She hadn’t exactly had a whole lot of fun in her life up to that point.
Her parents had always been so strict, her dad an ex-colonel who ran a tight ship.
Then her mother had died. A sudden heart attack when Sydney was just fourteen. Her dad and his tight ship...they became lost after that. Broken. She’d had to be the caretaker, growing up too fast.
Until her father had slipped into a bottle and not come out again.
She’d been eighteen when he crashed his car.
She’d joined the air force just two weeks later.
Slade had been the Ortez brother she met first. The one with the ready smile, the big dreams.
But it had been Gunner whom she was always so intently aware of. Gunner who put her on edge with his heated stare.
She’d agreed to marry Slade, though, because she did love him, and he’d said that he loved her.
While Gunner...back then, he’d barely seemed to tolerate her at all.
Gunner wasn’t saying a word now. Just staring at her. And she’d already said enough for them, hadn’t she? “Get some rest,” she told him, and turned away. She was supposed to stay in another villa, the one on the far end. Only she wouldn’t be going there first.
She needed to talk to Slade. Alone.
She headed for the door. Logan had his back turned to her as he talked into his phone, but she had no doubt that he’d heard every word she said to Gunner.
“You don’t have to lie.” Gunner’s flat words. Stopping her.
Insulting her. “Is that what you think I’m doing?” Her fingers curled around the doorknob. “Then maybe you don’t know me half as well as I thought.”
And she left him.
* * *
“CALE, DO YOU mind if I speak to Slade alone?”
Cale stood in the doorway of the second villa, his broad shoulders stretching to take up the space. He stared down at her with hooded eyes. “You sure that’s what you want to do? He’s pretty messed up right now, Sydney.”
“I need to talk to him.” To find out what had happened to him. Where he’d been all that time.
Cale gave a slow nod. “Okay, but if you need me, I’ll be right outside.”
Her eyebrows climbed. She was EOD; she could take care of herself.
But Cale’s lips curved in the ghost of a grin. “You just look so delicate...”
A lie. But she used that delicate trap to fool many of her enemies.
“Sydney?” Slade’s voice sounded subdued. Good. Maybe he was calming down.
“Right outside,” Cale murmured as he slipped past her and gave her the privacy that she needed.
Slade came toward her, his steps uncertain. Only fair, considering how uncertain she felt right now.
“I thought about you,” Slade said as his gaze slid over her face, “so much.” Then those slow steps of his were coming toward her. He wrapped his arms around her, pulled her tight against his chest.
Why did being in his arms feel wrong? Sydney forced her own arms to lift. To hug him back. “I’m glad you’re alive.” That was the truth.
He tensed. “At least one person is.”
She eased back so that she could stare up at his face. “Gunner is glad, too. He’s your brother—”
“Half brother.”
A distinction that Slade had pointed out before, but Gunner...he never had.
“He didn’t know that you were out there,” Sydney whispered to him. “Search parties went back to recover you—” She’d almost said your body. “But no one found any sign of you.” She shook her head. “Where were you, Slade?”
“I don’t know.” Gruff. Lost. “The first few months were a blur.” He stalked away from her, began to pace the living area. “Different camps. Shacks. They dragged me through the jungle so many times.”
“And they never tried to ransom you?” Why not? It didn’t make sense to her. If you’ve got a valuable hostage, you use that hostage.
“I wasn’t the only prisoner they had. Some were ransomed.” He stopped his pacing. “Some were killed.”
She rocked forward onto the balls of her feet. “Are there others still being held?” If there were, they needed to get another rescue team ready.
“No. I was the last.” He swung to face her. His chin shot up. “Look, I don’t know why they didn’t kill me, too. I don’t know why they dragged me around. Sometimes I wished that they would kill me.”
“Slade—”
“Sometimes I just wanted it all to end.” His throat moved as he swallowed. “They would...they would ask me questions some days about my life—about you.”
Her heart was pounding faster. When she and Gunner had been held, their captor had asked them about the EOD. “Did you tell them about Elite Ops?” Slade hadn’t been in the group, but he’d once gotten clearance to work as a liaison on a mission with the group.
“Yes.” Hushed.
That was how the leader had known about their division.
“I told them. I would have told them anything for food and water.”
The mercenary who had come after EOD agents a little while back...that mercenary had been hired by someone in South America. Someone who had learned about the EOD from Slade?
No wonder his captors left him alive. They knew they could use him in order to get us.
“I want him investigated, Sydney.”
There was a sharp edge in his words now. He’d seemed almost...calm...a moment before, but now Slade was marching back toward her, his limp barely noticeable. “Did you hear me?” Slade demanded. “I want Gunner investigated. He left me to die. He’s not getting away with what he did to me.”
She had to make Slade see reason. “We both thought you were dead. Slade, we had your funeral.” It had nearly ripped her apart to stand there with the scent of flowers choking her.
But Slade laughed. “I’m sure that was exactly what he wanted.”
No, it hadn’t been. Gunner’s eyes had been haunted at the grave site.
“I’ll tear the whole EOD down if I have to do it, but Gunner won’t get away with what he’s done.” Then he was standing right in front of her, glaring down at Sydney. “I’ll make him pay, I swear I will.”
His eyes looked...wild. And his hands were shaking.
“Slade, are you all right?”
“You were with him, weren’t you?” Angry, low, biting.
Sydney squared her shoulders. “You’ve been through—” Hell. “I don’t want you getting so worked up, okay?”