The Colonel's Widow?

“Rook!” she shrieked. “No! Help! Somebody help!”

He clutched at his chest.

She screamed.

His eyes met hers and he whispered something—she couldn’t tell what.

She grabbed his arm, but he was too heavy. She couldn’t hold on to him.

The last thing she saw was his beautiful face distorted by the bloodstained waters of the Mediterranean as he sank beneath its waves.

Irina Castle bolted upright, gasping for breath.

“No!” The word rasped past her constricted throat, pulling her out of the dream.

She wasn’t on their yacht. She was at Castle Ranch, alone. She kicked the covers away and gulped in air. The taste of his sweat stung her tongue.

No. Not his sweat. Her tears.

Harsh moonlight glinted like a knife blade on every surface. She covered her face with her hands, trying to block it out.

She hated moonlight. Hated night. Darkness brought the fear, and moonlight brought the dream.

Every night she promised herself that next time she wouldn’t ask him. Next time, she’d take all the dream would give and hold out for more. After all, her memories were all she had left.

But every night she asked.

Sliding out of bed, she reached to close the drapes and shut out the moon’s light. But her skin burned and perspiration prickled the nape of her neck, so instead she flung open the French doors.

Cold air sent shivers crawling down her spine. She took another deep breath, hoping the sharp April chill would chase away the tattered remnants of her nightmare.

No such luck. Her body still quivered with unquenched desire. The empty place inside her still ached with grief.

In the distance, the Black Hills of Wyoming loomed in magnificent desolation. Rook had loved the mountains. He’d drawn strength and purpose from them. And like the Black Hills fed him, his strength, his dedication, his larger-than-life presence had fed her.

Then he’d been shot. His body was never recovered. So for the past two years, she’d poured money into looking for him.

Two weeks ago, her accountant had issued an ultimatum—stop her unending search for Rook, or dissolve Black Hills Search and Rescue, the legacy he’d devoted his life to.

She stopped the search. How could she have known that her decision would set events in motion that would nearly destroy his two closest friends?

HE COULDN’T SLEEP. Hadn’t been able to since he’d been released from the hospital. The idea that he’d been shot—shot—still spooked him. He was lucky to be alive.

So he sat up, looking out the window toward the ranch house. Toward Irina’s bedroom. One of his favorite pastimes was watching her bedroom at night. She rarely closed the drapes.

He saw movement. Irina stepped out onto her patio with the red gown on—his favorite. She couldn’t sleep, either. He watched her for a while, noticing that the pain from his gunshot wound wasn’t so bad while he watched her.

Then he saw something—someone—inside the bedroom.

“Irina, don’t tell me you’ve got a man in there,” he whispered.

A cloud drifted by and the moonlight got brighter. He could see the man’s face clearly. Cunningham. He’d know that hard face anywhere. What the hell was he doing in Irina’s suite? At midnight?

He stood carefully, groaning with pain and dizziness, and got his shaving kit. Inside, hidden with the rest of his stash of goodies, was a LoJack.

It didn’t matter what Cunningham was doing in Irina’s suite. What mattered was that he had a window of opportunity to keep up with his every move.

He sighed and clenched his teeth against the throbbing pain. He didn’t want to go out there. He wanted to take another painkiller and go to bed. But he had a feeling this late-night meeting between Irina and Deke was no lovers’ assignation.

From the way Irina was acting, she didn’t know Cunningham was there.

Was this the night Cunningham would lead them to Rook Castle?

Pulling on a jacket, he stuck the LoJack in a pocket and took one more longing look at the bottle of painkillers on his bathroom sink. He needed one—bad. But he had to take care of business first.

Novus Ordo was willing to spend millions to find and capture his nemesis, Rook Castle.

He wanted at least one of those millions as a finder’s fee.

BLACK HILLS SEARCH and Rescue specialist Deke Cunningham moved silently through the east wing of the sprawling ranch house. Behind him, beyond the enclosed courtyard, past the living room and kitchen, was the west wing, home of the offices of Black Hills Search and Rescue. The building to the south housed the staff quarters.

Hard to believe it had only been two weeks since Irina had called Matt Parker back from overseas.

A lot had happened, not the least of which was that he’d become a father.

Unbelievable. And thrilling. An involuntary grin stretched his mouth as he thought of Mindy and his newborn son.

On the heels of his grin came a wince. His tongue sought the cut on his lip that matched the one over his eye as he stopped in front of the door to Irina’s suite.

Damn, he didn’t want to be here. He wanted to be at the hospital with Mindy and their baby. He wanted to be planning their future together as a family.

But even more, he wanted to be in a different world. A world where his best friend hadn’t had to die in order to save his wife. A world where a terrorist hadn’t made it his mission to kill Rook Castle and everyone close to him.

But that world didn’t exist. So he had to do his best to clean up this one—to make it safe for the people he loved. And one of those people was Irina Castle, Rook’s widow.

He took a deep breath and glanced up and down the hall. There were four suites in the east wing. Irina’s, of course. Next to hers was the one he’d lived in until he’d left on a mission to rescue his ex-wife, Mindy.

The suite directly across from his belonged to Rook’s baby sister, Jennie. For the past two years, she’d been living in Texas with a family friend and attending graduate school. The fourth suite, opposite Irina’s rooms, was empty.

Satisfied that there was no one around, Deke gripped the door handle. He’d waited until two o’clock in the morning for a reason. If he’d ever been on a stealth mission in his life, this was it.

The door was unlocked. “Dammit, Irina,” he whispered. “You know the danger.”

He eased open the door and peeked around it. Moonlight angled across the rumpled bed.

The rumpled, empty bed.

Instantly on alert, he drew his weapon as he slipped inside and closed the door. A movement caught his eye. Curtains ruffling in the breeze. The French doors were open.