Chapter One

Tanner

The line went dead as Wolf ended the brief call with Tex on speaker phone. Both my team and his SEAL team were behind locked doors in his small den, all the women and children safely tucked away upstairs behind closed windows and under his state-of-the-art surveillance system and our watchful eye on monitor screens. No one was getting by us. Not tonight anyway.

“How the fuck did this happen?” my teammate and best friend, Red, barked, raking a hand through his hair. “I thought we took Mendez down.”

“Whoever was his second must’ve stepped up to the plate in a big way,” our leader, Tito, murmured, throwing us a steely look.

We’d taken a week of R&R after the Op that put down Mendez after he’d kidnapped Red’s girlfriend, Danielle, and her sister. We’d literally just gotten back to Camp Pendleton and were prepping to deploy back to Syria for another recon mission to hunt down Mustaf Al Shadeek, the ISIS general who’d evaded capture in our last mission and managed to kill a dozen more marines since we’d last had him in our sights. But now, here we were, back playing grab ass games with the fucking Mexican cartel, only this time they were playing much dirtier, and our commander wasn’t in the mood to fuck around anymore. He’d gotten wind of our little care packages and had arranged a little closed door sit down with the SEAL team commander and now we were in it together for the long-haul until this shit was over. Not that I didn’t like my new SEAL friends—they were cool as hell and I trusted them nearly as much as I trusted my own team—but I wanted to get back to our primary mission. Shadeek.

But, it looked like this El Lobo Blanco and whoever he worked for would have to take priority.

Dude glanced at the girls on the screen then back to Wolf. “Well, however it happened, and whoever this asshole is, we take him down.”

Benny lifted his hand for a fist bump. “Amen to that, brother.”

Lucky popped a piece of gum in his mouth and sat back to cross his legs, his eyes concerned. “So, how do we begin to do that?”

Wolf glanced up from his wife’s iPad, which had miraculously managed to remain unscathed in the cyberattack. “We hope Tex can figure this shit out and point us in the right direction so we aren’t chasing our tails. He’s grabbed an emergency backup laptop and is seeing what he can do while he flies up to get his girls.”

“Where are they?” Abe asked from his perch near a window, keeping an eye out through the blinds.

“Somewhere in the Allegheny mountains. They were having a little girly getaway and he hasn’t been able to get ahold of them. He’s about to lose his mind. He had to go.”

“Of course, he did,” Cookie said.

“So,” Wolf went back to pecking awkwardly at the iPad screen. “In the meantime, he’s asked me to use the clues in the photo to see what I can do to find this supposed cousin of his and get her under our protection since he can’t be in two places at once.”

Kid picked up her photo from the desk and whistled between his teeth. “She’s cute.”

Wolf glanced over. “I guess.”

“Let me see that.” I reached over and snagged the picture from Kid’s hand with a smirk.

Sure enough, the mystery girl was . . . more than cute. She was fucking epic. Even in a candid surveillance still from twenty meters, it was obvious that she was smokin’ hot. I glanced up. “We sure she’s related to Tex? I mean, no offense, but Kid’s right . . .” I shook the picture. “This girl shares your guy’s DNA?”

Wolf and his entire team swiveled their heads my way, stared for a moment, then burst out laughing.

“Who knows?” Wolf shrugged and turned back to his task as he sobered. “But these bastards think so, and that’s all that matters right now.”

True enough.

A couple of minutes later, he stood, iPad in hand. “I’ll be goddamned. I got her.”

Her picture still clutched in my hand, I jumped up and strode over to look at the DMV photo on his tiny screen. The hair was a bit darker and longer and she wore a tiny diamond stud in her nose, but yeah, it was her all right. My eyes raked over her delicate features, took in the haunted look in her gigantic sky-blue eyes that were fringed with long, dark lashes and a worldliness I would’ve never guessed from the surveillance shot.

Then I spotted her address and my breath seized in my lungs in a tangled mass of painful memories. Biloxi, Mississippi. What were the odds she lived in my hometown? The place that still haunted my nightmares—that no matter how far I ran, I could never run far enough from to escape the demons of my shame?

“So, it’s her? Tex has a cousin he never knew about?” Mozart asked, breaking the spell.

“Rebekah Anne Keegan,” Wolf read her name aloud then glanced up with a bemused smile. “Well, I’ll be damned. I guess so.”

Dude glanced around. “Well, we can’t leave her. She’s Tex’s family and now the cartel has a hit on her. Who’s gonna go get her?”

Abe frowned. “I figured a team of us would go.” He glanced around. “Right?”

Wolf shook his head then glanced at Tito for backup.

Tito leaned forward in his seat. “We can’t all go. We have to be smart about this until we know exactly what we’re facing. There are just too many of us with targets on our backs and too many family members to protect.”

“So, what’s the plan?” Lucky asked.

He and Wolf exchanged a glance and Wolf nodded as if they’d already discussed this. Tito interlaced his fingers as if in prayer before continuing. “Well, Tex has his immediate family covered, then he’ll set up comms and be in touch as soon as he’s able. Wolf and I have decided there’s power in numbers, so we need to stick together, and Commanders Hurt and Briggs have given us a lot of latitude on this Op due to the personal nature of the threats.” He glanced around. “I don’t need to tell you how sensitive this is for all of us, so we’re going to keep our heads on straight and our emotions in check. We’ll all have each other’s backs and our family’s backs at all times. Are we clear?”

We all exchanged quick glances and nods. Crystal fucking clear. We’d have it no other way.

“Now, down to business,” Wolf picked up where Tito left off. “We’ve decided that my team will hunker down here for the duration with the women and children.”

No one said a word.

“And Tito’s team will take point on making sure every other person whose photo is in those packages is safe and accounted for one way or another. Either bring them here or put them in a safe house. Do what you need to do to make sure they’re safe then get back here ASAP.”

I flipped Rebekah’s photo over and over in my hand as they made plans for who would go where to fetch which family members, my heart still a jumbled mess as my past filled my heart and mind.

“So, that just leaves the girl,” Tito announced, and somehow, I felt his eyes on me.

I swallowed, thumbed the photo face-up once more, and forced a smirk. I’d outrun my fucked up past so far. What was one tiny blonde? “I’ll get her.”

He eyed me closely. He knew where I was from and a bit of my history. “You’re sure? You don’t always have to jump right into the fire, Maverick. One of the other guys can take this one if it’s too much for you to go back home.”

“Mav—” Red started, suddenly cueing in to what was happening.

I shook my head once, shooting him a cocky grin. “It’s Mississippi, guys. Not Syria. It’ll be a cake walk.”

Famous last words.