Worse. Definitely.
There was not much here that was going into the better column any time soon, as he—Dan Gillman, aka Fishboy, aka Gilligan, aka Lucky, aka the man she’d just had crazy, loud, boisterous, furniture-banging sex with—lay with his head down, face against the pillow of her couch, depleted and breathing hard. He was still between her legs, still inside of her, still warm and large, although much less solid.
Any second now he was going to lift his head and she was going to have to look into his eyes and say … what? She would have to say something. Maybe See? I told you it got hot in here.
But, God, that would make her sound as if she did this a lot-had sex with a near stranger at the drop of a hat, or the drop of a zipper, as it were.
She could say If that was day one, day five could darn well kill us both, but that presupposed that he’d told her the truth, that the BS he’d laid on her about being her “boyfriend” for two weeks—yeah, right—wasn’t merely just part of his attempt to get her to have sex with him tonight and only tonight.
But he didn’t lift his head, and he still didn’t lift his head, and Jenn realized with a sudden jolt of shock that his ragged breathing wasn’t stopping. That…
He was …
Actually …
Crying?
And suddenly it wasn’t so hard to figure out what to say. “Are you all right?” she asked.
And suddenly she wasn’t the one who was mortified—he was.
“Oh, shit,” he said. “I’m sorry, I just… I …”
He rolled off of her, rolled away, pulling out and leaving her scrambling to push her skirt back down as she fought her way free from the cushions so she could sit up next to him there on the edge of the sofa, where he was now perching.
He’d turned away from her just a little—just enough to hide his face. But it was more than obvious that he was wiping his eyes with the heels of his big hands.
She touched his shoulder, solid beneath the soft cotton of the T-shirt that she’d never managed to get off of him, much to her disappointment at the time. Now, she was enormously glad that he still had it on. “Dan …”
He laughed a mix of his disgust and disbelief, glancing at her with eyes that, yes, were rimmed with red. “Jesus Christ,” he said. “You must think … I’m some kind of…”
“No,” she said, running her hand down his broad back, as if he were one of her six-year-old nephews who’d just gotten teased by the fifth graders on the school bus. She could hear her cell phone buzzing at the bottom of her purse, but whoever was calling—her mother, one of her brothers, even Maria—could just leave a message. Now was not the time to go scrambling for her phone.
“I just, um …” Dan looked down at his hands, at his open right palm as he sat with his elbows on his knees, his pants pulled back up but still loose and unfastened around his ridiculously trim waist.
As Jenn watched and waited, he traced his own unbroken fate line with his thumb. “I don’t get why I’m alive and …” He turned to look at her, letting her see that, again, there were tears in his eyes.
And okay, he was gorgeous when he was smiling and laughing, he was hot as hell when he was reading her palm and attempting to seduce her. But with those midnight eyes brimming with that heartfelt emotion, he was human, and that made him even more beautiful.
It made him … real.
And it took her breath away.
“I was right next to him,” Dan told her haltingly. “This kid, he was maybe nineteen, twenty tops. Private Edmund Williams. His friends called him Eddie. And I’m the SEAL, you know. So Williams and his Marine buddies are trying to impress me by taking me to this restaurant where the food is so spicy your eyes water for three days after eating it. It was my idea to go. I love eating the local food, and the way they were talking about it… It was supposed to be safe, in the part of town where they like Americans but…”
He looked away from her, down at the floor, but his eyes were out of focus and she knew he was thousands of miles away, in the dust and heat of some ancient, poverty-stricken city on the other side of the world. Her phone was ringing again, and she reached out with her foot and kicked her bag farther away from her. If it was Maria, she’d call on the landline. And if it was the Troubleshooters team, they’d call Dan directly.
Her family could wait.
“I don’t remember the explosion,” he was saying as he shook his head. “I don’t remember very much about the entire incident at all. I know from the report that it was an insurgents’ munitions dump, hidden in a school basement.” He looked at her again. “Can you imagine that? In a fucking elementary school? That’s where they kept their stockpile of rockets and grenades and even dynamite.”
“God,” she said, because she could not imagine that.
“It was a block away,” he continued. “If we were closer, we would have been vaporized. As it was, shrapnel went everywhere, and the entire squad of Marines was hit—everyone except me. But Eddie, who was right next to me, right next to me—he’s hit in the throat, and he’s down and … His friends are all looking at me like I’m Jesus, like I can save him because I’m a fucking SEAL. God, I do remember flashes of that. I can’t goddamn forget it. … But there’s no corpsman, no medevac team in the world that can get him to a surgical station quickly enough to keep him from bleeding to death.”
He looked at her again, wiping his eyes again before his tears fell. “At least that’s what I read in the report. I don’t remember much of it, but I apparently carried him all the way back to the hospital on the base and tried to beat the crap out of the triage corps-man who told me it was too late. That Eddie was already gone.”
“Oh, Dan, I’m so sorry.” Jenn’s heart was in her throat, and she had to wipe away the tears that had welled in her own eyes, but she didn’t stop touching him, her hand now in the softness of his hair at the nape of his neck.
He was back to looking at his hands. “I can’t stop thinking about it. He was three inches away from me, and the shrapnel hit him. Three inches, and he’s the one in the body bag. I’m three inches to the left of him, and I’m the one who walks away without a scratch. I mean, yeah, I got tossed around and they think I must’ve hit my head pretty hard, because I blacked out but… I’m the one who gets to keep breathing, to come here to New York, to meet you”—he glanced at her again—“and yeah. To make love like that. It’s been a while since I’ve … been with anyone and … It was unbelievably great and …” He laughed, running both hands down his face. “Jesus, maybe now I’m embarrassing myself even more because you didn’t think so—”
“No,” she said. “It was great. It was. It was incredible.”
“Yeah?” he asked, and this time when he turned to look at her, he didn’t look away. He held her gaze with eyes that were softly uncertain, as if he didn’t dare believe her. At least not completely. But he reached over and took her hand, bringing it to his mouth, to kiss her knuckles, her palm, her wrist …
Oh, God. His lips were so soft. “It’s been a while for me, too,” she admitted. “A long while. So it wouldn’t take much to rate two solid thumbs up. But that was truly inspiring.” She laughed even as she felt herself blush. “I wonder what my downstairs neighbor thinks. She opens her door and glares at me when I make too much noise getting my mail.”
He smiled, a boyish mix of relief, amusement, and pride. “Yeah, I thought we might actually put this couch through the floor. Damn, woman …”
“Okay, so I guess I know what Mrs. Harrison thinks.” She rolled her eyes.
But now he was looking at her like he maybe wanted to try it again—putting the couch through the floor—and she was the one who had to look away. “But I do wonder what you think,” she said softly. “I’ve never done anything like this, not with anyone. Of course, that’s probably what I’d say even if I did it all the time, right?”
“Jenni, don’t worry. I believe you, completely,” he said. “Although, really, if you did … ? So what, you know? Women are
allowed to have fun, too.”
“Yeah, and what planet are you from?” she asked.
“Haven’t you watched Sex and the City?”
“Of course,” she deadpanned. “Can’t you tell? I’m so obviously into expensive shoes and designer handbags.”
Dan smiled. “I’ll take that as a no.”
“It’s a hell no,” she said. “I mean, I’ve seen a few episodes, and it’s funny enough, and well-acted, but excuse me, the women are all beautiful. Even the one who’s supposed to be plain is drop-dead gorgeous.”
“Which one is supposed to be plain?” he asked.
“See?” she said. “It’s a fantasy, totally. But it’s not mine. It’s not one I can relate to.”
“I think they’re all supposed to be hot,” he said.
“Great,” Jenn said. “I think I’ll invest a hundred hours watching extremely beautiful women floundering around, making messes of their lives, and then I’ll go buy twenty cats and never leave my apartment again.”
“So what is your fantasy?” he asked. “The West Wing?”
She did have the box set of that, and he’d apparently spent some time looking at her bookshelves.
So she answered him honestly. “Yes. I want Maria in the White House. Obviously, it’s not going to happen tomorrow, but in fifteen or twenty years … ?”
“I’ll be a senior chief by then,” he said. “If I stay in the Navy. If I’m—”
He broke off, and she knew what he was thinking. If I’m still alive. If, next time, I’m not the one standing three inches to the left. …
But he forced a smile, and then he leaned forward and kissed her.
It was such a sweet kiss, so different from the way he’d kissed her before.
And when he straightened up to look into her eyes, that uncertainty was back.
“I’m a mess, Jenn,” he said quietly. “I’ve got so much noise in my head, so much crap to sort through. But all I want, right now, more than anything, is to make love to you again. On your bed this time, so I can fall asleep after, with you in my arms. But…”
Her heart lurched, the way she’d heard it described in romance novels. She’d always rolled her eyes at the description. As if a heart could actually lurch.
But she was wrong, and all those writers were right.
He had more to say, and she waited, watching as the muscles jumped in the side of his jaw, as he struggled to find the words.
“I have these … nightmares,” he finally admitted, “that I haven’t been able to shake, and—”
“It’s all right,” she interrupted him. This time she leaned in to kiss him. “Just wake me if you have a bad dream, okay?”
“That’s not what you signed on for,” he said.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “I don’t remember the part where I signed anything.”
“Yeah, thanks, Ms. Literal, but you know what I mean. This is supposed to be two weeks of fun. It’s not going to be fun for you if—”
“Oh, it’ll be plenty fun,” Jenn said, more than half amazed at the words coming out of her mouth. A few short minutes ago, she’d been convinced that his talk of two weeks was just that—talk. She’d been certain that he only wanted what she’d already given him, so he was going to fade away into the night.
But now? She believed him, too.
She believed him and she liked him—this beautiful, sad, funny, damaged yet so-courageous man. And even though she knew that two weeks was nothing, that it was a heartbeat of a relationship that would be over too soon, she didn’t care. She wanted him to stay with her for every second of the precious time that he had, before he had to go back to that horrible, dangerous world where standing three random inches to the left meant the difference between living and dying.
She kissed him again, and with a confidence that would have astonished her had she been watching this play out from afar, she reached down into his still unfastened pants to find him and wrap her fingers around him.
Because he’d said it himself—that he wanted, more than anything, to make love to her again.
“Oh, yeah, I like that,” he breathed into her mouth, as his body confirmed his words.
“Good,” Jenn said. “Help me get this bed opened up, and we’ll give Mrs. Harrison downstairs something to really complain about.”
CHAPTER
TEN
Maria wasn’t used to cloak and dagger. She also wasn’t used to not having the final say.
“Ma’am,” Alyssa said, gently but firmly. “It’s important we don’t talk about this here, but I will explain when we get where we’re going.”
“How about you tell me what’s going on in the cab?” Maria suggested.
“Fair enough,” Alyssa conceded, even though they weren’t taking a cab. They were being met, at the service entrance of this building, by several cars from the FBI. But she didn’t want to tell Maria that. Not here, where it was entirely possible the killer was listening in. “Pack only what you need for tonight and for the morning. Our team will be available to come back here and pick up anything else you might need, but we must get out of here. Now. Without any further discussion.”
The assemblywoman was a few years younger than Alyssa, but she hadn’t gotten to where she was by being a fool. She knew something bad had gone down, and she had about a million questions in her eyes, but she finally nodded.
“I’ll get my bag.” She turned back, though, to ask, “May I bring my laptop?”
“No, ma’am,” Alyssa said. “But we’ll make sure you have access to a computer and to the Internet when we get… where we’re going.”
“What about Jenn?”
“She’ll meet us over there.” Alyssa prayed that that wasn’t a lie. Sam hadn’t been able to reach Danny or Jenn, and had sent Izzy and Lopez out to kick down her apartment door, if need be.
Someone capable of kidnapping and killing Margaret Thorn -dyke could damn well target Maria’s chief of staff next.
But Maria nodded—she wanted to believe Alyssa—and vanished into her bedroom.
Sam, meanwhile, was bundling Ashton into his cold-weather-wear, the hood of which had little mouse ears. Despite the awful news, it was hard for Alyssa not to smile at Ash, especially when the baby, perpetually cheerful, delivered up one of his silly, drooly smiles. And especially when Sam smiled back at him, talking to him the whole time he dressed him.
“You know I’m gonna take a picture of you in this thing. And when you’re thirteen and permanently mortified, I’m gonna post it on your facebook page.” He glanced up as if he knew Alyssa were watching, and told her, “Tony just called. He’s two minutes away. When he gets here, we’ll go. I’ve got all of Ash’s gear. When we get where we’re going”—a location that only Sam and Jules knew—“I’m going to recommend that we call a time-out. Just a short one,” he added when she started shaking her head no, “We don’t want you wrecking another shirt.”
“Too late,” she told him. “Besides we don’t have time for even a short break.”
“Tough sh … sugar.” He made a face at Ash. “Daddy almost said a bad word.” He looked back at Alyssa. “We’ll make time. While we’re waiting for … you know who to arrive.”
Alyssa glanced at her watch. Jules’s ETA wasn’t for another few hours.
“There’s plenty for the team to do between now and then,” Sam said, somewhat cryptically. She knew he was talking about getting hold of an electronic surveillance device and doing a sweep of this apartment, as well as Jenn’s place and the office.
Maybe there was time for a break, of sorts.
Sam knew that Alyssa didn’t like breast-feeding Ash in public. Not because there was anything wrong with it, but because she felt it undermined her authority as team leader. Particularly when her team consisted of several extremely immature Navy SEALs.
It was tough enough, being a woman in charge of a truckload of testosterone, without rubbing their faces in the fact that she was female by feeding her baby in fr
ont of them.
She’d tried the discreet blanket thing, but Ash was a grabber, prone not just to exposing her to the world, but to waving the blanket gleefully in the air and drawing everyone’s attention.
Maria came back out of her bedroom, rolling an airline-carry-on-sized bag behind her. She’d changed out of her yoga pants and sweatshirt, and into standard Manhattan-wear: black pants, black blouse, black jacket, black high-heeled boots.
It was the kind of outfit Alyssa would’ve worn to a meeting at the White House, and Maria had put it on, along with makeup, just in case someone spotted her during the fifteen seconds they were going to be out in public.
What a life she’d chosen for herself.
Although she probably thought the exact same thing about Alyssa.
Sam’s phone beeped and he answered it, relaying to Alyssa, “Tony’s here.”
Alyssa reached into her jacket and drew her sidearm from the holster she’d stopped to put on after that phone call from Jules. She didn’t mind so much being seen without makeup or underdressed, but getting caught unarmed—that was a potential career killer.
In fact, it was a potential killer, period.
She’d gone into Savannah’s little apartment and picked up the suitcase with which the TS Inc team always traveled—even on a so-called low-key assignment such as this one. It contained a wide variety of weaponry, including a small amount of that old SEAL favorite, C4 explosives. A Navy SEAL could use it not just for big explosions, but for little ones, too. Like, to open a locked door, fast. So it was, and would continue to be, a staple in the Troubleshooters equipment locker.
She hefted the bag now, setting it on the floor by the door, which she knocked upon twice.
Tony knocked back, also twice, from out in the corridor, and she unfastened the variety of bolts and nightlocks.
He was dressed up, shivering slightly. He probably didn’t have an overcoat, just a utilitarian cold-weather jacket that wouldn’t have worked with the nicely tailored suit and tie he was wearing. He’d fixed his hair differently, too. It was gelled to be artfully messed, and he looked adorable.
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