Chapter 8
One month later...
"Cory, you have to do it. I can’t go back until I know you’ll be okay." Delaney stood beside Cory in the large room dedicated to rehabilitation of wounded soldiers.
His face burned red, sweat popping out as he tried to pull the long rubber strap toward him using what was left of his right arm. When it was only halfway, he let go and growled. "F*ck this!"
A pretty blond physical therapist stepped up to him. "Cory, the only way you’ll get better is to fight past the pain, and use those muscles that haven’t been used in a month. Now do it." Her voice was soft but firm, her lips set in a thin line. Petite and delicate-looking she might be, but she wasn’t taking anything less than Cory’s best.
"You’re new here, aren’t you?" Delaney asked.
"Yes, ma’am." She placed the rubber strap over Cory’s arm and stepped back. "My name’s Leigha. I’ll be Cory’s physical therapist for the next few weeks."
"I don’t want a different therapist," Cory groused. "What was wrong with the one I had?"
"He was transferred to San Antonio Medical Center. He’s leaving in two weeks." Leigha nodded toward the rubber strap. "Now, give me five repetitions with the strap."
"I don’t have the rest of my arm. Why bother?"
She crossed both arms over her chest and leaned close, whispering, "Are you a SEAL or a pansy ass?"
Delaney was torn between telling off Leigha for being so hard on Cory, and laughing out loud. The woman looked like she could be broken in two by any one of the wounded warriors in the rehab center. She couldn’t be more than five feet tall in heels, but she had backbone. In a place as depressing as it was hopeful, she’d need the strength.
Cory had been through multiple surgeries on his stump to clean out the shrapnel, dead tissue, and bone. The pain he’d suffered broke Delaney’s heart, and she was glad her commander had given her leave to stay with him through the worst of it.
But now duty called, and she had to go back to the war. After smelling the acrid scents of alcohol and disinfectant, and freezing in hospital rooms kept cool to ward off infection, she looked forward to the grit, dust, and heat of the desert. And she couldn’t wait to get back behind the controls of a Black Hawk helicopter.
During one of Cory’s rest breaks when his therapist had gone off to help another soldier, Delaney touched his shoulder. "Cory, honey, I need to leave. I have to pack and be on the plane in two hours."
"You sure you don’t want me to come with you to the airport?" Cory looked up, his eyebrows raised in a hopeful expression.
Delaney shook her head. "I don’t like tearful goodbyes, and I don’t want to worry about you getting back to the hospital."
His face fell, and he reached out with his good hand to capture hers. "I don’t know what I would have done without you, O’Connell."
She smiled. He’d never called her Delaney and he’d yet to kiss her like he meant it. Sure he’d pecked her on the cheek, but he acted as if he’d lost some of his manhood when he’d lost his arm. As bad as it had been through his surgeries, the agony, and depression, Delaney couldn’t tell him how she really felt. After losing an arm, what more disappointment and heartache could he stand?
She really loved Cory and couldn’t bear to see him in any additional pain. But did she have to marry him to keep him from giving up hope?
Maybe once she was back in the desert, he’d come to realize they weren’t meant to be. And to prove it to him and to herself, she leaned up on her toes to get closer, captured his face between her palms and kissed him like she would have kissed Tuck—long, lingering and with a little tongue action.
Cory didn’t taste like Tuck, but he cupped the back of her neck and deepened the kiss. Granted, he was a good kisser. At least, he had that going for him. But the spark just wasn’t there—that soul-inspiring jolt of electricity that pulsed through her veins when she kissed Tuck was absent.
"Eh-hem. Want me to come back later?" Leigha stood behind Cory with her brows raised.
Delaney straightened, her cheeks burning. "No. I was just leaving."
"Take your time. I’m here all day." She winked at Cory and performed a perky about-face.
Delaney chuckled. "I think you’ve met your match in that one."
"Yeah." Cory frowned, his gaze following the woman across the floor. Then he turned to Delaney. "Promise me you’ll Skype when you can."
"I’ll try. With the time difference, I’m not sure how often I can."
"And tell Tuck I’m okay. He’s probably blaming himself." Cory stared down at his arm. "He shouldn’t. I don’t."
"I’ll let him know." If she saw him in theater. The SEALs didn’t always stay in one place for long, and she wasn’t sure of her assignment when she got back. They might send her to another province. Her chest ached at the thought of seeing Tuck again. Having left in such a hurry, she hadn’t had an opportunity to say all that needed to be said.
Knowing the way Tuck felt about commitment, she wasn’t sure there was anything left to say. She was engaged to Cory. Anything they might have had was over unless she broke her engagement.
"Cory?" Delaney opened her mouth, wanting to say so much more. To tell him the kiss hadn’t done anything for her, that they weren’t meant for each other. To break their engagement.
"Yeah, babe?" He still held her hand, weaving his fingers through hers.
Words lodged in her throat and she finally choked out, "You realize that was our first real kiss."
He smiled. "I know. I’m just sad it wasn’t before..." He shrugged. "You know."
"Before you lost your arm?" Delaney called it as it was. "That doesn’t matter."
"Does to me. It might have been better."
"The kiss?"
"Yeah."
"You didn’t feel anything either?"
His brows furrowed. "Is that what you think?" He pulled her into his one-armed embrace and kissed the top of her head. "Of course I did."
Delaney could have kicked herself. She braced herself for when the full impact of her words came to him.
She didn’t have long to wait.
"Wait."
Her stomach sank and knotted.
Cory set her at arm’s length, his frown deepening. "Either? Are you telling me you didn’t feel it?"
She hesitated, prepared to lie, and then sighed, leaning her forehead against his broad chest. "I wanted to."
He tipped up her chin. "I thought you loved me."
"I do. I’m just not sure it’s the kind of love you need."
"O’Connell, I’ve loved you from the first time you spilled popcorn on the couch in our apartment at Little Creek."
She smiled up at him, his image blurred through a wash of ready tears. "Tuck was mad. He missed a pass by the Miami Dolphins when they played the New England Patriots."
"He got over it. Especially when you started picking up all the popcorn in his lap. Seems to me he forgot all about the game." Cory grinned. "For a while there, I thought you two would get together."
Delaney opened her mouth to tell him he’d been right.
Before she could, Cory continued. "But when he didn’t make a move, I figured I had a shot. So you didn’t feel anything when we kissed?" He shook his head. "Then I’m not giving my best." He winked. "I used to have a reputation with the women, until I met you. I had a knack for flirting." His chest puffed out.
"Why did you stop flirting?"
All the air left his lungs and he sagged. "What’s it matter? I got my girl. Why should I flirt?"
"Cory, you can’t wait around for me. What if I don’t come back?"
"You’re too damned good a helicopter pilot to bite the big one in the sandbox. You’ll be back."
"But—"
"I don’t want to hear it. One of us has to carry on the tradition of duty, honor, country."
She pressed a finger to his lips. "Promise me this."
He captured the finger and kissed the tip. "Anything."
"Keep your options open."
He frowned. "I love you, O’Connell. I don’t want anything else."
"Promise me," she insisted, narrowing her gaze.
"I’ll think about it."
She waited, ready to blurt out that she wanted to be released from her promise to marry him, but at the last minute couldn’t. "Play nice with your therapist and be strong."
"I have to be. We’re getting married when you get back." He drew her close with his good arm and crushed her lips with his.
Delaney let him kiss her, allowing his tongue to slide between her teeth and caress the length of hers. When they broke apart, she only felt relief. Ducking her head, she hurried from the room, casting one last glance behind her as she left.
Cory was still watching her, his brow furrowed.
Leigha, the therapist, descended on him and put him to work.
At least he was in good hands. Leigha knew what Cory needed more than Delaney. With her out of the way, he’d work hard at recuperating. When she returned, she’d break the truth to him that they couldn’t get married. By that time, he’d have had weeks apart from her. Hopefully enough time to see that they weren’t right for each other.
Her heart heavy, Delaney struck out for her hotel room to pack her bag and take a taxi to the airport. Her pulse quickened at the thought of being back in the cockpit and in the same country as Tuck.
*
"I heard Razor is back in town."
Tuck was on his seventieth sit-up when Big Bird dropped that bomb. He stopped halfway up, his heart slamming hard against his chest. Delaney was back. "That’s good." He pumped out ten more repetitions, sweat dripping off his brow. Though the sun was well on its way to the horizon, the earth had yet to lose any of the daytime residual heat. Temperatures hovered at over one hundred, until the sun completely set. And then the sandbox became almost bearable.
Big Bird dropped down beside him and started with leg lifts, making them look like child’s play, his long legs rising and falling, the muscles of his bare abdomen flexing and extending with each rep.
"Read on Reaper’s Facebook he was doing good. Got him in rehab. Bet he’s givin’ those therapists a run for their money. Should be bench pressing a couple hundred pounds by day three."
Tuck remained silent, his gut clenching.
Big Bird let his feet fall to the ground and he stared over at Tuck. "You still thinking the injury was your fault?"
Tuck grunted, refusing to answer. His team never missed an opportunity to counsel him on what he should and shouldn’t be feeling. He’d been there when Cory had almost lost his life.
"Could have been any one of us. Even you."
"Should have been me," he bit out, regretting his outburst as soon as it crossed his lips.
"We all signed on as SEALs, accepting the risks equally. Just because you didn’t go through that door first doesn’t mean you got something to be ashamed of."
"I don’t want to talk about it." Tuck rose to his feet, ready to jog a dozen laps inside the wire. Outside the wire, if he could. To hell with IEDs. Maybe he’d land on one and put an end to his second-guessing.
Big Bird rose, lightning fast, and grabbed his arm. "Well, you better talk about something. We’re a team, and you’re not acting like a part of it."
Tuck’s fists clenched. He wanted to hit Big Bird, a man he’d give his life for. Hell, there wasn’t a man on his entire team he wouldn’t give his life for. Including Reaper.
"Go ahead, hit me," Big Bird said. "If punching me makes you feel better and gets this shit outta your system. We need you back, one hundred ten percent. You copy?"
His fists loosened and he nodded. "Roger."
Big Bird let go of his arm and stepped back. "Now, run. Sweat it out and be ready for our next call."
Tuck took off and ran. And ran. After four laps around the perimeter, he’d pushed himself so hard he probably bordered on heat exhaustion. He stumbled to the shower tent and stood under the lukewarm water until his body cooled enough to ensure he wouldn’t pass out.
Big Bird had been right. He’d been in a cross between raging funk and a shit hole since Reaper had been medevaced out with a CCATT team and Delaney. Time for him to get his head on straight and did what he’d trained to do. Kill the bad guys.
He dried off and stepped into a pair of clean shorts, slipped on his flip-flops, and shook the water out of his shaggy hair. He might even get a haircut. That might make him feel more human, less like a slug.
With his attitude adjusted, he stepped out of the shower tent and ran into Captain Delaney O’Connell, nearly knocking her off her feet.
She staggered backward until he caught her arm and dragged her against his chest.
"Tuck." Her face blanched at first, then flushed.
"Delaney." His fingers tightened around her arm, his mouth twitching, aching to claim hers. A knot lodged in his gut.
Her gaze shifted to his mouth and her pretty pink tongue darted out to wet her lips.
He wanted to taste where her tongue had been, to chew on that full lower lip, to suck it into his mouth while his hand roved over her body.
She wore a robe and he’d bet not much underneath, and his fingers itched to explore and find out if her skin was really as soft as he remembered.
Tuck dipped his head, his mouth angling toward hers. "I’d heard you were back."
She tipped back her head, her eyes drifting to half-mast. "I missed you."
Before his lips touched hers, he remembered. Tuck straightened, his hand falling to his sides. "How’s Cory?" He backed up several steps, afraid to be too close in case he forgot himself again.
"Doing better. He’s in rehab now. The worst of the surgeries are over, and he’s on his way to mending."
"That’s good." Pulling his towel from his shoulder, he stretched the damp terry cloth between his fists, anything to keep from reaching out and pulling her into his arms again. "How was your flight back?"
Her mouth twisted into a wry grin. "Long and tedious."
Every instinct urged him to grab this woman and kiss her until they were both breathless. He’d really missed her. More than he’d ever missed any woman. But she was taken.
"Well, I’m glad you made it back safely and that Cory is doing better." He turned to walk away before he did something stupid. A SEAL didn’t lust after his buddy’s fiancé.
"Tuck?" A soft touch on his arm stopped him, a crackle of electricity shooting through his veins. He froze, fighting the urge to throw her over his shoulder and find a quiet, shadowed space where he could make mad, crazy love to her in this camp full of soldiers.
He stared down at her hand, willing her to remove it.
She didn’t, the fingers tightening. "I missed you," she said softly.
"You’re with Cory now." His voice came out harsh, unyielding.
She looked away. "The injury’s been hard on him. For a man so used to doing everything himself, he’s had to rely on others."
His heart ached for his friend. If he could have, he’d have gone with them to the States and done everything in his power to help Cory through the worst of it. In a softer tone, he said, "I’m glad you were there with him."
She looked up, her eyes glassy with unshed tears. "I had to be. But I wanted to be here. With you." Her chin dipped, and a single tear slipped down her cheek.
That tear was Tuck’s undoing. He pulled her into his arms and crushed her to him. "Jesus, Del. I never knew how much I’d miss you until you were gone. Four weeks felt like four years."
"I’m here now." Her hand curled around the back of his neck.
He bent to take her lips, stopping just short. Then he gripped her face between his palms, his jaw hardening. "You know we can’t do this."
She stared into his eyes, her own, limpid pools. "Why does facing a hundred enemy soldiers seem easy compared to this?" She laughed and brushed a tear from the corner of her eyes.
"I can’t do this."
She nodded. "I know."
"Our relationship has to be strictly business from now on."
Again, she nodded, swallowing hard, more tears streaming down her face.
"Goodnight, Captain O’Connell." Against his better judgment, he pressed a kiss to her forehead. The gesture wasn’t enough to make up for what he really wanted from her. But Cory was a long way from recovery and would never get back his arm. Tuck hadn’t saved him from losing it in the first place, he sure as hell wasn’t going to be responsible for Cory losing Delaney.
He turned and walked away from the only woman he’d felt he could have loved enough to spend the rest of his life with.
For several minutes, Delaney stood where he’d left her, unable to move for the tears blinding her. She’d never cried over a man…until Tuck. Damn him!
She scrubbed the tears from her cheeks, but more followed. If she didn’t get a grip on her emotions, one of her squad members would see her. Then word would get back the female Night Stalker was going all hormonal and losing her touch. She refused to let her personal life interfere with her professional duties. Squaring her shoulders, though her heart hurt enough to make her sick to her stomach, she completed her shower and headed back to the tent she shared with Lindsay.
"You don’t look much better for the shower," the nurse commented when she entered the tent.
"I’m not here to win a beauty contest," Delaney mumbled, turning away so that Lindsay couldn’t see her puffy eyes and guess that she’d been crying.
"So, did you run into tall, dark and gorgeous?"
Delaney’s lips twitched. "If you’re referring to Tuck, yes. I saw him briefly."
"Is he disappointed you are engaged to another man?"
"Apparently not."
"Did he try to kiss you?"
"Not even once. He’d never poach on a buddy’s territory."
Lindsay sighed. "Must be nice to have two handsome SEALs in love with you at once."
"No, it’s not." Delaney fell onto her cot and buried her face in her pillow. She’d been so happy to see Tuck. For him to keep her at a distance was killing her.
"Captain O’Connell?" a voice spoke from outside her tent.
She sat up, scrubbed her hands over her face to wash away all traces of tears then said, "Enter."
A young PFC stepped through the doorway. "Your presence is required in the Ops tent in fifteen minutes."
Delaney thanked the PFC and waited until he left before groaning.
"Holy smokes, you’ve barely been here half a day and they’re sending you out?"
Delaney didn’t care. Anywhere was better than staying in the same camp as Tuck. Vowing to be tough, she suited up, grabbed her flight bag, and marched to the Ops tent.
The next couple days passed in a blur of flying sorties and getting back up to speed on the ongoing effort to suppress the Taliban insurgents wreaking havoc on nearby villages.
She didn’t see Tuck, nor have anything to do with SEAL operations during that time frame. Two weeks passed, and she still hadn’t run into Tuck. She figured he was avoiding her. Accepting the fact he didn’t want anything to do with her, she went about her business, flying sorties of troops and supplies to the hard-to-reach or dangerous locations in the enemy-infested hills.
During the second week she was back, she got orders to conduct a night mission heading north into cave-pocked hills. The operations hut had been sweltering hot and tempers had been short. She and her crew were supposed to deliver a small squad of highly trained troops to a building. Then she was to hover nearby until she got word from the soldiers to extract them. She’d done this type of maneuver so many times, she could almost fly it blind, although that wasn’t advisable.
That evening, she showed up at the chopper, performed all her flight checks, and settled into the pilot’s seat.
The crew climbed on board, checked their weapons, and gave her the verbal "thumbs up". A group of men showed up dressed all in black, including their black Kevlar vests and helmets. Each face was smeared in black camouflage, unrecognizable, but by their sizes and shapes, she recognized the members of the SEAL Unit, assigned to Camp Leatherneck.
Delaney’s heart thumped against her chest. She wondered if Tuck was one of the SEALs dressed in black. Would he speak to her, if he was? Perhaps not knowing and not talking to him was better. He was just another troop who needed a skilled pilot to insert and extract him from the designated locations.
Keeping her focus forward, she checked her gauges and waited for her cue from the gunners in back.
"Take her up!" Mac called out.
Easing back on the control, she lifted off the ground and sent the helicopter toward their destination.
The flight went smoothly with little radio chatter, and soon Delaney hovered low over the drop zone.
SEALs fast-roped to the ground and ran toward what appeared to be dark holes in the sides of the hills.
Before they’d gone twenty yards, the bright flare of tracer rounds lit the insides of one of the black entrances to the mountainside.
Delaney had been briefed to take off immediately and retreat to a safe location away from the firefight. Yet, she hesitated, afraid the bullets being fired would hit one of the SEALs rushing toward the caves.
She started to pull up when the door gunner let loose a round of fifty-caliber bullets. "Man down!" he shouted into his mic. "Man down!"
Delaney lifted off the ground and swooped in, aiming at the opening where the tracer rounds blinked in the dark.
"What are you doing?" her co-pilot asked.
"Rescuing an American," she said, her fingers tight on the controls, her insides quaking. The man down could be Tuck.
"They have to take out the gunner before we can pick them up. We’re one giant target out here, captain."
"We can’t leave a man down."
"No, but we can’t help if we’re shot down."
Hovering a moment longer, she forced her hand to move. The helicopter pulled up and back, flying away from the action.
Delaney goosed the fuel, sending the chopper leaping upward.
"Incoming!" Mac cried.
An explosion rocked the entire craft and it pitched to the starboard, heading straight into a rocky hillside.
Delaney fought for control, righting the blades at the last minute, but not soon enough to miss the bullets strafing the fuselage.
"Shit! I’m hit," Jones called out.
Not only was Jones hit, the helicopter shuddered, the engine shut down, and they plummeted toward earth.
"Brace yourselves for an emergency landing!" Delaney said into mic. With the power off, the blades slowed and gravity did the rest.