Page 86 of Special Ops Seduction

There was a quick series of assents, and then it was on.

Jonas felt himself slip into that particular space that he’d always liked best. The heightened danger. The adrenalineand cortisol. And all the grueling training that let him use all that to do things regular people couldn’t.

He didn’t have to see his teammates. He knew where they were. He knew them, so he knew how they would move, how they would cover him, how they would follow orders when necessary and take their own initiative, too.

These war games were the only time he felt alive. Or connected.

Or they were, something in him suggested.Until Bethan.

But this was emphatically not the time for such thoughts, especially if they were true. He assured himself he’d handle it all later. He’d face what needed facing, honestly. That was who he was, whatever else he wasn’t.

Here, now, there was the mission.

He headed toward the farmhouse’s back door at a low run, not liking the fact that he had to expose himself for a little too long while he made the break from the surrounding trees. He assumed Bethan was experiencing the same problem, and there was nothing for it. Some situations required stealth and cover. But this one wasn’t one of them.

Jonas made it to the back door, automatically checked his weapon, and then took approximately three seconds to work the lock.

He opened the door, that prickling sense of his on overdrive as he stepped in.

It just wasn’t right. He didn’t believe that an individual like the one they were chasing would leave a door like that. So easy to open.Tooeasy, when the same person had tracked Alaska Force without their knowledge and abducted the Sowandes without a trace.

But he shoved that aside as he conducted a sweep of the first floor. He found nothing interesting in the kitchen or the living room, and he was finishing an initial walk-through of the dining room when he met Bethan coming down the stairs from the second floor.

Because she’d known he would handle the first floor, soshe’d gone upstairs without asking for confirmation. Working with her had never been anything but seamless.

Not now, he growled at himself.

“I found your window,” she said in a low voice, her eyes still scanning around them, as if she were waiting for an armed response team to leap out at any moment. Just like he was. “There’s nothing personal in the room, but it was recently used. The other rooms on the second floor are stripped of any bedclothes, pillows, and so on. That particular room has two made-up twin beds, one of which looks more rumpled than the other.”

“Someone’s been staying there.”

Bethan nodded. “The window is typical for an old house like this and is too swollen to open fully. Now it’s stuck. This might be going out on a limb, but my guess? They stuck Iyara in there, she tried to escape, and couldn’t.”

“Why the sister? Why not the scientist?”

“Just a feeling.” Bethan didn’t quite grin at him, which still felt more personal—more intimate—than it should have. “It doesn’t feel like a man was in there. Also the twin beds are kid-sized. Sowande is not a small man.”

Jonas nodded, tucking that away. “Attic?”

“Crawl space,” Bethan replied.

And then they waited. Until they both heard the faint, almost to be confused for some far-off bit of wildlife sound that Jonas knew was the others joining them.

Sure enough, moments later, first Blue, then August, materialized.

Jonas nodded at them. “Get ready for whoever was here to come back. Rory, if they show up, don’t stop them. Let them come. Meanwhile, Bethan and I are going to take a look in the basement.”

“Check,” Rory said over the comm unit.

“You got it.” August was already moving to take a position overlooking the front drive.

Blue nodded, then melted off to the west side of thehouse, where a private dirt lane wound around and came in from the orchards.

“Ready?” Jonas asked Bethan.

She jerked her chin in an affirmative. Then she fell in behind him as he headed for the back of the house and the door to the basement he’d seen on his first pass through the kitchen.

“Old houses like this are creaky,” Bethan murmured as they moved. “If anyone’s down there, they already know we’re here.”

---