Unbroken Vows

by Frances Williams

  The dark look on his dripping face brightened. “Yeah. You’re all right. Do you see the boat?”

  “There, behind you.” She pointed.

  David turned to look. “Looks like torque has set it running in a circle. A fairly slow circle.”

  “It’s too far away. We’ll never be able to reach it.”

  “Where’s the shore?” He kept his eyes on the boat.

  She squinted into the distance all around her. “I can’t see it.”

  David glanced at the sun and jerked his chin toward his left shoulder. “Neither can I, but it’s that way, a very long swim. The boat’s a lot closer. It’s that or the sharks.”

  “Jeez, David. I didn’t mean there really were sharks around.” She jerked her head from side to side searching fearfully for the ominous fins.

  “I did. They just haven’t hit this neighborhood yet.”

  “You can’t board a moving boat. It could hit you in the head. One slip and that propeller would be slicing into you.”

  “We’ve no other choice. I have to try.”

  He took her hands and set them lightly at his shoulders, making himself a flotation device of sorts. She appreciated the rest holding on to him gave her. On beach vacations she’d stayed in the ocean a lot longer than this without tiring. But that hadn’t been after she’d had to fight for her life. And not when she’d been so terribly scared.

  “I have to get to that boat quickly, Cara, and I’ll have a better chance of boarding her if I don’t have to worry that you’re beside me in danger of getting run over by the keel. Can you tread water here until I come back for you?”

  She understood exactly what he was saying. They had to get out of the water before a passing shark found himself an easy meal. David couldn’t waste time swimming at her slower pace, along with trying to look after her in the boat’s vicinity. Which he’d do, she knew, whether she wanted him to or not.

  “You go ahead, David. I’ll be fine. I’ll follow you slowly so I won’t get tired and I’ll be closer to the boat when you come back for me. The bowline is dragging in the water, maybe you can grab that and haul yourself in.”

  “Right. I’ll look for it.”

  “Good luck.” She let go of David’s shoulders and waved him on.

  “That’s my girl.”He lifted a hand out of the water and stroked her cheek.

  Then he was gone, swimming away from her with the powerful strokes she’d seen him use back in the wonderful safety of his lake.

  If this was to be the end, she wanted him to know that she loved him. She opened her mouth to call those words after him, then choked them back. David had his hands full trying to keep them alive. He needed no distractions.

  All too soon she could no longer make out his form in the water.

  She tried to convince herself that he actually would be able to heave himself into a moving powerboat. If he didn’t, they were both going to end up as shark meat. She forced the horrible thought to a corner of her mind and concentrated on trying to keep her eyes on the boat that looked much too far away.

  Moving slowly through the water with minimal motions of arms and legs, she felt terribly alone in the vastness of the ocean.

  Time lost meaning in the tiring rhythm of keeping herself afloat. It felt as if David had been gone for hours. Her arms were growing as heavy as lead. Her eyes were burning from the bright sun bouncing off mirrorlike waves.

  Horrible images of what might be happening to David kept assaulting her mind. He was knocked unconscious by the boat. He slipped under the keel and his back was chopped up by propeller blades.

  He was gone. The ocean had taken him. And she was so tired. Maybe it would be better simply to let herself slide beneath the surface and end it that way. Certainly better than being devoured by sharks.

  But David would never forgive her if she gave up. Even if he wasn’t around to know it.

  For sure she’d started to lose it. Now she was hearing his voice calling her name. Something landed in the water near her. The splash woke her from her daze. A life ring.

  “Grab it, Cara.”

  The boat was stopped in the water a few yards away. It took the last of her strength to hook her arm through the ring and hold on while David reeled her in. He leaned over and vised a hand around her wrist to pull her into the boat.

  She flopped onto the deck like a landed fish, gasping and unable to move.

  David went down on one knee beside her and gathered her to him, holding her tight to his chest.

  “It’s all right. You’re safe. It’s all over.”

  She was safe. Safely enveloped within the strong circle of his arms that felt so much like her only true home. Utter heaven to be pressed against the warm solidity of his chest. The unique scent of him, underlying the salty smell of his ocean-drenched clothes, assuring her more than his words that everything really was all right.

  He ran his lips over her forehead, her cheeks, pressed his mouth against hers. She had no energy to do anything but lie back and revel in the wonderful feel of his kisses calming her fears, easing the pain of her exhausted muscles. She couldn’t make out the words he murmured against her skin, but she loved their tone.

  His gaze darted fearfully over her, his hand ranged over her legs, her arms, as if he expected to find some horrible evidence that she’d suffered some hurt.

  “Are you okay?” His voice rasped with concern.

  The words made her drag up a bit of a smile. “Yes.” She didn’t have the breath to speak in more than a whisper. “I’m okay.”

  “Thank God for that” came out on a shaky breath.

  “Did you see anything of the other two on your way back to the boat, David?”

  “No. They’re gone.”

  The deaths of the two men didn’t leave her as unaffected as they had David. No matter that they’d meant them the worst kind of harm, she was sorry they hadn’t made it.

  He held her until she was able to move a little under her own steam.

  “I have to take the wheel, Cara. We’ve got to get going before somebody comes out here looking for José and his pal.”

  He used the support of the bench to push himself to his feet. She thought about feigning deeper exhaustion than she felt, simply for the pleasure of remaining in his arms. But she couldn’t argue with the frightening logic of what he’d said.

  “Right, David. Do you need me to help you with anything?”

  “No. You just go ahead and lie here for as long as you need to. I’m going to head for Cartagena. There’s an American consulate there, where I can contact Roger Elliott. We’ll need his help to get out of Colombia. I’m afraid you’ll have to write off your things back at the resort.”

  “A few clothes and my credit cards in exchange for our lives? Not a bad deal, I’d say.”

  He chuckled and dropped down again to touch his lips to hers.

  She was sure he intended only to give her a light kiss. But his lips lingered, nibbled hers. Then his mouth was pressing harder, hotter against hers. She gave him entry, and his tongue slid inside to meet hers. The pain of her exhausted body suddenly didn’t seem important as the energy of liquid heat began to rise in her.

  Before he managed to take all her wits from her, she laid a restraining hand on his chest.

  “You’ve got to get this boat away from here, David. We’re still too close to the island for comfort.”

  “Right. The wheel.”

  She was glad to see his obvious reluctance to leave her as he stood up once more and headed for the helmsman’s chair. That he liked their embraces and their kisses as much as she did brought her a little happiness. Maybe he didn’t want her for anything more, but that at least was something.

  In a few minutes she felt recovered enough to go stand beside him.

  His initial grin on seeing her slipped into a frown.

  “What the hell did you think you were doing when you tackled that boatman? You were supposed to jump overboard when I moved.”


  “Well, how was I supposed to know that? There were two bad guys, two of us. Seemed the right thing to do. Hey, it worked, didn’t it? You’re still here. I’m still here.”

  He made a grumbling noise in his throat. “Well, I don’t want you tackling any more bad guys. Understood?”

  She was too relieved that the two of them had made it through those last few terrifying hours to let David’s bossy tone bother her.

  She laid her hand on the large hard knob of his shoulder. His shirt, like hers, had already dried in the sun.

  “Don’t worry, David. I don’t intend to make fighting bad guys my life’s work.” She slid him a sideways grin. “And I never had to do it at all before you showed up.”

  Chapter 15

  They spent the night on cots in the safety of the consulate, while the powers-that-be busied themselves with the logistics of getting two nondocumented aliens out of the country. They left Cartagena early in the morning on a small private jet.

  The distance David had begun to put between them before their scary run-in with Dan Kane was nothing compared to the taciturn coolness he’d shown her since their arrival in Panama. After depositing her at a hotel, he went off to stay at the military base.

  He’d been gone for hours, doing who knew what, while she sat in the hot sticky room where the air conditioner didn’t work and made reassuring phone calls to her family.

  He couldn’t be bothered joining her for their last meal together? Fine. She turned on the nightstand lamp, the only functioning light in the room, ordered room service and picked at her food alone.

  David, now merely her ex-partner, probably wouldn’t show up before meeting her for their noon flight back to Miami and then on to Washington.

  She was a grown woman, a respected professional. She wasn’t about to go off and mope over a man. Love affairs ended for someone somewhere every day of the week. No one died of it. You cried a little, maybe. Then you got on with your life. Soon it wouldn’t hurt at all to think of David Reid, she told herself.

  Twice.

  Three times.

  This empty feeling in her heart couldn’t possibly last forever. She’d simply wait it out.

  A soft rap came at her door. She forced herself to walk toward it at a reasonable pace. The last few steps moved a lot faster.

  David stood in front of her dressed in navy whites, his officer’s hat tucked under one arm. He’d picked up a plain black cane from somewhere.

  He looked as if he’d just stepped down from a movie screen. But then, he always did look like some fantasy hero.

  She opened the door wider to invite him in. Lightness, she decided, was the way to go.

  “Does this mean you’ve reenlisted?”

  “Huh? Oh, you mean the uniform?” The hat arced to the bed. “No, just borrowed.”

  Apparently the strained humor of her flippant remark had gone right by him. Not surprising. He looked as if his mind were miles away. Not the most flattering reaction in the world from a man who’d made incredibly passionate love to her only two nights ago. Incredible, at least, from her point of view.

  He plowed a hand absently through his hair. “Have you had dinner?”

  Her eyebrows shot up. She pointed to the dishes on the tiny table right in front of him. David Reid, not notice things? Had he already written her off so completely he hardly saw her or her surroundings?

  He glanced down at the remnants of her meal. “Oh. Good. I wanted to come back here to have dinner with you, but I couldn’t get away.”

  How hard did he try? she wondered.

  “That’s all right.” She shrugged. “No problem.”

  “I just got word that a Congressional fact-finding committee is heading for the States in a couple of hours. There’s room on the flight. Can you make it?”

  So soon? She wouldn’t even have the night to decompress from spending every waking hour—and lately, every sleeping hour—with David to saying goodbye to him for good.

  Her nonchalant toss of her head wouldn’t betray any of that.

  “Sure. It’s not like I have a lot of packing to do. I’m wearing the only part of my wardrobe I have left.” Someone had shown up with a pair of sneakers two sizes too large, a toothbrush, a tiny tube of toothpaste and a comb.

  David commandeered a couple of olives and a slice of tomato from her plate and downed them.

  “I hope you’ve been able to settle down a little after what happened yesterday,” he said.

  “I’m getting there.”

  Settled down? Her stomach was churning with wanting to throw herself into his arms, but no way would she be the one to make the first move. It looked, though, as if David was so preoccupied with matters other than herself, any move from him would be a long time coming.

  “You feel okay about Tommy?”

  “Okay? I’m not sure that’s the right word. I still wish I’d been able to get him out of that awful place. I did my best. It didn’t work, but that isn’t my fault.”

  “No, it isn’t. I’m glad you understand that.”

  “I do, David. But that doesn’t keep me from feeling sorry about what’s happened to him.”

  David gave a sigh of amused resignation. “You win the prize, hands down, for being the most maddeningly single-minded person I know.”

  The sudden gentling in his voice shot her mind back to the very best of their time together.

  Her hair combs and pins hadn’t made it out of the Caribbean. Her blond locks hung loose around her shoulders, and humidity had glued one thin strand to her cheek. David carefully fingered it back behind her ear. His light touch was enough to set her heart pounding.

  “You’ve been gone so long—” She bit her tongue, wishing she’d been able to resist saying that. “What have you been doing all day?”

  His hand hovered over the roll she hadn’t bothered to eat. “May I have this?”

  “Help yourself.”

  The roll disappeared in a couple of bites. The evidence that perhaps he hadn’t taken any time at all for dinner made her sorry she’d doubted his excuse that it truly had been business of some kind that had kept him away.

  “I’ve been debriefing to various higher-ups on what we found out about Dan Kane.”

  “Oh, David. Should you have done that? We promised not to make any trouble for him.”

  His face hardened. “A promise extorted by a drug criminal bent on murder is no real promise at all.”

  “Maybe not, but he threatened to come after us if we talked about him.”

  David hooked his cane over the back of a chair and stepped closer. At last he seemed to be totally focused on her. He reached out and lifted her hands, folding them within his at his waist. The stimulating warmth and strength of his hands flowed into her, considerably brightening her gray mood.

  “I don’t want you to worry about him or anyone else coming after you. I promise you’ll be safe in Baltimore. Forget Dan Kane.”

  “That’ll take some doing. You were the assigned hero in our partnership, David, not me. Every time I turn around, I’ll be looking to see if someone is following me.”

  “I don’t want you to live like that. I want you to remember only the pleasant parts about our stay in Colombia, the nice people we met, the spectacular mountain scenery.”

  She agreed that the scenery had been spectacular. But, for her, the pleasant parts about Colombia were the times she’d spent in David Reid’s arms. She sure wasn’t likely to forget that.

  “To remind you of those good times and help you forget the bad,” he said, “I have something for you.”

  He fished in a pocket, brought out a small red box with elegant gold lettering and handed it to her.

  “A present, David? For me?”

  “A present. For you.”

  She opened the lid and caught her breath at the beauty of the jeweled brooch sparkling up at her from its tiny bed of black satin. Emeralds shaped the petals of a five-pointed blossom centered on a brilliant diamond.

&nb
sp; “Colombian emeralds,” he said, “to replace the flowers you had to throw away that day back in the village.”

  “Oh, David, it’s beautiful.” The pin was the most exquisite piece of jewelry she’d ever seen. And surely the most expensive.

  She ran her finger over the delicate golden curve of the flower stem, then replaced the cover and held the box out to him. “This is remarkably generous of you. Believe me, I do appreciate the thought, but I can’t accept the gift. It’s too—”

  “I’ll be very disappointed if you don’t. Think of it as a thank-you gift.”

  “A thank-you gift? What for?”

  “For bringing me along on a mission that gave me back a measure of self-respect. For making me feel I might actually be useful for something again. There was some truth in what you told me that first day. Maybe I had pulled up the drawbridge for good. But you got me down off that mountain. Others had tried. You were the one who did it. I owe you for that.”

  “I can’t take credit for it. If you hadn’t been ready to rejoin the world, you’d never have come. But after all the help you gave me, I’m glad I might have been able to return something to you.”

  “I don’t think you understand that what you did for me was nothing less than give me back my interest in life. It’s probably no news to you that I’d just about lost it. Please.” He gently pushed the box back to her. “Take the gift. It would make me very happy for you to have it.”

  It was beyond her to disappoint him. The pin’s cost didn’t matter. The fact that the gift came from him made her love it as much as she’d loved the armload of flowers he’d placed in her lap in the boat.

  “All right, then. I’ll keep the brooch as a memento of the pleasant parts of our trip to Colombia.” It would only painfully remind her of David Reid and of their one magical night of lovemaking.

  “Do you remember that darling little girl who sold the flowers to us?” she asked. A sharp pain knifed through her heart. She and David would never create a child together. For some absurd reason, what didn’t even exist felt like a terrible loss.