Page 5 of Her Righteous Protector

“You don’t want to know,” Simon sighed.

Max’s hand hesitated over his gun safe. “You’re right, I probably don’t, but unfortunately I do.”

“I told you to quit watching the news, it’ll rot your brain,” his commander said with a wry laugh.

“This is Lark Sorensen we’re talking about right? Her mother’s the CEO of InTechno. No wonder this could turn into a political clusterfuck.” Max pulled out his gun and then grabbed his body armor out of his closet. “Okay, I’ll get the team rousted. We’ll be on base in less than thirty.”

“Even Kane? Thought he takes off to Lake Anna every weekend.”

There it was, one of the reasons that Max liked his commander; he took the time to know the men who reported under him.

“I talked to my men on Wednesday and told them to stay close, I felt like something was brewing.”

“Well, you were right. I’ll see you in the briefing room closest to my office when you get here.”

Simon hung up and Max pulled up the group text for his SEAL team. In one quick blast, he told them all to immediately get to base and expect to head out for an unknown length of time.

Within sixty seconds every man on his team responded in the affirmative, and by that time Max was in his truck. When he pulled into base parking, the competitive part of him was a little perturbed to see that Asher and Raiden had already arrived.

How in the hell did Raiden arrive first when he lives farther away?

Max stopped thinking about it and started focusing on the fact that Asher made a decent pot of coffee as he made his way down the corridor to the briefing room. He grinned when he saw his oversized mug placed on the front table with steam rising out of it. He glanced over at Asher and smiled.

“Raiden, how did you—” Max started to ask as he lifted his mug of coffee.

“Gabriella left for a Wyoming tour on Thursday, so I was over at my parents’ today to replace their storm windows. Figured since we were on standby I might as well stay there since it was closer to base.”

Max nodded as he took his second sip of coffee. The three men in the room turned as Cullen Lyons and Zed Zaragoza walked into the room.

“Who made the coffee?” Cullen immediately asked as he headed to the coffee pot. “Please say it wasn’t you, Max.”

“It was Asher.”

“There is a God.” Cullen turned over two mugs and emptied the carafe for himself and Zed. “Asher, you’re going to have to make another pot for the others,” he said as he wagged the empty container up in the air.

Max looked down at his watch. Seven more minutes and it would be the thirty minutes he had allotted for everyone to reach base. He wanted to give his men as much info as he could before the commander came in. He knew that Commander Clark would still be here to go over everything.

Kane slipped in the door, dropped his gear, then dropped down into a seat and started scrolling through his computer tablet.

Typical.

Ezio, Leo, and Nic were the last two to arrive. Max waited until everyone had a mug of coffee before he leaned against the desk at the front of the room. He looked over his men with a sense of satisfaction. Nobody could ask for a better team. Nobody.

“So it’s back to the sandbox,” he announced casually.

“Sounds great to me.” Leo lifted his mug with a grin. “I’m pretty damn sick of the rain.”

“And the dark,” Zed piped up.

“Which country?” Kane asked, never looking up from his tablet.

“Afghanistan,” Max answered.

Kane’s head shot up. All eyes were now looking at him. Even Cullen managed to look serious for a moment.

“Commander Clark will be here pretty soon to give us all of the details. He said this will be tricky.”

“Does that mean he thinks some of our assignments have been easy?” Asher asked.