“Touchy, touchy.” Stiffly she held out her arm, but instead of taking off her shirt, she merely pulled up one sleeve and kept the rest of the cloth clutched to her chest.
She didn’t trust him, Max noted.
That was fine, because he didn’t trust her, either. He was still distracted by her perfume. Even worse, there was an irritating whine in his ears when he sat beside her. Was there a fly somewhere in the cabin?
Ignoring the whine, he pulled up her sleeve and studied her bare arm. The wound was right where she’d said, stretching from her elbow toward her shoulder. The scar had faded to pale silver, and there was no sign that anything had torn open.
“Well?” She sat stiffly, her body angled away from him. “Is it the burn or something else? Maybe there was something in the water. Jellyfish can sting, can’t they?”
“Trust me, you’d know a jellyfish sting,” Max said grimly. He’d had a few nasty encounters on prior missions in the Pacific, and the memory was still unpleasant. “Stop squirming.” He shone his light on the scar, looking for recent cuts or trauma, but he saw only a little blood where she’d scraped her arm. “Make a fist and show me where it hurts.”
“It hurts near the old scar, just like I told you.” She did the restless hand thing again with her hair, and Max felt his eyes drifting over the bright tangles, then down to her soft mouth. He wasn’t used to being around women during a mission. Hell, he wasn’t used to being around women, period. After he’d joined Foxfire, his free time was almost nil, and any limited female companionship had been arranged by Ryker’s people. It was simple sex, hot and fast, a means for physical release. And his body was reminding him that it had been too long since he’d had even that kind of encounter.
“Stop moving,” he muttered. “Is the pain above or below the scar? Right or left?” The whine in his head had grown to a buzz, but Max could find no source. Could this be some kind of delayed chemical reaction to fuel contamination from the crashed plane?
“I can’t tell. The pain comes and goes, but it’s gotten worse in the last few hours.”
“Touch the closest spot where you can remember having pain.” Max knelt beside her, watching her arm flex as she traced the right side of the scar.
A wave of dizziness hit him. He steadied himself with one hand on the edge of the cot beside her leg.
“Don’t you ever take them off?”
He ignored her question, waiting for the dizziness to fade. He’d had a physical a few days before he’d deployed, but his newest chip was a prototype. Possibly some kind of malfunction. Just great.
“Are you listening to me? You look really weird, Max.”
He definitely felt weird. “I always wear the gloves,” he said tightly.
“Even during…you know.”
He smiled thinly. “When I eat?”
“Actually, I meant when you—”
“I know what you meant.”
Of course he knew what she meant. Even the scientists back at the Foxfire base had wanted to see how his tactile sensitivity would affect his sexual encounters. Lloyd Ryker, Foxfire’s head, had gone so far as suggesting that Max keep a detailed journal of his reactions. According to Ryker, knowledge of a woman’s body chemistry during her peak arousal of sex could have some tactical use for covert operatives.
Max considered himself as loyal as it got, but he had ignored that particular order. His skills were too new—and occasionally too unpredictable—for him to guarantee their value during sexual encounters.
But it was hard not to wonder what full body contact, including his hands, would be like. He had never taken off his gloves with a woman in intimacy, not since a Foxfire surgeon had slipped a tiny electrode into his brain and linked his tactile sense with his sense of smell. There had been more procedures after that, each one amplifying his abilities. It had taken weeks for him to learn how to identify the complex chemical formulas picked up through his skin.
But now the identification process had become second nature. He had accepted the personal restrictions because they protected him and made him a better soldier. Going back simply wasn’t an option.
The dull throb centered behind his right ear. Probably stress, he told himself. If not, he’d put it down as a chip malfunction. For that Ryker would give the science team hell when Max got back.
As far as he knew, he was the only Foxfire member using the third-generation tactile chip. It was too new to have any record of failure rates yet.
He recalled the single wrong note he had picked up when he’d first carried Miki to the bunker. Something had drifted among those faint chemical layers of seawater and engine fuel, but it continued to elude him, even though he was trained to recognize everything from mouthwash to nuclear waste. He should have recognized whatever he’d picked up on her skin, but he couldn’t.
As Max stood up, fresh pain dug at his eyes. He would get some air, clear his head and then call Truman down.
Something circled his wrist. He frowned when he saw Miki’s fingers tighten against his gloves.
“This isn’t leather,” she whispered. “It’s too soft, too thin. What is this stuff?”
A manmade fiber that had taken ten years to perfect in the Foxfire labs, Max thought. The exact components were still highly classified.
Her voice echoed a little and he realized his hearing was affected now, too. He looked at her fingers, strong and pale against his glove, and he thought about the brush of her skin everywhere. He wanted to touch her and taste her while she was lost in passion. Hell, there was no point in pretending she hadn’t gotten under his skin.
But he wasn’t going to do a damned thing about it, Max swore. He pulled away, his expression masked. “Stay here.”
“Where are you going?”
“For Truman.” He watched her face for signs of tension or evasiveness, but he saw neither. She just nodded calmly.
“You should make sure that he’s completely recovered.” She sat up quickly, looking pale. “What if he’s collapsed again? Wait, I’m going with you,” she said firmly. “Then we have to check on Dutch.”
“You’re too weak to go anywhere.”
She took a deep breath and stood up slowly. “Not anymore. I’ll be fine.” She crossed the cabin, her face determined. “What are you waiting for? I want to check on Truman.”
Max opened the rusty door. Instantly the Lab appeared in the companionway, ears high. He circled warily, then shot forward, sniffing Miki’s arm. Very carefully he pressed his nose to her elbow, licking her scar.
She didn’t move. A frown worked down her forehead. “He’s doing it again.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s smelling my hand like he did before. Now my arm. Why?”
Before Max could answer, Truman turned in a tight circle, sat down and sank into a prone position. His head rested on his front paws as he stared intently at Miki.
Max didn’t move.
Foxfire’s canine prodigy would take this position for only one reason. He had just picked up a scent signature for Enrique Cruz, the man who had stolen the government’s newest billion-dollar weapon guidance system.
That meant Blondie here was up to her neck in deep shit.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“WHAT’S WRONG WITH TRUMAN?” Her voice was low and a little hoarse. “Why did he lie down suddenly like that?”
Max kept his face blank. “Probably tired.”
“I don’t think so. I think he was trained to do that.” She stared at the dog. “My friend’s dogs do things like that all the time, especially the little one.” She moved, her hands restless. “I don’t like any of this and my arm hurts. So why are you really here?”
Max stripped off his heavy waterproof vest. He had to get answers from her. She was implicated now beyond any possible doubt.
Sand had blown over the lower deck during past storms and broken seashells were mounded against one wall, but Miki didn’t seem to notice. Her gaze was locked on Max’s face. “
What is so important that you can’t leave this deserted speck of land and you won’t let us leave, either?”
Max cut her off. “I’ll ask the questions. Let’s start with how you got up that ridge.”
She studied him in stony silence.
“How did you find that tunnel so easily?” The most logical answer was that Cruz had told her it was there.
She shook her head, not answering.
“Tell me about Cruz.” He moved in, pinning her flat against the wall, with no place to go and no place to look but his eyes.
Color filled her face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Cruz who?”
She was damned good, he thought. There was just the right touch of wariness and innocent confusion in her voice. Cruz must have trained her well. The two were probably lovers.
For some reason the image hit him hard and left him angry.
“You want to leave this island? It won’t happen until you start talking.”
“I’m here because of engine failure. We crashed. You saw the plane.”
“Crashes can be arranged.”
“Are you nuts?”
She sounded entirely believable in her outrage, but that was no surprise to Max.
“Where did you meet Cruz?”
“I don’t know anyone named Crux.”
“Cruz,” Max repeated slowly, drawing out the word. He pulled off one glove, his eyes never leaving her face. “You’re very good, Blondie. And you’re lying.” He looked down at Truman, who was still motionless, his head pointed toward Miki’s right arm. “My good friend here doesn’t ever lie.”
“You mean that position is some kind of signal?” She chewed her lip, and the more she chewed, the more worried she looked. “What is it supposed to mean?”
Her face was turning pale, her breathing irregular. No doubt she was worried that he’d seen through her cover story.
“I know you’re involved, Miki. It will be far less painful for you if you give me the whole story now.”
“You—you scum. I’m not afraid of you or your—”
Max caught her in mid-sentence. His bare fingers tightened, covering the pulse that throbbed at her neck. He opened his mind and dove down through the static the way he’d been trained, matching molecule names with chemical fragments registered by his sensitive fingers.
Surfactants.
Female sweat.
He touched her ear. Sea salt. High octane engine fuel.
And there—something else?
He ignored her flailing hands, moving lower, exploring the warm skin beneath her collarbone.
Her face filled with sudden color. “Stop. I’m not—”
His hand covered her mouth, cutting off her angry protest. The shock of skin-to-skin contact burned, stirring all of his finely honed senses. She was softer than he’d expected, warmer than was safe, a hint of perfume still lingering on her skin. She was throwing off all kinds of hormones, spiking cortisol and cytokines as her immune and stress responses piled up.
Max kept his focus tight but completely impersonal. Ruthlessly focused, he moved his fingers lower, settling at the warm hollow between her breasts. If Cruz had kissed her here, if he had left even a trace of saliva on her skin, Max would know it. Cruz hadn’t been given details about his final surgery at Foxfire’s lab. Ryker had ordered two chips implanted, chips that released a unique chemical formula into Cruz’s bloodstream. The lab-engineered mix did not exist in nature as a precaution against false positives.
So the answer was clear. If Max found even a hint of that genetically engineered alkaloid on this woman’s skin, he had full authority to treat her as a hostile and interrogate her by whatever means he deemed necessary.
He ignored her wriggling, her fear, the heat of her skin and the soft pressure of her hips cradling his thighs. Her softness and fear meant nothing to him. He had to find the marker formula.
He pressed her hard against the wall and pushed up the edge of her bra, his hand across her mouth. She was soft and full, her nipple pressing his callused palm. Despite his control, the slide of her breast against his bare skin tangled his senses, making his blood thick and hot with need.
He covered her breast with his hand and filtered out her muttering, fascinated by the heat of her skin and the way color flared through her face. He didn’t care about her, he told himself. These feelings of his were strictly a reflex. This search was impersonal, no more than a way to gather clues.
But despite that, his hand tightened in reflex. Blood pounded to his groin as his fingers opened, slow and gentle, claiming her breast with its perfect, dusky nipple.
He told himself all that mattered was finding Cruz’s marker amid the layers of hormones sheening her skin. Desire was irrelevant and curiosity forbidden. There was no room for any emotion in his touch.
But his hand was hot where it lay against her skin. His nerves felt too sensitive, too volatile.
Pain stabbed beneath his left ear. Without warning dizziness struck him, and he swayed beneath a blast of sensory static.
She struggled ineffectually, her body twisting against his and her words muffled by his hand. Max saw her staring at a line of blood on his wrist.
Blood. His blood.
He had a nosebleed, and he never had nosebleeds. Max had no doubt that she had caused it somehow, probably part of Cruz’s new skill set.
He felt sick at the sight of her, sick at the extent of Cruz’s reach and the stench of his betrayal. “How much did he give you?” Waves of pain dug through his neck, and he felt fresh blood brush on his lip. “What’s the going rate to sell out your country these days?”
She kicked him, biting down hard on his hand.
Even then something continued to tease him, shadowlike on her skin, a fragment that he couldn’t identify despite all his training. Yet if Cruz had touched her, Max should have found the marker alkaloids immediately. There was also her concern for Truman, which had seemed entirely sincere.
She was his enemy, but the pieces simply didn’t add up.
He released her arm, keeping his hand across her mouth, but the storm of her hormones pulled him in, overwhelming in their complexity. She hadn’t had sex for quite a while, Max noted. Her body was responding to his touch, even amid her fury.
Fury. Not fear. She wasn’t afraid of him.
Another piece of the puzzle that didn’t fit.
He took a deep breath and straightened her shirt, trying to ignore the heat of her skin and the need that her body had aroused. He wanted to strip all the barriers between them. He wanted his hands free, moving over her like sunlight. He wanted to take her here and now, hard and fast against the wall while she moaned his name and came blindly in his arms.
The dizziness was worse, pounding behind his eyes. He couldn’t hear.
Her face bright with color, she fought him, but there was no calculation, no cold cunning there, and for a moment Max wondered if Truman could have made a mistake.
He felt more blood on his lip. Something had happened when he touched her, bringing waves of dizziness and pain, and he had to find out why.
She tried to kick him again, biting at his wrist. He saw a line of bruises on her cheek, probably from her fall on the cliff. When he tugged her sideways, trying to get a better look, she fought hard, and her movements slammed her arm against the ship’s metal wall.
She went rigid, her eyes wide and startled. Breath hissed from her mouth. And then she simply crumpled in his arms.
A drop of his fresh blood fell on her Hawaiian shirt, mixing into the bright colors. Everything about her was bright and clean, full of restless energy, Max thought. It was so long since he could remember feeling young or clean or innocent.
Yes, he could understand why she had caught Cruz’s eye.
Pain stabbed at his ear as he set her on the rusted metal floor. He touched the inside of her wrist, picking up more of her stress hormones. Her face was pale and cool.
Her faint was no act.
Anx
ious, he touched her neck. Only when he felt the steady drum of her pulse did he relax. But his emotions were anything but calm.
He raised her hand, studying the angry scar above her elbow and trying to reconstruct the accident. Kneeling, he touched one edge of the wound gently.
Something jumped, racing like a spark up his arm and into his head, knocking him backward. In that blurred moment of pain Max felt completely drained yet in some way connected to her, fused in nerve and muscle.
He took a deep breath, and then touched the edge of her scar again. Another white jolt of light drilled through him, making his ears ring and his muscles clench.
The effect was definitely connected with her scar, he thought grimly. She had done something that day—or something had been done to her. Now it was affecting both of them.
She tossed restlessly beside him. Her eyelids fluttered and she murmured something that sounded like race, which made no sense.
Her beauty was unavoidable, but it was her energy that stirred his senses, making Max’s hand curve gently over her cheek. Hunger made his blood pound. He wanted her fire and stubbornness, here and now. He needed to—
Stop.
He pulled his hand away. Slowly he stood up.
Everything was wrong, he thought. His feelings never drove him like this. He never lost control.
He looked down at his bare hand. She had been solicitous about Dutch, hotly protective about Truman. She had even worried about his embarrassment over his scars.
Nothing about it added up.
Except that she stirred his senses and made his body come alive in a way he had never experienced. For long seconds something hot and reckless had shimmered between them. Already Max knew that neither of them would emerge unchanged from that contact.
If it didn’t short circuit him completely.
More blood trickled onto his lip, and he brushed it away in grim silence.
Anything that affected him this deeply was a matter of national security. Ryker would need an update immediately.
Max stared at her white face, at the angry scar on her arm, turning the pieces over and over in his head. After making certain that she was stable and breathing normally, he left Truman on guard and climbed up to the deck. By the time he reached the water his dizziness was gone and the whine in his ears had faded.
Code Name: Bundle! Page 38