Code Name: Kayla's Fire Read Online Free PDF Page A

eyes on
her. She scanned the black apron with Bruce written on it as he leaned over the table. “What can I get ya?”
    Roping her purse on the back of her chair, she said, “Do you make a
good Margarita?”
    Bruce’s cheeks puckered, and he gave her the once-over. “For you
beautiful, I’d make anything.”
    “Hey, man,” Mace growled. “I’m sittin’ right here. How do you know she
isn’t my girlfriend?”
    The waiter turned his attention on Mace. “Because you’d be next to
her, having a hard time keeping your hands to yourself.” Balancing on his
knuckles, Bruce tilted in her direction. “Least I would.”
    Mace rolled his eyes. “I’ll have a Bud, man, and don’t do that when
her boyfriend gets here, he’ll grind you into ash.”
    “Margarita for me, make it two.”
    The waiter winked at her and returned within seconds, placing a red
wicker basket of nachos and salsa on their table.
    “Two?” Mace asked, grinning at her. “I didn’t work you that hard in
Physio.”
    “Did too.”
    “Not.”
    “I’m thirsty.”
    “Have some water.”
    “Captain Austen is not my boyfriend, Mace.”
    Mace nodded at the waiter when he dropped a brew in front of him.
“You’re right, he’s more than that. A man doesn’t break his balls going twenty hours
a day trying to catch a serial killer if he doesn’t like a girl, but it’s your
PTSD that scares him more than the Shark.”
    Her gaze fell to the tiles covering their table. Brilliant, hand-painted
strokes of blue, red and yellow brightened the small squares. “None of you were
supposed to know.”
    “So—we do now. We love you. Deal with it.” Mace squeezed her hands.
“Tell me what’s really wrong. Normally you’d be dressing him down. You’re
acting like a girl these days.”
    She breathed out a pent-up gust of air. “I don’t know what’s wrong
with me, Mace.”
    “Why don’t you stop fighting him for starters?”
    She looked into Mace’s beautiful baby blue eyes, too warm and kind to
be a warrior, but in combat, he was lethal. Patient, deadly accuracy had given
Mace a reputation as one of the best snipers in the military community. “I
don’t understand what you mean.”
    “Yes, you do.” Mace plucked a chip from the basket and loaded it with salsa.
“If he isn’t your boyfriend, what is he?”
    “Overprotective. On a mission. Dog with a bone. All of the above.”
Flicking a loose wave of hair from her eyes, she said, “I want Thane to stop
chasing the Shark. You have to convince him.”
    Mace swayed his head. “Not until the Shark is dead. I don’t know if the
son of a bitch realizes whom he’s up against, but he put crosshairs between his
own eyes when he decided to come after you. He’s never going to trial.”
    Scooping a hefty amount of salsa onto a chip, she cupped her other
hand underneath. “Why is Thane so obsessed about this?”
    Mace’s broad shoulders rose with a chuckle. “We’re back to…Why do ya
think?”
    “It’s not because of me,” she said around a full mouth.
    He leaned back, crossing his abundantly muscled arms. “Guess again.
The only reason he’s doing this is
because of you. Before you became a target, he was satisfied NCIS would find
the Shark. Women were dying, but no one asked us to track him down. It’s a
prime example of bureaucratic paradigms. SEALs don’t pursue serial killers,
they ferret out Tangos.” He shrugged. “It was obvious to all of us we should
have started to hunt him as soon as we knew what we were dealing with. In a
way, you’re saving a lot of other women.”
    “I hope so.” She sighed and leaned back, trying not to drip the salsa
all over herself while balancing a chip. “You give him such a bad time, but you
respect him a lot, don’t you?”
    “I do. I think the bigger question is what do you think about him?”
    She’d been under lock and key for too long. The entire time her
thoughts swirled around the Captain. “I’m going to leave—if I live through