Page 37 of Covert Vengeance

Amber waved it away. “Are you kidding? No thanks needed.”

“Can you thank Jesse for me? I’d tell him in person but I’m not up to coming down and dealing with all those people yet.”

Amber didn’t blame her, but a tendril of dread wound around her stomach at the thought of having to face him so soon. “Sure.”

If she saw him. She planned to avoid him as much as possible from now until he left, which would hopefully be soon.

Why was he still here, anyway? He’d helped her and Kiyomi get out of Syria, so his job was done. She and the others would take it from here.

“Are the others all downstairs?” she asked Megan.

Her sister nodded. “They’re all eating in the breakfast room.”

“There’s a breakfast room?”

She grinned. “Yep. We eat other things in there too, though.” Picking up Kiyomi’s tray, she stood and looked down at the battered Valkyrie. “You’ll text if you need anything?” She nodded at the phone on the bedside table.

“I will. Thanks.”

“No worries.” Megan carried the tray out of the room and Amber followed her into the hall. “You hungry?”

“I’ll just grab a piece of toast maybe, and coffee if there is any.”

“Oh, there’s definitely coffee. I insisted on coffee when I moved in here. Marcus drinks tea. Yorkshire Gold, to be exact.” She shook her head, an amused expression on her face. “It’s growing on me, but it’ll never be able to replace coffee in my heart.”

They started for the stairs. “You guys are really close, huh?”

Megan lifted a shoulder. “As close as people like us can get, I think. I love him to bits, and on top of everything he’s done for me, he’s now put his neck out for all of us by hosting us here. He’s a good man. Private, hard to read until you get to know him a bit, but definitely one of the good ones.”

“I want to hear the story about how you rescued him in Syria sometime.”

“We rescued each other. I was near Aleppo doing some recon on a target when I heard chatter about possible friendly POWs being held nearby. They were being held by the same group I was interested in. I infiltrated the building to check it out, and there he was—the sole survivor of his SAS troop. He was in bad shape. Real bad shape, much worse than Kiyomi. I couldn’t just leave him there.”

Megan sighed. “Suffice it to say, he didn’t want to be pulled out, he wanted to stay and kill the men who’d killed his troopers,” she said as they reached the top of the stairs. “He didn’t come quietly, but in the end he came, because I didn’t give him a choice. We got pinned down in a bad spot after that. He’s the reason we survived it.”

“After that, I got him to friendly forces and they evacuated him,” she continued. “I checked up on him later, and he’d left his contact info for me with one of his commanding officers. We kept in touch on and off. Then when this whole thing about the Valkyrie program blew up in the media and I needed somewhere safe to go, he was the first person I thought of to call.”

Amber was impressed. And grateful that Marcus had stepped up to help her sister. “Now I respect him even more.”

“Good. He deserves it.”

The carpet runner was thick and plush beneath their feet as they made their way down to the main floor. The murmur of voices and clink of silverware on plates came from the back of the house.

Amber braced herself for the sight of Cordova, but when she entered the breakfast room and saw him sitting at the round table with the others, their eyes locked and her stupid heart skipped a beat. Maybe even two beats.

Hell.She fought a scowl, not wanting him to know he’d gotten to her.

“Morning,” Trinity said brightly as she spread jam on her toast. The slices were sitting in the center of the table in actual toast racks that looked like they were made of silver.

“Morning.” Bautista and Georgia were there too, leaving the only remaining available seat beside Cordova, and after what he’d done last night, she’d rather starve than sit there.

He raised his dark eyebrows at her, his stare knowing. “Sleep okay?”

She refused to look away. “Fine. You?”

“Like a baby once I finally did fall asleep.” The look in his eyes told her he’d taken care of business the same way she had. “Time change must have messed me up.”

Not likely. And now all she could picture was what that would look like: Cordova naked on his back in bed, his fist wrapped around the thick length of his cock as he stroked himself off. His muscles bunching. Whole, gorgeous body tightening. Face awash in ecstasy as he made himself come while thinking of her.

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