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Synopsis
Stirring romance featuring the heroes of the Navy SEALs, Delta Force, Air Force Pararescue, the Green Berets, the Army Rangers and other special forces: men and women who live and fight in extreme danger to preserve our freedoms, defenders and protectors of all we hold dear. This collection includes the work of bestselling romance writers such as Shannon K. Butcher and Stephanie Tyler and Larissa Ione, writing as Sydney Croft. Sydney Croft's special forces couple, Annika and Creed, work for the Agency for Covert Rare Operatives (ACRO), all of whose members have special powers, while Shannon K. Butcher's hero is an ex-Navy SEAL. But these fighting men and women have a gentler, protective side; hard-edged weapons when on active duty, they can be caring lovers, of special forces teammates or the civilians they protect.
Release date: March 25, 2010
Publisher: Robinson
Print pages: 546
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The Mammoth Book of Special Ops Romance
Trisha Telep
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“Once Burned” © by Penny McCall. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Cane River” © by Rinda Elliott. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Surrender at Dawn” © by Laura Griffin. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Into the Night Sky” © by Charlotte Mede. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“A Kept Man” © by Shannon K. Butcher. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Russian Roulette” © by Rachel Caine. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“VeriSEAL” © by Marliss Melton. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Shoot to Thrill” © by Charlene Teglia. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Angels of Punishment” © by Michele Albert. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Dark Force” © by Cheyenne McCray. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Lipstick Spy School” © by Gina Robinson. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Don’t Walk Away” © by Shiloh Walker. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Heat of the Night” © by Jordan Summers. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Overkill” © by E. C. Sheedy. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Grey Man” © by Caitlyn Nicholas. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Good Guys” © by Liz Muir. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Code Word: Storm” © by Sydney Croft. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“TAG Team” © by Nicola Marsh. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Game” © by Gennita Low. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Traitor” © by Debra Webb. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
Everybody needs a hero. I know Tina Turner flatly stated that “we don’t need another” one but I say Tina is wrong! So, if you like your military suspenseful,
you’ve come to the right place. This book is packed as tight as a sexy six-pack with tough yet tender men who have the skills to get the job done. They win their loves – or take them by
force, if necessary – but still wake up day after day to right the wrongs of the world, whether they be in the jungles of Indonesia, the waters of the US eastern seaboard or deep in the
lawless South American wilds. Navy Seals, Delta Force, Green Beret and special ops commandos from different countries around the world are joined by FBI and CIA operatives, mercenaries and double
agents in stories to make you swoon. These stories run the gamut from cosy, curl-up-with-a-warm-cup-of-cocoa-and-a-sweet-hard-boiled-Navy-Seal-on-a-mission to flat out adrenaline-fuelled action and
a chance to let these trained warriors show you exactly what they’re built for. Danger and intrigue are their business but passionate, soul-crushing sex and unbridled desire are high on their
list of targets as well.
The lives of these highly-trained warriors can seem a bit of a mystery to the rest of us – unknowable and slightly off to the side of everyday life. Their missions are never really seen
directly but you read about them in newspapers when a kidnapping is foiled or an ambassador is saved. They slip in and out of the shadows rarely seen, and their praises often go unsung. But what
about when you do catch a glimpse of one? I mean, they have to go grocery shopping sometime, don’t they? And where do they channel all that energy when they are not saving people from burning
buildings, masterminding great escapes or taking a bullet for their best buddy? These are men of passion and intensity – their very lives depend on it – and that same intensity is found
in the bedroom. Truly, these guys (and girls) seem to have two main settings: hard and harder.
And what kind of book would this be without a nod to the more fantastic side of Special Ops: superheroes and other teams of covert paranormal operatives. Not everyone uses AK-47s and Uzis as
standard operating equipment, you know. Some use electric fingertips, ghost summoning, salt and holy water instead of guns and knives. Who said Special Forces can’t have otherwordly powers?
Aren’t these guys pretty much superhuman anyway?
So stay in with stories of hot-blooded, highly trained former lovers reunited on missions, skilled soldiers in (and out of) uniform, and hapless civilians spellbound by the allure of
unstoppable, sexy saviours who inspire more than just their gratitude. Heart-stopping danger means heart-stopping passion. From traditional military suspense and intelligence capers of sexy
operatives with a paranormal kick, you’ll find all kinds of stories to sate your physical desires and leave you gasping. These are men on a mission . . . for your heart.
Trisha Telep
Penny McCall
One
Kate Morris snapped awake, snatched from the depths of REM sleep by the slight buzz of her home-made alarm system going off. Not a muscle so much as twitched, not even her
eyelids. There was no way her bedroom had been breached so quickly, but Kate wasn’t a woman who took chances. Not any more.
The house had gone silent again, but silent didn’t mean empty. This silence was like a held breath, the ticking seconds between one chess move and another, the moment after a gauntlet was
thrown down. “Game on,” this silence said, and the intruder wasn’t your garden-variety sneak thief looking for trinkets. It wasn’t a pervert either, and it sure as hell
wasn’t the Avon lady. It was a pro – a pro who knew he’d been made. Who it was, what he wanted, Kate had no clue. What he’d get, she thought with a grim smile, was a
fight.
She rolled out of bed, a gun already in her hand by the time her bare feet hit the floor. She cat-footed it into the en-suite bathroom, barely pausing there to strap a knife – one of the
weapons she had stashed around her house – at her calf.
She eased open the door to the hallway and slipped out, headed away from the stairs to the foyer. Her house was one of the old Victorians in Washington, DC – three rambling, half-restored
floors, complete with servants’ quarters in the attic and a back staircase. She eased down the stairs, skipping the third and seventh risers with their purposely unrepaired squeaks, assessing
the situation as she went.
The guy downstairs was good, good enough to get through the best security systems in the world. He wasn’t good enough to avoid her traps though, or get out of them easily. The back stairs
let out on to the kitchen. She slipped through that room, taking a few seconds to assess the situation. The front door was half open. The intruder, a darker shape against the slight illumination
from the street lights, was crouched down in her foyer with his back to her, still trying to disentangle himself from the snarls of fishing line wrapped around his ankles.
Kate ran on the balls of her feet, fast and quiet, ending up with the gun barrel pressed to the nape of his neck. “Stand up. Slowly.”
He did, and she nearly fumbled the gun, covering her sudden case of nerves by jamming the barrel into the small of his back. She was tall, but he had enough height on her to make it dangerous to
keep her gun at his neck. Having her arm in the air put her off balance – physically. Emotionally she was already reeling. She hid that too.
“One shot and you’ll never walk again,” she said. “If you’re still alive.”
“It’s me,” he said, which covered a hell of lot of territory – none of which she was eager to revisit.
“I know.” She didn’t lower the gun.
“Is this how you welcome an old friend into your house?”
“Friends wait to be invited.”
“We’re not friends any more? I’m crushed.”
“We were never friends.”
“No, ‘friends’ is way too mild a word for what we were.”
His words hit her like fists. Kate wanted a moment, just a few seconds really, to catch her breath. But he was too good at reading her. Or at least he had been, once upon a time. “When I
came down here I wasn’t planning to pull the trigger,” she said, as if seeing him again meant nothing to her. “Dead bodies are so inconvenient: all the questions from the police,
and the mess. I just refinished this floor.”
“So you’re not over me.”
“Keep talking, Swiss Cheese.”
He turned, slowly, moving the gun aside with an index finger, then bent to take a closer look at it, flipping on a penlight. “Hair trigger?”
“And armour-piercing rounds.”
“I’m flattered.”
“Right, like I was expecting you to show up. My house is probably at the bottom of your list of favourite destinations, right after hell.”
Reese Kyle shook his head, his slight smile lending no humour to a face that could have been chiselled out of granite. There was nothing soft about the rest of him either, and she didn’t
just mean the tall body with its rock-hard muscles. The man inside that shell, and the heart that beat in his chest, were just as cold and hard. He pulled a wicked-looking dive knife from the
sheath at his waist, sliced away the fishing line around his ankles, and closed her front door.
“Thanks, but you’re supposed to be on the other side.”
“Nope. I’m here for a reason.” His eyes dropped to her bare legs, moving up slowly to settle on her skimpy tank top.
Her nipples hardened. “That better not be the reason,” she said.
He lifted his eyes to her face. “I’m on an op.”
That staggered her, almost more than seeing him. “Mike would never send you to work an op that involves me,” she said, referring to Mike Kovaleski, the FBI handler who’d once
run her professional life. “Not after the last time.”
“Mike does whatever it takes to get the job done.”
“The two of us don’t exactly have a stellar track record as a team when it comes to getting the job done.” Or anything else for that matter.
“Nobody asked you to quit.”
She snorted. “Shit flows downhill, and I was at the bottom of the slope. Not to mention the one with the blown cover. It was just a matter of time before I was sent packing.”
“You didn’t have to cut me out of your life.”
“You weren’t exactly burning up the phone lines.”
“I was trying to let the dust settle.”
“Five years is a lot of dust.”
“You could have picked up the phone.”
“Yeah, I could have.” She jerked the door open. “Try to stay gone this time.”
“Of all the pig-headed, stubborn—” Reese stomped over to the door, but Kate’s hand must have been fisted around the knob because when he slammed it she jerked forwards,
crashing into him.
Reese wrapped his arms around her; it was either that or they would both have gone down in a heap on the floor. She felt so damn good, like no time had passed – for either of them, if he
was any judge of body language. She might be holding a hard line verbally, but her body told another story. She still wanted him. Bad. Probably why she was so pissed off. Too pissed off to step
back, and he’d be damned if he flinched first.
“You want to dance?” she asked, a challenge in her words, in her eyes, in the way she held her body against his, deliberately relaxed. She said it as if being pressed up against him
meant nothing.
“No,” he said, and kissed her. If she wanted to play games, they’d play, he thought. The taste of her burst through him. She was fire in his arms, fire that became an inferno
when she kissed him back, her tongue tangling with his – just for a second – before he felt the barrel of her gun poking him in the stomach. His world turned to ice, between one racing
heartbeat and the next. And that was before he heard her cock the hammer.
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t pull the trigger.”
Two
“If you shoot me you’ll never know why I’m here.”
“I could live with that.”
“Can your clients?”
She didn’t move, her eyes just shifted up until their gazes met. Time passed, a second, a minute, and then she uncocked the gun Reese had forgotten about and stepped back. He missed her,
death threat and all.
“I’m listening,” she said.
He snorted. “There ought to be a calendar around here so I can write that down for posterity.”
She eased back a couple more steps, slipped the gun into her thigh holster, and flipped on a small nightlight that gave off barely enough illumination for them to see each other. “Did you
just drop in to do a stand-up routine, or is there some other reason you darkened my door?”
Stand-up routine? Hell, it was comic relief. Hearing her voice was hard enough without seeing her in a skin-tight tank and shorts, slim, curvy, hotter than any Hollywood gym body. And then there
were the weapons. The Glock 27 – a back-up-size handgun with all the power of the full-size model – strapped to her thigh, a Smith and Wesson combat knife on her opposite calf, not to
mention the look in her cool blue eyes. Kate Morris knew her weapons and she wasn’t afraid to use them. It was sexy as hell.
“Reese.”
He looked up, and Kate knew she was in trouble. More trouble than a little light could solve. But she couldn’t be in the dark with him. Not after he’d kissed her. And she’d
responded. She rolled her eyes when she remembered that. Responded? Hell, the anger that had lain dormant for the last five years had flashed to heat so fast she’d have jumped him right then
and there if not for the fact that her muscles had gone weak. There’d been too many nights she and Reese had spent filled with each other, too many memories she couldn’t help but
relive, the feel of him moving over her, in her, the scent and heat of his skin . . .
Her eyes lifted to his. She could see he was taking that trip down memory lane too, and that he knew she was right there with him. But he moved away, positioning himself in the entrance to the
hallway.
Kate pulled back, shoving the past out of her mind so she could focus. She didn’t waste any time wondering why he was bracing for a fight. Reese Kyle never borrowed trouble. He inflicted
it.
She eased over a few more steps, stopping so she had a clear view down the hall and into the living room and dining room. Reese had nowhere to go that she couldn’t get to him. Fast.
He smiled slightly, one eyebrow inching up.
“If we’re going to play cat and mouse,” she said, “I get to be the cat.”
“Most women would object to that characterization.”
“Most women wouldn’t do more than make a cutting remark.”
His eyes dropped to the gun. Not so sure she wouldn’t use it on him, she thought, grimly amused.
“You were telling me why the stuffed suits at the bureau sent one of their puppets to annoy me.”
That hit the mark. The muscles in his jaw bunched before he got hold of himself. “We got a tip about Amir Kashani.”
“Tip?”
“Kashani and his family are being held hostage, as of about an hour ago.”
Kate snatched a cell phone from the top drawer of the apothecary’s chest in the foyer.
Reese closed his hand around her wrist.
“I have two men in that house,” she said, switching the phone to her other hand and flipping it open.
“I don’t know what shape they’re in, but they’re definitely out of commission. You try to call them in the middle of the night for no reason, the kidnappers will know
you’re on to them, no matter how slick you are at hiding it.”
Her thumb hovered over the speed dial. She snapped the phone closed instead, paced a couple of steps away, thinking about the bodyguards who were on duty with Kashani’s family. She knew
them well, knew their wives and kids. Amir Kashani trusted her with his life and the lives of his family; that made them hers. And she had to stop thinking of their safety if she was going to
rescue them.
“Kashani is a member of the Balyks, the monarchist ruling party in Balykistan, but he has a reputation as a man who embraces democracy,” she said, putting herself back in the op,
which was the only place she could be any good to the people who needed her. “He’s here to negotiate a peace treaty between his party and the Reformists. His people trust him to make
the best agreement possible, and the other side believes his word will be honoured.”
“Not everyone wants peace,” Reese said. “The men who are holding Kashani and his family are part of a militant faction of the Reformist Party. They won’t settle for less
than supremacy, and that means they have to win the war, not end it amicably.”
“The peace treaty negotiations are supposed to start first thing tomorrow morning. But Kashani will do whatever he’s told as long as his family is in danger.” And it was up to
her to save them. She wanted to move now, but without more intelligence she could blunder in and make a mess, costing innocent lives. It was a mistake she refused to make again. But she
couldn’t let past tragedy freeze her in place, either. “Tell me the rest of what you know.”
“The Bureau is replacing you with an agent—”
“No.”
“Use your brain instead of your heart.”
“I learned that lesson five years ago. From you.”
This time he met her eyes, and his were hot.
Direct hit, she thought. Too bad it didn’t make her feel any better. His being right wasn’t helping. “Those are my . . .” people, she’d almost said. Not the
way to convince him. “Those are my employees and my clients. My reputation. It’s taken me five years to get this business up and running.”
“Your incorporation papers were filed four years ago.”
“And you think I spent a year mooning over you.” She huffed out a slight laugh. “I didn’t lose you, Reese, I left you behind. What I lost was a career I spent half my
life working for.”
“You walked away.”
“Yeah.” She’d walked away before the Bureau could give her directions. And before Reese could add injury to insult by putting words to the silence he’d left between them
after their last op went bad. “This time I’m sticking.”
“I can’t walk,” Reese said.
“Still the good little soldier?”
“Is that why you really think I’m here?”
Kate backed off from that, and not just verbally. “There’s no way I’m letting the FBI bully their way into my life and destroy what I’ve built. This is my job, and
I’m going to do it.”
“That’s what we figured you’d say.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I thought I could reason with you.”
Sure, he wanted to reason with her, that’s why he was braced for a fight. “You thought you could put me out of commission and replace me with an agent.”
At least he had the grace to look sheepish.
“I know the layout of Kashani’s house, their routine —” she continued.
“You can run the op with Mike.”
“Right.” Mike Kovaleski was a rough, gruff, ex-marine who took no bullshit, accepted no excuses and wasted no time caring about anything but the missions and the agents under his
direction. And he didn’t share authority. “I run the op, period. Mike agrees, or I run it without you.”
Reese hesitated, weighing his options.
Kate dropped her hand to rest on the Glock holstered at her thigh.
He pulled a cell phone out of his belt clip, hit speed dial and handed it to her. She didn’t waste time with greetings or old-times’-sakes, just repeated her ultimatum.
“Figured you’d say that,” Mike said in his distinctive rasp.
“You could have called me. There was no need to send—” her eyes cut to Reese “—anyone, let alone a special ops hothead.”
“Reese went to bat for you five years ago.”
“And you’re telling me this because . . .?”
“If you have to be saddled with a special ops hothead, it helps to have one who gives a shit about you. Or I can pull Reese and send in some other agents—”
“Nobody else,” Kate said. “You send in a bunch of trigger-happy Feds and somebody will die.”
“You’d know that first-hand,” Mike shot back. Then she heard him blow out a breath. “Shouldn’t have said that. You pissed me off.”
“Nice to know I still have the touch.”
“Been keeping my eye on you, kid. Wouldn’t let you handle this otherwise,” he said, as close to a compliment as she’d get, but – as usual – he spoiled it.
“Try to send Kyle back in one piece. Lunkhead insisted on taking this op, even after I reminded him you’d as soon shoot him as look at him.”
Her eyes cut to Reese’s. “I guess he still doesn’t trust me to watch my own back.”
“Maybe not, but he’s trusting you with his.”
Kate disconnected, handed the phone back. “It’s my op.”
Reese’s jaw bunched, but he didn’t look away.
“The family is my only concern. They already know me.”
“So do the kidnappers.”
“Then they know that what I care about is my client and his family, and they know I’ll do whatever it takes to keep them safe.”
“They’ll be expecting you.”
“Exactly. If someone else shows up, they’ll know the FBI is on to them. So . . .” She lifted her chin, stared him down. “It’s me or no one.”
Three
“You or no one,” Reese repeated, his mind taking an instant detour off the job and into the personal, his body already a step ahead of him. He was halfway
across the foyer and reaching for her when she said, “I still have the gun,” and even then it didn’t really register.
“You’ll have to use it,” he said, “because that’s the only way you’re getting rid of me this time.”
She slipped away, deciding retreat was the better part of valour. Even as the frustration hit him, the aching need still clamouring to be satisfied, Reese knew he had to focus on the job and
worry about the personal later. He managed his part by stopping where he was, then fisting his hands to stop from reaching for her. If he touched her again, he’d have to have her. Even if the
whole world paid a price.
“The kidnapping,” she reminded him. “It’s me or no one.”
“Then it’s no one,” he said and started for the door.
This time she stepped in front of him. “Why are you interfering?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to; they’d always understood each other perfectly.
“We made this mistake before,” she said.
“Yeah.” And she’d paid for it.
Kate had been an FBI agent when he met her, one who’d risen through the ranks quickly to become one of the lead agents on a new FBI taskforce specializing in foreign terrorism on US soil,
specifically those incidents involving hostages. Some of the men she’d outstripped had chalked up her fast rise to the fact that she was a woman in an organization trying to modernize their
hiring profile. Anyone who’d run an op with her knew she’d gotten where she was on skill, courage and complete balls-to-the-wall dedication.
Reese had come out of the military – army special forces, to be exact – about a year before he’d been assigned to her taskforce. He still recalled that moment, the first time
he’d laid eyes on Kate Morris, five feet eight inches of strength and determination, a living weapon no less effective for being easy on the eyes. He still remembered the way their gazes had
met across the room, the impact of it knocking him back a full step. He hadn’t been a man who believed in love at first sight. Hell, he hadn’t been a man who believed in love at all. He
still didn’t. He’d seen too much of the horror people inflicted on one another in the name of religion, of loyalty. Of love.
What he’d felt for Kate had been lust – desire was a prettier word, but there’d been nothing pretty about the craving running through him, the need to touch and taste, to throw
himself head first into the flames with no regard to what that kind of fire would do to him. Thank God she’d felt it too, Reese thought. It had been nearly impossible to concentrate on the
job, but she’d been with him every heated step of the way. There’d been a lot of down time between missions, and they’d been unable to keep their hands off one another. It
hadn’t been a problem. Until it spilled over into work.
There’d been a hostage situation involving a Colombian family being held in New York by a drug lord because the father had turned informant. After two days they’d reached an impasse
in the negotiations. Reese had wanted to take the kidnappers by force. Kate had been equally convinced she could talk them out, so convinced she’d gone in without waiting for the green light
from him. She’d never gotten the chance to find out if her way would have worked because the second Reese realized the risk she’d taken, he’d stormed the place. The bad guys had
escaped, Kate had taken a bullet to her left shoulder, and the witness had been killed. The other casualty had been her job. She’d quit before she could be fired, and not for pride’s
sake. Kate Morris was a woman who took responsibility for her actions. She’d screwed up, and she’d owned that.
Reese hadn’t spoken to her since. He’d been pissed, at her, at himself. He’d forgotten the mission, put civilians in danger because all he’d been able to see was her.
He’d believed distance would help, but not a day of the last five years had gone by without Kate being his first thought in the morning and his last at night. He’d kept tabs on her;
he’d even picked up the phone a time or fifty. Thinking was as far as he’d allowed himself to take it.
Five years should have cooled his blood. At least that’s what he’d told himself when he’d agreed to take this op. He’d been wrong. The wildness might have gone out of the
fire, but the flame was still there, deep and warm and steady.
And as long as Kate was pissed off, he didn’t have to decide what to do about it.
“It could have been a lot worse,” she said, reading his mind again – but not his feelings, thankfully.
“It will be this time if you don’t listen to reason. These people mean business.”
“The bad guys always mean business. That’s why I have a job.”
“You’ve got to be rusty.”
“Sure, I was just sleeping away in complete oblivion when you showed up. Self-preservation is like sex, Reese, you neve
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The Mammoth Book of the Deep
The Mammoth Book of Dickensian Whodunnits
The Mammoth Book of Dirty, Sick, X-Rated & Politically Incorrect Jokes
The Mammoth Book of Egyptian Whodunnits
The Mammoth Book of Erotic Online Diaries
The Mammoth Book of Erotic Women
The Mammoth Book of Extreme Fantasy
The Mammoth Book of Funniest Cartoons of All Time
The Mammoth Book of Hard Men
The Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits
The Mammoth Book of Illustrated True Crime
The Mammoth Book of Inside the Elite Forces
The Mammoth Book of International Erotica
The Mammoth Book of Irish Romance
The Mammoth Book of Jack the Ripper
The Mammoth Book of Jacobean Whodunnits
The Mammoth Book of the Kama Sutra
The Mammoth Book of Killers at Large
The Mammoth Book of King Arthur
The Mammoth Book of Lesbian Erotica
The Mammoth Book of Limericks
The Mammoth Book of Maneaters
The Mammoth Book of Modern Ghost Stories
The Mammoth Book of Modern Battles
The Mammoth Book of Monsters
The Mammoth Book of Mountain Disasters
The Mammoth Book of New Gay Erotica
The Mammoth Book of New Terror
The Mammoth Book of On the Edge
The Mammoth Book of On the Road
The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance
The Mammoth Book of Pirates
The Mammoth Book of Poker
The Mammoth Book of Prophecies
The Mammoth Book of Roaring Twenties Whodunnits
The Mammoth Book of Sex, Drugs and Rock ’N’ Roll
The Mammoth Book of Short Spy Novels
The Mammoth Book of Sorcerers’ Tales
The Mammoth Book of The Beatles
The Mammoth Book of The Mafia
The Mammoth Book of Time Travel Romance
The Mammoth Book of True Crime
The Mammoth Book of True Hauntings
The Mammoth Book of True War Stories
The Mammoth Book of Unsolved Crimes
The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance
The Mammoth Book of Vintage Whodunnits
The Mammoth Book of Women Who Kill
The Mammoth Book of Zombie Comics
“Once Burned” © by Penny McCall. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Cane River” © by Rinda Elliott. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Surrender at Dawn” © by Laura Griffin. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Into the Night Sky” © by Charlotte Mede. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“A Kept Man” © by Shannon K. Butcher. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Russian Roulette” © by Rachel Caine. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“VeriSEAL” © by Marliss Melton. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Shoot to Thrill” © by Charlene Teglia. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Angels of Punishment” © by Michele Albert. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Dark Force” © by Cheyenne McCray. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Lipstick Spy School” © by Gina Robinson. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Don’t Walk Away” © by Shiloh Walker. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Heat of the Night” © by Jordan Summers. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Overkill” © by E. C. Sheedy. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Grey Man” © by Caitlyn Nicholas. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Good Guys” © by Liz Muir. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“Code Word: Storm” © by Sydney Croft. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“TAG Team” © by Nicola Marsh. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Game” © by Gennita Low. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
“The Traitor” © by Debra Webb. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
Everybody needs a hero. I know Tina Turner flatly stated that “we don’t need another” one but I say Tina is wrong! So, if you like your military suspenseful,
you’ve come to the right place. This book is packed as tight as a sexy six-pack with tough yet tender men who have the skills to get the job done. They win their loves – or take them by
force, if necessary – but still wake up day after day to right the wrongs of the world, whether they be in the jungles of Indonesia, the waters of the US eastern seaboard or deep in the
lawless South American wilds. Navy Seals, Delta Force, Green Beret and special ops commandos from different countries around the world are joined by FBI and CIA operatives, mercenaries and double
agents in stories to make you swoon. These stories run the gamut from cosy, curl-up-with-a-warm-cup-of-cocoa-and-a-sweet-hard-boiled-Navy-Seal-on-a-mission to flat out adrenaline-fuelled action and
a chance to let these trained warriors show you exactly what they’re built for. Danger and intrigue are their business but passionate, soul-crushing sex and unbridled desire are high on their
list of targets as well.
The lives of these highly-trained warriors can seem a bit of a mystery to the rest of us – unknowable and slightly off to the side of everyday life. Their missions are never really seen
directly but you read about them in newspapers when a kidnapping is foiled or an ambassador is saved. They slip in and out of the shadows rarely seen, and their praises often go unsung. But what
about when you do catch a glimpse of one? I mean, they have to go grocery shopping sometime, don’t they? And where do they channel all that energy when they are not saving people from burning
buildings, masterminding great escapes or taking a bullet for their best buddy? These are men of passion and intensity – their very lives depend on it – and that same intensity is found
in the bedroom. Truly, these guys (and girls) seem to have two main settings: hard and harder.
And what kind of book would this be without a nod to the more fantastic side of Special Ops: superheroes and other teams of covert paranormal operatives. Not everyone uses AK-47s and Uzis as
standard operating equipment, you know. Some use electric fingertips, ghost summoning, salt and holy water instead of guns and knives. Who said Special Forces can’t have otherwordly powers?
Aren’t these guys pretty much superhuman anyway?
So stay in with stories of hot-blooded, highly trained former lovers reunited on missions, skilled soldiers in (and out of) uniform, and hapless civilians spellbound by the allure of
unstoppable, sexy saviours who inspire more than just their gratitude. Heart-stopping danger means heart-stopping passion. From traditional military suspense and intelligence capers of sexy
operatives with a paranormal kick, you’ll find all kinds of stories to sate your physical desires and leave you gasping. These are men on a mission . . . for your heart.
Trisha Telep
Penny McCall
One
Kate Morris snapped awake, snatched from the depths of REM sleep by the slight buzz of her home-made alarm system going off. Not a muscle so much as twitched, not even her
eyelids. There was no way her bedroom had been breached so quickly, but Kate wasn’t a woman who took chances. Not any more.
The house had gone silent again, but silent didn’t mean empty. This silence was like a held breath, the ticking seconds between one chess move and another, the moment after a gauntlet was
thrown down. “Game on,” this silence said, and the intruder wasn’t your garden-variety sneak thief looking for trinkets. It wasn’t a pervert either, and it sure as hell
wasn’t the Avon lady. It was a pro – a pro who knew he’d been made. Who it was, what he wanted, Kate had no clue. What he’d get, she thought with a grim smile, was a
fight.
She rolled out of bed, a gun already in her hand by the time her bare feet hit the floor. She cat-footed it into the en-suite bathroom, barely pausing there to strap a knife – one of the
weapons she had stashed around her house – at her calf.
She eased open the door to the hallway and slipped out, headed away from the stairs to the foyer. Her house was one of the old Victorians in Washington, DC – three rambling, half-restored
floors, complete with servants’ quarters in the attic and a back staircase. She eased down the stairs, skipping the third and seventh risers with their purposely unrepaired squeaks, assessing
the situation as she went.
The guy downstairs was good, good enough to get through the best security systems in the world. He wasn’t good enough to avoid her traps though, or get out of them easily. The back stairs
let out on to the kitchen. She slipped through that room, taking a few seconds to assess the situation. The front door was half open. The intruder, a darker shape against the slight illumination
from the street lights, was crouched down in her foyer with his back to her, still trying to disentangle himself from the snarls of fishing line wrapped around his ankles.
Kate ran on the balls of her feet, fast and quiet, ending up with the gun barrel pressed to the nape of his neck. “Stand up. Slowly.”
He did, and she nearly fumbled the gun, covering her sudden case of nerves by jamming the barrel into the small of his back. She was tall, but he had enough height on her to make it dangerous to
keep her gun at his neck. Having her arm in the air put her off balance – physically. Emotionally she was already reeling. She hid that too.
“One shot and you’ll never walk again,” she said. “If you’re still alive.”
“It’s me,” he said, which covered a hell of lot of territory – none of which she was eager to revisit.
“I know.” She didn’t lower the gun.
“Is this how you welcome an old friend into your house?”
“Friends wait to be invited.”
“We’re not friends any more? I’m crushed.”
“We were never friends.”
“No, ‘friends’ is way too mild a word for what we were.”
His words hit her like fists. Kate wanted a moment, just a few seconds really, to catch her breath. But he was too good at reading her. Or at least he had been, once upon a time. “When I
came down here I wasn’t planning to pull the trigger,” she said, as if seeing him again meant nothing to her. “Dead bodies are so inconvenient: all the questions from the police,
and the mess. I just refinished this floor.”
“So you’re not over me.”
“Keep talking, Swiss Cheese.”
He turned, slowly, moving the gun aside with an index finger, then bent to take a closer look at it, flipping on a penlight. “Hair trigger?”
“And armour-piercing rounds.”
“I’m flattered.”
“Right, like I was expecting you to show up. My house is probably at the bottom of your list of favourite destinations, right after hell.”
Reese Kyle shook his head, his slight smile lending no humour to a face that could have been chiselled out of granite. There was nothing soft about the rest of him either, and she didn’t
just mean the tall body with its rock-hard muscles. The man inside that shell, and the heart that beat in his chest, were just as cold and hard. He pulled a wicked-looking dive knife from the
sheath at his waist, sliced away the fishing line around his ankles, and closed her front door.
“Thanks, but you’re supposed to be on the other side.”
“Nope. I’m here for a reason.” His eyes dropped to her bare legs, moving up slowly to settle on her skimpy tank top.
Her nipples hardened. “That better not be the reason,” she said.
He lifted his eyes to her face. “I’m on an op.”
That staggered her, almost more than seeing him. “Mike would never send you to work an op that involves me,” she said, referring to Mike Kovaleski, the FBI handler who’d once
run her professional life. “Not after the last time.”
“Mike does whatever it takes to get the job done.”
“The two of us don’t exactly have a stellar track record as a team when it comes to getting the job done.” Or anything else for that matter.
“Nobody asked you to quit.”
She snorted. “Shit flows downhill, and I was at the bottom of the slope. Not to mention the one with the blown cover. It was just a matter of time before I was sent packing.”
“You didn’t have to cut me out of your life.”
“You weren’t exactly burning up the phone lines.”
“I was trying to let the dust settle.”
“Five years is a lot of dust.”
“You could have picked up the phone.”
“Yeah, I could have.” She jerked the door open. “Try to stay gone this time.”
“Of all the pig-headed, stubborn—” Reese stomped over to the door, but Kate’s hand must have been fisted around the knob because when he slammed it she jerked forwards,
crashing into him.
Reese wrapped his arms around her; it was either that or they would both have gone down in a heap on the floor. She felt so damn good, like no time had passed – for either of them, if he
was any judge of body language. She might be holding a hard line verbally, but her body told another story. She still wanted him. Bad. Probably why she was so pissed off. Too pissed off to step
back, and he’d be damned if he flinched first.
“You want to dance?” she asked, a challenge in her words, in her eyes, in the way she held her body against his, deliberately relaxed. She said it as if being pressed up against him
meant nothing.
“No,” he said, and kissed her. If she wanted to play games, they’d play, he thought. The taste of her burst through him. She was fire in his arms, fire that became an inferno
when she kissed him back, her tongue tangling with his – just for a second – before he felt the barrel of her gun poking him in the stomach. His world turned to ice, between one racing
heartbeat and the next. And that was before he heard her cock the hammer.
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t pull the trigger.”
Two
“If you shoot me you’ll never know why I’m here.”
“I could live with that.”
“Can your clients?”
She didn’t move, her eyes just shifted up until their gazes met. Time passed, a second, a minute, and then she uncocked the gun Reese had forgotten about and stepped back. He missed her,
death threat and all.
“I’m listening,” she said.
He snorted. “There ought to be a calendar around here so I can write that down for posterity.”
She eased back a couple more steps, slipped the gun into her thigh holster, and flipped on a small nightlight that gave off barely enough illumination for them to see each other. “Did you
just drop in to do a stand-up routine, or is there some other reason you darkened my door?”
Stand-up routine? Hell, it was comic relief. Hearing her voice was hard enough without seeing her in a skin-tight tank and shorts, slim, curvy, hotter than any Hollywood gym body. And then there
were the weapons. The Glock 27 – a back-up-size handgun with all the power of the full-size model – strapped to her thigh, a Smith and Wesson combat knife on her opposite calf, not to
mention the look in her cool blue eyes. Kate Morris knew her weapons and she wasn’t afraid to use them. It was sexy as hell.
“Reese.”
He looked up, and Kate knew she was in trouble. More trouble than a little light could solve. But she couldn’t be in the dark with him. Not after he’d kissed her. And she’d
responded. She rolled her eyes when she remembered that. Responded? Hell, the anger that had lain dormant for the last five years had flashed to heat so fast she’d have jumped him right then
and there if not for the fact that her muscles had gone weak. There’d been too many nights she and Reese had spent filled with each other, too many memories she couldn’t help but
relive, the feel of him moving over her, in her, the scent and heat of his skin . . .
Her eyes lifted to his. She could see he was taking that trip down memory lane too, and that he knew she was right there with him. But he moved away, positioning himself in the entrance to the
hallway.
Kate pulled back, shoving the past out of her mind so she could focus. She didn’t waste any time wondering why he was bracing for a fight. Reese Kyle never borrowed trouble. He inflicted
it.
She eased over a few more steps, stopping so she had a clear view down the hall and into the living room and dining room. Reese had nowhere to go that she couldn’t get to him. Fast.
He smiled slightly, one eyebrow inching up.
“If we’re going to play cat and mouse,” she said, “I get to be the cat.”
“Most women would object to that characterization.”
“Most women wouldn’t do more than make a cutting remark.”
His eyes dropped to the gun. Not so sure she wouldn’t use it on him, she thought, grimly amused.
“You were telling me why the stuffed suits at the bureau sent one of their puppets to annoy me.”
That hit the mark. The muscles in his jaw bunched before he got hold of himself. “We got a tip about Amir Kashani.”
“Tip?”
“Kashani and his family are being held hostage, as of about an hour ago.”
Kate snatched a cell phone from the top drawer of the apothecary’s chest in the foyer.
Reese closed his hand around her wrist.
“I have two men in that house,” she said, switching the phone to her other hand and flipping it open.
“I don’t know what shape they’re in, but they’re definitely out of commission. You try to call them in the middle of the night for no reason, the kidnappers will know
you’re on to them, no matter how slick you are at hiding it.”
Her thumb hovered over the speed dial. She snapped the phone closed instead, paced a couple of steps away, thinking about the bodyguards who were on duty with Kashani’s family. She knew
them well, knew their wives and kids. Amir Kashani trusted her with his life and the lives of his family; that made them hers. And she had to stop thinking of their safety if she was going to
rescue them.
“Kashani is a member of the Balyks, the monarchist ruling party in Balykistan, but he has a reputation as a man who embraces democracy,” she said, putting herself back in the op,
which was the only place she could be any good to the people who needed her. “He’s here to negotiate a peace treaty between his party and the Reformists. His people trust him to make
the best agreement possible, and the other side believes his word will be honoured.”
“Not everyone wants peace,” Reese said. “The men who are holding Kashani and his family are part of a militant faction of the Reformist Party. They won’t settle for less
than supremacy, and that means they have to win the war, not end it amicably.”
“The peace treaty negotiations are supposed to start first thing tomorrow morning. But Kashani will do whatever he’s told as long as his family is in danger.” And it was up to
her to save them. She wanted to move now, but without more intelligence she could blunder in and make a mess, costing innocent lives. It was a mistake she refused to make again. But she
couldn’t let past tragedy freeze her in place, either. “Tell me the rest of what you know.”
“The Bureau is replacing you with an agent—”
“No.”
“Use your brain instead of your heart.”
“I learned that lesson five years ago. From you.”
This time he met her eyes, and his were hot.
Direct hit, she thought. Too bad it didn’t make her feel any better. His being right wasn’t helping. “Those are my . . .” people, she’d almost said. Not the
way to convince him. “Those are my employees and my clients. My reputation. It’s taken me five years to get this business up and running.”
“Your incorporation papers were filed four years ago.”
“And you think I spent a year mooning over you.” She huffed out a slight laugh. “I didn’t lose you, Reese, I left you behind. What I lost was a career I spent half my
life working for.”
“You walked away.”
“Yeah.” She’d walked away before the Bureau could give her directions. And before Reese could add injury to insult by putting words to the silence he’d left between them
after their last op went bad. “This time I’m sticking.”
“I can’t walk,” Reese said.
“Still the good little soldier?”
“Is that why you really think I’m here?”
Kate backed off from that, and not just verbally. “There’s no way I’m letting the FBI bully their way into my life and destroy what I’ve built. This is my job, and
I’m going to do it.”
“That’s what we figured you’d say.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I thought I could reason with you.”
Sure, he wanted to reason with her, that’s why he was braced for a fight. “You thought you could put me out of commission and replace me with an agent.”
At least he had the grace to look sheepish.
“I know the layout of Kashani’s house, their routine —” she continued.
“You can run the op with Mike.”
“Right.” Mike Kovaleski was a rough, gruff, ex-marine who took no bullshit, accepted no excuses and wasted no time caring about anything but the missions and the agents under his
direction. And he didn’t share authority. “I run the op, period. Mike agrees, or I run it without you.”
Reese hesitated, weighing his options.
Kate dropped her hand to rest on the Glock holstered at her thigh.
He pulled a cell phone out of his belt clip, hit speed dial and handed it to her. She didn’t waste time with greetings or old-times’-sakes, just repeated her ultimatum.
“Figured you’d say that,” Mike said in his distinctive rasp.
“You could have called me. There was no need to send—” her eyes cut to Reese “—anyone, let alone a special ops hothead.”
“Reese went to bat for you five years ago.”
“And you’re telling me this because . . .?”
“If you have to be saddled with a special ops hothead, it helps to have one who gives a shit about you. Or I can pull Reese and send in some other agents—”
“Nobody else,” Kate said. “You send in a bunch of trigger-happy Feds and somebody will die.”
“You’d know that first-hand,” Mike shot back. Then she heard him blow out a breath. “Shouldn’t have said that. You pissed me off.”
“Nice to know I still have the touch.”
“Been keeping my eye on you, kid. Wouldn’t let you handle this otherwise,” he said, as close to a compliment as she’d get, but – as usual – he spoiled it.
“Try to send Kyle back in one piece. Lunkhead insisted on taking this op, even after I reminded him you’d as soon shoot him as look at him.”
Her eyes cut to Reese’s. “I guess he still doesn’t trust me to watch my own back.”
“Maybe not, but he’s trusting you with his.”
Kate disconnected, handed the phone back. “It’s my op.”
Reese’s jaw bunched, but he didn’t look away.
“The family is my only concern. They already know me.”
“So do the kidnappers.”
“Then they know that what I care about is my client and his family, and they know I’ll do whatever it takes to keep them safe.”
“They’ll be expecting you.”
“Exactly. If someone else shows up, they’ll know the FBI is on to them. So . . .” She lifted her chin, stared him down. “It’s me or no one.”
Three
“You or no one,” Reese repeated, his mind taking an instant detour off the job and into the personal, his body already a step ahead of him. He was halfway
across the foyer and reaching for her when she said, “I still have the gun,” and even then it didn’t really register.
“You’ll have to use it,” he said, “because that’s the only way you’re getting rid of me this time.”
She slipped away, deciding retreat was the better part of valour. Even as the frustration hit him, the aching need still clamouring to be satisfied, Reese knew he had to focus on the job and
worry about the personal later. He managed his part by stopping where he was, then fisting his hands to stop from reaching for her. If he touched her again, he’d have to have her. Even if the
whole world paid a price.
“The kidnapping,” she reminded him. “It’s me or no one.”
“Then it’s no one,” he said and started for the door.
This time she stepped in front of him. “Why are you interfering?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to; they’d always understood each other perfectly.
“We made this mistake before,” she said.
“Yeah.” And she’d paid for it.
Kate had been an FBI agent when he met her, one who’d risen through the ranks quickly to become one of the lead agents on a new FBI taskforce specializing in foreign terrorism on US soil,
specifically those incidents involving hostages. Some of the men she’d outstripped had chalked up her fast rise to the fact that she was a woman in an organization trying to modernize their
hiring profile. Anyone who’d run an op with her knew she’d gotten where she was on skill, courage and complete balls-to-the-wall dedication.
Reese had come out of the military – army special forces, to be exact – about a year before he’d been assigned to her taskforce. He still recalled that moment, the first time
he’d laid eyes on Kate Morris, five feet eight inches of strength and determination, a living weapon no less effective for being easy on the eyes. He still remembered the way their gazes had
met across the room, the impact of it knocking him back a full step. He hadn’t been a man who believed in love at first sight. Hell, he hadn’t been a man who believed in love at all. He
still didn’t. He’d seen too much of the horror people inflicted on one another in the name of religion, of loyalty. Of love.
What he’d felt for Kate had been lust – desire was a prettier word, but there’d been nothing pretty about the craving running through him, the need to touch and taste, to throw
himself head first into the flames with no regard to what that kind of fire would do to him. Thank God she’d felt it too, Reese thought. It had been nearly impossible to concentrate on the
job, but she’d been with him every heated step of the way. There’d been a lot of down time between missions, and they’d been unable to keep their hands off one another. It
hadn’t been a problem. Until it spilled over into work.
There’d been a hostage situation involving a Colombian family being held in New York by a drug lord because the father had turned informant. After two days they’d reached an impasse
in the negotiations. Reese had wanted to take the kidnappers by force. Kate had been equally convinced she could talk them out, so convinced she’d gone in without waiting for the green light
from him. She’d never gotten the chance to find out if her way would have worked because the second Reese realized the risk she’d taken, he’d stormed the place. The bad guys had
escaped, Kate had taken a bullet to her left shoulder, and the witness had been killed. The other casualty had been her job. She’d quit before she could be fired, and not for pride’s
sake. Kate Morris was a woman who took responsibility for her actions. She’d screwed up, and she’d owned that.
Reese hadn’t spoken to her since. He’d been pissed, at her, at himself. He’d forgotten the mission, put civilians in danger because all he’d been able to see was her.
He’d believed distance would help, but not a day of the last five years had gone by without Kate being his first thought in the morning and his last at night. He’d kept tabs on her;
he’d even picked up the phone a time or fifty. Thinking was as far as he’d allowed himself to take it.
Five years should have cooled his blood. At least that’s what he’d told himself when he’d agreed to take this op. He’d been wrong. The wildness might have gone out of the
fire, but the flame was still there, deep and warm and steady.
And as long as Kate was pissed off, he didn’t have to decide what to do about it.
“It could have been a lot worse,” she said, reading his mind again – but not his feelings, thankfully.
“It will be this time if you don’t listen to reason. These people mean business.”
“The bad guys always mean business. That’s why I have a job.”
“You’ve got to be rusty.”
“Sure, I was just sleeping away in complete oblivion when you showed up. Self-preservation is like sex, Reese, you neve
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The Mammoth Book of Special Ops Romance
Trisha Telep
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