“I wanna hear it,” Ranger said. “My favorite are night jumps. All that darkness, a thousand tiny lights below. The quiet, despite the roar in your ears. It’s truly flying.”

“Yeah, those are fun.” Colt held out a fist.

Ranger met it. “We did a mission where we jumped out over the Gulf of Aden, near Yemen. Hit the water, deployed a Zodiac, motored close to shore, deflated the Z, swam the rest of the way with tanks, got out”—he took a breath—“infiltrated, took out our target, swam back out, reinflated the Zodiac, and hooked up with a submarine all in one night.”

“Just the one mission?” Colt asked.

“Nope.” Ranger grinned.

“You guys are crazy,” Tae said.

And they even looked alike as they shot each other wild grins.

“No. They’re brothers,” Noemi said. “Couldn’t keep them out of trouble if we wanted to.”

Funny, she looked at Ranger with almost a hint of accusation.

“Please keep your wild stories to yourself,” Tae said to Colt. “You’re freaking me out.”

“Really.”

“Yes. I’m just going to . . . trust that God loves you as much as I do.”

He stilled next to her.

Whoops. She’d done it again.

She glanced at him. He’d gotten very quiet, looking up at the parachutists.

Aw. Why did she always have to take control of everything?

Because yes, while he might have said that they belonged together, it didn’t mean he was going to use the L-word.

Nice, Tae.

She stood up. “I . . . I’m going to use the restroom.”

“You need me to go with you?” Colt got up to let her out.

“I think I’ve got this, but thanks, champ.”

Really, she just needed to splash some water on her face, tell herself to calm down.

See, this was exactly how she ended up on a plane with a Russian gangster. Put her heart out there too fast without thinking it through.

She walked past a hamburger stand, a concession stand with merch, and a giant A-10 Thunderbolt with teeth painted around the gun on the front, parked in front of a small hangar.

Just let it go. Let it go . . .

She was passing by a truck with a logo of a drone, the words AERIAL MEDIA written on the side, when she spotted him. Lean, strong gait, dark hair, the set of his jaw . . .

Her steps stumbled, as she watched him pass her.

No, that couldn’t be—

She was simply seeing things, the thought of her epic mistakes with Sergei conjuring up facsimiles of the man. Besides, this guy wore a uniform from the drone company. And he walked right by her without even looking up.

So not arrogant Sergei in the least.

Talk about jumpy.

Tae entered the bathroom—mostly empty—and as she washed her hands, she stared at herself in the mirror. She didn’t love Colt. How could she? Love meant commitment and long-term plans and . . .