Page 93 of Special Ops Seduction

“I understand that this guy has a hard-on for the two of you,” Isaac said. “But I have two competing issues. First is the fact that you have a death sentence on your heads. I don’t really think you should be running around and encouraging your bodies to process all that poison even more quickly.”

“That’s a legitimate concern,” Bethan said in her soldier’s voice, basic acknowledgment without offering a solution. Why did that make him want to smile?

Isaac clearly chose to ignore that. “The second issue is bigger. It’s that this man, proven unstable already, has a biological weapon in his hands. Maybe he was just testing it out on the two of you. Either way, where will he test it next? I’m thinking, if I’m in the business of war and defense contractors and I’m out here on the East Coast, I’m going to take down to New York City, create chaos, and profit from it.”

Jonas made a low noise. “That’s why we left. You focus on saving the world. Bethan and I? We’re going to focus on taking this muppet down.”

Isaac muttered something uncharitable.

“We have a death sentence coming at us,” Jonas reminded him. “We’re not contagious. What’s the harm?”

Jonas knew his friend could think of all kinds of harm, but all he did was blow out a breath. “You know where our safe house is in Manhattan,” he said after a moment. “I don’t want you out of contact. And the minute you start feeling symptomatic—”

“I have no intention of dying today,” Jonas growled, and he was aware of how Bethan reacted to that, beside him. He could feel Isaac do the same. “Or tomorrow, while we’re at it.”

He knew he might as well have declared himself reborn. Resurrected, even. Or someone else.

“Okay,” his friend, leader, and brother-in-arms said quietly. “Then get to work.”

Jonas was already driving well over the speed limit, but at that he went even faster.

“Where’s the safe house in Manhattan?” Bethan asked, leaning forward to program the navigation system.

But Jonas waved her off. “I know where we’re going.”

And he drove even faster. Because time was running out.

Once they made it into the city, he stashed the SUV in a parking garage. Then he and Bethan walked out, blending into the sea of humanity that was Midtown Manhattan on a random, sunny workday.

New York, in Jonas’s opinion, had nothing to recommend it. Crowds made him itchy. The tall buildings blocked out the sky, when he liked it visible—and big. There were too many smells, all of them the complicated result of too many human beings packed into too few square miles. Refuse. Despair. Garbage, literal and figurative. Food, mixing with all of that, and body odor, everywhere. He didn’t like concrete. He didn’t like traffic, stoplights, and the neon carnival that was Times Square.

But somehow, today, all of those things seemed to move in him like a kind of poem.

He looked over at Bethan as they stopped, thirty people back in a tight scrum waiting for the crosswalk to get clear of the jolting traffic. She felt his gaze on her the way she always did, glancing over and smiling slightly. But he could see the emotion in her eyes.

All thesepeople. So muchlife, careless and unheeding, right here on this corner.

Jonas reached over because he couldn’t help himself. Because she was the only person in his entire life who had ever told him they loved him, and he wasn’t ready to deal with that. But he couldn’t forget that she’d said it, either.

He took her hand, loving the way she gripped him backimmediately. And the way her smile changed, her eyes getting soft and bright.

The light changed, and they let the crowd carry them along to cross the street that smelled like exhaust and the subway system rattling below. They were jostled, pushed, and crowded, but their fingers stayed tightly laced together. Her hand in his, skin touching skin. The most solid bond he thought he’d ever known.

So many people all around them. All that life.

And Jonas...wanted.

He wanted everything.

He wanted the noise. The smells. The wild, pointless laughter. The flashes of joy. The sharp elbows, the muttered curses.

All of it.

Most of all, he wanted Bethan. This. No words, but her gaze catching his in the middle of the crowd, deeper and better than all of those conversations he’d never bothered to have with anyone else.

When they finally made it to the utterly unremarkable apartment building squashed on a side street, Jonas wished the walk had taken five times as long. He wished that they really were off on some kind of last-day joyride.

But that wasn’t who they were.

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