“You move, he dies.”
“Don’t fucking listen to him,” Tanner yells.
“You willing to sacrifice your friend to save your own life?”
Shots come from behind me, taking out the rest of the men, but Vander positions himself in front of Tanner and me, using us to block anyone from taking him out from the chopper.
I had to watch as one of our people died before, and I’m sure as hell not doing it today. The gun in my hand is empty. He’ll see if I go for the other one at my hip.
I glance down at the knife on Tanner’s belt.
“Even with your team, you couldn’t manage to best me. Vargas and I will laugh over this after he feeds what’s left of you to his dogs.”
“Kill him, DC. I don’t care if he fucking shoots me as long as I die knowing this asshole is dead too.”
“I don’t think so.” Vander laughs and cuts his gaze to Tanner for a beat.
It’s the moment I need.
“Not a fucking chance.”
I palm the knife and bury it in Vander’s throat before he can pull the trigger. The gun falls from his hand to the deck, and his body crumples behind it.
“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Tanner yells.
He shoves his shoulder under my armpit and we head for the bird, its rotors turning. Tanner shoves me toward the door, and Rome helps pull me inside.
“Where the fuck is Concord?”
When the last member of our team dives inside the opposite door, Rome yells, “Go!” and the chopper lifts off the deck.
From my spot on the floor, my eyes find Kat’s. She reaches out, and I grab her hand.
“I knew you’d come for me.”
I haul myself into the seat beside her and pull her against my body. Closing my eyes, I breathe her in. She’s everything that’s good and pure in my life, and I almost lost her. Never again. No more secrets.
“I’ll always come for you.”
“Hold on to your asses, because this might get bumpy!”
We all look back toward the yacht as Concord points. We’re just out of range as it explodes into a ball of fire.
Kat meets my gaze, and I close my hand around hers. “It’s really over.”
I nod. “Let’s go home.”
Chapter 41
Kat
“Do I want to know who this plane belongs to?” I ask after the captain of the Gulfstream announces that we’ll be taking off, and the flight attendant in a simple navy dress who gave us bottles of water disappears.
“Knowing Rome, it could be anyone.”
As the jet hurtles down the runway, I’m reminded of my fear as we took off in the Cessna what seems like a million years ago. Has it only been two and a half days? How is that even possible?
Dane twines his fingers through mine and squeezes as we lift off the ground.
“I’m okay,” I whisper in the quiet of the cabin.
“Maybe I just wanted to hold your hand.” He lifts it to his mouth and presses a kiss to my knuckles as his eyes meet mine.
My husband, the mercenary. With his face battered and his black shirt ripped from where the bullets tore through and hit his body armor, I have no trouble believing it.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Without any elaboration, Dane knows exactly what I’m talking about. He lowers our hands to the armrest between us and shifts to face me.
“I had to protect you.”
“By lying to me?”
Dane finally breaks eye contact and looks at the tan-colored panels of the ceiling of the jet.
“I should never have been with you to begin with. Shouldn’t have asked to see you again after Mexico. Hell, I shouldn’t have stayed at that resort longer than the two days I was supposed to be there, but I couldn’t leave.”
His laugh is forced, and my heart sinks. Does he regret it all? But Dane continues.
“Rome wanted to kick my ass for disobeying orders, but I told him to go fuck himself because I’d just met the woman I was going to marry, and I wasn’t letting her go.” He looks down at me, seeing the confusion on my face. “I didn’t think I had a choice. None of us had been in relationships since we started with the team, and it was an unwritten rule that you stayed unattached, because that opened up a whole mess of complications that weren’t worth it.”
Dane meets my gaze and swallows. “But you were worth it, and I knew I would make it work any way I could. If I were a better man, maybe I could’ve walked away from you and let you find someone else, but I knew from that first night you were mine and I’d do whatever it took to keep you in my life. I should apologize for that, but I can’t. The only thing I can apologize for is not telling you everything from the beginning. I didn’t want to drag the best part of my life down into the darkness.”
“Was any of it true? The stories you told me? Was it all a lie?”
His grip on my hand tightens. “The only thing I outright lied to you about was my job. Everything else was the truth or as close to the truth as I could manage. I hated lying to you, but I figured the guilt was worth it to keep you safe.”
Something else occurred to me, and I jerked back, pulling my hand from his. “Is your name even Dane Cross? Are we even really married?”
“Yes. Absolutely fucking yes to both.” He must sense the question I’m going to ask next, because he continues. “When I traveled back and forth to my missions, I used an alias. I was so fucking careful to make sure no one from that world could find a trail back to you. The only way someone could have connected the dots was from the inside.”
I nod, feeling somewhat reassured that at least not everything was a lie, but I have to know the rest of it. “Were you ever going to tell me the truth?”
Dane inhales and lets the air out. “I wanted to, but you were in no shape to hear it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I walked away from my team and working in the field a year ago because I left them hanging, and we lost one of our men and two clients.”
“When Benjie died,” I say, understanding dawning.
Chapter 42
Dane