He stepped closer. “Let me—”
“No.” She stopped him with a shake of her head. “You tell it how it is and you don’t apologize, remember?”
“You said you understood,” he murmured. “You said you weren’t looking for anything permanent with someone like me.”
Penny’s throat convulsed with the effort to keep her cool. “I did say that, probably numerous times and both aloud and to myself. I guess I’m not as immune to you as I thought. But that’s my problem, not yours.”
“Penny.”
It took strength she didn’t know she had not to run into his arms at the sound of her name falling from his lips. Not Red. Not sweetheart. Penny. She’d thought she could handle the pain of losing him in whatever way that happened, but she’d been deluding herself. She felt raw and open. And scared out of her mind.
As a defense against the gaping hole forming in her heart, she hiked up her mental walls, closed off her emotional wounds, and summoned the courage to carry on. Dwelling on her loss and the things she couldn’t have only did one thing: it hurt. And there was too much riding on them right now to let that happen.
“Trust me, Rafe. I’ve already done the whole second-place thing when it comes to the military, to this kind of life. I have no desire to do that again. You’re in the clear. Your soldier-of-fortune lifestyle can remain perfectly intact without you having to worry about the little woman at home.”
He looked as if he’d been slapped, an unknown emotion finally dissolving his blank mask. Penny looked away and forced herself to breathe. She thought she’d known what real pain felt like, but it didn’t come close to the sensation ripping apart her insides.
This kind of pain—the one brought on by losing the man you love before you ever really had him…
This pain felt like death.
*
Instinct made Rafe want to kick the ass of whoever had put that haunted look in Penny’s eyes, but what could he do when he’d been the bastard to put it there? He wished like hell that he could give her everything she deserved. But longing for the impossible only resulted in more shattered dreams.
Rafe’s mouth opened to say something—anything to make her understand. Except he didn’t get it himself. Before he could conjure the right words to form some kind of an explanation, the hut door slammed open.
Rafe spun around, his gun coming up on reflex. Instead of the enemy charging into the room, one of the village children pointed toward the eastern line of the rain forest and spoke in rapid-fire Miskito.
Men. Strangers.
Rafe rechecked the barrel of the Glock and placed it in Penny’s hands before picking up the AK-47 for himself. “Stay here.”
Penny stepped into his path. “Are you insane? What if it’s Diego’s men? They’ll shoot you on sight!”
“It’s not Fuentes’s men, but that doesn’t mean I want you anywhere near this right now.” He grasped her arms in a gentle grip and maneuvered her to the side. “Stay,” he ordered over his shoulder right before he stepped outside.
It took an entire ten fucking seconds before Penny followed him onto the porch with the Glock still tucked in her hand. He whirled on her, not bothering to dampen his agitation. “Damn it, Red. What the hell did I tell you?”
“You told me to stay, but I never went to obedience school, so I still get those commands all confused.” Her narrowed eyes dared him to say something.
Rafe’s chest rumbled with his growl. She drove him fucking crazy. Short of throwing her over his shoulder and tying her to the damn bed, there was no way to keep her out of this.
Seven figures approached the village, all with badass assault rifles propped on their shoulders and looking like they’d stepped out of the cargo hold of a Boeing. If it weren’t for the sight of their familiar ugly mugs, Rafe would’ve started praying for a fucking Hail Mary.
“Hey there, darlin’.” Logan reached them first and instantly flashed Penny his signature smile. “Bet you missed the hell out of us, huh? Must’ve really sucked only having Ortega to talk to.”
“I’m a fucking exceptional conversationalist,” Rafe said dryly.
Logan scoffed. “Try that on someone who hasn’t been crammed in a three-by-three foxhole with you for thirty-six hours. I had to talk to the fucking grubs to keep my sanity.”
Penny laughed, giving Logan a quick hug before moving on to Trey and from there, each of the guys. Even Stone accepted her show of affection before he cut his gaze to him. “You know, when I named all the ways this op could go wrong, I didn’t mean that you should go and fucking aim for every single one of them.”