“Nnnaaaaa!”

Great. The moment she’d been dreaming of for over four hundred days, and she sounded like a freaking Muppet. Desperation turned her into a wriggling ball as she tried to right herself and get to her feet. He couldn’t leave again! She couldn’t let him! The terror was illogical, she knew, but she couldn’t stop its visceral hold on her mind any more than she could hold back a monsoon. “Nnaaaa,” she cried again. “Gaaaawwwet!”

“Hey.” A pair of hands as reassuring as the voice descended on her shoulders. Sage recognized Zeke’s hulking form immediately. He crouched beside her, trying to help her up. “Hey hon, easy, easy. You’re safe now, okay? We’re gonna get you to safety. I’m with the United States Army. My name is Sergeant Zeke Hayes, and—”

“Uh mow!”

For a long second, the burly man looked like a six-year-old who’d just de-masked Spiderman. “Holy…shit.” He scrubbed a hand down his face before breaking into a full bellow. “Hawk! Get back in here. Now.”

Chapter Three

Okay, so Zeke had been right in grilling him before the mission. It was harder to keep his head in the game on this one, especially as they’d arrived and surrounded the hut—especially because he knew what they’d find inside. Or at least prayed they’d find.

Turned out their timing was better than perfect. They’d gotten here in time, and the women were safe. That didn’t mean he had to stick around and help Zeke with the head count. He was glad to be out of that cramped room with all of those women crying in relief—and ripping his gut out in the process.

But now the asshat wanted him back in there? Zeke had to know this wasn’t the easiest fucking thing for him. Which meant that whatever the reason for the callback, the beer tab was on Z tonight.

“This’d better be good,” he growled, stomping back into the Quonset hut. “Your panties have been twisted more times today than—”

A fist in his gut would’ve been less painful. And joyful. And terrible. And incredible.

Zeke had just helped the woman to her feet, though it was doubtful she’d continue standing on them. She looked weak as a fawn and shaky as a newborn colt.

She also looked exactly like Sage.

He gulped painfully as he glared at Zeke. His friend didn’t even bother to look back. Z was too busy cutting free the zip ties that had cut purple welts into her wrists. When the woman winced from the fresh flow of blood to her hands, the cavity in his chest filled with pain too.

Forget the beer tab. Zeke was going to pay for his whole three-day bender after this. He didn’t bother asking the guy what kind of a sick joke he thought he was pulling, because Zeke knew—knew—that some pots didn’t get stirred. So if that wasn’t his friend’s purpose, what was?

Zeke gently helped the woman lift her head. They’d zip-tied a filthy rag into her mouth, and his friend started exploring how to best cut that free as well.

After two seconds, Garrett barely noticed the thing.

She looked past it, directly at him. No. She looked into him, just as she always could. Just as she always would. She cut him open from sternum to scrotum, filling every vital organ in his body with life again, blinding him with that brilliant green light that had haunted his dreams and been a relentless ghost in his soul.

She was a ghost no more.

Shit. Holy, heavenly shit.

He didn’t remember how his legs carried him or how many steps he took. It only mattered that he yanked the knife out of Z’s hand, palming it himself. He had to be the one who set her free. He needed to be the one who saw her face when the last disgusting piece of her captivity got peeled back.

He cut the tie with a savage jerk. She reacted with a little cry, but he knew he hadn’t hurt her. The sound was one of need. Of release. Of love.

When he pulled the rag free from her face, tears ran through the dirt underneath. In wordless wonder, he cupped both sides of her jaw and kissed each tear until he got to her lips. She sighed against his mouth, opening to him, inching her shaking arms around his neck.

“My heart,” he said against her lips.

“My hero,” she whispered back.

Garrett stiffened and swallowed. The words entered his gut and twisted it like scarab beetles. Hero? Right. Some champion he was, buying the story from the CNO hook, line, and fucking sinker. No skeletons in the van merely meant the rebels had moved the bodies as some kind of a sick fuck you to God only knew who. There was no sense in jeopardizing extra American lives to look for two charred corpses. The region was unstable and unsafe now.

Goddamnit, he’d believed every line they’d fed him. He’d settled for saying goodbye to her photo on a tripod as they tossed flower petals off a cutter in the Sound, instead of demanding they all look harder, deeper, further for her.

Never again. He vowed it now with every cell of his being. He’d never again give up on her. The angels had given her back to him, and he sure as fuck wasn’t blowing the chance. He’d never again let her go, and he’d never again rest before knowing she was safe, secure, completely protected.

He began making good on that oath that moment, clutching her close and claiming her mouth with a kiss so deep and consuming, they both dragged air in harsh, heavy breaths afterward.

He kept her pressed against him, still barely comprehending it was her heart beating beneath his, before murmuring, “Welcome back, Sage Weston.”

Sage pulled back a little. She tilted her face up at him, her chapped lips tremulous with the question that tumbled off them. “Welcome back…to what?”

“To life, sugar.” He brushed her lips softly with his own again. “To life.”

* * *

Several hours later, he watched another degree of that life dance across her features as she laughed into his cell phone. She held the phone on the side of her face that hadn’t turned five shades of blue yet, causing Garrett to Zen-breathe his way out of another surge of fury. She’d shrugged off the injuries, unwilling to tell him how they’d gotten there, telling him that she’d shared all during Franzen’s debrief and didn’t want to go through it again with him.

Garrett told himself to be patient. He’d woken up in a grimy hotel room today about to masturbate in his sleep with her wraith. Tonight, ensconced safely in the US Embassy’s guest quarters, he was about to climb into bed with her very warm, very alive self. Be grateful, you nut sack. And patient. Very patient. That includes what’s about to go down here. You have no idea what she’s been through. She may not want your dark-blue balls up in her business yet, got it?

He turned from her, trying to focus on something a little less arousing than the sight of her in his old Pike Place Market T-shirt and a pair of utilitarian white panties. The task was not easy. The combo was sexy as fuck, no matter how basic its inspiration. She’d literally had nothing with her when they’d gotten here and had been too tired and hungry to wait for clothes to be scrounged up, other than the underwear. He’d assured the embassy staff they could wait for a while and had shuttled her up to his room. She’d rushed for the shower, spending the next twenty minutes moaning in ecstasy beneath the hot spray. Garrett had paced the bedroom, fighting an erection that could’ve raised a barn with the nails it could pound.

Concentrate on something else.

He looked out the window at the courtyard that grew brighter with the peachy shades of dawn. A grim smile took over his lips. This morning, King and all his henchmen were behind bars. The Thai police had gladly turned them over, and now they’d face international repercussions for what they’d done to Sage, Rayna, and the five aid workers.

The shitty thing was, men like King were human cockroaches. Kill one and you ended up stirring the whole intrusion. He had no doubt that other Special Operations Forces teams would be called here soon to try to quash more of the monsters.

Sage’s throaty laugh was a welcome step into his thoughts. He turned and visually feasted on her again. She was propped against the wall with his phone against her ear, her legs stretched out and crossed at the ankle. Her calves and thighs were nearly as sinewy as his now, but all the curves that’d invaded his imagination for the last twelve months were still there. Barely. She’d lost a lot of weight. There were old scratches on her ankles, indicative of heavy hiking through thick brush. The muscles in her arms were pronounced, too. Every inch of her body that he could see was clear evidence of what she’d survived in the last year.

What had she survived?

Patience, damn it. This isn’t an op you can control. You can’t kick in the doors of her psyche and just demand answers.

“Okay, Mom. Yes, I’ll call as soon as we get back stateside.” She bit her lip and swiped at the tears that escaped anyway. “Yep, he’s right here. I love you too.”

She clicked the call off and extended the phone to him with a watery smile.