“Dude!” Fitz exclaimed. “You guys missed Plane Crash Girl!”
“What?” Torres took one look at my face and then tracked my line of sight.
“That was Izzy.” I watched until she turned the corner.
“No shit?” Torres’s eyes flared wide. “I missed meeting the one and only Isabeau? I saw you out on the patio, but I didn’t want to interrupt if you were hitting on . . .” He shook his head. “That was seriously her?”
“Seriously her.” I nodded.
“What fucking plane crash?” Rowell asked, and we headed to the car.
I told them the story as I designated drove half their asses back to post while Fitz took the others.
It took me hours to get to sleep that night, and once I did, I dreamed about her. No plane. No river. No ambulances. Just her.
My phone rang the next morning as I finished my run, and I didn’t recognize the area code, but I answered, my chest heaving from the nine miles I’d just covered. “Hello?”
“Nate?”
The smile on my face was instantaneous. “Izzy?”
“Yeah.” She laughed nervously. “Look, you’re not leaving today, are you?”
“No.” I stared at the stack of boxes in my barracks room, already packed for storage. “Why? Everything okay?” Juggling the phone, I stripped off my shirt and threw it in the pile of the last load of laundry I’d do tonight.
“I didn’t get on the plane.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
NATHANIEL
Kabul, Afghanistan
August 2021
I had just pulled my Kevlar over my head and fastened the Velcro when three pounding knocks sounded on my bedroom door. There was a more-than-furious woman waiting for me on the other side when I opened it.
“What the hell do you mean, I’m not going with you?” Izzy yelled up at me, her hands fisted on her hips. She was dressed for another day in the office, in black linen slacks and a blouse that cut across her collarbone, but the heels made me smile. And that perfume? Swore to God, Izzy was the only woman I knew who could pull off Chanel in a fucking war zone.
“How do you even know I’m going anywhere?” I asked, bracing one hand on the doorframe and the other on the handle of the door.
She glared up at me, her eyes lingering on my combat gear, and then she hoisted a brow. “Because Orange or Blue, whatever the hell his name is supposed to be, told me that he’d be standing guard outside the conference room today while we work, and I’m more than aware that you wouldn’t switch out babysitters unless you were leaving,” she snapped, fire in her eyes.
“One, it was Sergeant Black. Two, we’re not going to argue in the hallway like a pair of dramatic college kids.”
“Fine by me.” She ducked under my arm and marched into my room, folding her arms across her chest as she took in the space. It wasn’t a suite like hers, just a single with a private bathroom, which was the next-best thing I had to being stateside. As accommodations came, this was the Ritz-Carlton of Afghanistan.
A sigh ripped through my lips as I recognized that there was no throwing Izzy out of my room without making a bigger scene, and I shut the door to give us privacy. “I thought you wanted to get Serena back. I pulled a shit ton of strings to make a flight happen, and I’m going to see if she’s still up there, hence why I asked Sergeant Black to keep an eye on you since none of your entourage has meetings today.”
We were supposed to be back on the road—or in the sky—tomorrow, but given the state of the country, I was hoping I could talk her onto a plane home instead if I brought Serena back.
“I’m going with you.” She lifted her chin.
“You have zero reason to go with me.” I shook my head. “It’s not happening.”
“You don’t get to tell me where I go!”
I stalked forward until the toes of my boots touched the tips of her high heels. “That’s exactly what I get to do as the head of your security. Remember, you agreed to listen to every order out there,” I said, pointing to the door. “You only get to throw your fits in here.”
Her jaw dropped. “I am not throwing a fit, Nathaniel Phelan.”
“You are.” A corner of my mouth quirked up. “Whether you like it or not, Isabeau, you’re a senior congressional aide, which means unless you have a reason to put yourself in harm’s way, then I’m not going to dangle you in front of the enemy like a tasty little target.”
“And if I do have a reason?”
“You don’t. I changed your itinerary this morning the second I read the reports that it looks like Kunduz is going to fall today.” A couple of hours ago, I’d had her curled up in my lap, which was something I desperately tried to forget. It had been a slip on my part, but the second I’d seen her kneeling on that floor, shaking like a leaf, I’d acted on instinct, just like always when it came to her. “There’s zero chance you’re keeping that meeting.”
She swallowed and nodded. “Which I appreciate, as much as I hate it.” Closing her eyes, she rubbed the bridge of her nose.
“In fact, I’d feel entirely better if you all got your polished asses on a plane and abandoned this whole trip. Cut your losses, Izzy,” I blatantly begged.
“We have a job to do,” she retorted. “Senator Lauren is still coming next week—”
“Which is a mistake.” I stepped back so I could get a break from the perfect sweetness of her perfume invading my lungs. “This country is going to fall a hell of a lot faster than forecasted.”
“Reports said we have six to twelve months,” she argued, but the pursing of her lips told me she knew I wasn’t blowing smoke.
“Yeah, well, I trust what I’m seeing in a place I know pretty damned well more than someone’s best-case-scenario analysis of it from half a world away, and what’s going on out there”—I pointed to my window—“is not the best-case scenario.”
“I’m not stupid, Nate. I know that.” Panic flared in her eyes. “But Serena is up there.”
“And I know what Serena looks like. I’ve already got feelers out in the area, so by the time I get there, hopefully someone will have tracked her down. I’ll be back before dinner.”
“She might not recognize you,” she fired back.
“Oh, come on, that’s the best argument you’ve got?” I cocked a brow at her, and she dropped her gaze, but it wasn’t in that You’ve won way I’d seen before, or even the Fine, I’ll give in way. No . . . that emotion beneath those furrowed brows was guilt. “What did you do, Isabeau?”
She swallowed. “Mazar-i-Sharif is still safe.”
My eyes flared. “You’re shitting me if you think that. Sheberghan fell to the Taliban yesterday. Intel indicates not only is Kunduz Province being overrun, but also Sar-e Pol, and Takhar. What do those all have in common, Izzy?”