Going Dark

by Monica McCarty

  Although technically she hadn’t even gotten that.

  What was her problem? He’d made it clear that he hadn’t wanted this, that he didn’t want to get involved. That she chose to ignore it was her fault. If she was feeling hurt, she had no one to blame but herself.

  She buried her disappointment and forced a cool, nonchalance to her expression. “We both made a mistake. It was a heat-of-the-moment adrenaline type of thing. I’ve never had unprotected sex, either, and I’m on the pill, but I am happy to get tested if you want.”

  “That isn’t necessary.” His obvious relief that she wasn’t going to make a big deal out of this—even though it very much felt like a big deal to her—stung much more than it should.

  She was being ridiculous. She needed to act like an adult. Adolescents thought sex meant feelings; she should know better. It didn’t mean anything. Hot sex was just hot sex.

  Their chemistry was off the charts, so what? That didn’t mean it was time to start picking out china patterns. Chemistry didn’t equate to soul mate. Good in bed—okay, fantastic in bed—didn’t make ideal life partner.

  She needed to stop imagining feelings and connections and look at the reality. She was attracted to him. Who wouldn’t be? Look at him. He was seriously put together. Not just a great face but the body as well. She was painfully aware that he was lying in bed naked beside her with the duvet only partially covering him. But the glimpse she’d caught of his bare chest and arms before she turned away had been enough to turn her to jelly all over again. Big and cut up didn’t cover it by half.

  It was probably better not to look. Just the feel of that rock-hard body behind her had made her act stupid enough.

  But beyond attraction and apparent sexual compatibility, they didn’t have anything in common. Even if he wasn’t on the run from something and she hadn’t just gotten out of a bad relationship, it would never work. They were polar opposites. What had happened to her trifecta of not going to happen?

  There was also the former military issue. The cool, confident, hard-as-nails “machine” she had been talking about pretty much summed him up. She had to admit in situations like this his alpha-man skills were welcome—and sexy—but in everyday life? No, thanks. She didn’t need another wannabe hero in her life. She had no interest in going there. Ever.

  Then why was she so disappointed?

  She thought she’d done a good job of hiding it, but she must not have been as good an actor as she thought.

  “Look, Annie, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about this.”

  Now, that made her perk up. As in hackles perked way up. “Wrong idea?”

  He frowned at her tone, but in typical guy fashion plowed right on through the danger sign. “I like you, and this morning was . . . great.” Great? “But you and me . . .” He shrugged uncomfortably. “It can’t happen.”

  She tucked the duvet around her chest as she sat up to stare at him. It was a testament to her flaring temper that she didn’t gape at her first full view of his chest. But good Lord. Her mouth went dry. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on him. Eyes back up. “I think it did just happen.”

  Rather spectacularly as a matter of fact.

  His frown turned a little wary, as if he knew he might be stomping through a minefield. “Not that. I meant about anything more.”

  In other words, don’t get your hopes up, it didn’t mean anything, and don’t read anything into it.

  All that confusion she’d been feeling a few minutes ago? It was gone. He’d just cleared it right up for her.

  “You think after all that’s happened in the past couple of days that I’m looking for something more?”

  He put one hand behind his head to look at her, bending his elbow and causing the muscles in his arm to flex.

  Holy crap! She forced her gaze away so she wouldn’t stare, but the flush in her cheeks got a little hotter.

  He gave kind of an amused sigh. “You don’t exactly strike me as the one-night-stand type.”

  She should consider it a compliment, but right now it just annoyed her. He thought he knew her so well, did he? Or was he just used to women falling in love with him after sex? Neither sat well with her. “I’m not,” she said with a sugary smile. “Mornings, on the other hand . . .”

  It took him a moment to realize what she meant. One-morning stands. When he did, his gaze darkened. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She shrugged. “It means that you don’t know anything about me or what I like.”

  “Oh, I think I know what you like well enough.”

  He gave her a cocky look that made her nipples tighten and her body tingle in places that should be too sore to be doing so. Jerk.

  Her cheeks were no doubt bright red, but she ignored the sensual taunt. “You don’t have to worry about me getting ‘the wrong idea,’” she said. “I knew exactly what I was doing.” She gave him a long look, letting her eyes slide over every inch of his well-muscled chest. “It couldn’t have escaped your notice that I’m attracted to you. Your body is incredible.” She thought about asking him about the scars and tattoo, but didn’t want to get off track. The same small scars she’d noticed on his hands were on most of his body except for his chest. “But now that we’ve gotten it out of our systems.” She shrugged. “It’s not as if we have a lot in common. You aren’t exactly my type.”

  She wasn’t the only one angry now. He sat up and glared back at her. “What . . . not educated enough or not girlie enough?”

  She clutched the duvet tighter, her cheeks flaming. Julien hadn’t been girlie. Well, maybe compared to him, but that wasn’t exactly a fair comparison. He oozed testosterone. “Neither. More like too conservative, too good ol’ boy Texas, and too macho military.”

  “Macho? What is this, the eighties?”

  “Alpha, whatever you want to call it.”

  “Machine.”

  Their eyes met. She didn’t say anything, but yes, that about summed it up.

  She’d pissed him off, and she could tell he wanted to retaliate. To do something to prove her wrong. And having a feeling she knew what that might be, she started to scoot away, edging off the bed.

  But she was saved by the bell—or, in this case, the buzz.

  It took them both a minute to realize where it was coming from. He swore and got out of bed.

  She sucked in her breath, her heart beating like a jackhammer. Whether he’d forgotten that he was naked or just didn’t care—probably the latter—she got an eyeful of a first-rate backside.

  She’d been wrong. He didn’t need football pants. He looked pretty damned perfect as is.

  He reached for his pants to retrieve his cell phone from one of the pockets, but the buzzing had already stopped.

  Taking a look at the number, he muttered something under his breath that rhymed with “duck.”

  Seeing him reach for his clothes, she did the same.

  “I have to make a call.” She looked in his direction after pulling her nightshirt over her head. Had he been watching her? She couldn’t tell from his expression, but from the way his muscles were clenched she thought he might have.

  “I thought you said no one knew your number.”

  “I said it was a burner and untraceable.”

  In other words, he wasn’t going to tell her who called.

  He reached for his shirt and started to put it on, when she caught sight of the tattoo again and frowned. “That tattoo on your arm. What kind of crest is it? It looks familiar.”

  He froze. At least it seemed that way at first, but when he turned to look at her, his expression was normal. “You probably have many times. It’s a popular beer.”

  She thought for a minute and then it came to her. “You have a Budweiser tattoo?”

  He arched an eyebrow. “Not highbrow enough for you?”

  �
��I prefer Coors Light. So yes.”

  He bit out a sharp laugh and shook his head. “You don’t back down, do you?”

  It was rhetorical, so she didn’t answer. Instead she said, “How did you get the scars?”

  She was learning to read him better. His expression gave nothing away on first glance, but the slight tensing of his jaw and whitening of his lips told her the question was not a welcome one.

  “Car accident,” he said so indifferently that she knew it was a lie. “I’ll be back in a little bit. If you’re hungry you can go down to breakfast without me.”

  “All right.”

  “Annie?”

  She looked up.

  “We’re not done here.”

  She wasn’t so sure. It felt as if they were very done.

  Twenty-one

  Colt got the meeting he’d wanted, although the old bastard made him wait over an hour first in the “drawing room.”

  Who the hell had a drawing room anymore? Relics like General Thomas Murray, that’s who. The entire place stank of old money, old family, and old America. A Murray had called “Blairhaven” (named after the family’s ancestral castle in Scotland) home since the time of the Revolution.

  Colt had been uncomfortable the first time Kate brought him here, and it had never changed. The old plantation house in Alexandria, Virginia, harked back to a time of Jeffersonian pastoral America that felt not only out of touch, but repressive, given the unavoidable connection with its slave past. It represented an idealized vision of a bucolic world that had never really existed.

  The rooms themselves felt like a museum, filled with antiques and oversized paintings of illustrious long-dead relatives. The family’s old and distinguished military service figured in many of them.

  Colt sat on one of the sturdier-looking carved mahogany chairs, hoping it would hold his weight. It had a cushion made out of that fabric Kate had loved. Toile, he thought it was called. He’d never been a fan. Probably because it reminded him of this place, and that she’d come from somewhere where people were rich enough to have names for fabric.

  He fiddled with the hands of the brass clock on the side table beside him. It was one of three in the room, which made sense, as two didn’t seem to be working.

  He’d declined tea from the disapproving maid, having never acquired the taste for it and recalling how he’d broken an “irreplaceable” cup the first time he was here.

  Ah, the fond memories.

  Finally the butler—yep, the butler—showed him into the general’s study.

  The bastard didn’t even look up when he entered the room and was “announced.” The general finished reading some document before slowly lifting his head.

  Colt barely hid his shock. General Thomas Murray, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, had aged in the three years since Colt last saw him in person. He was in his late fifties, but he looked a good decade older. Whether it was the stress of the job or the loss of his son, Colt didn’t know, but the intervening years had not been kind to him. His once distinguished graying-at-the-temples dark hair had thinned and gone almost completely white, and his skin now sagged with deep lines like a basset hound’s. But it was his eyes that had changed the most. Once sharp with intelligence and suffer-no-fools harshness, they now seemed glassy and weary behind the thick wire-rimmed glasses.

  The room smelled of leather, smoke, and whiskey. The latter, Colt suspected, was coming from the man behind the desk. It might be five o’clock somewhere, but here it was only noon.

  “What do you want?” the old man snapped impatiently.

  So much for pleasantries. The general had never liked him, and after the breakup of Colt’s marriage—which the general probably blamed him for—he had no reason to hide it.

  “Information.”

  “And why the hell would I tell you anything? You may have fooled my goddaughter for a while, but the best thing she ever did was toss your sorry ass out.”

  Colt didn’t bother correcting him, but that wasn’t exactly how it had gone down. He’d done the walking away in the end, although Kate might have said he’d done so from the beginning.

  “If you think I’ll let you worm your way back into her life, just when she’s found someone worthy of her—”

  Colt ignored the implication and didn’t rise to the bait. Whether he’d been worthy of her had ceased to matter a long time ago. “This has nothing to do with Kate.”

  The general’s eyes narrowed. “Bullshit. It would be just like you to take advantage of a tragedy to prey on her kind nature.”

  “So you know why I’m here. I want information about Retiarius. And I’ll tell you exactly what I told Kate. Give it to me, and I’ll never bother her—or you—again.”

  “Why would I believe the word of a hoodlum?”

  “Haven’t you heard?” Colt said sarcastically. “I’m one of the good guys now. All those hoodlum skills have been sanctioned and paid for by the United States of America. Hooyah.”

  The general ignored the taunt. They both knew what Colt did, but as with many higher-ups, the general preferred not to acknowledge the part Colt played in implementing their “foreign policy.” Colt did the dirty work so that men like the general could keep their hands clean. The kind of black ops he was sent on gave politicians plausible deniability that couldn’t come back to bite them later. Like, for example, if they were thinking about running for office, as he’d heard the general was considering.

  General Murray had the sympathy vote after losing his son—that was for sure. Colt hadn’t liked Thomas Junior (known as TJ) any better than he did the senior. And it wasn’t just because he’d been in the “chair force,” although that didn’t hurt. Naw, Junior was a selfish, entitled prick who had a silver spoon so far up his ass he probably shit quarters.

  He’d hated Colt on sight and done everything he could think of to discredit him in Kate’s eyes. Admittedly it hadn’t taken much effort, but Colt always wondered what TJ’s real motivation had been. Had there been more than just god-brotherly love on Junior’s part? They weren’t related by blood. Kate’s mother and the general’s wife had been sorority sisters. Kappa Kappa something or other.

  “Just say what you want and get out of here,” the general said.

  “I want to know what happened out there, and I need you to help me.”

  “How the hell am I supposed to do that? No one knows what happened out there.”

  “By telling me everything you know and getting me the clearance I need to see the feeds, files, and anything else that might be relevant.”

  “What purpose would that serve? Better minds than yours have gone over those things backward and forward. It isn’t going to tell you anything we don’t already know.”

  “Which is jack shit.”

  The general didn’t argue.

  “How many of those better minds went to Russia afterward to investigate?” Colt asked.

  For the first time since he’d entered the room, something sparked in the general’s eyes. “The president has forbidden sending in a team.”

  “I’m not talking about a team.”

  The spark dimmed. The old man gave him a dismissive laugh. “Go in by yourself? You’re mad. Besides, POTUS would never approve.”

  “What’s that old saying?” Colt asked. “It’s better to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission? Besides, I’m on vacation, and I’ve always had a hankering to visit Siberia.”

  The general sat back in his big leather swivel chair and stared at him, an appraising look on his face. “It would be a suicide mission, and if anyone discovered you, it could cause problems.”

  “Maybe for me, but it won’t for you. I won’t be taken alive, and I’ll make sure none of this ever leads back to you. It’s not as if I haven’t done missions like this before.”

  The general seemed to be consi
dering it for a moment, but then he shook his head. “As appealing as the prospect of you not being taken alive makes it, I can’t take that chance. Not now.”

  Colt squeezed his fists, unable to prevent the bitterness from seeping out. But God, he hated politics. They were talking about men here. Fourteen men who’d given their lives for this fucking nation. They deserved more—a hell of a lot more—than this. “When you intend to run for office, you mean?”

  “Nothing has been decided.”

  “But you won’t take the chance—is that it?”

  The general sat there, stone-faced.

  Colt leaned forward. “That is bullshit, and you know it. You can’t let them get away with this. I would think you more than anyone would want to stick it to the Russians.” Colt got his first real reaction. The old man flinched, and Colt pressed on. He’d always been good at finding weak spots. Cracks. Ways to hurt. “If I find proof that the Russians took them out, then maybe the president will finally listen to you and your hawk friends about the need to do something about it.”

  “She’ll never make the first move,” the general said, but there was a gleam in his eye anyway. He paused, clearly deliberating. After a moment, he looked back at Colt. “Tell me what you need.”

  Twenty-two

  Dean was still fuming when he went outside to the “car park” to return the call he’d missed from the LC.

  He didn’t know what he was so angry about. He should be glad that Annie understood that nothing more could come of their morning, too-hot-to-think-about lapse into the steamy and pornographic. He wasn’t exactly in a position to get involved with anyone. He couldn’t even tell her his real name, for fuck’s sake.

  So why was he pissed that she saw it the same way?

  “Your body is incredible. . . . You aren’t exactly my type.”

  So it had been purely physical for her—so what? How many times had he had sex with someone for the same reason? That was what it had been about for him, too, hadn’t it?