Survival Mission - Chapter 16
Trevor heard Valerie, knew she had to be incredibly capable if Cascade Confidential employed her. But she wasn’t DEA.
She doesn’t know how bad it can get in the field.
Worry bordering on terror hit him sideways, as effective as a one-two punch to his gut. He was in too deep with Valerie. And he knew the quickest way to get out.
“Look, this was great, but let’s be real. Both of our sympathetic nervous systems are on high alert. It definitely heightens the sexual experience.”
Her amber eyes turned rusty, and the steely strength of her flashed fire in their depths. “Oh, so this was a release of cortisol and adrenaline. Gotcha.” She turned away, bent over and picked up her water bottle, felt her side pocket for her phone, he assumed, and stopped as she must have remembered Ziggy destroyed it.
“So you’re heading to your car now?”
“You’re damn right I am. And for the record, Trevor? I hope you get a rash on your ass.” She spun around and hiked down the trail, her disheveled ponytail swinging.
Trevor sighed, too spent to call after her. It was for the best. He needed her out of danger, and it wasn’t as if they had anything in common besides being in the same wrong, remote place at the time of an imminent drug drop.
He pulled out his sat phone. The home office confirmed what he’d overheard—the same report he’d listened to Valerie give her boss. Intel updated the delivery vehicle to several drones instead of a helicopter, and the drug load might include meth and coke along with the fentanyl. A team of DEA agents and specially trained local police were en route, prepared to take out each of the delivery teams. It was noon; the takedown was expected at two.
Trevor began to retrace his steps to the lakeshore.
***
Valerie cursed herself for the first mile of her hike back to her car. She wanted to curse out Trevor, too, but couldn’t risk turning back. Not because she was afraid of Ziggy’s gang finding her—they all were preparing to get their goods, she assumed—but because Trevor deserved her tongue-lashing.
When she thought of the word tongue, though, her mind went to other places, saw the images of where she’d placed her tongue on Trevor’s body, where he’d stroked hers…
“Stop.” She issued the order to her racing thoughts as her feet kept moving forward. “Focus.” The forest was alive with color, leaves falling in lazy swirls like snowflakes soon would, blanketing the area until spring. For the second time since she’d stood up from where they’d had—what did Trevor insinuate?—their “heightened” sexual experience, she reflexively reached for her phone to check to see if she had connectivity, and exactly where she was on the trail with the maps she’d downloaded before she left.
But her fingers found nothing. Her phone was crushed, useless, laying next to Ziggy. No worries. Once she got to her car, she’d be home in under two hours, and all of this would be behind her. In fact, she might make it home in time to go by her cell phone provider and get a new phone. They stayed open later on the weekends.
Doubt tugged at her, as if she was forgetting something. Her tent and camp gear, sure, but they could be replaced. It wasn’t worth the risk of going back to the lake, not for a sleeping bag, tent—
She stopped.
Her car keys were in the pocket of the vest she’d left in her tent.