Page 37 of Unintended Love

“Absolutely.” She stepped away and grinned. “Besides, you owe me dessert. Chocolate, please.”

“I’ll order you ten chocolate desserts if you spend the whole night with me.”

Ashlin held out her hand. “Deal.” She turned and opened the door. “I’ll text you when I know what time were getting off work.”

He stepped back, kissed two fingers, and pressed them in her direction. “Stay safe, my tiny Tiger.”

She kissed her first two fingers and held them toward him. “Stay safe, my husband.” She closed the door and locked it, setting the alarm to home. She slid off her heels and quietly tiptoed to her rooms in the darkness, lit by a single nightlight in the living room. She stripped off her clothes and threw them in the hamper, deciding to crawl into bed in her underwear. She could sleep for an hour and a half before she had to get up.

As Ashlin and her teammates walked into the red-brick building that looked like a thousand other buildings in Washington D.C., the definition of nondescript, she couldn’t decide whether she was energized and excited from last night or suffering from assadraggin. She was thankful that her teammates hadn’t drilled her much on the ride to work about her previous evening, and she was able to take a much-needed power nap. Other than greeting people they met in the hallway, they went straight to their workroom. Another day of layering satellite photographs, thermal imaging, and night vision images to determine the size of the camp and the number of men that was suspected of being a terrorist training facility.

Around nine thirty in the morning, their boss entered the darkened room with underlit tables. “Ladies, join me in the conference room down the hall.”

They all followed her to the largest meeting room. Hand on the knob, she turned and spoke in a low voice. “Come in and sit down. The other team is already here. They have been briefed on the overall mission. We will meet at the end of the day for a private discussion.”

“Gentlemen, you have all signed nondisclosure agreements.” Katlin walked to the front of the room and stood under the huge screen, while Ashlin and her team took the empty seats at the other end of the huge oak table.

Once seated, she glanced at the other team. Standing to the right of Katlin was Clint. Her Clint. It took every ounce of training Ashlin had ever had to fight back the smile that tried to escape.

“Hey, Clint.” Mia walked up to him and gave him a hug, followed closely by a smiling Kira, Piper, and Kayla. Ashlin popped out of the chair and was the last in line to hug her husband.

He held onto her a little longer than the others. “I’ve missed you,” he whispered into her ear.

“Me, too,” was all she had time to say before she had to step back and take her seat.

Katlin sat in the head chair and smiled. When everyone had returned to their seats, she announced, “Nothing happens to any of my teams that I don’t know about. Including Las Vegas. I’m going to consider those few days a teambuilding exercise between Black Swan and Clint Riggs. The fact that all the Ladies know the team captain is part of the reason that we’ve contracted them. Besides, Xena’s team was busy. Congratulations, Ashlin and Clint. Your marriage was one of the negative factors to contracting you, but I used my personal experience of working with my husband on several missions to assure me that the two of you will remain professional.”

She smiled first at Clint, then down the table at Ashlin. “If your marriage can survive bullets and bombs, it can survive anything, including babies. That’s a whole different story.”

She focused her attention on Clint. “As we’ve discussed, you run your team like a special ops team, same as us. The whole team is part of the planning process from the beginning. When this meeting concludes, you will be joining the Ladies in the dark room. A fresh set of eyes may see new things. You have three days to plan this mission…together. I expect to be briefed at three o’clock on Friday afternoon. You can have the weekend off if you don’t need to prep, but you are in the air Monday at oh dark thirty. You know how to get in touch with me. Good luck.” Their boss left the room.

Kayla and Clint both stood at the same time and said, “Introductions.” The two team leaders looked at each other and high-fived.

“See, we’re already thinking alike,” Kayla said with a smile.

A tinge of jealousy ran through Ashlin. How ridiculous, she mentally scolded herself. They’re both team leaders and will need to work together on this mission. There is absolutely nothing going on between them.

“Let’s go around the table and introduce ourselves and our specialty,” Clint suggested.

“I’ll start. I’m Marine Captain Kayla Scarlatto. Lady Lion is my handle. Although every one of us is capable of every job, my specialty is sniper.”

“Are all of you active-duty?” Lukas Murillo asked.

“Yes,” the five women responded at the same time.

“The Director of Section 7 said you have all been trained like us,” Shawn Beck stated.

Kayla grinned. “No. We’ve undergone a great deal more training than you. We went through the exact same training as Navy SEALs, then went through Army Special Forces School, followed by Air Force Para-Jumper School. We then spent several weeks with the CIA learning tricks far beyond your skills. Our team probably has as many HALO jumps, hours underwater, and has performed as many emergency surgeries as yours.” She let out a heavy sigh. “If we have to waste time in the next three days proving our capabilities, we should call Director Wolf back in here to cancel your contract. We barely have enough time to plan this mission.”

Clint stepped next to Kayla. “I think everybody here, except for our newest member, Shawn Beck, has met my sister, Xena. She trained beside these women. That’s how I know them. Rather than re-upping, she decided to come home and work for our dad. Their training is why she has her own team.”

“Holy fuck. You’re one of them?” the man next to Clint said.

“I thought your sister was a one-off, trained by you,” the next man down declared.

“Are you telling me there’s more?” Another one of Clint’s men asked.

“These women are one of the best kept secrets in the military, and you will keep their secret,” Clint warned. “Don’t you ever forget that you each signed a nondisclosure agreement. Director Wolf is one of the most lethal women I’ve ever met. She wasn’t kidding when she said she would personally hunt you down and kill you if you spoke a single word about these women. She has hundreds of assassins on her payroll, then there are contractors like us. I know you men. None of you would hesitate to carry out a kill order.” He glanced around the table, holding each man’s gaze. “Now, let’s get on with the introductions.”