Today is release day for WYATT'S
WAR, the first book in my military romance series HEARTS & HEROES. Hot
military hero, romantic suspense, spitfire heroine in San Antonio,TX.
WYATT'S WAR
by Myla Jackson
July 8, 2014 Release
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Scroll down to read Excerpt
Hearts & Heroes, Book 1
After a particularly difficult
operation in Somalia, Master Sergeant Wyatt Magnus is stuck with “light” duty
providing anti-terrorist security for delegates at the International Trade
Convention in San Antonio.
As he settles in for what he expects
will be an easy assignment, he discovers he’s got a whole new kind of battle on
his hands with the convention’s director, a tightly packaged,
five-foot-nothing, sexy piece of work with an iron fist.
Under pressure to bring foreign
dignitaries to the River Walk without a hitch, Fiona Allen doesn’t have time to
babysit a Special Forces grunt with a superiority complex. Even if just looking
at him makes her mouth water.
When a hotel snafu lands them in the
same room, at first she’s steaming mad. Then burning up in smoking-hot desire.
But even as she tells herself he’s a one-time ride, trouble is brewing behind
the scenes. The kind of trouble with a vendetta—and a detonator.
Warning: Contains one
hot hero with a gift for strategic placement of his hands, one fiery redhead
who’d like to make a career out of exploring every rippling muscle, and one
hotel room that’s about to see some serious action. Fire extinguisher
recommended.
For more information:
To learn more about Myla Jackson visit her
website at http://www.mylajackson.com. Or join her newsletter to enter in the fun with
other readers:MylaJackson_Newsletter@yahoogroups.com
Excerpt
Chapter One
Sergeant Major Wyatt
Magnus pushed past the pain in his knee, forcing himself to finish a three-mile
run in the sticky heat of south Texas. Thankfully his ribs had healed and his
broken fingers had mended enough he could pull the trigger again. He didn’t
anticipate needing to use the nine-millimeter Beretta tucked beneath his
fluorescent vest. San Antonio wasn’t what he’d call a hot zone. Not like
Somalia, his last real assignment.
It wouldn’t be long
before his commander saw he was fit for combat duty, not playing the role of a
babysitter for fat tourists, politicians and businessmen visiting the Alamo and
stuffing themselves on Tex-Mex food while pretending to attend an International
Trade Convention.
The scents of fajitas
and salsa filled the air, accompanied by the happy cadence of a mariachi band.
Twinkle lights lit the trees along the downtown River Walk as he completed his
run around the San Antonio Convention Center and started back to his hotel.
Neither the food, nor the music lightened his spirits.
Since being medevaced
out of Somalia to San Antonio Medical Center, the combined armed forces’
medical facility, he’d been chomping at the bit to get back to where the action
was. But for some damn reason, his commander and the psych evaluator thought he
needed to cool his heels a little longer and get his head on straight before he
went back into the more volatile situations.
So what? He’d been
captured and tortured by Somali militants. If he hadn’t been so trusting of the
men he’d been sent to train in combat techniques, he might have picked up on
the signs. Staff Sergeant Dane might not be dead and Wyatt wouldn’t have spent
three of the worst weeks of his life held captive. He’d been tortured: nine
fingers, four ribs and one kneecap broken and had been beaten to within an inch
of his life. All his training, his experience in the field, the culture
briefings and in-country observations hadn’t prepared him for complete betrayal
by the very people he had been sent there to help.
He understood why the
Somali armed forces had turned him over to the residual al-Shabab militants
that were attempting a comeback after being ousted from the capital, Mogadishu.
He might have done the same if his family had been kidnapped and threatened
with torture and beheading if he didn’t hand over the foreigners.
No, he’d have found a
better way to deal with the terrorists. A way that involved very painful
deaths. His breathing grew shallower and the beginning of a panic attack snuck
up on him like a freight train.
Focus. The psych doc had given him methods to cope
with the onset of anxiety that made him feel like he was having a heart attack.
He had to focus to get his mind out of Somalia and torture and back to San
Antonio and the River Walk.
Ahead he spied the
pert twitch of a female butt encased in hot pink running shorts and a neon
green tank top. Her ass was as far from the dry terrain of Somalia as a guy
could get. Wyatt focused on her and her tight buttocks, picking up the pace to
catch up. She was a pretty young woman with an MP3 device strapped to her arm
with wires leading to the earbuds in her ears. Her dark red hair pulled back in
a loose ponytail bounced with every step. Running in the zone, she seemed to
ignore everything around but the path in front of her.
Once he caught up,
Wyatt slowed to her pace, falling in behind. His heart rate slowed, returning
to normal, his breathing regular and steady. Panic attack averted, he felt more
normal, in control and aware of the time. As much as he liked following the
pretty woman with the pink ass and the dark red, bobbing ponytail, he needed to
get back and shower before he met the coordinator of the International Trade
Convention.
Wyatt lengthened his
stride and passed the woman, thankful that simply by jogging ahead of him,
she’d brought him back to the present and out of a near clash with the
crippling anxiety he refused to let get the better of him.
As he put distance
between him and the woman in pink, he passed the shadow of a building. A
movement out of the corner of his eye made him spin around. He jogged in a
circle, his pulse ratcheting up, his body ready, instincts on high alert. The
scuffle of feet made him circle again and stop. He crouched in a fighting
stance and faced the threat, the memory of his abduction exploding in his mind,
slamming him back to Somalia, back to the dry terrain of Africa and the twenty
rebels who’d jumped him and Dane when they’d been leading a training exercise
in the bush.
Instead of Somali
militants garbed in camouflage and turbans, a small child darted out of his
parents’ reach and ran past Wyatt, headed toward the edge of the river.
His mother screamed,
“Johnnie, stop!”
By the time Wyatt grasped
that the child wasn’t an al-Shabab fighter, the kid had nearly reached the
edge.
