Delores Fossen - Marching Orders

“Stay put,” he warned in a rough whisper.

Anna latched on to his arm when he moved slightly. “You’re not going out there, are you?”

“No. Colonel Shaw would want me to stay here with you. We have people all around the place. They can take care of the situation.”

Anna hadn’t known about the people who were outside guarding the church. But Rafe had. And so had his commanding officer. They obviously assumed something like this could happen, or they wouldn’t have made such security arrangements.

What else did they know?

Another shadow slashed across the window, and a swish of sound followed. Maybe a gun rigged with a silencer and maybe just the wind rustling through the trees. But Anna didn’t think it was the wind.

“At your six, Rafe,” Colonel Shaw called out.

Rafe pivoted, took aim and fired twice. There was a spray of hot lead and glass. A sharp groan of pain.

And then the silence returned.

Anna counted off the seconds with each thud of her heartbeat. She wanted to ask Rafe if he was hurt, but she didn’t dare risk it.

“The situation’s contained,” she heard a man announce. His voice hadn’t come from inside the church, however, but out there somewhere on the other side of that shattered window.

The lights flared on, and in the same motion, Rafe sprang to his feet. Seemingly as an afterthought, he held out his hand and offered it to her so he could help her up from the floor.

“Are you okay?” he asked. Rafe reholstered his gun as calmly as he’d drawn it.

No. She wasn’t. Along with the incident in Monte de Leon, these had been some of the most terrifying moments of her life. Anna gulped in a huge breath of air and glanced back at a gaping hole in the glass. She caught a glimpse of an Alpha Team member before he darted out of sight.

“What just happened?” she managed to ask.

“We’ll know more when the colonel’s had a chance to meet with the team.” Rafe turned toward the photographer who was cowering near a pew.

“Why don’t you go ahead and pack up? We’ll have pictures done some other time, okay?”

The man eagerly nodded and began to take down the equipment. Anna didn’t intend to be placated quite so easily. “What’s going on here, Rafe?”

He brushed a kiss on her cheek, took her by the hand and led her to a pew at the back of the church. “I’ll go over everything with you after I’ve spoken to Colonel Shaw.”

“In other words, there’s something you don’t want me to know.” And by the time he did tell her, it most certainly wouldn’t be everything. It would have been processed through layers and layers of debriefings until it was sanitized beyond recognition. “Who was out there?”

“Rafe?” Shaw again. “Come over here. I need a word with you.”

Anna grabbed his arm. “I want to know what happened.”

It seemed as if he was about to tell her, but then Shaw repeated the order he’d given just moments earlier. “It won’t take long,” the colonel added. This time, there was some impatience in his voice.

“We’ll talk later,” Rafe assured her. “And don’t worry, everything will be fine.”

“It’ll be fine when you tell me—”

“Not now, Kate,” he snapped. Rafe started to walk away but then came to a complete halt.

Kate.

He’d called her Kate, the name of Colonel Shaw’s latest girlfriend.

Anna stared at him and felt her blood run cold.

Oh, my God. Who was this man she’d just married?

Who?

One thing was for certain, it wasn’t Rafe McQuade. Behind those familiar eyes and face, her husband was a stranger.

Kate.

He’d called her Kate. Talk about a stupid mistake. It could jeopardize everything.

Rafe stared at her while he quickly tried to come up with an apology. Or at least a reasonable explanation. But she didn’t look very receptive to whatever he had to say. There were a lot of questions in her eyes. And doubts. Doubts that he’d put there with that slip of the tongue.

How the devil could he have gotten her name wrong?

He lifted his hand to Colonel Shaw in a wait-a-minute gesture and went toward her. She stepped back. Not once. Twice. A clear signal that this wasn’t a good time to try to pull her into his arms.

“Why?” she asked, shaking her head. That wasn’t the only thing shaking. Her bottom lip was none too steady.

“Because I made a mistake.” It was a good start, but he was a long way from undoing the damage.

“Because I was scared. The thought of losing you has a way of doing that to me. Believe me, I know who you are.”

“Do you?” she demanded.

It wasn’t anger he heard in her voice but fear. He would have preferred the anger.

“I know,” he assured her. “You’re Anna, the woman I love. The woman I married.” He eased closer. Baby steps. And kept eye contact with her. Until he could finally reach out and touch her. He ran his fingers along her arm and rubbed gently.

“And I’m so sorry.”

Her breath settled a little. It wasn’t an acceptance by a long shot, but it would have to do for now. Behind him, he could hear Colonel Shaw’s impatient murmurings.

“I really need to do this debriefing,” Rafe continued. “But when we’re done, we’ll talk. And if necessary I’ll do some groveling, okay?” He threw in a grin, but it did nothing to soothe the tension on her face.

Rafe waited a moment to see if she had anything to say. She didn’t. Anna only stared at him.

All right. So, this wasn’t a five-minute fix. Not that he’d thought it would be. It was yet another contingency, a bad one, in a day already filled to the brim with contingencies.

“I won’t be long.” He gave her arm a gentle squeeze, turned and went to his boss.

“Problem?” Shaw asked the moment Rafe joined him on the other side of the church.

Rafe hesitated, debating how much he should tell, but from his boss’s demeanor, he already had enough to deal with. “I can handle it. What’s the situation with the shooter?”

“The guy’s alive but not talking. No ID on him, but they might be able to get something when they run his prints.”

It was a long shot, and they both knew it. “Any idea what he was doing out there?”

“He tried to tamper with the communication equipment. The team scoured the area and didn’t find anyone else. Seems he was working alone.”

Rafe had already figured that part out for himself, but it was good to hear his commanding officer verify it. If there had been others, they wouldn’t be having this conversation, and his bride wouldn’t be in the pew staring craters in him. The three of them would still be in the dark waiting for the remainder of Alpha Team to contain the situation.

He almost wished they were still waiting it out. Then, he’d have a second chance to take back what he said to Anna.

“I’ve got someone checking over the equipment to make sure everything is fine,” Shaw said, his explanation low enough that Anna wouldn’t be able to hear. “And it looks as if we’ll have an all clear for you two to leave in a couple of minutes. I’ll stay here to wrap up things.”

Rafe made a sound of agreement and issued an obligatory thanks and farewell to the photographer when he hurried out the door. The guy looked scared out of his mind, and probably was. A definite case of the wrong place at the wrong time, but at least everyone was alive. It could have been much worse.

Much worse.

Shaw tipped his head to Anna and kept his voice to a whisper. “Is she all right?”

Rafe wanted to say yes, but he couldn’t. Besides, with that stunned expression on her face, it was obvious that she was far from all right. “I called her by the wrong name.”