Breaking Protocol

by Michelle Witvliet

  He really hoped she didn’t think that having coffee ready and waiting for him when he got up was going to lessen his annoyance when he found her missing. Ha! Like that would ever happen. Not a chance. No way. No how. There weren’t enough coffee beans in all of South America for that to happen.

  With a very large stoneware mug clutched in his big fist, he lifted it to his lips and tossed back a long swallow of the steaming dark brew. It burned all the way down, and for the first time that morning his curse was directed at himself for failing to control what he felt was his worst character flaw. As much as he was loath to admit it, he was not a patient man by nature, not even when it came to letting his morning coffee cool. He had to work very hard to control his impatience.

  From out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of the cigarette pack lying half-hidden under a rumpled dish towel. He gave it only a heartbeat’s hesitation before plucking off the towel and snatching the pack from the counter. In the silence, the cellophane wrapper crinkled under his fingers as he shook a cigarette loose. Just one more, he told himself, bringing the cigarette to his lips and striking the match. Okay, so add lack of self-control to his list of shortcomings. Piper Jordan tended to bring out the worst in him.

  Still dressed in the black sleeveless tee and cargo pants he’d fallen asleep in, he strode through the living room and broke his purposeful stride only long enough to flip the television to an all-news-and-weather channel. The only thing missing from his commando-style attire were the rubber-soled jungle boots, which he’d unlaced and removed before kicking back in the recliner the night before. If he wasn’t so distracted by his AWOL housemate he might have given the tropical storm warnings scrolling across the bottom of the screen more than a cursory glance.

  It didn’t take him long to spot the subject of his preoccupied thoughts. He breathed a relieved though no less annoyed sigh when discovering that his errant agent hadn’t wandered very far, and he watched her with single-minded fascination.

  Barely dressed in a neon-pink string bikini, she stood on the beach facing the ocean, her taut, lean muscles moving effortlessly through an obviously long practiced tai chi routine. Except for the minor adjustments she made for her injured arm, which she moved with careful attention to its limitations, her exquisite long-limbed movements were fluid and nearly flawless. She performed a meticulous ballet with only the ocean’s roar for accompaniment. Mesmerized by the graceful beauty and gentle strength she exuded with each sweeping gesture, Carter studied her as every disciplined posture flowed rhythmically into the next, creating a smooth, amazingly controlled sequence of arm and leg positions.

  At least she’d had the presence of mind to take the small handgun, he thought when he noticed the compact 9mm lying on a towel a few feet away from where she moved through her tai chi routine, right next to where she’d kicked off her shoes. He might often describe her behavior as capricious, but he could hardly ever accuse her of being downright careless.

  Once assured she wasn’t in any immediate danger, he took a moment and headed to the kitchen for a much-needed second cup of coffee.

  * * *

  Sweat glistened on her honey brown skin by the time Piper finished. It trickled between the gentle slope of her breasts and down her spine. Standing at the edge of the water, she took deep, measured breaths and stared across the vast expanse of ocean as the rising tropical sun pierced the cloudless azure blue sky and warmed her soul with its blinding brilliance. A sense of peace she seldom felt settled around her.

  The breaking waves crept up the shell—and pebble-strewn beach, licking and foaming at her toes, and she took a few cautious steps into the shallow, lapping surf. The water felt wonderful, warm and soothing on her stretched muscles, and she realized just shallow wading wasn’t going to be enough. Glancing at the house, she didn’t see any signs of life, and she quickly stripped off the skimpy bikini, tossing top and bottom in the general direction of where she’d left her shoes and gun.

  Gloriously free, she waded eagerly into the water. The silky warmth rolled and rippled across her calves and through her thighs in a sensuously undulating massage. She stepped deeper and deeper until the water was just past the blushing pink oleander blossom tattooed high on her right hip. Just as she was about to plunge into the next frothy swell, something powerful snaked around her waist and dragged her back to shore.

  “What are you doing?” she sputtered, all the while kicking and grappling to break free from Riggs’s iron grip.

  “I was just about to ask you the same damn thing,” he grated, flinging her onto the sand. Her bottom landed with a gritty thud, and her breasts, in spite of their diminutive proportions, did a little jiggle when she landed.

  “Just what is your problem?” Piper huffed as she jumped to her feet and reached for her discarded bathing suit.

  “You!” he shouted as he shot an accusing finger in her direction. “You’re my problem.” He glared at her. “Have you completely lost your mind? Did you even once think what that salt water would have done to your arm? Not to mention how every predator out there would pick up the scent of that bloody bandage.”

  Piper was momentarily stunned into silence. To be perfectly honest, if only to herself, she hadn’t given her wound any thought when she decided to go for a quick dip. But she sure as hell wasn’t about to give Riggs one speck of satisfaction by admitting she might have made a teensy error in judgment. It was easier to let him think she was crazy.

  She brushed sand from her hips and thighs before quickly stepping into the bikini bottom and tugging it up her legs. “C’mon, Riggs, aren’t you overreacting just a little?”

  “There is no such thing as overreacting just a little where you’re concerned. I did not save your ass in Colombia so you could serve yourself up as shark bait.”

  “Why did you?” Piper asked, working at untangling the knotted straps of the bikini bra.

  “What?” Riggs stopped raving long enough to give her a hard look. The air left his lungs with a single hissing wheeze. There she stood, a shining wet sea nymph, sleek and bronzed, and practically naked. He clenched his hands into tight fists to keep from brushing off the fortunate grains of sand clinging to her breast. The chain around her middle glistened enticingly and the circular gold medallion dangling from it glimmered against her tanned flesh like a shining beacon.

  Stripping off his shirt, he flung the wad of black cotton in her direction. “This’ll be quicker,” he mumbled as he spun on his heel and trudged away.

  The moment he reached the house, Carter staggered to the bathroom like a drunken sailor retuning from shore leave and cranked the shower faucet to cold. He wanted ice pellets hitting his skin; he wanted water so frigid it would turn his flesh blue. All he got from the roof’s storage tank was mildly temperate, bordering on downright tepid. It wasn’t anywhere near chilling enough to douse his overheated libido or soothe the intensity of his throbbing arousal. He couldn’t do anything but brace his palms against the tile wall and let the lukewarm water wash over his head and shoulders and down his back while he finally openly and honestly acknowledged the attraction he’d successfully disregarded for the last five years.

  It hadn’t always been like this. In fact, in the beginning, when he’d recruited Piper fresh out of the army, their working relationship had been remarkably uncomplicated. From their first mission together, they functioned as a well-trained team, anticipating each other’s thoughts and actions with an economy of words or effort. Then something changed. He could never pinpoint when the relationship started its subtle shift in perspective, but he knew exactly when he realized it happened because it was the last time they’d worked together. He limited their contact after that, and arranged to have her paired with other agents to keep from breaking the very policy he expected the rest of the staff to follow.

  Her stint in Colombia was supposed to have doused the fire; instead it o
nly seemed to fan the flames.

  He’d had beautiful women, fascinating women, intelligent women, powerful women—Washington was full of them—but none of them ever held his interest for very long. No woman he’d ever dated or even bedded in all that time had ever come close to comparing to the woman he’d kept at arm’s length.

  It wasn’t cold water that brought him to his senses, although the result was just as effective. A loud, insistent banging jarred him back to the here and now.

  “Hey, Riggs, you’re hogging the bathroom. How much longer you gonna be in there?”

  He mumbled something incoherent as he shut off the water, dragged the towel across his limbs and tugged underwear and a pair of navy cotton shorts over his still damp flesh.

  Upon opening the door, he discovered her with nothing but a towel wrapped around her lithe body. Although, given her propensity for wearing nothing at all, he was surprised she bothered with even that much. He was at that particular moment in time extremely grateful for her small gesture of uncharacteristic modesty—very grateful indeed.

  Piper smiled with blatant appreciation. “Looking good, Riggs,” she teased as she patted his taut stomach with a playful tap of her fingertips. “I’m real glad to see you didn’t let yourself go after hitting the big four-oh. Happy belated, by the way. Sorry I wasn’t around to help you celebrate.”

  Just one more thing to be grateful for, he thought. He was glad she hadn’t been there. He’d celebrated that milestone birthday in the ICU fighting for his life and wondering if he’d make it to forty-one. Carter tossed an unamused glance in her direction as he shouldered past and continued down the hall toward his bedroom. “The shower is all yours.”

  Piper eyed him with thoughtful consideration as he strode away. He might be barefooted and dressed in nothing but a pair of butt-hugging shorts, but he wore them with the same rigid posture he would as if in full dress uniform. There was still a lot of military bearing lingering in the man’s attitude, that was for sure.

  She frowned with remorse as she slipped into the bathroom, glancing at his receding back one last time before shutting the door. The tension had grown unbearable between them on the beach, and she blamed herself for creating the hostile atmosphere. She had hoped to lighten the moment with her teasing just now. It hadn’t taken long to realize how miserably she’d failed at the attempt to ease them back to the time they’d once shared an easy, uncomplicated rapport.

  Piper wanted to kick herself. She couldn’t believe she’d placed him in such an awkward position the night before only to top it off with that dumb stunt on the beach. As much as she appreciated the warmth and reassuring comfort he’d provided through the dark hours before sunrise, she knew it hadn’t been given easily. In fact, his reluctance had been palpable, and his reaction to her earlier had been nothing short of revulsion.

  As difficult as it was for her to admit, she was willing to accept that the man wasn’t interested. What she couldn’t and wouldn’t accept was losing him as a friend and mentor. There had to be a way for them to get past this awkwardness that she’d wedged between them.

  She winced as she peeled the bandage from her arm and carefully inspected the wound from different angles in the medicine cabinet mirror. All things considered, it looked pretty good for an arm with a gouge of missing flesh. A crusty scab was starting to form around the edge, but the middle was still raw and open tissue. Riggs was right about it leaving a scar, and this one was going to be a doozy, but it wasn’t the first scar she’d acquired in the line of duty and she didn’t hold any expectations that it would be her last.

  As she stepped into the shower, her gaze fell to the jagged eight-inch ropey line of scar tissue running down the outside of her left knee. It glistened like a pearly pink worm against the rest of her smooth, tanned skin. Acquired in Afghanistan five years earlier, the memory brought with it the reminder that it was the last time she and Riggs had worked a mission together. He’d carried her on his back for more than two miles through narrow passes over mountainous terrain after she’d torn her leg open on a jutting rock formation. Soon after they’d returned to the States, he began to spend less and less time in the field and assigned her with different partners on every mission after that.

  As she recalled, he’d accused her of being reckless then, too. Well, maybe she was, but maybe her recklessness was part of why she was so good at what she did.

  After a quick shower, she patted the wound dry and wrapped a fresh roll of gauze around her bicep as she pondered how she would make things right between her and Riggs. There had to be a way to make things right. She refused to believe their relationship was past the point of fixing.

  * * *

  “Rule number one,” Carter began without preamble the second her khaki shorts-covered butt touched the teakwood seat of the dining room chair. “You are not to step one foot out of this house without clearing it with me first. Is that clear?”

  Piper nodded without enthusiasm.

  “Rule number two: Other than in the privacy of your bedroom, you will dress appropriately.”

  Her nodding reply, as she sipped her juice, was appropriate even if her lackluster demeanor was not.

  “Is it safe to assume you understand the concept of appropriate dress?”

  “Yes, Riggs, it is safe to assume.” Then she held up her right hand, as if taking an oath. “I, Piper Jordan, promise to faithfully keep my lady parts covered in all common areas except for my room.”

  He’d settle for that. “Rule number three,” he said, finally settling his gaze on the woman sitting across the table, an action he immediately regretted. After visually inventorying her various scrapes and bruises and badly bandaged arm, he felt like he’d taken the gold at a world-class prick competition, and damn it all if he didn’t resent her for making him feel that way.

  In a burst of sudden agitation, he struck the heel of his palm against the edge of the table, not hard enough to make the breakfast dishes dance, but it caused her head to snap to attention. Unblinking, she stared with a narrowed, pained gaze, though the rest of her expression remained indefinable.

  “For God’s sake, Piper, stop looking at me like I just kicked your dog.”

  “You don’t need to shout.” She picked up her fork and stirred her eggs with the tip of the tines. “There’s nothing wrong with my hearing.”

  “I’m not shouting,” he said, immediately realizing he was. He inhaled sharply and began again, successfully managing to soften his tone to a level of calm he scarcely felt. “I’m trying to stress the importance of your situation. All I’m asking is that you work with my efforts, not against them.”

  She waved her hands in a gesture of surrender. “Sure. Fine, whatever you say.” Like nothing he said was of much concern, she grabbed half an English muffin and slathered orange marmalade all over it from a jar on the table.

  Carter’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. This was not the Piper he was used to dealing with. This reticent side of her was completely foreign to him. Always opinionated and, more often than not, downright argumentative, she never agreed to anything this readily. He wasn’t sure he liked it. He was most assuredly skeptical of it.

  He pinned a narrowed gaze on her. “What are you up to?” he questioned.

  At the same time she tossed her half-eaten muffin on her plate, Piper lifted her chin and stared him down. “What do you want from me? I do what I want and you throw a fit, I agree to what you want and you’re still not happy. Tell me what the hell you want me to do and I’ll do it! Just stop making such a big fucking deal about it!” She whipped her napkin off her lap and threw it on the table. Then she pushed her chair out with a highly pronounced butt-jut and started to clear off their barely touched breakfast.

  Ignoring her mini-tantrum, Carter raised his hand to emphasize the next point he wanted to make. Then, thinking better of it, he waved his argum
ent away, choosing to remove himself from the situation instead. In order for him to stay on task, he needed some time to clear his head and gain some much desired perspective before he continued with anything having to do with Piper Jordan—for both their sakes.

  * * *

  From her vantage point on the balcony, Piper watched Riggs hurry down the beach and break into a pounding run. He was around the bend and out of her line of sight in less than sixty seconds. For a long time after, she stared at the lonely stretch of empty beach and pondered her lengthy and often troubled history with Carter Riggs.

  He’d always been a difficult man to ignore and an even harder one to understand. But Piper had recognized Riggs’s powerful presence from the day he’d recruited her; everything about him exuded potent virility, commanding strength and keen intelligence. Even his size could be downright daunting. At six-foot-four and more than two hundred pounds of hard-packed, unadulterated muscle, Carter Riggs was a life-sized action figure.

  She’d been attracted to him since the very beginning of their association, but because he’d made it clear from day one what a stickler he was about following protocol—everything strictly by the book—she’d managed to keep those feelings under tight wraps. But now...every one of those feelings, along with a few new ones, was back in force and stronger than ever.

  During the short spans of time she lived in D.C. between assignments, she’d seen him out and about, often with other women. She’d even allowed herself the occasional fantasy of what it might be like to be on a date with him herself, but that was as far as she’d ever let it go. When the Colombia assignment had been offered to her, she’d jumped at the opportunity, reasoning that a year should be enough time to get over her one-sided infatuation.

  And she’d really thought she’d succeeded, until Riggs showed up leading her rescue, that was. From the moment she realized the man she’d aimed her gun at was Carter Riggs, Piper knew nothing had changed. She was still as head-over-heels crazy about the man as she was pre-Colombia, and the realization made her just as miserable.