Only Her (A K2 Team Novel)(79)

“You’ve reached the Ziegler residence. We can’t come to the phone right now, so unless you’re selling something, please leave a message,” a man’s voice said.

Riley disconnected. “We,” he’d said, so she assumed that meant he was married. Now what? She pulled up the address, noting the location was two or three miles from her clinic. That still didn’t tell her anything. She glanced at the clock, seeing that she had plenty of time to drive by the Zieglers’ house before Jake and Maria came to pick her up.

Keys in hand, she got in her car, turned the ignition, and backed up. At the end of her driveway, she stopped. Chewing on her bottom lip, she thought about what she was doing. Don’t go off half-cocked, Riley. Whoever was targeting her probably knew what kind of car she drove and might recognize her. It wouldn’t be out of the way for Jake to drive by the Zieglers’ on their way to the air show.



Where the hell was she going? She knew it was dangerous to take off by herself. Cody reached for his keys, planning to follow her, but then she stopped. After a minute, she drove the car back into her carport, got out, and went back into her house. What was that all about?

After leaving her, he’d sat on his porch, watching her house, while scenes from his nightmare flashed through his mind. The first time Asra had approached him with intel, she had slipped a note into his hand. He’d been standing on the street in front of her house, talking to her brother, one of their interpreters. Asra had stood behind Jalandhar, eyes downcast. When Jalandhar had turned away to go into his house, she had slipped a piece of paper into Cody’s hand before hurrying to follow her brother.

His male brain thought she was giving him a love note of some kind, maybe asking him to meet her somewhere. He almost didn’t open the folded page, but when he did, he’d stared at the words in shock. The Taliban had compromised her brother and was threatening to kill him and his family if he didn’t give them information on the Americans he interpreted for. She’d begged Cody to find a way to help her family, and in return she would pass on anything she heard. At the end of the note, she said that if Cody told anyone that she was giving him information she would jump off the roof of her house, because the Taliban had ears everywhere, and it would mean death for her, anyway.

He’d debated long and hard about keeping her a secret. Reporting her to his commander should have been the first thing he’d done on returning to base camp. If Kincaid had still been his commander, he would have. But Kincaid was back in the states and no longer in the military.

Cody had been temporarily assigned to a marine regiment in Kandahar as their sniper. If he went to the base commander with this, or any officer for that matter, he knew how things would roll. They would use Asra without any concern for her safety, while bringing her brother in for questioning. He couldn’t do that to her, so she stayed his secret. He passed on her intel each of the next two times she’d given it, saying he’d been in the right place at the right time to overhear the information. He’d never been sure the higher-ups had bought his story, but they hadn’t pressed him on it.

Nor did he report her brother. The country was fucked. That was a given. The Taliban was merciless, and he couldn’t blame Jalandhar for trying to keep his family safe. In the young man’s shoes, Cody wouldn’t have done anything different. To counter whatever info Jalandhar was passing on—there wasn’t all that much that he was privy to—Cody frequently gave the young man false information.

Everything he’d done had been to save a young girl brave enough to try to help her family and country, and he’d failed her. She’d not been given a quick death, and because of him, she’d been horribly tortured. How was he supposed to live with that?

His stomach took a sickening roll, and his mind begged for numbness. He’d told Riley that he was going to call Tom and ask for a meeting. Instead, he went looking for the scotch. If he finished off a bottle, maybe he would forget there was a woman across the street who deserved better than to be dragged into his hellhole. He hadn’t even been able to look her in the eyes after he’d admitted his part in getting Asra killed. And what about Jalandhar and the rest of Asra’s family? Had they been tortured and killed, too? It would be a miracle if they hadn’t been.

Hands braced against the kitchen counter and head bowed, Cody tried to will away the image of Asra’s mutilated body. It didn’t work, and he eyed the scotch bottle. What the hell, Jake and Maria had just picked up Riley, so he was good to go. He filled a glass to the rim.