When You Dare
Page 99

One man reached for her breast and laughed at her panic. Instead, he struck her in the ribs. She lost her breath, gagging with the pain, falling to her knees, knowing they might kick her, knowing the ground held bugs and mud and worse. She struggled to stay upright, struggled, struggled…
Jerking awake with a start, Molly cried out—and immediately Dare came into the room.
“Hey. It’s okay.” The overhead light came on, blinding her. The bed dipped when he sat down beside her, when he pulled her into his arms.
Her throat felt too tight for her to swallow, burning with the need to cry. She was crying. She felt the tears hot on her cheeks and shame beat at her.
Angry at herself, at the bastards who’d done this to her, she tried to struggle away from Dare.
He tightened his hold. “Don’t do that, Molly. I understand. I know. But don’t push me away.” He kissed her hair, closed those impossibly strong arms around her.
“I hate them.” Her voice sounded high and broken, infuriating her more. Shaming her more.
“I do, too.” Shifting, he pulled her onto his lap. “When I was younger, when I got that knife wound on my chest?”
That got her attention, and she nodded to let him know she was listening.
“I was so pissed off I was blind with it. Mostly at myself for not being able to stop it, but at the man who did it, too. It took me a few weeks to recover, especially after I got an infection.”
Dare wore a shirt now, and she subtly tried to dry her eyes against the soft cotton.
He caught the sheet and lifted a corner of it to her. “Do you need a tissue?”
“No.” She sounded strangled, as if those awful hands were around her throat again, threatening to kill her. She buried her face against Dare. Ignoring the rasp of her voice, the weakness, she asked, “What were you doing when you got stabbed?”
“This isn’t to be repeated.”
She nodded.
“A senator’s son was being held hostage. I was hired to go get him. Me, specifically, because no one knew me yet. I was brand-new, tested but not yet tried, if you know what I mean.”
His hands moved over her back, up and down, not in any way sexual but still possessive.
Molly gulped back a fresh wave of tears. “I don’t.”
“I’d been trained. Everyone knew what I could do in live-action tests, but I hadn’t yet gone out in the field. This was my maiden run. And I almost f**ked it up.”
As the nightmare faded, she licked her dry lips. “But you didn’t?”
“No, thank God. Not entirely. If I had, the kid would’ve died. Talk about nightmares…” He shook his head and squeezed her again. After a deep breath, he continued. “The boy, who was around twelve at the time, was being held in a compound in Arizona. The place was owned by a wealthy, supposedly law-abiding businessman. No one would have thought to look for the kid there. But I’ve always had good instincts, and I tracked him to that location.”
“How?”
“You can almost always gauge a person by their associations. If a man has enough ties with people of questionable character, then I label him questionable.”
“Like my dad.”
“Like your dad,” he agreed.
Thinking about her father added to her angst. “How do you think you messed up?”
“I got too emotional.” Disgust sounded in his tone. “Thoughts of that kid and how scared he had to be, wondering if he was hurt or even being hurt right then, riddled my discipline.” The muscles of his face tightened, and his voice lowered. “Even knowing better, I went in too soon.”
Concern for Dare dispelled the leftover fear of the nightmare. She looked up and saw his beautiful face, the clean-cut jaw, the straight nose and deep blue eyes. “What did you do?”
“I found the boy. They’d roughed him up some, deliberately terrified him, but he was being so damned mature, so strong… He didn’t cry.” Dare looked down at her, using his thumb to brush away a tear. “I would have understood if he had. His eyes were red, and his voice shook. I was so proud of him—just like I’m proud of you.”
“You saved him?”
“Yeah, I got him out of there, though not before I had to tackle a guard.” His mouth quirked. “The son of a bitch blindsided me, and he was going to cut my throat. But that scrawny little kid jumped on his back, wrapping around him like a spider monkey. It slowed him down and gave me the advantage I needed.”
She knew, but still she asked, “To do what?”
Dare’s eyes darkened. “I pulled that f**king knife out of my chest and gutted the bastard with it.”
Dear Lord. “You could do that?”
“He didn’t hit my heart or a lung, so yeah. It hurt like hell, but it wasn’t a death blow.” He rubbed his ear. “The thing is, if the kid hadn’t acted when he did, we both would have died, and that’s inexcusable. It was a lesson about taking my time, studying everything before I make a move.” He went silent for a second, then he let out a breath. “It was a lesson, too, about my own ability.”
“Because you got him and yourself out of there.”
He discounted his own heroism. “God, I bled like a stuck pig. Twice I almost passed out. Luckily my guys were waiting outside the perimeter of the place, because I’m not sure I’d have gotten much farther before dropping.”
Tucking her head against his shoulder, Molly hugged him. “I’m so glad you made it.”