About This Book
Welcome to a brand-new series from USA Today best-selling author Dale Mayer, where dark-ops SEALs have special senses and skills, needed to solve intrigue, betrayal, and … murder. A series with all the elements you’ve come to love, plus so much more, … including psychics!
With the bulk of his team down, Terk tries to establish a new base, while struggling to heal the team through the special connection each has. Damon is concerned about finding Tasha, one of their admins, and keeping her safe. But, without any secure place to take her, Damon’s making do with the little they have—whether she’s happy about his plan or not.
Tasha, barely surviving an assassination attempt, is not sure who to trust. When Damon comes to check on her, she can only hope her instincts and her heart are right about him. This man meant everything to her for the years they’d worked together, but he’d always kept her at arm’s reach. Now to learn that he and Terk are the only fully cognizant members of her old team, she wants to help but doesn’t want to risk her life … again.
Still struggling with their new reality, both Tasha and Damon need to find out who did this to them. It’s the only way to get their lives back—and to have a future together …
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Chapter 1
Ice poured herself a coffee and sat down at the compound’s massive dining room table with the cup. When her phone rang, she smiled at the number displayed. “Hey, Terk. How’re you doing?” She put the call on Speakerphone.
“I’m okay,” Terkel replied, his voice distracted and tight. “Barely.”
“Terk?” Merk called from across the table. He got up and walked closer and sat across from Levi. “You don’t sound too good, brother. What’s up?”
“I’m fine.” Terk paused. “Or I will be. Right now, things have blown to shit.”
“As in literally?” Merk asked.
“The entire group, … they’re all gone. I had a solid team—seven like me—and they’re all gone.”
“Dead?” Ice’s jaw dropped in shock.
Several others stood to join them, gathered around Ice’s phone. Levi stepped forward, his hand on Ice’s shoulder. “Terk? Are they all dead?”
“No.” Terk took a deep breath. “I’m not making sense. I’m sorry.”
“Take it easy.” Ice’s voice remained calm and reassuring. “What do you mean, they’re all gone?”
“All their abilities are gone,” he stated. “Something’s happened to them. Somebody has deliberately removed whatever supersenses they could utilize—or what we have been utilizing for the last ten years for the government.” His tone was bitter. “When the US gov recently closed us down, they promised that our black ops department would never rise again, but I didn’t expect them to attack us personally.”
“What are you talking about?” Merk asked in alarm, standing up now to stare at Ice’s phone. “Are you in danger?”
“Maybe? I don’t know,” Terk replied. “I need to find out exactly what the hell’s going on.”
“What can we do to help?” Ice asked.
Terk gave a broken laugh. “That’s not why I’m calling. Well, it is, but it isn’t.”
Ice looked at Merk, who frowned as he shook his head. Ice knew he and the others had heard Terk’s stressed-out tone and the completely confusing bits and pieces coming from his mouth. Ice spoke next. “Terk, you’re not making sense again. Take a breath and explain. Please. You’re scaring me.”
Terk took a long slow deep breath. “Tell Stone to open the gate,” he said. “She’s out there.”
“Who’s out there?” Levi asked, looked outside, and shrugged.
“She’s coming up the road now. You have to let her in.”
“Who? Why?” Ice asked.
“Because … she’s harnessed with C-4.”
“Jesus.” Levi bolted to display the camera feeds on the big screen in the dining room. “Is it live?”
“It is, and she’s been sent to you.”
“Well, that’s an interesting move,” Ice noted, her voice sharp, activating her comm to connect to Stone in the control room. “Who’s after us?”
“I think it’s rebels within the Iranian government. But it could be our own government. I don’t know anymore,” Terk snapped. “I also don’t know how they got her so close to you. Or how they pinned your connection to me,” he added. “I’ve been very careful.”
“We can look after ourselves,” Ice replied immediately. “But who is this woman to you?”
“She’s pregnant,” he explained, “so that adds to the intensity here.”
“Understood. So who is the father? Is he connected somehow?”
There was silence on the other end.
Merk said, “Terk, talk to us.”
“She’s carrying my baby,” Terk replied, his voice heavy.
Merk, his expression grim, looked at Ice, her face mirroring his shock. Merk asked, “How do you know her, Terk?”
“Brother, you don’t understand,” Terk stated. “I’ve never met this woman before in my life.” And, with that, the phone went dead.
Chapter 2
Damon Wilcox stared as Terkel slowly lowered his phone, his attention still on the screen in front of him. That was a hard conversation. Damon could only imagine the reaction on the other end of that phone right now. “What do you think they’ll do?”
“I think”—Terkel raised his gaze to look at Damon—“No, I know that they’ll let her in.”
“It’s a risk for all of them,” he reminded his old friend.
Terkel nodded. “Yes, it is, but I have faith in who they are as people. That woman didn’t deserve what those assholes did to her.”
“We don’t even have a name, do we?”
“Celia,” he noted quietly. “That’s all I know.”
Damon nodded slowly. “And while they are looking after her”—he watched as Terk started texting on his phone again—“where do you want us to start?”
Terk looked at him, the briefest of smiles on his face. “You need to focus on regaining your abilities. Of everybody, you’re the one who appears to have most of them. Or at least didn’t lose them all.”
“No.” Damon frowned at that and stared off in the distance. “I can feel something.” He paused. “I don’t know what it is—maybe a block, maybe a burn or a scar through my sight or something. I don’t know. But I can sense something foreign.”
“Foreign? As in something inside you?” Terk asked sharply.
Damon sighed. “I can’t explain it.” He looked at his friend curiously. “And you don’t have any disruption in your talents?”
“No, but I was off-line, doing some … maintenance,” he noted, for lack of a better word. “That’s when I noticed you guys were all slowly going down.”