The next morning, Kat had just finished a grueling workout, punching, kicking, spinning and leaping her way through a difficult practice sequence, when a knock on the hallway door startled her. Jeff was not up yet, or at least he hadn’t emerged from his room where he’d retreated angrily-and alone-last night.
Hard to tell what he was madder about-the fact that she hadn’t killed the Ghost or that fact that she was determined to go to this meeting without him. It sure had blown the mood between them last night. And she’d so been looking forward to making love with him. An urge to throw a petulant tantrum stunned her. She never threw tantrums, let alone pouted. And she was on the verge of doing both.
She toweled off the worst of the sweat streaming down her face and cracked open the hallway door. She gasped in surprise and threw the portal wide open. “What are you doing here?” she exclaimed as four of her teammates piled into the suite.
Aleesha Gautier, temporary commander of the Medusas while Major Vanessa “Viper” Blake was on maternity leave, laughed richly. In the thick Jamaican accent she affected when she was stressed or amused, she replied, “Ahh, girly. De way me hears it, our little Cobra got herself a big ol’ mon-fish on de hook.”
Kat stared. “Where in the world did you hear that?”
“Why, from de fish hisself. He say to me, ‘Git your happy self down here to de islands. Your sniper girlie need someone to watch her six.’”
Kat gaped. “Jeff called you?”
Aleesha nodded. “Dat he did.”
“When?”
Misty, the team’s resident gorgeous blonde, replied. “Last night. He said you’re insisting on-I believe his exact words were-being a damn fool and not letting him back you up. He said you needed us.”
Kat didn’t know what to say. She was elated to have her teammates here to help. But she was shocked that Jeff had called them. Why not call in his own team, whom he was accustomed to working with and knew like the back of his hand? The answer was obvious, of course. Because she knew the Medusas like the back of her hand. Apparently, he’d deemed it more important for her to feel safe and in her comfort zone than for him to feel that way. The generosity of the gesture stole her breath away.
Karen Turner, the team’s Amazon look-alike Marine, glanced around the suite. “So where is the good captain? The way we hear it, he’s quite an eyeful.”
“Who told you that?” Kat demanded.
Dark-haired Isabella Torres laughed gaily. “Captain Steiger was on Dex’s team until Maverick was given his own team to command. Dex says he’s quite the ladies’ man.” Dexter Thorpe was Isabella’s significant other and a Special Forces operator, himself.
Embarrassed at this third degree about her love life, Kat asked Isabella by way of blatant distraction, “So, when is Dex going to make an honest woman out of you, anyway?”
Isabella sighed. “His father’s trying to coerce him into taking over the family business again and Dex is frantically taking missions to stay out in the field and out of contact with his family. Which means we haven’t had much chance to discuss that recently.”
And given that Isabella’s family wasn’t too keen on her career either, Kat supposed Bella wasn’t about to throw stones at Dex for hiding from his parents.
The door behind her opened and Kat turned swiftly. Jeff wore a pale blue polo shirt, white Bermuda shorts and deck shoes. He looked like a bronzed god. His hair was neatly combed, still damp from his shower, and his eyes glowed bright blue, so sexy her knees went weak just to look at them.
He flashed a cover-model smile and drawled in his irresistible Southern accent. “You must be the Medusas I’ve heard so much about. It’s a pleasure to meet y’all.”
Misty muttered under her breath, “Way to go, Cobra!”
The other women grinned appreciatively as Aleesha held out her hand. “I’m Aleesha Gautier. Or you can call me Mamba. I’m nominally in charge of this gaggle.”
Jeff stared at her hand cautiously, then spared a quick glance over at Kat. “She’s not going to do the same thing you did the first time you shook my hand, is she?”
Kat did something she rarely did. She blushed to the roots of her hair. “Not unless you call her baby, too.”
The other women’s eyebrows shot up en masse, and unholy amusement glinted in their gazes. She’d forgotten how nothing was secret or sacred among them. Becoming a Medusa had come with inheriting five nosy, if well-meaning, sisters. If they caught wind of the depth of her infatuation with Jeff, they’d razz her until she wished she’d never met any of them.
Kat sighed and made introductions all around, including the snake field handles of all her teammates.
Aleesha asked briskly, “So. What’s up?”
Kat sat back and let Jeff bring the team up to speed. He gave a good briefing. Quick. To the point, but thorough.
Aleesha said to him when he finished, “Since you’re the expert on this case and have already been named mission commander, how ’bout you take point on this? Has Cobra briefed you on our various specialties?”
“No, ma’am. She hasn’t said much about you ladies. But if she’s any indication, you’re a hell of a team.”
More amused glances shot Kat’s way.
Aleesha smiled broadly. “Call me ma’am again, boy-o, and I may ’ave to hurt you. You makin’ me feel olduh dan dirt.”
Jeff grinned back. “Duly noted, Mamba.”
Aleesha gave him a quick rundown of who did what on the team. They all were cross-trained in a wide variety of skills, but Karen was the pro at things mechanical, Isabella was the team’s intelligence analyst, Misty was a pilot and a whiz with computers and Aleesha was the team’s medic. In fact, she’d been a trauma surgeon prior to becoming a Medusa.
Jeff looked faintly shell-shocked when Aleesha finished the recitation of the team’s skill set. But he said calmly enough, “Have you ladies had breakfast?”
Karen laughed. “We’re commandos. We’re always hungry.”
Kat made a room-service order for six while Jeff pulled out a detailed map of Barbados and showed the Medusas where tonight’s meeting was supposed to take place.
The four other Medusas spent the afternoon casing Welchman Hall Gully, a gorgeous park/walking trail tucked into one of the many gullies slashing across the island’s landscape. Kat retreated to her room to meditate until they returned, and Jeff left after mumbling something about getting some special gear for tonight.
It was just as well they stayed apart. Her teammates were far too perceptive to miss the sparks-either of sexual tension or anger-that inevitably flew between them when they spent more than two minutes together. And Kat really could do without the Medusas’ teasing.
Late in the afternoon, they all reconvened to finalize a plan of action. The caves beneath the gully were going to be a problem. They were extensive, and there was no way the Medusas could reconnoiter, let alone cover, all of them tonight. If the Ghost wanted to emerge from or escape into the caves, they’d be hard put to intercept him. The team settled on forming a loose net around Kat and planning to let the Ghost slip into it unmolested.
“And are you going to let him leave in peace as well?” Kat asked Jeff as they sat around the dining table, with maps and sodas scattered across it.
He looked her square in the eye for the first time all day. “No, I am not.”
“But-”
He cut her off. “Don’t argue with me on this, Kat.”
“I am going to argue with you on this. There’s no way the Ghost would have set up this meeting unless he has something of the utmost importance to tell me. We owe him the courtesy of hearing him out and giving him free passage away from the meeting.”
“We owe him nothing. He’s a criminal.”
“He could’ve tried to kill me last night. But he didn’t.”
“You could’ve killed him, too, but you didn’t. I’d say you two are even on that score.”
Kat flinched as her teammates stared at her.
Aleesha asked quietly, “Cobra? Are you okay?”
“Yes,” she grated. “I’m fine. Jeff seems to think that honor counts for nothing, however. And he’s prepared to trample mine.”
Aleesha looked over at Jeff soberly. “Mon, de girl, she take dat honor wicked serious.”
He exhaled heavily. “Yeah. I know.” He paused. “Our orders are to stop the Ghost. Using whatever means necessary. Nothing in our orders precludes use of force. As mission commander, I have to assume that implicit in our mission orders is not only permission to use force but a directive to do so if it will accomplish the mission.”
Kat winced. Jeff had resorted to legalese for one reason and one reason only. He was warning her that he’d given her a lawful order-to use force if necessary to apprehend the Ghost. And furthermore, if she failed to do so, he’d hold her liable for having disobeyed a direct order.
Sure enough, on cue he said grimly, “Do you understand me, Captain Kim?”
“Yes, and I acknowledge that you have given me a lawful order. Do you want that in writing?”
She looked up from her tightly clenched hands at him across the table. His stare gave away nothing. No pity, no compassion, no caring. Just the hard, cold gaze of a military commander putting a subordinate sharply and unquestionably in her place.
So. That was how it was going to be.
Anguish wrenched her heart messily in two as she sat there, frozen, her face totally devoid of expression. Damn Hidoshi for teaching her this terrible control, anyway. She wanted to scream and cry and rage, to argue with Jeff about the stupidity of his decision, to demand to know how he could cut her off like this. Worse, she desperately wanted to beg him to look at her the way he had last night in the moonlight. To love her a little. But here she sat, as cold and lifeless as some plastic mannequin who didn’t feel a damn thing.
Jeff sighed heavily and looked away from her.
Meanwhile, her teammates stared back and forth between the two of them in nothing less than open shock. As well they should. She’d never shown a single hint of temper, let alone defiance, in all the time any of them had known her.
Damn. Damn, damn, damn.
She’d known from the very beginning that it would never work between her and Jeff. And sure enough, it had come to this.
She stood up from the table and said woodenly, “I’m going for a walk. I’ll be back in time for the final briefing.”
Kat was mildly surprised that none of the Medusas followed her down to the beach. But she supposed they were so stunned by her outburst that they didn’t know what to do. She’d been walking aimlessly along the beach for about an hour, oblivious to the magnificent sunset glinting scarlet off the pristine sand, when her cell phone rang.
Reluctantly, she pulled it out. Startled at the caller, she opened the phone. “Hi, Vanessa. Did the others sic you on me?”
“Hi. And yes, they did. Wanna talk?”
“If I say no and hang up, will you call me back continuously until I do talk to you?”
“No. I’ll be on the first plane down there to get in your face until you talk to me.”
Kat sighed. The woman would do it, too. Vanessa wasn’t known for taking no for an answer. Thing was, of all her teammates, her boss came the closest to understanding her. She sometimes thought Vanessa had an inkling of her true capabilities but chose to honor her secret. Vanessa also seemed to have a handle on Kat’s view of things like honor and right and wrong.
Kat asked in resignation, “What did they tell you?”
“That Captain Steiger, while making a rational mission decision, is forcing you into doing something he shouldn’t.”
Her teammates had supported her? She ought to have expected it, but it surprised and pleased her nonetheless. “They said that?”
“Aleesha said he asked you to go against your personal code of honor. She’s worried that you’ll disobey him and get in trouble.”
Kat didn’t reply.
“Will you disobey him?” her boss pressed.
“No offense, Vanessa, but I’ll face a court-martial rather than go against my code of honor. I know you’ll think I’m a fool, and you can tell me how I’m throwing away my career, but it’s who I am. I can’t go against my prom-” she broke off, horrified at what she’d just revealed.
“I don’t think you’re a fool, Kat. And I’d never ask you to go against the vows you made to your grandfather.”
Kat practically dropped her phone. “How do you know about him?”
Vanessa had the good grace to sound apologetic. “I talked to Captain Steiger a few minutes ago.”
Kat’s stomach burst into butterflies. Not the excited, happy kind. The nervous, unpleasant ones. When Vanessa didn’t continue, she asked reluctantly, “What did he say?”
“He loves you, Kat.”
“He said that?”
Vanessa laughed. “Are you kidding? Of course he didn’t say it. He probably doesn’t even know it himself yet. But he’s a wreck. He’s tearing himself in two over what he believes to be his duty and his feelings for you. He could hardly form a coherent sentence when he was talking to me. He’s a mess.”
“Then how do you know how he feels?” Kat challenged.
“Because I watched Jack go through the exact same thing.”
Jack Scatalone. Their training officer and supervisor, and Vanessa’s husband. The man who’d been assigned to train the Medusas-and to break them. He’d been ordered to make sure they never became Special Forces operators. Except no matter what he’d thrown at them, they’d survived and succeeded. He’d reluctantly come to the conclusion that they deserved to take their place in the Spec Ops community, yet he’d been ordered to dismantle the team regardless of his pleas to let the Medusas have a shot. And to top it off, he’d been falling in love with Vanessa at the same time he was forced to sabotage her team.
Of all people, he probably was the one who could best understand the dilemma Jeff found himself in. Vanessa probably got it, too. Heck, even Kat could understand why Jeff was doing what he was doing. But that didn’t mean she could meekly go along with it.
“Look, Vanessa. The Ghost appealed to my honor. He gave me his word that he meant no harm and that this meeting was vital. If I show up, I’m tacitly giving him my word in return that I won’t pull any stunts on him. I can’t take the guy down.”
“Any idea why this thief wants to talk to you so much?”
“We’ve been chewing on that all day. No one has any idea. We all agree it’s insane, and something compelling must be driving him to it.”
“Does he know who you are?”
Kat mulled that one over. “He probably has a good idea. He ripped off my throat mike during the fight. When I hit the ground, it was gone, so he must’ve taken it with him.”
“And after examining it, he’d probably have a pretty good idea that he’s dealing with at least a U.S. government agent, if not a military member. Not too many civilians have access to the caliber of equipment we use. Let’s assume he does know roughly who you are.”
Kat frowned. Okay. So that only made his request to meet her all the more puzzling. Vanessa was quiet on the other end of the phone, and Kat didn’t fill in the silence. Viper’s intellect was formidable, and her instincts were pretty much without exception spot-on.
Finally, Vanessa sighed. “Jeff said this guy was old school. Carried no gun and made no effort to do serious injury to the two of you. Is that your impression of this guy as well?”
“It is.”
“Something extraordinary has happened. Something he wants the American government to know about-badly enough to risk his life to tell it to you. You’re the logical person for him to approach. Particularly since you could’ve killed him and didn’t. You’ve earned a measure of trust from him.”
Kat burst out, “And Jeff’s asking me to betray that trust!”
“I’ll talk to Jeff. You go to that meeting. Do what you have to do.”
“Are you telling me to follow Jeff’s order?” Kat asked in disbelief.
“I’m telling you to follow your heart. You’ve got more courage and decency in your pinkie finger than most people muster in a lifetime. I’m telling you to do what you think is right. Then, no matter what consequences follow, I’ll back you up and you’ll be at peace with yourself.”
It was as if a wash of cool water flowed over her, flushing away all the bad energy, all the anger and disquiet making her sick at heart. Kat took a deep breath. Released it slowly.
“Thank you, Vanessa.”
“There’s nothing to thank me for. I told you to do what you were already going to do anyway.”
“I haven’t made up my mind-”
“Sure you have.”
“Huh?”
“You’re the heart and soul of my team. The arrow on the Medusas’ compass that always points us in the right direction. You never waver; you always know the right thing to do. Whenever I’m not sure of what I’m doing, I can always look into your eyes and see exactly what I’m supposed to do. Tonight, I hear in your voice that you know the right thing to do. And I’m telling you to go with it. You’ve never steered me wrong before. I’ve no reason to believe you’ve read this one wrong, either.”
Kat was speechless. Such a ringing vote of confidence from Vanessa, whom she arguably admired more than any other person alive, was overwhelming.
“You still there, Cobra?”
“Uh, yeah. Thanks. Wow.”
Vanessa laughed. “So does this mean Junior and I get to stay home to look after my swollen ankles and eat chocolate tonight?”
Kat chuckled. “You do realize you’ve probably just signed the death warrant on my career, don’t you?”
“You know, about half the folks in the Spec Ops community said Jack would never make colonel because he broke every rule in the book to bring the Medusas into existence. The other half said he was a shoo-in for colonel precisely because he broke every rule in the book and brought the Medusas into existence. And here he is, sporting a shiny new set of eagles on his shoulders. Risk takers are rewarded more often than not, Cobra. You’ll come out of this okay.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
“I’ll stand beside you no matter what happens.”
Too bad Jeff couldn’t say the same thing. “Thanks, boss.”
“Any time.”
In a much calmer frame of mind, Kat performed an ancient tai chi routine as the sun slid away into the west. She had a job to do, Jeff or no Jeff. And she would not fail Vanessa or the Ghost. She would live up to both of their best opinions of her.
No matter what Jeff did to her for it.