Page 69 of Annika's Aurora

“Yeah, it was in my way and didn’t take too kindly to me cutting it and its buddies so that my team and I could pass.” She chuckled and kissed the mark.

“Okay, now the big one.” She traced the scar on his abdomen. “This one looks pretty serious.” He looked down at the ugly jagged scar. That was also the one he regretted the most. The one that had come when he’d taken the biggest risk.

“Knife wound.”

“You were stabbed? Can you tell me about it?” He could tell she was shocked, but he’d been rather lucky as a SEAL that he’d never been shot, except for the graze, like so many others had been. The knife wound had been his worst injury and it happened shortly before he’d left the SEALs.

“I can’t tell you too many of the details, but since it was all over the news at the time, I can tell you some. A group of aid workers had been captured by a Taliban group that was trying to assert themselves in the region.”

“Wait, I remember that. They were building something for the community, right?”

“A school. Nicki and her team …”

“Nicki?”

Uh-oh. “She … umm …” He so didn’t want to tell her about that mistake. “Umm …” he stuttered again and could feel his cheeks heat.

Annika laughed, cupping his cheek with her hand. “Logan, it’s okay. We both have a past. I certainly wasn’t a virgin when we first slept together.”

The thought of Annika with any other man was not something he had ever considered, and he didn’t like it. But he hadn’t been a monk during their time apart, so who was he to judge. Even still, he worked to tamp down his anger at the thought of another man touching her.

“My team and a few of those aid workers hung out together on some nights. She was a drunken mistake, and we both knew it.” He lowered his head shamefully, unable to meet her eyes. He’d made a lot of drunken mistakes in the last fifteen years. But that night with Nicki was one of the worst. He didn’t exactly treat her with the respect she deserved the next day. He would always regret his actions concerning her. He’d known as soon as he’d gotten her into bed, she was a mistake. She wasn’t what he’d wanted.

She kissed him briefly on the lips. “It’s okay that you have a past, Logan.”

He kissed her too and squeezed her a little tighter to him. “So, tell me about this.” She pointed to the scar again.

“When the aid workers disappeared nobody saw anything, and nobody knew where they were taken. We pulled all our resources to find them. Finally, we tracked them to a grouping of caves the Taliban were hiding in. My team was tasked with the rescue.”

“I’d heard a SEAL team got them out. I always wondered if you had been there.”

“We worked our way through the system of caves and tunnels, immobilizing enemy combatants. I was in the lead. I was always in the lead. Always willing to take the risk. We found the aid workers grouped together in one of the caves. They had been roughed up pretty bad. Nicki was … not good.” Logan felt the anger rush through him as it did every time he thought about what had happened to her. She’d been broken and bloody, obviously raped several times. When he’d spotted her laying there in the dirt, clothes torn and ratty, hair matted, half starved, he’d felt an intense rage take over his body. He’d crouched down beside her, and her eyes widened when she recognized him. He could see the relief flood through her, and she cried.

Being the team medic, he treated as many of her extensive injuries as he could as quickly as possible. The other members of her group were not as badly injured as she. He’d learned later that she’d fought them fiercely and had been punished in the most horrendous ways possible. Nicki had been strong, full of life, but the woman lying in the dirt was unrecognizable. They had broken her.

“How awful for her,” Annika remarked, her voice full of compassion. “Is she … did she survive?”

“Yes. But I’m pretty sure it was a long road to recovery for her.”

“I’m sorry for her, but that doesn’t explain how you were stabbed.”

“She reacted badly after spotting one of the terrorists who was trying to sneak away. I just knew …” As he’d treated her injuries, she had looked over his shoulder and shrank back in fear. Logan had glanced back and spotted a man in the usual Afghan clothing and turban trying to sneak out of a tunnel his team hadn’t spotted yet. Seeing the fear in Nicki’s eyes, Logan knew that he was the one who’d broken her. The rage took over. He charged the man before the rest of his team was even aware of his presence. The rage had blinded him, and he hadn’t seen the knife until it was too late.

“You knew he was the one who’d hurt her.”

He nodded, still feeling shame for losing control the way he had. “I went after him and didn’t see the knife. I was just so angry. Tired of dealing with these assholes who have no qualms about doing unspeakable, horrible things to women. I just reacted, badly, as it turns out. I didn’t even feel the knife. My teammates had to pull me off of him before I killed him.”

She was quiet for a moment as she studied the scar. “I don’t know much about anatomy, but this looks like it could be a dangerous spot to get stabbed.”

“Yeah, I got lucky. A few inches in either direction and the blade could have done some serious damage to organs.”

She leaned over and placed her lips over that scar as she did all the others. Unable to face her compassion because of the shame he felt for his actions, he pushed her gently away from him and sat up. He had his feet on the floor and was about to get up when Annika stopped him. She wrapped her arms around him from behind and laid her head on the back of his shoulder. He dropped his head, feeling unworthy of her care.

“I’m sorry, Annika,” he choked out.

“You have nothing to be sorry for, Logan. You were doing your job. You saved that woman and the others. That’s all that matters.”

“I’ve broken every promise I’d ever made to you.”

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