Page 9 of Mariposa (Queens Command #1)

KADE

SIX MONTHS UNTIL GRADUATION

I ’m hard on her, but I’m hard on her for a reason.

She is an astonishing woman with a positive spirit and an infectious smile.

She’s strong, but she hasn’t met her limits yet.

I’ll keep pushing her until she breaks, and I’ll build her back up stronger when she does.

Like I’ve done with each one of my students before her. But there’s one major issue.

She isn’t breaking , and it’s frustrating as fuck.

She’s full of ambition, strong, resilient, and most of all… breathtakingly beautiful .

I’m not talking about her looks, even though everyone looks at her when she enters a room.

She’s alluring in how she breathes, talks, and in how she shows kindness and grace when she doesn’t have to.

She manages to carry and balance all those things on her shoulders while fighting her way through the school with strict restrictions on herself.

Her intelligence and knowledge leave every cadre and me stunned.

I can see why my son and she have been together for as long as they have. She’s breathtaking and devastatingly hard to ignore, and fuck, how I need to ignore her.

How am I supposed to ignore her when everything about her is gravitating?

I hate the way I notice all the little details about Violet Isla.

The complex color of her light brown eyes with golden flecks.

How she only has one dimple. I caught it when she laughed at something Booker said.

She’s so determined, with a fire ready to burn her own world for her country if she has to.

She never quits. She’s everything the Army needs.

I take a drag of my cigarette and blow it into the air.

I know I may seem like a miserable piece of shit that doesn’t want to see her or any of them pull through, but it’s not my truth.

I’m hard on them for a reason. I need them to be prepared for what I’ve seen and what war is like.

Deep down inside, I know I can’t protect them from it, but I can try.

I only have a year left until retirement, and I’m not looking forward to what civilian life holds for me. I like my team. My job. My career. It’s all I’ve done for the past nineteen years, and I’m proud of my accomplishments. Still, the scars I hold forever took pieces of me.

The worst scars are the ones you can’t see—the ones imprinted in your soul and the ones you take to your grave.

Who would want a man full of scars with stories that turned me into a cold-blooded man?

It’s two in the morning, and I can’t sleep.

I’m on the beach, staring at the waves, trying to let the ocean drown out the heaviness I carry daily, but all I hear are gunshots, bombs, and my men screaming. The sounds of war curse me, and I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to escape them. I’m lost inside my head with my black boots in the sand.

I get lost and zone out sometimes whenever I see fire. One minute, I’m here, and the next, I’m pointing a gun at my skull.

Damon Hawk always comes back to haunt me. He was a kid when he joined the military. He used to be one of my students but didn’t make it through the last stage to become a Green Beret. He was a great soldier. Always on time, strong, intelligent, no bullshit kind of man.

The night he lost his life… I was there .

Terrorists captured him, and he was in their grasp for months. At that time, we were confident we were going to rescue him. SEAL Team Executioners and my team were assigned to work together…the best teams in the world were there that cruel night.

My body aches from going so hard in the gym. I hoped all those deadlifts and bench presses would push me to the point of exhaustion and hurt. But it doesn’t compare to the pain I feel in my head like a prison. Being a cadre again…it’s triggering. That’s a fucking understatement.

I pull out the piece of wood I’m working on, along with my custom-made knife, and carve. Even though my body is in North Carolina, my mind is transported back to Iraq.

“Help me! Help me!”

Damon Hawk’s screams still linger in my head, but it was the silence that followed that was horribly louder than his pleas for mercy. The silence meant he was gone, and he’s another brother we couldn’t save. Fuck. He just died, and I don’t want to accept that we failed him.

Don’t feel . Don’t fucking feel it .

I walk out of the torture building, now painted in black from all the smoke. The smell of a human corpse burning isn’t something that will ever leave you. Seeing Damon Hawke in that way will forever haunt my nightmares and make my heart chip further from the cruel reality of war.

We were so fucking close. I was counting it down in my head. I was right behind Operator Bane when Zeke broke open the door.

Ten, nine, eight…

We were just a few seconds from saving his life, and now? He’s gone.

I’m coughing, trying to control myself, and constantly wiping my eyes from the burning sensation.

I suck in the fresh air, letting the cold winds run through my lungs as I blink through blurred vision.

The area is surrounded by aircraft and special operators from all branches, but it doesn’t matter anymore.

It’s a mission that failed.

Grim stalks past me, brushing his shoulder against mine. He’s taken off his signature Reaper mask, and I recognize that familiar look all too well.

Guilt, grief, and dark demons.

“Well, if it isn’t Master Sergeant O’Connell, Operator fucking…” He stops walking, and his ocean eyes brighten a little.

“Grim.” We embrace each other in a brotherly hug. We pat each other’s backs and shake each other’s gloved hands.

“Jesus…you’re still out on missions, old man?” he jokes.

I take off my balaclava and run a hand through my hair.

“You’ll have to take my skills and ambition out of my cold, dead hands, Grim.”

“I don’t blame you. Even when I’m home, I’m aching to return to work. It’s an obsession.”

He can’t match my gaze anymore and starts to play with something in his pocket. He pulls out a pink cross necklace and smirks.

“It’s an honor to have worked on this mission with you. It feels like old times.” He shakes his head, and with a stressed gaze, he meets my distant eyes.

“How the fuck do you do it, Master Sergeant?”

“Do what, brother?” My brow lifts as I look for my pack of cigarettes.

“Live up to your name? Live up to the military’s expectations?

With so much death that surrounds you and me.

We’re the team leaders, the ones everyone and the military depend on to make these difficult decisions.

How do you fucking do it all without breaking?

” Grim’s deep voice searches for comfort that I can’t give him.

Truth be told, I don’t know how to do it.

I’ve become numb. Fear is a fucking weakness out here.

If I dare dwell in those emotions, I have a feeling it’ll lead to my death.

“Stop talking like that. You’re lacking conviction. There’s no place for that here. I taught you that.”

Grim stops twirling the cross necklace and places it back into his pocket like it’s sacred. I don’t remember him being religious.

He parts his lips, but a familiar voice blares behind my shoulder.

“The legendary fucking Operator Kade O’Connell! Holy shit!” Kane Slaughter, call sign Operator Bane, comes up from behind me. He places his hand on my shoulder, giving it a friendly squeeze, and I smirk. He’s on Grim’s SEAL team.

“Sir! It’s an honor to have you here with us tonight.”

I grimace.

“It’s not a fucking honor, Slaughter,” I snap.

Grim tilts his head, watching me intently. Kane flinches.

“We lost a good man tonight.”

“You knew him?” Kane asks softly.

“Damon Hawke used to be one of my students. He was supposed to return to the course in about six months to become one of us. A special operator—a Green Beret, and now? I get to attend his funeral. If you’ll do me a fucking favor and wipe that naive grin off your face because there’s nothing to smile about right now.

” I point to the burning building behind me.

I clench my jaw tight, and all three of us watch Damon’s dead body being escorted by a group of soldiers.

They’re in charge of taking his body back home to be reunited with his family.

Grim straightens his posture, as do I. I roll my neck, causing it to pop several times as the two men look at each other like they’re estranged.

“Yes, sir,” Kane nods his head at me.

He hides his dark blue eyes like he’s ashamed. He kicks a rock with his boot before he turns. “I didn’t know he was one of your students,” he concedes.

“Well, now you do.” A sting hits my eye, but I blink it away before I can feel. In a split second, the pain is gone, and the numbness I’ve taught myself to become addicted to returns.

Whenever I’m in this state of mind, I don’t feel. It’s a shield I wear so perfectly now. It’s the reason why everyone fears me and the reason why everyone calls me Operator Beast.

Everyone says I don’t have a heart, and I believe it myself at this point.

When was the last time I could smile without having this anchor of dread weigh me down?

I don’t know what it’s like to feel happy anymore, but I’m proud of that.

It’s what makes me strong. Because if I can’t feel happy, I can’t feel pain, either.

Numb is the way I live, and I thrive like that.

It’s what helps me survive the wars I fight and what helps me win the battles I endure in my head.

Helicopter blades whip the air in the distance just as mics start to go off in our ears, and we all start to disperse because it’s time for the next mission.

“Excuse me. I’m heading back to base,” I snap. Kane steps back from me just as Grim runs a hand through his beard. Bane and Grim look at each other and then back at me, nodding.

I stalk toward the parked Black Hawk helicopter, already preparing for the next mission instead of trying to grieve Damon’s loss. I won’t let myself feel it. It’ll hurt too much, and I’m not that type of man.

I’m a monster.