Dangerous Territory: An Alpha Ops novella by Emmy Curtis Read Free Book Online

gathered their packs and flashlights and stowed them at the very back of the cave. He pointed at the ground and she sat, huddled in a corner.
    She could see nothing until her eyes adjusted. Josh had placed himself directly in front of her, pointing his sidearm toward the corner that led to the entrance of the cave, taking aim at whatever planned to do them harm. He was so steady, unwavering. She pitied anyone who tried to take them. The threat of tears fizzed behind her eyes at the image of Josh protecting her from an unseen enemy.
    Her thoughts flickered to Beth and Walker. Was she okay? Would he get in trouble for disobeying orders to stay with her? Before she could wonder further, she shut her brain down. No attachments, no emotion. She repeated it over and over in her head until she could no longer even discern their faces in her memory. She felt safe but was terrified nonetheless.
    Suddenly, the sound of falling scree and footsteps echoed around them. It sounded as if a hundred people were invading the cave. Tiny pieces of grit sprinkled from the roof, and Grace instinctively wrapped her arms over her head. Maybe the whole cave was collapsing in on them. And yet Josh didn’t move. She peeked out and saw him in exactly the same, unwavering position, protecting her. Gradually, the noises subsided, and Josh finally moved.
    He bent down to her ear. “Stay,” he whispered. He moved very slowly away from her until she was left alone in the pitch-blackness. What the fuck was she doing with her life? A second Pulitzer wasn’t worth this, was it? Was it? She was used to this train of thought. Every time something uncomfortable happened, every time something happened to take her out of her zone, she considered a life back in the United States. Safe in a town, writing for a weekly local newspaper. A puppy and a… man? When she pictured this, the placeholder face her man had was Josh’s. She guessed she would have to come up with a different man for her fantasy. Maybe revert to Chris Hemsworth instead. He had been her fail-safe fantasy husband before her one-night stand with Josh. Sweet Jesus, she was going to have to stop thinking about that now. She’d had no inkling that he was military at the time. How could she? Not many troops hang out at the Four Seasons on Christmas Eve.
    “It’s okay. They didn’t even find the cave.” He came back and reestablished the faint light on the ledge. He plunked on the floor next to her. “Are you all right?”
    “How did they not find us?” It seemed impossible. “They sounded as if they were inside with us.”
    “It’s the acoustics of the valley, I think. There were a bunch of people on the other side of the pass, but it sounded as if they were right here. The two men I saw walked straight past us. The moon’s gone in.”
    She paused. “Why were you at the Four Seasons?”
    He rummaged around in his pack for something and was silent for a moment. When he found what he was looking for, he leaned back against the rock and his shoulder settled against hers. Her skin fritzed again.
    Not real
, she insisted to herself. Just the adrenaline of the situation. “Tell me, Grace. Are we on, or off, the record here? Are you memorizing everything we do and say so that you can hit the wires as soon as we get back to base? Are you going to tell everyone that your rescuer’s radio broke? That your life was put in danger not once but twice by the military? Are you going to complain about how you were treated? What’s your angle here?”
    Grace hesitated. It was a difficult question, and she had a feeling that her answer would affect the rest of the night and the rest of her rescue if she said the wrong thing.
    “I… I won’t use any of your personal details if I write about this. Not your name, not anything you tell me about yourself. I promise.”
    “So we are absolutely off the record here?”
    “Absolutely.” Grace rubbed her bare legs in the dark. Thank goodness he couldn’t see