Cole (Wounded Sons #5)

239 Pages·2021·0.57 MB·english

by  Leah Sharelle [Sharelle

COLE
BOOK FIVE
THE WOUNDED SONS SERIES
BY
LEAH SHARELLE
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
EPILOGUE
Copyright © 2021 Leah Sharelle

COLE: The wounded sons – Book Five
By Leah Sharelle

All Rights Reserved.

Editing and Proofreading: R Corcoran
Photography: Chic Professional Photography
Cover Models: Louis Armitage
Cover Design: Formatting & Design by Jaye
Interior Design: Formatting & Design by Jaye

This book may not be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without
permission from the author. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials
in violation of the author’s rights. All characters and storylines are the properties of the author, and
your support and respect are appreciated.
This book is a work of fiction. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any
similarity to real persons, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.

This author writes using Australian English and may include Australian diction
DEDICATION

To Pirate and all the members of my Flock. XX
PROLOGUE

COLE

“Mum is still crying, Dad,” I worried, glancing in the direction of my mother, who was being
consoled by my Aunt Stella.
Looking over his shoulder, my father nodded his head. “Yep.”
That was Creed Stephens, a man of few words. It stemmed from his days as a sniper, being quiet
came with the job. My father had been one of the best, second only to Cooper Steel, my uncle. Along
with my other uncles, Deck, Booth, and Mannix, they made up the best and most successful commando
teams in the Australian Army’s history. They set up the original Team Five, along with Ford, Lucky
and Darth, who died before I was born. Their reputation was unsurpassed.
“She is going to be okay, isn’t she?”
“Don’t worry about Mum, mate, you know I will look after her. I need you to focus on what you
are about to do. Your first deployment as a member of Gabe’s team requires you to be there, not back
here with your mum.”
Dad was right, of course; in fact, I can’t remember a time when he was wrong. My father was my
hero, my siblings and me, his MC brothers too, but Dad was the man I wanted to be like the most.
Emulating his achievements from his commando days my ultimate goal. My older brother Zander
chose to walk in his MC shoes and become a patched member of the Wounded Souls MC, and while I
was a lifelong member, too, I wanted a different path.
“Dad, I have been to war a time or two,” I grumbled, feeling like a kid all of a sudden. “Two
deployments in the SASR, remember? One with the Special Operations Engineering Regiment also
under my belt,” I reminded him.
Dad eyed me in that way that made you feel like squirming; you know, when you realise you said
something wrong, you just don’t know for the life of you what it was.
“Cole, don’t go believing you’re invincible. Special Ops is one thing, but being a part of an elite
Tier One unit like Team FIVE is a whole other nightmare. It’s you and five other men; you go in where
the other units have no business being. It’s an honour to fucking serve with men in the calibre you
aspire to be.”
“Dad, I know that—” but Dad wasn’t finished, not by a long shot.
“You go in the man you are now, but you don’t come back the same way, son. Whether you know
it or like it, what you come across over there is going to change you, Cole. It’s the man that you
become, despite what you do and see, is the only thing I can impress upon you. Don’t let it overtake
you, Cole, don’t drown in the horror. Will you do that for me, son?”
Staring at my father, his black onyx eyes mirrored mine. Out of all my brothers, I looked the most
like our father. Zander, Dane and Chase inherited the same black hair, the same dangerous looks, the
same black eyes, but my brothers had a lot of our mum in them. Me? I was Creed Stephen’s clone
from the top of my head to the bottom of my booted feet.
Maybe that was why Dad was acting so concerned over my selection into the Wounded Sons;
maybe he worried that I, too, was going to come back from war a different man as he had. Of course,
Dad had some outside extenuating circumstances that helped that process along. The death of a fellow
soldier and that of his first wife, both happening well before my birth and any of my four siblings.
Dad knew death, he faced it, and he almost let it beat him. Then, my mother happened and Dad
found the peace her love offered him. Memphis Stephens was a force to be reckoned with, and I
thanked God every day she was my mum. That didn’t mean that the same thing would ever happen to
me. I thrived on being in the army, being a Special Operator. I loved the rush of being in the military,
being challenged every time I stepped into a foreign country. Now I was part of a Tier 1 team with my
best friends since birth, and I was ready for everything that offered me.
“Don’t worry, Dad,” I assured my father, “I’ve got this.”
Dad gave me his signature chin lift, but his eyes were still narrowed and worried.
“Don’t get too cocky, son, shit can go south quicker than you can blink, and when it does, because
it will at some point, it can take a man out at the knees. War doesn’t have a script, Cole; it’s
unpredictable.” Dad stared off into the distance, and I knew instantly he was thinking of his final
deployment when Booth lost his blood brother and Steel lost his leg. It was also when my father
suffered injuries from the same firefight that made up the team’s mind to get out and start a different
kind of brotherhood. One without the bullets but one that still had enemies that could not always be
seen coming.
I appreciated what my father was trying to convey, I understood his concern, but I was not the
same person as he had been during his time in the military. I had no baggage, no PTSD, and no
worries, other than Gabriel giving me the stink eye and growling at his watch.
“Not happening to me, Dad,” I promised, slapping him on the shoulder. “As you always say, old
man, not on your life.”
I had no idea that years later, that cocky statement would come back to haunt me. Such is the
misplaced exuberance of a man who was yet to see the darkest side of war.

YEARS LATER

If there was one thing I hated, it was the humid conditions of a tropical jungle. Thick foliage
obscuring your line of sight, thousands of fucking insects and tree animals all making noises at the
same time, blocking out the sounds of the enemy. Give me the sparse openness of the desert any day of
the week.
Putting one foot in front of the other, I willed my body to make it up the steep muddy embankment
—the forty-kilo pack on my back making the task harder than necessary. I was in peak physical shape,
but this hill just might be my undoing.
I’d separated from Gabe and the team two days ago to get a head start on my objective. Find the
hideout of the militia, report back to my captain and sit tight until they arrived.
This was my speciality.