Saving secrets, p.25
Saving Secrets, page 25
“I learned to tune out my sisters at a young age.”
“It’s not your sisters.” How was this possible? I was supposed to meet her in a few days. A few long days of driving, but she was expecting me… in San Diego!
Reginn’s face broke into a shit-eating grin.
“Did you do this?” I ran into the bedroom, ready to dress, and hug Nicky and make sure she was okay, and… I spun in a circle in my towel. “I have no clothes!”
“Top drawer. Take mine.” He leaned against the bathroom doorway in his towel, watching me throw on one of his long-sleeved shirts, then his sweatpants. I almost fell racing to the door. “Easy, Ace. Don’t break yourself on the way.”
As soon as the door creaked open, Nicky bolted through the doorway and I swept her into a hug. Her long black raven waves were held at bay by a simple braid down her back as her head nestled just how I remembered into my chest. She was my little sister in every way, not just in size and age. I loved all of her silver dangling jewelry that replicated the waves of the ocean, her baggy-beach girl jeans, and knit cream sweater. Even her wave-like turquoise ring on her pointer finger screamed low-key California girl. I inhaled deeply, almost positive she wore the Bobbi Brown Beach fragrance I bought her for Christmas. Where I was simple, she was elegant. Our hazel eyes were the only part of us that matched.
“How’d you get here? How do you even know where here is?”
“An old man with a surly attitude called me and said you needed rest. And I don’t have class on Friday. Then another younger dude, named Ron or Reggie or something, said you would be here, so—” Nicky paused, catching a glimpse of Reginn, who was trying to cover all of himself in a towel. Nicky whispered to me behind her hand, “Is that Mr. Category 5?” Her eyes did a double take when Reginn turned around and headed back into the bathroom. Then shut the door in our faces.
“I need a new security guard and all new lock combinations! This was not how I planned it when we called you,” Reginn shouted.
“Does he have a brother?” Nicky asked.
“No luck.”
“Damn,” she sighed. “But really. The family genetics are superb. I met his sisters, holy cow, can they be more beautiful?”
“Thank you,” Kya said, coming into the bedroom with a stack of bacon. “Hungry?”
“Starving!” Reginn said behind the door. “Is that bacon? Please leave the bedroom so I can change.”
Lily entered with two cups of coffee, handing one to me and the other to Nicky. “What are we talking about?”
“Why are we having a family meeting in my bedroom instead of the kitchen?” Reginn yelled.
“Did Reginn tell you the time when we spent Easter in the Grand Canyon and we found him playing with a baby rattlesnake before our parents were awake?” Kya tilted her head back toward the bathroom door. “He said he always wanted to know if a baby rattler really rattled.”
“Can I please tell the story?” Reginn said, yanking open the door wearing two towels. “You butcher it every time.”
Nicky went pale. “Did it bite him?”
“No. I think he did more damage to the poor thing than it did to him,” Lily said.
I threw a sweatshirt and pants at Reginn before going on my tip toes and kissing him. “Is that how the story went?”
Reginn cupped the back of my neck and kissed me until no one remained left in the bedroom. “They’re leaving out the best part.”
“What?”
“How I found her in the first place.”
EPILOGUE
REGINN
One Year Later
Somewhere Outside the Gobi Desert
“THIS ISN’T A HONEYMOON IF you’re working,” I shouted into the communication link.
“I don’t think of it as work. I’m flying. This is fun for me. And we’re spending time together. So technically it’s like a holiday with just a smidge of labor on the side, Wolfy.”
“And what are those?” I yelled, pointing to the crates of explosives and four goats in the back next to our luggage.
“Oh, those. Those are just some extra supplies.”
“For whom?”
“A group of local camel herders backed by our government with the covert support of AMN to play a vital role in spying on a communist state,” she mumbled into the communications link.
“Darling, you tricked me.” I took a look around at the auburn and gold sand-filled view. “I should’ve known when you wanted to see the stars under the Gobi Desert, we were not on a vacation!” Although, tonight was supposed to be a clear, crisp, star-filled sky. I was going to see if I could convince her into carrying on my family name in our yurt. I liked the idea of a child with her eyes… without her attraction to bullets and flames. But no dice if I had to do it with camel herders watching.
“Isn’t this a fantastic vacation! I know we’re on a honeymoon. And there will be plenty of time for honeymoon things after I drop this payload, promise.” She made her seductive pouty face. “How about a quickie in the back once I land this thing as a compromise for losing when we decided on today’s activities?”
“It smells like a fucking petting zoo in here, even you can’t convince me—” The helicopter jarred to the side and dropped two hundred feet. We skimmed over the surface on the desert, knocking sand up so forcefully it burned my skin. “That’s not funny, Ace.”
“You should’ve listened to the Tibetan monk, he said you need to meditate more.”
“Not when you’re flying, darling. That’s when I’m praying,” I cursed as she banked the helicopter right to avoid a jagged red cliff.
“I’ll drop you off with the camels if you’d rather spend the evening with them. Aden did say you might enjoy revisiting old friends.”
“Don’t threaten me,” I laughed. “There are vipers down there. How about you get reacquainted with your old friends, huh?”
“That’s a cruel joke. I was puking. You know I couldn’t help it.” Last month she finally told me the real reason she ran into the jungle, and I didn’t have as much sympathy as I should’ve. Then she threw her knife so perfectly, it grazed my earlobe. In return, I left a frozen snake in our freezer for her to find. She almost peed herself. It was worth every effort it took to trap, bag, and sneak it inside without her knowing.
“This detour you decided on today is a bummer. I booked us heli-skiing while we’re in Kashmir this week. I know you wanted to see the mountains and the only way to do it this time of year is on skis. But if you’d rather play with the goats and camels, I’ll cancel it.”
“We’ll be back at the yurt by sunset. I don’t know why you’re not excited to see your old friends.” She giggled. “We will make it to Kashmir by the end of the week. I swear!”
This wasn’t going to go as planned. Because it never did.
“All right, darling,” I said, mentally preparing for the days ahead. I cinched the slack out of my harness and leaned over to tighten hers. I gave her a quick kiss on the cheek before pulling out the rifle I’d tucked under the seat after seeing the crates in the back.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Getting ready,” I said casually, putting a few extra clips of ammo in my pockets.
“This is a simple drop. The herders aren’t armed. No one even knows we’re coming.”
“Uh huh,” I said, noting our fuel level on the gage. “Is that why we’re halfway through our fuel?”
“Shit. I didn’t think you were going to notice that,” she said. “I’ve got extra tanks in the back to use when we land.”
“There’s a leak somewhere, isn’t there?”
“Possibly…”
“And we’re going to land in the middle of the desert with three goats and a crate full of explosives.”
“That might be correct.”
I took another deep breath. “All in a day’s work.”
Rhea grinned. “I love you.”
I needed hazard duty pay for our honeymoon and probably the next thirty years with this woman. “Love you too, Rhea.”
#
RHEA
Three Days Later
I FELL ONTO THE COUCH IN front of the fireplace. “I told you we’d make it in time.”
“No. You said we’d be in a yurt before sunset. It’s three days later and we’re in Kashmir because we stole two horses, and then were smuggled via a drug lord’s plane into the country.” He laughed. “I was this close,” he held up two fingers, “to selling you for a first-class ticket to the Virgin Islands.”
He acted like he didn’t enjoy every minute of running from the raiders and bargaining with the herders.
“I did sell you,” I said with complete honesty. I smoothed my hands down my new sweater and scarf. “You went for a pretty penny. But the saleswoman decided you might be too much trouble.” I had to agree with her and paid in Indian rupees.
The fire warmed my bare feet. After the past three days under the desert sky, I was ready for some hot chocolate and a meal not cooked over a spit. The walls of the lodge were mostly glass, but the animal furs and the rambling fire kept us warm.
Reginn put a mug in my hand and laid next to me, pulling me into his lap. We both stared at the sloping snow-capped mountains as the flurries drifted down. I couldn’t make up my mind where I wanted to stare—the view out our window, or Reginn, clad in dark jeans and a thin shirt. He’d grown out his starkly blond hair to match his beard. He looked just like the first time I saw him. Sometimes I caught myself thinking he was only a dream, and one day I’d wake up. But this past year, the dream never ended. Every morning the adventure continued, the life beside him grew, and so did our plans for the future.
“You’ve been quiet the past weeks.” He stroked the backs of his scraped knuckles down my cheek. “You know I always worry when you’re not talking to me. Was the trip too much? We can rest the next few days, no skiing.”
I bit my lip. I didn’t know how to broach the subject. We’d all mourned Eli in our own way, Stacy taking it the hardest. She left AMN for a few months, and only returned recently. And when she did, I felt like she was hiding something. She wasn’t her normal self. Then a few weeks ago, I was planning this trip, and I went to Stacy’s office to see if we could take the team dog, Cain, on his first mission. It was late. And I was tired. I was half-asleep. But I could’ve swore I saw… I don’t know what I saw. I heard Cain bark, like someone entered his doggy-office, so I barged into Stacy’s department, guns blazing.
It was dark, and by the time I flipped on the lights, the room was empty except for Cain panting in the corner. Then Stacy came clacking down the hall in her high heels, and I was too freaked out to say anything. Too embarrassed I was seeing ghosts instead of hearing them. I wasn’t ready to explain what I saw.
Certainly not to Stacy, but I also didn’t want to give Reginn hope.
Until today, when a package arrived at our hotel without a return address. I opened it while Reginn was in the shower.
“Rhea, what aren’t you telling me?”
“We got a wedding gift today,” I said, handing Reginn a gold-plated maritime watch with a phoenix on the face.
Reginn’s eyes frosted over. I watched the pain lance through him. “This is Eli’s. Did the Captain send this?”
“No. I spoke to him last month. He said his men never found Eli’s body. He’s on Conrad’s payroll now. I don’t think he’d lie about this.”
I could feel the tension radiating from him. “What are you saying, Rhea?”
“I’m not saying anything.” I breathed in deliberately. “I’m only asking you what your answer is.” I gripped Reginn’s palm and turned over the watch.
Engraved in the back metal piece in small script was one question:
How about a new adventure?
“Say it, Rhea, because I don’t know if I can,” Reginn whispered.
“I think Eli’s alive. And he wants us to meet him here.” I handed Reginn the satellite image of an ice-capped island that came folded in the same envelope as the watch.
Reginn shook his head. “This could be a sham, or worse, a trap to get to you.”
“I know. Trust me, I’ve thought about that. But the package was addressed to us. I also remember the story about the reindeer, Wolfy.”
Reginn tucked back my hair, taking a sip from my mug, and examining the satellite image. “How did you know the story was about me and Eli?”
“Because I know Eli, and I know you. And I’m willing to bet this is the same place you found the reindeer, wasn’t it?” I nestled my way further into Reginn’s lap. “Tell me the story about the reindeer in Greenland. And don’t leave out any details this time!”
Reginn sighed, kissing the top of my head. “I will. But after the story, we are talking about this. I’m not saying yes until we check out where this package came from.”
“Okay. Okay. What really happened in Greenland?”
Reginn nipped at my fingers. “There were once four stubborn men on an icesheet somewhere off the Labrador Sea in Greenland hunting reindeer and pretending an old gray man named Conrad didn’t want to freeze our balls into tiny marbles before the mission was over.” I smiled, leaning back into Reginn’s warmth as he spoke fondly of his friends. “The first slightly intoxicated soldier, shall we call him Aden, bet the second ruggedly handsome soldier he couldn’t shimmy across the icesheet and turn the herd toward the sad, freezing hunters.”
“You don’t have to call yourself ruggedly handsome.”
“I’m not. That one was Jake. Stop interrupting, you’re ruining the story. The fourth slightly sober soldier bet them all they’d get hypothermia before they made it across. That one was Eli, darling.”
I loved this man, and everything that brought me to him. Every journey, every failure, every moment with him made life worth living. And I knew he was already booking the tickets to Greenland before the night was over.
The End
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to my brilliant editor Liz Long at Blue Fire Media. This is our fourth adventure together. You make it easy to share my book babies with the world. Your encouragement keeps me going, and I’m so glad I found you. Cheers, to many more, my friend.
Thank you to all of my family, friends, acquaintances, strangers, and book lovers for devoting your time to this love story and giving an independent author a chance. I hope you found the escape and love you were seeking.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
K.W. Hall is an independent author of romance novels. She made the leap into romance writing at the beginning of 2021. She hasn’t looked back after leaving her career as a registered nurse to pursue her dream of writing steamy romance novels. In her previous life she completed many degrees in various fields, but after years of searching she realized creating new worlds of romance and adventure was her calling.
Raised as an army brat, K.W. lived all over the southern United States during her childhood. She currently resides in Honolulu, Hawaii with her own warrior husband. When not reading or writing, she can be found running the sandy beaches of Oahu. Okay, that wasn’t completely truthful. More likely, she is staring at the waves with a drink in her hand.
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K.W. Hall, Saving Secrets
