Taking Fire - Lindsay McKenna

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my nature,” he said seriously, seeing the haunted look come to her eyes. Something told him Khat rarely received any protection from anyone. She’d learned a long time ago to take care of herself and never expected help from another quarter. What the hell had happened to her to make her think like that? He shouldn’t feel so damned elated to discover she wasn’t married or wasn’t in a relationship presently.

      “Your last name, is spelled T-A-R-I-K?”

      Now why would she want to know that? “In the old country it was spelled T-A-R-I-Q, but when my father came to the States, he changed it to make it easier for his patients to pronounce and spell.”

      “It’s my understanding the name means one who uses a hammer?” She lifted her chin and stared at him.

      “Guilty on all counts,” Mike said, giving her a slow smile. “There’s various meanings to it. One is it means a bright, shining star that leads the way.”

      “You are a leader. There is no question.”

      “I try to be,” Mike said. “Another, the name of the Morning Star, Venus.”

      “I think you’ve taken two of the three definitions to heart,” Khat said lightly.

      “What? I’m not a star?” He chuckled. “I did love astronomy when I was a kid. My dad even bought me a small telescope so I could look at the stars.”

      “But that lost out to becoming a warrior? Your first name, Michael, combined with your last name pushes you toward being a man of action. Someone who can use the sword.”

      “You’re right.” He lost his smile. “If I had one wish before I left you, it is to know your full first name. I know Khat is your nickname.”

      Feeling her heart move beneath his humble request, Khat saw the sincerity in his narrowing eyes. “I can’t. I’m sorry. Besides, my name does not have the glory and power that yours does.” She managed a small smile, appreciating him for who he was: a very brave SEAL. The joke was, her Pashtun name, Khatereh, simply meant, “memory.” And so it had been. There were branding memories in her mind about her scarred flesh and fractured soul she could never forget. And she was never the same after her capture. So much for memory.

      She rose. “It’s time to go.”

       CHAPTER FOUR

      MIKE STOOD NEXT to Khat as they waited beneath the edge of a wadi that spilled out onto a plain where the Medevac would land shortly. It was a quarter moon night. He could hear the wind gusting off the mountains, sliding into the desert plain before them. The stars were bright. The horses had been hidden and tied farther up into the wadi. Nothing moved. He breathed a sigh of relief that a drone was overhead with thermal imaging capability, not picking up anything but animal body heat. There were no humans in the immediate area except them. Still, he was alert and took nothing for granted.

      Damn, he didn’t want to leave Khat out here alone. It ground against every protective mechanism Mike possessed. Hell, yes, she was competent. She said she’d been doing this for five years, and she was still alive. So who did he think he was? She was the one who saved their sorry asses a few days ago, not vice versa. Mike smiled a little, his eyes glittering as he swept the rocky scree slope to his right, the same slope his team had damned near been killed on. If not for Khat.

      His hearing was slowly returning to normal, not as sharp as it had been, but he could hear Khat talking in a very low voice on the radio transmission to the Medevac coming their way, giving the pilot the GPS position to land the bird five hundred feet from where they were hidden. She’d already gone out earlier, like a shadow, and removed rocks or limbs that could be kicked up by the whirling blades of the Black Hawk, potentially causing them injury. She knew her job.

      Mike kept hearing the call signs Archangel and Boulder. Which sign was hers? If he could pick up her black ops code name, that was a piece of vital intel he could use.

      Khat signed off the sat phone, everything in place. She shoved it into a pocket on her H-gear she wore around her torso. Her M-4 was in a harness across her chest. Her mouth was dry with tension. Even though the drone’s eyes were above the exfil point, she was wary. The wind rustled the tree leaves. Her hearing was cocked toward any other sound out of place. Leaning down, she placed Mike’s rucksack to her right, where she could easily pick it up and sling it over her shoulder in a run to the Black Hawk. He couldn’t do it; his left arm was in a sling.

      She straightened, pulling the NVGs around her neck, pushing her fingers through her captured hair in a single braid down her back. Nerves always got her at moments like this. Murphy’s law of “if anything could go wrong, it would,” was alive and well in a combat zone. Her mind was racing over the rally point in case they were jumped by unseen and undetected Taliban. It would be their only escape route. Khat felt the heat of Mike’s body close to hers and could sense his alertness. Amazed he didn’t feel tense, she realized it was a different kind of training. Join the SEALs and you knew you would be facing combat continuously. It took a special kind of person to be comfortable in such a situation. She wasn’t one of them.

      She felt Mike turn, his shadow looming over her. The thin wash of moonlight only made the gloom even scarier for Khat. Her gaze caught the faintest movement of a leaf, a change in it, indicating someone could be sneaking up on them. It wasn’t; it was just the wind playing havoc on her senses, but her nerves were taut.

      In the distance, she could hear the Black Hawk and the two Apache combat gunships, escorting it, the thumping of the rotors cutting through the darkness toward their position. They would land with no lights on. Everyone was wearing NVGs. The night hid them from attack up to a point.

      Mike eased the NVGs on his helmet. Khat’s face was tense, her eyes narrowed, in complete guard mode. She’d pulled off her goggles, the black baseball cap pushed up on her head. A powerful surge of protection nearly overwhelmed him. He was so damn invested in her emotionally, and he didn’t want to extricate himself. Watching her scan the area, her profile clean, those soft lips accentuated, he thought the unthinkable. He wanted to kiss the hell out of her, feel her mouth beneath his. Feel her respond. A flood of heated emotions coursed through him as he stood beside her. To hell with it. He set the M-4 against a tree trunk, easily within reach if he needed it in a hurry. Lifting his hand, he placed it gently upon her shoulder, so as not to startle her.

      Khat felt the warmth of Mike’s strong hand come to rest on her shoulder. She was wearing her cammies and even through them, she could feel the male heat of his fingers. Surprised, she turned quickly, thinking he saw something and was silently warning her. Instead, as she looked up into his darkly shadowed face, her lips parted. The look in his glittering eyes was focused on her. Her breath hitched as he pulled her toward him. He was going to kiss her! Panic mingled with shock. And then, Khat felt an even more powerful emotion sweep through her, erasing the other two feelings. Her mind shorted out. Mike was going to kiss her. Nothing was further from her reality. For five years of loneliness, Khat had accepted her twisted fate.

      Until now.

      Her eyes widened as he bent his head, his mouth curving softly against hers. His hand was firm, guiding her as close as they could get to one another. The gear they wore prevented any real intimacy. She closed her eyes, inhaling his scent, feeling his mouth tentatively explore hers. The prickle of his beard against her cheek sent tingles racing through her. His hand slid from her shoulder, fingers curling gently around her nape, tipping her head upward, angling her just enough to deepen their kiss.

      Her world exploded, and Khat moaned, her hand moving to his chest, her fingers curving against his Kevlar vest. She tasted his maleness, his power, his coaxing, asking her to participate. It had been so long since she’d kissed a man! And she wanted this. She wanted to taste Mike Tarik, feel his roughened lips rasp against her softer yielding ones.

      Breath ragged, Khat sank against him, and he took her full weight, welcoming her into his partial embrace. He was giving her so much that it brought tears to her eyes. It

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