come to think of it, you do ask us to walk behind you.” Yeah, she was being whiny, because he took the lead so he’d take the brunt of any attack.

“You want to vent?” He gave her a come hither move with his fingers. “Bring it, sweetheart. Get it all out.”

The reasonable tone deflated her. She bent to snatch her keys off the floor and tucked them in the front pocket of her jeans. “I’m good.”

“Not even close. You should see your face. Spill it so we can get to work.”

He wanted her to keep venting? At this point, her father would be making phone calls and turning his back to her. “You’ll think I’m a complete witch.”