He loved the pink that blossomed in her cheeks. But she didn’t back away from him. “Boyfriend sounds so…middle-schoolish.”
“What would you call me then?” Rex asked.
“I don’t know. My friend? My manfriend?”
Everyone laughed at that. “Not sure that works either,” Rex said as he used the pressure of his hand at her back to turn her toward the clinic again. “How about we just leave it open for now?”
“I definitely think we need to keep an eye on Avery, but I think the more pressing issue will be Phantom. We’re going to have to sit on him to make sure he doesn’t overdo it, and to make sure he doesn’t get a bug up his ass to take himself to Timor-Leste,” Ace said.
“First line of business when we get back is to have a team chat with Commander North,” Rocco agreed.
“You know he’s going to slip away if he gets any indication Kalee is still alive, right?” Rex said.
“Which is why I’m going to have a talk with Tex as well,” Rocco replied. “I know Phantom already told him to keep his ear to the ground. I’m going to ask him to please run anything he finds by me or the commander first, so we can do some damage control and come up with a plan for controlling Phantom.”
“You think you can control him?” Avery asked with a quirk of her eyebrow. “It seems to me that you’re all underestimating your teammate. Besides, if I was this Kalee person, I’d want Phantom to come find me as soon as freaking possible. If she’s really alive and has been in the middle of that civil war for as long as she has, every second might count when it comes to her mental and physical health.”
Everyone was quiet for a long moment. They reached the door to the clinic, and Rocco held it closed with his hand on the handle for a beat. He looked down at Avery and said, “You’re right. I know you are. But it’s not in our nature to act alone. We’re a team.”
“You might be a team, but this sounds like something Phantom has to do. He feels responsible for not recognizing what he saw that day when you guys were there. I’m not suggesting you just let him go off on his own, then sit around and wait for him to get back, but you need to give him some space to process everything. I’m guessing he needs to prove to himself that he’s not the kind of man his mother and aunt tried to tell him he was. A loser. A waste of space.”
Rex inhaled sharply. They all loved Phantom like a brother. He’d never given any indication that he felt anything other than pride at being a part of the SEAL team, but then again, maybe Avery had a point.
“It’s not safe for him to interject himself into the middle of a civil war,” Bubba argued.
“I never said it was. But it wasn’t safe for you guys to split up when you were rescuing me, either, was it? But you did it anyway. I just don’t think you’re seeing this from Phantom’s side. He feels like it’s his fault Kalee wasn’t rescued. And he feels like he needs to right that wrong.” She turned to Rex. “How would you have felt if you’d stopped removing rocks right before you got to me because the insurgents came up the mountain minutes earlier? Then you later found out that I was inside, but you didn’t move that last rock?”
She was right. Exactly right. He would’ve moved heaven and earth to get back to rescue her. “Point made.”
“We don’t even know if she’s truly still alive,” Rocco said. “So it’s all a moot point at this juncture. But you’ve made a good argument, and I’ll keep it in mind if and when the time comes.” Then he pulled open the door and gestured for Avery and the others to enter the building.
For the rest of the afternoon, they visited with Phantom in his small recovery room. Gumby headed off and got lunch for all of them, and they had a sort of picnic in the room while they were waiting for Phantom’s doctor to sign him out.
It was late when they headed to the airstrip to get on the plane that would take them out of the country. They had a few stops to make along the way back to California, but the second the wheels lifted off the hard-packed ground of the runway, Rex breathed out a sigh of relief.
He looked over at Avery and saw she was staring out the window at the mountains in the distance.
“You okay?” he asked quietly.
Avery shrugged. “I was excited to come over here and help out the locals. Women’s health is a serious concern, and I was all fired up to help empower them to look out for themselves. But I’m somewhat ashamed to admit that I haven’t thought about the women I met before I was taken captive. I’m also very glad to be leaving, and I never want to come back. And that makes me feel like a bad naval officer.”
Rex touched her hand and was pleased when she immediately grabbed hold of him. He squeezed her hand and said, “It makes you human, Avery. And above all, before your duty to your country, you have to do what’s best for you.”
She didn’t turn her face away from the window, and they watched the countryside get smaller and smaller as they gained altitude, but she did grip his hand tightly. He knew she’d heard him.
Ensign Scott Wheatland watched the plane take off, carrying the SEAL team and the bitch who’d seen him. He was glad to see them go, and he had to think the fact that the military police or a naval master-at-arms hadn’t come to haul him off to the brig was a good sign.
But he wasn’t about to let his guard down. Because he worked security, he had access to a lot of information he wouldn’t otherwise. He was allowed to go out into the town and talk with the locals to try to gain information. It was how he’d made his connection to get his supply of pills when he needed them.
All he had to do was lie low the next three weeks until he got back to the base in California. Then he’d dig a bit and see what was happening with the bitch. He knew she worked in the hospital, and he could check up on her. It was a miracle he hadn’t run into her in the past. Especially considering how much time he’d spent at the hospital. First with his own injury, then the countless times he’d had to bring in suspected drunk drivers to be tested.
And of course, he’d faked being sick time and again to try to get prescriptions for more painkillers.
He had a feeling she’d recognize him now. And everything would come crashing down if the lieutenant narced on him.
It was exactly why he’d told his contact to kill the bitch as soon as he could! But instead…look what happened. She’d been rescued, and now Scott had to worry every second about being taken to the brig for his role in the attack on the convoy and the death of the two privates. Not only that, but he had a million bucks he couldn’t touch.
“Enjoy the next three weeks,” he mumbled to himself as the plane disappeared into the clouds high above the base. “Because they’ll be your last.”
Chapter Twelve
Avery sighed in relief when the wheels of the plane touched down in Southern California. The last leg had been a long flight, and she’d stayed awake to make sure Phantom was all right, and that he wasn’t experiencing any kind of setback from the altitude.
She felt bad that Cole had stayed awake with her. She knew he was probably extremely tired, but he didn’t let it show. He brought her snacks to keep her energy up, forced her to drink lots of water, and they talked for hours.