Out of the silence came the crackle of a handheld radio, and the dispatcher cried, “Medevac! Medevac! Medevac!”
Davis, Johanna, and Tavish shot to their feet and darted from their tents, along with nine other camouflaged figures.
A rehearsed riot of belts and straps, buckles and Velcro, and twin Chinooks were airborne within five minutes, the pilots and copilots still blinking sleep from their eyes.
“Black Watch Lance Corporal Gannon reporting.”
“Fuck,” muttered Tavish. A desperate call from the Black Watch meant a serious problem. So far, the unit hadn’t suffered a single fatality.
“Supposedly friendly area is hot,” informed Gannon, letting everyone know how bad it was. “Our platoon is stranded. We are ambushed from both sides. Three down. Buchanan’s been hit by shrapnel in the neck!”
Listening to the medic calls stacking up like bids at an auction as another platoon was ambushed, Tavish cursed.
Colonel Hugh Smith, eyes trained on the valley below, ready to kill with his single, unerring bullets, said quietly, “It broke down before it began. Fuckers.”
“Considering the circumstances, they are still communicating in a calm and orderly fashion,” said Nurse Rose James, ever the optimist, even with the descriptions of the harrowing onslaught and Major Buchanan’s injury.
Doctor Major John Cameron blew out a loud breath, his usual bad mood appearing. Yet, Tavish wouldn’t exchange him for another medical companion; he was the most precise anesthesiologist and the most calm intensive care specialist he had worked with. Even better, he spoke more than five languages, which helped when the evacuated were from other nationalities, which often happened.
When they reached Sebastian’s group, their twin ship dove in first and just missed being hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, which arced over the tail and into the rock face. Blasts exploded from out of nowhere, vibrating the air so strongly the Chinooks shook.
“Up, up!” Tavish shouted, a hot tide of adrenaline rushing through him, as Davis shot up in the air. He hit his head so hard, his right brow opened up, blood flowing down his face.
A sudden spray of small-arms fire was more accurate, and the twin Chinook, with catastrophic damage to the hydraulic system, peeled off for an emergency landing.
The Apache escorting them was also hit, not before rocket-exploding a few caves, but left the area nonetheless.
“Fuck! We’re alone,” Bram said from the pilot cabin. The words settled heavily on their shoulders.
“You OK, Doc?” Hugh asked him, pulling him from the floor.
“Aye,” he replied, cleaning his wound and quickly stopping the blood flow.
“Those horns will kill you tomorrow,” Davis added, with a half smirk.
Tavish grunted. “Bugger off, Sonja.”
“What’s plan B?” asked Davis.
“There is no plan B,” answered Tavish. “We came to rescue that platoon down there. We wait and stick with the plan.”
Trees burned, building up smoke. The Taliban reinforcements streamed in from a network of caves, shooting without care.
“Get Buchanan off this mountain,” Lance Corporal Gannon pleaded.
They had been obeying orders from base to wait for a clearing. It was full dark, the hardest time to fly, with the wind picking up. The fighting around the gravely wounded soldiers was not too intense, but the sky glowed like a dying campfire from explosions here and there. The average thirty-nine-minute combat medevac mission had turned into more than an hour.
Gannon, on the ground, was sure they were down to minutes, as blood soaked the earth around Sebastian, even with the first aid care they had administered. “Just land, for fuck’s sake!”
“Doc. On your call,” said Davis.
“Davis and Bram, hold a hover. Gover and Capp, hoist the ones you can.” Hearing his own calm, commanding voice suddenly put order in his thoughts and helped with his decision. “I am going down.”
“It’s too dark to perform a hoist,” said Capp.
“I’m going down. You reel the others up. We work as a team,” he commanded.
“A dead doctor on a medevac team is useless,” stated Hugh, eye on the scope, finger on the trigger.
“Hugh.” Tavish’s hand fell on his longtime friend’s shoulder; he was the best sniper he had ever encountered. “I count on you to keep me alive.”
“Of course, Will.” Hugh’s use of Tavish’s nickname made a lifetime of friendship pass in front of his eyes.
“You get the fuck out of reach until I call!” Tavish dipped into a stash of gummy bears and shoved them into his mouth. Strapping himself onto a yellow hook, he checked on Rose and Cameron hanging IV bags and setting up monitors, prepping the cabin for the incoming patients—his patients—and the others on the team working as a well-oiled machine. As MERTs, they didn’t need to communicate with one another. Each member knew exactly what to do.
From the ground, Sebastian, Gannon, and the others saw the aircraft pull up a touch more, and then more as another rocket exploded on the mountain, but nowhere near them.
“You’re leaving us?” Gannon radioed, incredulous.
Inside the Chinook, they were all thinking the same thing—it was a mad rescue attempt—but as Tavish stepped into the air, they held it as sacred as every other.
From 230 feet up in the evening sky, with the wind spinning him like a circus performer, Tavish heard the panic in the lance corporal’s voice, and then saw the relief on his face, when he touched the ground beside them. He had to lie flat for a minute to recover his bearings.
Tavish took a cursory look at Sebastian. The cut on his face was horrible, but worse was the shrapnel that had embedded in his neck, cutting a major artery; he bled profusely.
Before Tavish could even touch him, Sebastian’s blood-covered hands thrust into Tavish’s gloved hand a photograph of his daughter. “Tell her—I lo—lov—”
Covered by Sebastian’s blood, a young strawberry blonde-haired, green-eyed girl smiled at Tavish.
Tavish put the photograph back into Sebastian’s armor pocket, patted it slightly, and with an encouraging smile, said, “You will tell her that, Major. Now, shut up.”
He threw a breathing tube into one of his nostrils, opening up a breathing path, and staunched the bleeding with gauze soaked in a clotting agent, but even as he worked, he thought it pointless.
“Doc, the enemy has superior positioning, but they’re lobbing AK-47 rounds, and whatever else, from a long distance, just hoping to score a lucky hit,” informed Hugh. “Capp and Gover will keep a circle of fire. We’re coming down.”
“Go, go, go!” He yelled for the platoon to climb on board. Bullets flecked the landing zone and sizzled past their ears, making Davis and Bram pull up again.
As bullets and grenades showered from above, Tavish ran an IV into Sebastian’s arm and secured the big Scot on the hoist. He climbed on it himself and signaled to Capp to reel them in: ten feet, fifty feet, a hundred feet off the ground.
Bram and Davis lowered and kept poised.
“Just there,” he shouted to Sebastian, who was not saying a word or crying or screaming as the other three wounded had, as was usual. He was so eerily quiet that Tavish prayed they were not too late.
The wind gusted, sending him and Sebastian swinging, Capp throwing his torso outside the helicopter to catch them before they floated toward the tail rotors.
Typically, blood was everywhere—screams of pain, shouted words—but until he lost consciousness, Sebastian kept his mouth shut and his gaze on the doctor with elegant, steady hands and grave sea-green eyes, who had given him hope when he had none.
Davis and Bram somehow flew perfectly, knowing that their seats were designed to flip down into operating tables, because bullet-ridden pilots were that common. Hugh had killed a bunch of Taliban, as had Capp and Gover with their machine guns, keeping themselves protected with their fire. Rose and Cameron had stabilized the other wounded and left space for Tavish to t
reat Sebastian.
They didn’t talk to each other or to anyone else about that mission, except during debriefing. They all understood it was special; more than ten soldiers were rescued when it should have been impossible to rescue one.
When the news came they would be awarded for bravery, it was the knowledge that all the wounded were alive that rewarded them.
Beardley Manor’s Library
3:24 p.m.
Laetitia had never felt like such an intruder in a conversation, and there was an intense, silent one taking place between the men. She stepped back, but Sebastian’s grip on her hand intensified. She saw the huge chef swallow several times, before he raised his eyes to Tavish.
“You . . . you remember.”
“Aye.” I remember. I remember every one of my more seriously injured patients and every request they made. And I’ve engraved in my heart the ones made by those I could not save. He stretched out his hand. “It’s good to see you so well.”
“Oh, man. It’s so good to see you.” Sebastian clapped Tavish’s hand in his and shook it vigorously. A warm smile, as wide as his scar allowed, spread on his face. “I tried to contact you. I’ve never had an opportunity to thank you properly, Doc.”
“I’m not Doc anymore. Tavish Uilleam will do.” Tavish cleared his throat, self-conscious. “Who would’ve thought that badass soldier would be a fucking talented chef.”
“I was a chef before I enlisted. My mother worked for the baron for many years. Family tradition,” he explained with a shrug. “If you’d leave your number with the lass, the least I can do is cook a special dinner for you. Any day, anywhere you wish. It will be a pleasure, Doc.”
“Tavish Uilleam,” he corrected automatically. “I’ll—”
“Why don’t we have dinner together? At my place?” Laetitia blurted, then blushed. “I mean—That’s to say—”
Easier than you thought, Tavish Uilleam. “I’d love to. I’m visiting friends who live nearby and decided to stop by to leave a new draft of the contract for you.” He tapped on the envelope by way of explaining. “At eight?”
“Perfect.” Sebastian used that as a cue to leave them alone. “See you then, Doc.”
“Buchanan,” Tavish said, nodding absent-mindedly. He was already admiring how Laetitia looked so lovely in plain black.
“Are you staying at Mallory Court?” What kind of question is that?
“Nae, not this time. I’m staying at my friends’ place. You might know it: Lakeside Manor.”
Ah. Laetitia nodded, forgetting to elaborate while taking in his outfit. For the first time, she was seeing him without the perfect, sharp tailored suits. The black jeans molded his body not like a tight second skin but in a comfortable way, which made her want to run her hands over them to discover the shape of his legs. Instead, the black sweater stretched over his stomach and rigid chest muscles. Her gaze lifted, and she appreciated his corded neck and square jaw, and his mouth, which was curled up.
Her eyes snapped to his. And locked.
There was a gleam inside those sea-greens.
Great! First you ask him out for dinner. At your place! Then you let yourself be caught eyeing his body. Just great.
She smiled as an excuse for her blunt scrutiny, and her face lightened.
There you are. Her smile transformed her.
He willed himself to regain control, but his mind and body clearly had other ideas. His mind was filled with images fired by his imagination—and he had a rather vivid imagination where Laetitia was concerned—and his body hardened in response, as renewed desire lanced through him like quick fire.
He cupped her chin in his palm. “I love it when you do this.”
Her legs weakened as heat shot to her core. She leaned in, a small degree. Her breath hitched. “Do what?”
“This smile of yours.” His thumb brushed her bottom lip. “It starts slowly, like the subtle opening of a flower, needing space to bloom, but not to burst. By tiny degrees, it softly illuminates your whole face. It is beautiful seeing it.” It makes me want to have you smiling only at me.
“It’s just a smile,” she whispered.
“Nae.” His thumb pressed on the center of her lip, and her mouth parted. “It’ll never be just a smile. This is you. Only you.” And you’ll be mine.
With those words, she felt as though Tavish had uncovered some secret part of her—looked into her soul. It was what she felt when she was happy, but she had never thought of herself as a flower but more as a bird to whom the world was giving a chance to stretch out her wings and feel the wind caress her feathers. Then have me. Now. Here.
He could smell her, honeysuckle and fresh air. A hot throb went through his groin as he made love to her with his eyes and thumb.
“Oh. I thought you were done.” Alejandro was at the threshold, smirking and pushing Baron Beardley’s wheelchair into the library. “My uncle wants a word with you.”
He narrowed his eyes at Alejandro and growled, “We’re done.” There will be time for more, later.
“Dinner?” Laetitia whispered.
I wouldn’t miss it! He nodded. “Eight.”
Tavish followed her with his eyes, and his vague unease at Alejandro became downright anger as the man settled the baron’s wheelchair near a sofa and stood there waiting, ostensibly, for Laetitia’s exit before turning and leaving the room himself.
CHAPTER 13
Ireland
Whoever looked at his navy-blue eyes and blond, curly hair framing his elegantly carved features, wearing trendy clothes, would have thought they had encountered a self-centered fashion model.
But on closer inspection, Johansen Kinsella was an intelligent, cunning, wealthy man, who appreciated the good things in life.
The man sitting in the dark knew that. He had been the same, once. Turning from the sideboard, a small glass of amber spirits in his hand, he asked, “Join me?”
Johansen accepted the Waterford crystal glass from the man, sniffing it before sipping. “Slàinte.”
His brother raised a silver cup with yagé. “Peace.”
The aged cognac slid down Johansen’s throat like liquid fire. “Why Martell, Andrew?”
“Why not?” he asked, not surprised his brother easily recognized the expensive liquor.
Leaning against the sideboard, his arms folded over his chest, Johansen said, “I’m afraid to ask.”
“Pardon me?” Andrew sat in his favorite armchair, in the darkest corner of the room.
“You don’t enjoy any of the good stuff anymore,” he said, setting aside the glass. He didn’t drink to excess, which could not be said of his brother. “Except when you want something. Usually something that includes pain, blood, death, or—and mayhem.”
“Is that any way to speak to your beloved older brother?”
Johansen laughed, without humor. “Let’s agree that you’re my older brother.”
A somber expression settled on his face. “We have been through interesting times, haven’t we?”
“Some more interesting than others,” Johansen slowly admitted. “What’s on your mind?”
“I’ve noticed a decrease in new devotees. No more donations. Services are lacking. There are only a couple of widows who are able to make yagé.” He observed his homemade cheroot dispassionately before taking a drag. “And when was the last time we had a virgin brought in? A year ago?”
Johansen might have laughed if he hadn’t known that his brother had become psychologically and physically dependent on what had started out as a supposedly innocent bachelor party. A whole week at the monastery to enjoy the last nights of free sex, women, and drinks of one of his friends. They had thought of it like a trip to an expensive resort or, rather, brothel. But it turned out to be something much darker.
His brother became addicted to the hallucinogenic tea and had moved to the monastery a month later. Johansen had returned every weekend over the two following months, imploring his brother to leave with him, which he refused
. Until a fateful night when he realized his brother was lost.
“There is growing unrest among the elders. Only three babies were born this year, and only five new ones have been delivered. The old women are dwindling, and soon we won’t be able to prepare curare.”
“You are not indigenous! You’re living in the twenty-first century. You live in luxury.” Johansen motioned his hand to encompass the room. “Stop this nonsense. Please.”
“They won’t be able to eat!”
“For fuck’s sake! You are rich! Buy food at the supermarket!” Johansen went to the only window and looked out. Heavy clouds covered the sky. He wanted out of there before the sun set. “I can’t help with old women, young virgins, or babies. But you—you I can help.”
“You don’t understand, Brother. This is not a youthful joke anymore.”
“I understand all right! This is barely legal, Brother.” Johansen stared at him. “There is nothing more for you here. Come with me.”
“I wish I could.”
“The prodigal brother!” Geoffrey pushed the door open, his thoughts racing at this most unexpected turn. He prided himself on preparing for every eventuality. He was never caught off guard, never unprepared. On this occasion, however, he had to admit that his cunning had failed him.
Johansen growled, “Geoffrey.”
Geoffrey turned to Andrew. “I told you he would come. I always give you what you need, my son.”
“Your loyalty is commendable,” Andrew answered.
Geoffrey ignored the irony coming in waves from the dark corner and offered half a bow. “It is as deep and endless as the eternal spirit.”
Johansen snorted. “More like as deep and endless as his coffers.”
“We all have our weaknesses, do we not?” Geoffrey smirked at Johansen. “And I fulfill his, which you cannot do.”
“You’re more foolish than I thought,” Johansen growled, low. “His value is zilch if he dies.”
“I’m not going to die.” Andrew stirred with a restless impatience. “Not before I have my pet back.”