Code of Honor

Code of Honor
Lenora Worth

Get in, save the girl and get back out.That was CHAIM agent Brice Whelan's mission. But saving missionary/nurse Selena Carter might be more difficult than expected. Selena's run-in with a drug cartel put the people in her care in danger. Yet the danger doesn't end when Brice brings her home.The counterfeit drugs have entered Georgia, and this time Selena isn't about to run away. Brice's mission hasn't changed he still needs to keep her safe. And that means staying by her side–whether she wants him there or not.

“You have to get on this plane! Now!”

Brice propelled her toward the plane. Selena’s resistance surprised him—she was tiny, but she showed remarkable strength. She was also remarkably stubborn.

Brice lifted his eyes to the heavens. He’d been sent down here to retrieve the missionary. But Selena was devoted to her work and refused to go. And Brice couldn’t leave without her. She was in a lot of danger. Too much danger.

“I have my orders,” he shouted over the thunderstorm.

“I can’t leave my villagers!”

“Do you want to die, Selena?”

“I want to live—to serve these people and God.”

How could he fight that kind of dedication?

In the end, he didn’t have a chance. Bullets hit like a hailstorm all around them, right along with the rain and wind. With a grunt, Brice picked her up and carried her through the jungle.

While Selena Carter beat at his chest every step of the way.

LENORA WORTH

has written over thirty novels, most of those for Steeple Hill Books. She also works freelance for a local magazine, where she had written monthly opinion columns, feature articles and social commentaries. She also wrote for five years for the local paper. Married to her high school sweetheart for thirty-three years, Lenora lives in Louisiana and has two grown children and a cat. She loves to read, take long walks and sit in her garden.

Code of Honor

Lenora Worth

He who follows righteous and mercy finds life, righteousness and honor.

—Proverbs 21:21

To my favorite nurse, Patricia Davids.

You are a special friend.

Contents

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

PROLOGUE

Somewhere in Northern Argentina

“Get on the plane!”

“No!”

Brice Whelan squinted through the rain falling all around him, his patience wearing as thin as his soaked black cotton T-shirt.

“We don’t have time to argue, Selena. You have to get on this plane! Now!”

The slender woman scowling up at him pushed at her wet burnished-brown hair and shook her head. “I can’t leave my villagers, Brice. I didn’t call you down here to rescue me. I wanted you to help me! I won’t go.”

Brice wrapped a rough hand around her arm, using brute strength to propel her toward the plane. Her returning resistance surprised him—she was a tiny bit of a thing—not more than a hundred pounds at best, but she showed remarkable strength. And she was also remarkably stubborn to boot. Double trouble.

Brice lifted his eyes to the fury of the heavens, wondering why he was standing here in the middle of a rain forest when he could have been sitting by a nice fire back home in Ireland or maybe watching a baseball game on television at his second home in Atlanta, Georgia. Then he remembered—CHAIM, the elite secretive Christian organization that worked to protect and help Christians in need all over the world. As a member of CHAIM, he had a duty to bring Selena Carter, a missionary nurse who helped run a clinic here in Día Belo, Argentina, home to Atlanta.

After Selena’s distraught phone call, he’d been sent down here to retrieve the devoted missionary. But Selena took her work very seriously and now she refused to go with him. And Brice couldn’t leave without her. Because she’d had a near run-in with a local guerrilla group known for drug trafficking and smuggling, she was in a lot of danger. Too much danger for the humanitarian organization that had sent her here and too much danger for her rich father back home. They wanted her back in Atlanta. Alive and well, preferably.

Brice just wanted her on that plane so he could get out of this rain. “I have my orders,” he shouted over the thunderstorm.