Forged in Fire (Delos Series Book 3) Read online

  Matt stood aside, blocking the hallway to the common room as the children warily filed out, their eyes huge with terror, clinging to one another as they hurried down the hall toward the warm kitchen that was filled with food being cooked for dinner.

  Dara was the last to come up, her hands on the backs of two older boys, who looked pale and scared. As she shooed them down the hall toward the rest of the retreating children, she stopped and turned to Matt.

  “You’re hurt,” she whispered, pointing at his left arm.

  Matt scowled and looked. Sure enough, a bullet had passed through the upper sleeve of his dark blue chambray shirt. There was blood staining it.

  Instantly, Dara was there, her hands near the wound, her expression one of intense concentration. She was in “doctor mode” now.

  “It’s nothing,” he muttered, gently removing her hand from his arm. “Just a slice. I’m okay. Right now, you need to go with Maggie and Callie. I need all of you in one area. Don’t leave the kitchen until I give an all-clear, all right?” He looked deeply into her grim expression. He liked that Dara, when the chips were down, wasn’t a frightened shadow. Deep within her, she had a lot of strength, and now Matt was seeing it. She was calm, in control, thinking clearly, none of that worry in her eyes or actions.

  “But—”

  “Dara, I’m fine,” Matt said, his voice almost a growl. He didn’t want to scare her because he saw her struggling to keep fear from controlling her in any way. She looked shocked by his rebuff. “Sweetheart, this might not be over. Things are in chaos around us right now,” he said, trying to soften the sharp tone of his voice. “Please? Go with the others. The kids really need calm adults around them right now.”

  “But where are you going?”

  He heard the concern in her low tone, saw her wrestling with it, saw her gaze at his bloodied left upper arm. Matt gently turned her around. “I’ll be out in front. I need to be outside. I need to keep watch for a while. You’ll all be fine in the kitchen. Give the kids some candy,” he teased. “They’ll settle right down.”

  Dara nodded, licked her lower lip, and gave him a steely look. “All right, but when you come back in, I’m examining that wound, Matt.” Her voice became firmer. “No argument.”

  He grinned a little and pushed her forward gently. “Okay, doc. I’ll be a good boy and come back and let you kiss it and make it better … later.”

  Dara snorted, shook her head, and hurried down the hall, her lab coat flapping around her long legs.

  Matt dragged in a ragged breath, turned, and trotted down the hall. He knew Taliban attack methods. Often, they bombed a market and then either had trucks of soldiers attack, had snipers waiting, or worse, exploded more bombs they had placed earlier in surrounding areas. Glancing at his watch, he saw it was four-thirty p.m. So much could happen in this place in thirty minutes. Shoving his emotions deep down, he was in full alert mode as he swung out the door and shut it behind him.

  He encountered a grisly scene on the street before him, the Afghan soldiers carrying dead Taliban bodies and hurling them into the rear of an army truck. Weapons were being gathered up, and Matt saw some of the Afghans rifling through the clothing of the dead Taliban, looking for maps, intelligence, letters, photos, or anything else that might identify the enemy.

  He ignored them and took a quick walk around the entire orphanage, testing the gate in the rear, which was their escape path if they needed one. He saw the bullet holes from the wild firing that had nicked out pieces of the building’s stucco.

  Luckily, none of the bullets had hit the windows. In the rear, where the white van was parked, Matt looked up at the surrounding buildings, which were two or three stories tall. He saw no snipers hiding at the top of any of them and felt slight relief trickle through him. Still tense, his heartbeat low and slow, he continued to scour the area with knowing eyes. For the most part, people had slammed closed the wooden shutters on their apartments, hiding inside.

  Their lives were one long-lasting hell as far as he was concerned.

  At the playground, Matt picked up his M4 shell casings, pocketing them. There were bullet holes torn through the slide, which would have to be repaired. The black smoke was drifting high into the stormy-looking sky. The wail of sirens was everywhere.

  Grimly, Matt went back inside. Dara was standing there, arms crossed, giving him a dark look.

  “Into my exam room,” she muttered, jerking her index finger toward the hall. “Now. And no argument, Matt Culver.”

  Stifling a grin and enjoying seeing Dara take charge, Matt put his weapon on the safety setting and held it in his left hand. “Yes, ma’am,” he murmured, meeting her narrowed blue eyes. Dara was in doctor mode, no question. That was actually natural because as a physician, she was familiar with trauma and shock and knew how to handle herself accordingly. As he walked beside her down the hall, the M4 over his shoulder, he knew Dara had been deeply shaken by this event. What would happen next? And how would it affect the bond that had begun to grow between them?

  CHAPTER 7

  Dara forced herself to focus on Matt’s wound as he sat down on the gurney. Moving to the medication area, she put what she needed on a small tray and brought it over to where he sat. He knew the drill and had taken off his Kevlar vest, laid it aside, then removed his chambray shirt. Beneath it, he wore a black T-shirt that revealed an impressively muscled chest. He rolled up the sleeve on the left side so she could work easily to clean and suture the slash.

  Pulling on a pair of latex gloves, she washed the area with antiseptic, gauging the one-inch slash across his large bicep. “You were lucky,” she muttered, frowning as she quickly cleaned the wound. It wasn’t that deep, but it could easily get infected.

  “Not lucky,” he said soothingly, watching her expression. “I knew what I was doing there every minute. That’s what we’re trained for.” She worked quickly, cleaning out the wound, adding antiseptic, and then taking a tube of what he recognized as a plastic adhesive. “I’ll be all right. This is just a scratch, Dara. Nothing more.”

  He saw her mouth tighten for a moment, felt her battling her feelings. Dara expertly placed a gloved finger on either side of the slice, pushed the edges closed, and then applied the adhesive. To Matt, it looked like superglue, but he was well aware it was better than getting stitched up. The glue would hold the edges of his skin together. And as she finished, she held the area for another thirty seconds, allowing it to air dry.

  “You were in danger, Matt. Pure and simple.”

  He gave her a sympathetic look. “Sweetheart, I wasn’t about to leave this orphanage at risk. I’ve seen too many market bombings, and I know Taliban tactics.” Again, he didn’t want to scare the hell out of her. For never having been in such a dangerous situation, Dara was handling it well.

  “I don’t know how Callie and Maggie deal with this kind of thing,” she whispered, her voice suddenly choked. She reached over to her tray and pulled the largest bandage from it, placing it gently over Matt’s wound. “Callie never tells me what’s going on over here. I’m always afraid for her, Matt. Afraid of events like this.” She jabbed an index finger in the direction of the market.

  He reached out, sliding his hand from her shoulder and down her back. She was standing between his opened legs and he could feel the shock making her more emotional than normal.

  Dara was a civilian from a safe country and she had a safe job. All she had to worry about was stupid drivers on the highway when she went to and from work. Here, it was different—very different. And he had no desire to add to the terror he heard in her husky voice.

  “Callie and Maggie know the playing field, Dara. You don’t. So it’s more stressful for you. They’ve been through this before, so it’s a known shock to them. They just roll a lot easier with it than someone who has never experienced such an event before, is all.”

  “Callie never told me about things like this, Matt. When I read about them in the newspaper or online, I never thought
… well, I never thought it could happen to them. Pretty naive, wasn’t I?” She stepped away, throwing the used gauze on the tray and carrying it to the counter, then pulling off her gloves.

  Matt shrugged on his shirt. He could smell the drying blood on the left sleeve. “Callie knows you’re a worrywart,” he teased, giving her a sympathetic look.

  “I am. I wish to hell I could turn it off,” she said with a sigh as she threw the used items into the trash. Dara washed the tray off beneath hot soap and water, then washed her own hands. Taking a deep, steadying breath, she turned and looked at him. “How does your arm feel now? Are you in pain?”

  “It’s fine, thanks.” Matt tried to make her feel better. “Just your touch made the pain go away.”

  “Liar,” she snorted.

  Matt saw her struggling to get back on level footing. Of course, anyone would be shaken by what had just happened. He saw her looking down the hall and out the windows. “Hey,” he said, sliding off the gurney, slipping his hand around her arm, and turning her toward him. “Don’t go out there for a while. You don’t want to see what it looks like, okay?” He knew that as a physician, she saw blood, but this was different. Very different.

  Matt wanted to protect her from the nightmares he knew she’d have if she saw the grisly scene. Human carnage was just that. He pulled Dara closer. To his surprise and relief, she easily walked into his arms. With the toe of his boot, he pushed the door closed. Right now, he wanted privacy with her. Both of them needed that.

  “Come here,” he rasped, tugging her forward. “Let me hold you …” And she came, her body melting against his, her arms going around his waist, her head resting on his chest. She smelled so good, despite the raw aromas of antiseptic and glue.

  Just being with Dara lifted him, whatever her mood. She made him want to survive this war more than he’d ever thought possible. Matt nuzzled her hair, inhaling the spicy scent. “What kind of shampoo do you use?” he asked, pressing several small kisses across her hairline and onto her temple.

  “It has vanilla and cinnamon in it,” she sighed, her arms tightening around him.

  “You always smell good,” he growled, sliding his hand across her shoulders. She was tight and tense, so Matt slowly began massaging them until he felt her begin to relax. He realized that there was an invisible connection between them, like a telephone line, only sharper, more intense, more profound. It was almost like telepathy to Matt. He had that kind of psychic connection with his team, too. They could communicate without words and even without hand signals. He and his team were intimately tied to one another because their lives depended upon it. It was that primal survival mechanism that came over him, giving him that extra edge.

  Now, with Dara, he knew he was starting to fall in love. But damn it, it was coming at the absolute worst time in their lives.

  Swallowing his frustration, Matt heard a soft sound in her throat as he continued to slide his hand up and down her back the way he had with Aliya. He knew the power of holding someone who was fighting off shock or terror. He nibbled lightly on the lobe of Dara’s ear and felt her flex against him, another sound of pleasure vibrating in her throat. He liked the sounds she made, and it hardened him. Slowly, with his hands, his small kisses meant to heal, not necessarily incite sexual hunger in her, Matt felt Dara surrender to him as she sagged wearily into his arms, allowing him to truly hold her.

  She’d worked hard all day long, and Matt knew she was exhausted. The bombing had torn away the fabric of her reality, made her see the daily danger that Callie, Maggie, and the children lived with. Matt knew it was a jolting, horrifying realization affecting the world as she knew it.

  Then again, being in Afghanistan would lead to a reality shift for anyone, and it would change them forever by the time they left.

  “Better now?” he asked, his voice low and thick as he eased her away from him just enough to look into her eyes. Dara didn’t realize just how much he saw in them. If she did, she’d probably avoid his gaze altogether.

  Matt wasn’t about to tell her how good he was at reading her because he didn’t want her to run. He wanted Dara to trust him. And she was beginning to do just that by willingly coming into his arms.

  Dara pushed strands of flyaway topknot off her cheek. “Yes, I’m better, thanks,” she agreed, her voice oddly husky.

  Matt saw heat in her eyes. He smiled a little, leaned down, brushed her lips, giving her a caring kiss meant to stabilize her, let her know she was safe with him, that the world was going to stop spinning in chaos around her. As she responded, her lips parting, he was surprised at her sudden hunger and assertiveness, liking it a lot. Maybe too much. Her kiss was filled with urgency. Need. Recognizing it as an urge for what he called survivor sex, he kept his kiss gentle, because right now, there was no place to take her to ease her out of that terrified, deep state of shock she was wrestling with. Finally, he parted from her lips, tasting her, wanting so much more.

  “Listen,” he told her, his voice low and serious. “I’m going to get Callie and Mohammed. I want him to take both of you back to Bagram right now.”

  Dara stared at him, her eyes widening. “Okay. But what about you?”

  He gave her a kiss on the nose. “I’m staying here tonight.” Instantly, Matt felt her tense as worry clearly filled her widening eyes. “Things will settle down in about forty-eight hours, Dara,” Matt said easily. But he wasn’t being completely straight with her.

  Damn, he didn’t want to tell her that after a bombing like this, Taliban often rigged secondary IEDs around the area. Sometimes, they went after Afghans known to be supportive of the Americans. And this orphanage was a huge target.

  Matt wouldn’t mention this, as he knew it would increase her worry for Callie and for everyone at the orphanage, as well as himself.

  “That will make Maggie and the kids feel so much better.”

  Matt wanted to take her over to the Eagle’s Nest, lie close to her all night, love her into oblivion, and become her entire universe. He smoothed the frown forming across her brow with his thumb and then pulled her a little closer to help her tap into that safety zone he was placing around her.

  “Yes, they need this kind of reassurance,” he offered gently. “Maggie, Mohammed, and these children need some extra security for the next two days. I’m a good guard dog.” He appreciated her understanding, seeing the resolve in her eyes but also that she was proud of him for remaining here to keep them all safe.

  “I know how much safer you make me feel when you’re around me,” Dara admitted. “And they really do need you here, Matt. I wish I could do more, but you’re the right person with the right training to make this call.”

  Matt was relieved to see she understood. He was watching Dara manage her worry and be very unselfish and caring about others in this situation. He knew doctors were like that, anyway, but until now, he hadn’t been sure how much her worry controlled her. Obviously not much when the situation demanded it. “Maggie and the kids need a little extra security, is all. It’s just a precaution. If I really thought this place was going to be attacked, I’d have made a call to my CO and he’d have sent five or six more Delta soldiers out here to stay with us. But that’s not what’s happening, Dara. Things in this neighborhood are upset right now, and people are scared. Some have lost family members. I want to stay here to keep people out of the orphanage. Often, there’s looting after a market bombing, and I want this charity to keep the things it has. That’s all. I promise.”

  She touched his bearded face, looking deep into his eyes. “I’m scared for everyone, Matt.”

  He kissed her tenderly and then gently eased away from her soft, luscious mouth. Matt rasped, “I know you are, sweetheart.” He stopped at promising her that everything would be fine, because in this country, you’d be a fool to promise anything. Chaos ruled this place, pure and simple.

  “Let’s go get Callie. I think the kids will settle down a lot quicker once they know I’m staying. They see me a
s a guard, someone who protected them, and that’s a good thing.”

  She gave him a teary-eyed look. “Those children deserve you being here.”

  “They’ll sleep better tonight knowing I’m here.” He looked at his watch. “It’s nearly five p.m.”

  He slid his hand into hers, opening the door and bringing her down the hall with him.

  Matt knew he’d have a fight on his hands with Callie. As they walked into the kitchen, all the children were eating, seemingly having forgotten the bombing. Callie was there with Maggie and the four Afghan widows.

  He pulled Maggie and Callie aside, Dara standing next to him. He’d released Dara’s hand before he’d opened the door, not wanting anyone to know of their relationship, at least not yet. Quietly, he explained his plan to them.

  Maggie looked utterly relieved. Callie’s expression grew stubborn and she jabbed her hands on her hips. “I’m staying, too, Matt.” She looked at Maggie. “This is where I belong.”

  He kept his tone quiet but firm. “Listen, Callie, your big sister needs to go back to base. You asked her out here, and now you have a responsibility to see that she gets back there. Dara’s torn up over what happened and she can use your help right now. I’ll be there and so will Maggie. Between the two of us, we have this handled. Okay?”

  Matt wanted to guilt her into going back to the base, where she’d be safe, too. He knew if Callie stayed behind, it would really amp up Dara’s worry for her sister.

  “I’ve been in market bombings,” Callie said, her temper flaring. “And I know this area is shell-shocked right now. A lot of robberies happen right after a bombing. I can be of help here. I can be another set of eyes and ears in case some guys try to get into our orphanage.”

  Matt held on to his patience. Callie was a fighter. Dara was a lover. It was just a difference between the sisters, but Callie needed to realize her first responsibility was to her big sister.

  “Can you shoot a rifle, Callie? Could you pull the trigger?”

  She glared at him. “I’m not trained in weapons. I joined this charity to help people, not kill them.”