Rules In Rescue. Nichole Severn

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       Chapter Two

      Memories could only get a man so far.

      Having Glennon here, his hands on her skin, resurrected those irrational feelings he thought he’d buried a long time ago. He wiped the excess blood from her wound, doing everything in his power not to crowd her as he worked. That was the thing about Glennon. She urged him to get closer, pulling him in with her scent, the brightness in her gaze and her smile. But she’d made herself perfectly clear when she’d tugged her arm out of his hold in the conference room. Calling him tonight had been strictly business.

      “How bad is it?” A hiss escaped from between her teeth as he inspected the wound for shrapnel, but she turned her head away to hide her reaction. Exhaustion wreaked havoc under her eyes, but she wouldn’t admit she needed sleep. Wouldn’t admit she needed anything. Always insisted on taking care of herself. Which made her asking for his help in the middle of the night...suspicious.

      “Could’ve been worse. Looks like a through-and-through. Just the one piece of shrapnel.” He’d seen plenty of bullet wounds on tour. Not for the faint of heart, but she held her own.

      Anthony discarded the sliver of metal and bloody gauze into the biohazard bin then reached for the needle and thread he’d already prepped. Crude, but she’d asked for a fast patch job. No anesthetic. No doctor consult.

      “Good.” Glennon tugged at her T-shirt and sports bra to give him better access. All that perfect, creamy skin exposed only for him. “Let’s get this over with.”

      Pinching the wound with sanitized hands, he sutured the sides closed. The rise and fall of her lean shoulders set his heart rate at an easy rhythm. As much as he’d wanted to hunt down that shooter on his own to make the bastard pay for putting a bullet in her, relief spread through him. She was alive. That was all that mattered. She’d asked him to protect her, and he’d done his job. But pulling bullet fragments from her shoulder wouldn’t be the end of it. Not in the least.

      Silence descended in a physical pressure against his chest. He’d imagined this day, the one where he’d be face-to-face with her again. He’d demand a reason for her leaving, try to explain why he’d gone on yet another tour. The conversations had played through his head on a near constant loop since the day he’d come home to the empty house they’d shared. But none of his fantasies had included a bullet in her shoulder or Glennon centered in a sniper’s crosshairs. He swallowed back violent ideas of revenge sprinting through his head. He had to focus on something else. Anything else but her. “How old is your son?”

      The idea she’d been with other men since leaving—had had a child with one of them—tightened the muscles down his spine. It shouldn’t have. They hadn’t been together in five years. So why did the thought of her moving on make him tighten his grip around the needle?

      Her rough exhale cooled the overheated skin down his forearm. “I think it’d be better for both of us if we stick to talking about Bennett’s disappearance, don’t you?”

      “All right.” Anthony tied off the suture and used the scissors from the first-aid kit to clip it short. He taped a piece of gauze over her wound to keep the stitches dry then disinfected and packed up the medical supplies. The patch job disappeared as she maneuvered her clothing back into place.

      Focus on her missing partner? No problem. Compartmentalization had become one of his best skills. He exhaled to rid his system of her intoxicating scent, the one that kept pulling him in closer. “Our forensics guy, Vincent, pulled the bullet from the windshield of the SUV, but we won’t know where it came from for a few more hours. You can grab a change of clothes from Elizabeth and crash in one of the empty offices until then.”

      “No.” Glennon shook her head as she hiked her jacket over her shoulder, wincing. “I’ll take the change of clothes, but I’m going back to that house as soon as possible.”

      He faced her. Go back? Was she insane? Before he knew it, he was in front of her, forcing her to look up at him. An icy feeling crashed through him. He’d almost lost her back at that house. Now she wanted to put her life in danger a second time in less than two hours? His six-foot-four-inch frame towered over her but Glennon held her ground. “Because one bullet wound wasn’t enough? Are you going for a shot in the head this time?”

      “I came here to find my partner and that’s exactly what I’m going to do,” she said. “Sergeant Spencer’s GPS put him in that house for over twenty-four hours. And since I didn’t have a chance to search the place properly before someone tried to shoot me, I’m going back. You can either come with me to make sure it doesn’t happen again or give me a set of car keys. Your choice.”

      “You could’ve died back there, Glennon.” Right in front of him, no less. And that wasn’t an option. He’d seen enough death in combat to last him two lifetimes. He wasn’t going for three. Her natural warmth worked through his T-shirt, raising his awareness of how close he’d gotten to her. Or maybe it was the flat-out fear of her taking another bullet that put him on edge. “You’re not stepping out of this building without protection.”

      “Good. Then we have a deal. Now let’s get to work.” She stepped away from him, slowly this time, but the pressure in his lungs refused to let up. That seemed to happen a lot since she’d come back into his life a few hours ago.

      Despite the size of the medical suite, Glennon took her original seat beside him. She extracted her phone from her jacket pocket and handed it to him. “Bennett sent me a message right before he disappeared.”

      “‘I found proof.’” Anthony noted the edge of the photo behind the message, a boy with buzzed blond hair and the hint of a wide smile, but nothing more. Had to be her son. Maybe four years old. “What did he mean by that?”

      “I don’t know. He won’t answer my calls and hasn’t been seen since for me to ask him.” She took the phone and shut off the screen. “I called in a favor from a friend stationed on base and downloaded the GPS data from Bennett’s phone. His last reported location was that house.”

      “Family? Friends? Girlfriend? Kids?” Despite his gut instincts, her partner’s disappearance might not have anything to with the assignment that’d brought them to Anchorage at all. Could’ve been a breakdown, a piece of Sergeant Spencer’s past his partner or the army knew nothing about. Elliot Dunham’s earlier observation soured on his tongue. This whole disappearing act might’ve been set up by Bennett himself, a way to get him out of trouble. Wouldn’t be the first time he’d seen enlisted soldiers leave their post.

      “No. He didn’t have anyone as far as I know, but he hasn’t been acting like himself since we got here. Closed off. Showing up late to work if he shows up at all.” Glennon shook her head as she leaned back in the chair. “Unfortunately, our assignments don’t really let us keep in contact with many people outside of work.”

      That meant Sergeant Spencer had no one to come СКАЧАТЬ