Page 37 of Guarded By the SEAL
She moved to walk past him, and he grabbed her arm. “What if we can’t figure this out on our own? What’s the alternative, Tess?”
“We’ll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it.”
His phone rang and he picked it up. “I’ve gotta take this.” He answered. “Hey, Jax. How’d it go?”
“Hawk and Ralph didn’t return from the mansion last night.”
“What?” Panic gripped his heart in his chest, and wouldn’t let go. They should have been out of the building in two hours, three at the most.
“Homeland Security is going in at oh-nine-hundred hours unless we hear from our men.”
Wyatt checked the clock on the wall. It was 10:05 a.m. in Georgia, but Colorado was two hours behind them. His mind was running through exactly what could be happening to his teammates at that very moment.
Ralph shouldn’t even be there.
It should be me.
Ralph went instead of me.
“Why fucking wait?” demanded Wyatt, aware of Ivy as she flashed him a frightened look. He headed for the porch and pushed outside, talking as he went. “What if they need help now?”
“Homeland is weighing all the options. They’re in charge here, not us.”
“That’s bullshit, Jax, and you know it. This is a HERO Force mission. Those are HERO Force lives on the line.” He thought of Jessa, at home without Ralph. He imagined her going through her pregnancy alone. “They need backup.” His voice cracked, and he squeezed his hand into a fiercely tight fist.
“We’re doing the best we can. I’m fighting hard for our men, Bulldog. You know I am.”
He did know that. Jax would never let them down. He’d sooner sacrifice himself than let one of the team get hurt. “Let me know as soon as you hear anything.”
“Will do.” The line went dead.
Wyatt stared at the phone before putting it down.
The screen door squeaked behind him and he turned. Teslyn crossed to him, her eyes full of worry. “What’s wrong?”
“The mission I was supposed to go on with my team. The men didn’t come back last night.”
“Oh, my God.” Her hand went to her throat.
“I should be there. It should be me.”
“Are they going to be okay?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know.” Fear tied his throat in a knot. “If they don’t come out, Homeland Security’s going in at the top of the hour.”
“Oh, Wyatt.” She pulled him into her arms, her fingers sliding into the hair at his nape as she held him to her.
He resisted, his brain wanting to shut her out, to shut the world out, to go back to sleep and rewind time so none of this had ever happened. He wanted to scream, to yell and throw things, to run into Steele’s compound and pummel every face he could find until his brothers walked out of that place by his side. He wrapped his arms around Teslyn and squeezed her tightly against him, needing to feel anything, needing something, someone, to be okay.
But try as he might, he couldn’t shake the terrifying certainty that Hawk and Ralph were not okay, and the fear that nothing in his life would ever be okay again.
CHAPTER18
Teslyn stood at the window overlooking the lake, the dim light of dusk making the landscape glow, and a candle burning by her side. HERO Force had called back two hours after the first call to tell Wyatt one of his friends, Hawk, had returned from the mission in terrible shape, having been beaten and tortured for hours on end. The other one, a man named Ralph, was dead.
Wyatt had shut her out.
He’d gone for a long walk, his desperate screams audible from the cabin porch where she and Ivy sat worriedly waiting for him, though he was clearly some distance away. Ivy heard them too, which is why Teslyn decided they needed to move back inside, after all.
