it’s not over between us, however?”
“Because you saw him, saw that feral look in his eyes. He doesn’t have much to lose right now.”
“Well, I do,” she said, moving ahead with Roscoe, her heart burning with the need for justice and her prayers centered on finding a lost little boy.
She was also moving away from Oliver. Somehow, they’d become too close. She didn’t do close. She was single and single-minded. Work consumed most of her time, and that was good enough for her. Or at least it had been up until now. But today, he’d stood there in the cave with her and another current of awareness had sizzled between them. Like heat lightning, there but hard to understand.
In spite of the circumstances, this man whom she didn’t want to like had become ingrained in her psyche. In the span of two days, they’d bonded in more ways than she’d ever bonded with anyone else. Well, maybe one other person.
Never one to rush things, Ava didn’t like the confusing feelings coursing over her each time Oliver was around. And now she was thinking about the man even after she’d purposely tried to distance herself from him. No, she’d been impulsive and rash once before in the love department. Not again.
She’d served with the one man who might have taken her heart. Julian Benton had been the gunner on her crew. They’d become close but he’d died in that chopper crash and left her numb with fear and afraid of life. She and Julian had never had a chance to explore where their feelings might have taken them because protocol and war had kept them too busy to take that next step.
So she’d put love out of her mind and she’d almost walked away from the world that had given her a home and hope.
Until the Military Working Dog program had saved her by offering her a way back to justice and that hope.
Did she dare go that deep with another man?
No. Not yet.
“Hey, be careful,” he said, catching up with her.
“I’m always careful,” she retorted. “And so is the trained animal guiding me.”
“Any alerts?”
“Not yet.”
“What made you switch to the MWD program?”
Oh, he wanted her to talk now, when she’d just been giving herself a mental pep talk. Since she didn’t have much of a choice, Ava replied, “A chopper crash.”
He kept his eyes straight ahead, his dark shades hiding his secrets. “You were on the front lines?”
“Yes.”
“And you don’t want to talk about it?”
“No.”
“But you survived.”
“I did.”
“Others didn’t survive?”
“No, they died.”
He didn’t miss a beat. “You’ll tell me later when we are clean and cool and sitting in a nice restaurant?”
“You wish.”
“I do wish,” he said, his tone steel edged, his voice low and husky.
“Maybe one day I’ll tell you but...you might not like what you hear. Isn’t that what you said to me?”
“Oh, so we’re gonna play that game where we try to hold on to our secrets until the very last minute?”
“One of my favorite games.”
Before he could say more, Roscoe alerted with a low growl. A sign of danger, not a frightened child.
Oliver held Ava’s arm and put a finger to his lips.
“I know how this works,” she whispered, drawing her own weapon. Then she gave Roscoe the signal to “Go.”
The big dog moved through the underbrush and rocky hillside, still growling low.
A bullet whizzed past Ava. Another hit at Roscoe’s feet.
“Come,” Ava commanded, bringing Roscoe back. Ava caught a glimpse of a figure dressed in dark jogging pants and a matching hoodie holding a gun aimed toward her.
Roscoe growled low, causing the other person to halt and lift the weapon. Ava did the same, ready for a face-off.
And then Oliver was there, pushing her down, a hail of gunfire and bullets bursting out in a harsh echo through the woods.
Overhead, birds flushed out of hiding and the whole forest came alive with critters being scared away and people shouting off in the distance. The shooter pivoted and took off.
Oliver rose up to get another shot with his handgun but it hit a tree while the culprit sprinted into the thicket.
“Stay here,” he told Ava as he took off through the woods, reporting through his radio.
Ava didn’t intend to stay here. She needed to be in on this hunt. And he needed to remember she was trained for this. If he hadn’t tackled her, she might have been able to get a clear shot.
Or she could have been killed, and Roscoe right along with her.
Moving on her hands and knees, she motioned Roscoe to do the same. Together they crouched through the woods, stopping to listen and search ahead.
Her heart hammering, her pulse on overdrive, Ava scanned the perimeter around her and kept Roscoe close.
Where was Oliver? And where was the shooter?
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