Breakpoint

by Ross, JoAnn

  Besides, as Dallas had said with a wicked wink, they’d be able to take a shower once they got to their room.

  It was the wink that had gotten to her. And had her thinking of exactly what they’d be doing in that shower.

  “You didn’t use the THOR credit card,” she said as the old-fashioned gilt cage elevator cranked its way up to their floor.

  “That’s because it’s mainly for business. Granted, using it in Hawaii was stretching the rules, but we needed a private place to interview that ensign.”

  “Who you had no idea was going to show up.”

  “True. But we did, after all, crack the crime there,” he reminded her.

  “This is business. We’re waiting for the ship.”

  “We could wait for the ship in a Motel 6,” he said. “And yeah, we might be talking about some gray areas, but there’s one thing I want to be perfectly clear about,” he said as he carried their bags into the room. “This is not business.” He put the bags on the floor, hung the Do Not Disturb sign on the door, closed it, and drew her into his arms. “It’s absolutely, strictly, one hundred percent personal.”

  The bathroom was as luxurious as the rest of the hotel. After spending a long time driving each other crazy beneath the warm streams of water, they finally made it to the antique Victorian bed.

  He was about to open the condom package when she caught hold of his wrist.

  “That’s not necessary,” she said.

  He paused as her words lingered in air perfumed by salt and the tropical flowers blooming outside their balcony doors.

  Okay, so maybe he was being overly cautious, using a condom while she was on the pill. But Dallas had always sworn that he’d never behave as irresponsibly as his biological father. Which was why he’d never—not once—ever had sex without insisting on protecting his partner.

  “You sure you’re not just still coming off the high from your sister having those babies?”

  “Positive.” She lifted her hand to his cheek. “I’m not saying I’m hoping to make a baby, here and now. In fact, the odds are really, really against that. But being with you, in this way, feels so right and natural and wonderful, if anything did happen, well”—she shrugged her bare shoulders—“I can’t think of anything I’d rather do than create a new life with you.”

  He blew out a breath. Tossed the foil pack onto the bedside table.

  “You humble me,” he said as they knelt together on the center of the bed.

  Her smile touched her eyes. “That’s sweet.” She skimmed her palm down his neck, over his shoulders, then down his chest. And beyond. “But right now, it’s the least I want to do to you.”

  He caught her long, clever fingers as they curled around him.

  “Sweetheart, as good as that feels—and I gotta tell you, it feels flat-out fantastic—if I let you keep it up, we’re going to achieve blastoff.”

  He leaned her back. Then stretched out beside her.

  Outside, the tide continued to ebb and flow, breaking into sparkling foam as it washed upon the sand.

  Inside, time spun out, then seemed suspended as Dallas seduced her solely with his mouth.

  He touched his tongue to the hollow of Juls’s throat and felt her pulse hammer hot and fast.

  When his lips closed around the puckered tip of her breast and tugged, she gasped.

  His mouth moved on, scattering hot kisses over her stomach, the inside of her thigh, the back of her knees. She cried out when his teeth nibbled at the ultrasensi tive tendon that he’d discovered during that stolen time in the Royal Hawaiian. Then he moved down her legs, tormenting each one in turn, to her ankles.

  She moaned his name, arching her back as her head tossed on the pillow.

  Parting the hot, slick folds between her thighs, he brought his mouth down on her. She tasted tangy and potent, like a salt-rimmed margarita on a hot summer day. Like sex and heat and, best of all, like Juls.

  “I want you, Dallas.” She reached for him. “I need you. Because I’m about to go crazy.”

  Once again, their minds were in perfect sync. Battered by tides of sensation, he knelt between her quivering thighs.

  “You’re mine.” Dallas had never spoken truer words.

  He lowered his body over her.

  Torso to torso.

  Thighs to thighs.

  Hot, damp flesh over hot, damp flesh.

  “Yours,” she echoed on a ragged, shaky breath.

  His eyes locked on hers.

  Watching.

  Waiting.

  Dallas had never considered himself a possessive man. But, overcome with a sudden need to claim her, he said, “Forever.”

  Her eyes, which were glazed with passion, widened. Then they softened, giving him her answer.

  She couldn’t speak. But her lips formed the single word he needed to hear.

  Yes.

  Then, drawing in a deep breath, she repeated it out loud. “Yes.” Again. “Yes.”

  She was laughing and crying, and the most incredible thing was, he felt like doing exactly the same thing.

  With his eyes still open, still on hers, he plunged into her with one strong, deep stroke.

  Her body arched, absorbing the sudden surge of male strength.

  Dallas viewed Juls’s pleasure, experiencing a surge of satisfaction that he’d been the one to put it there.

  Then she locked her long legs around his hips. He felt every ripple in her body as she closed around him like a tight, hot fist.

  And he was lost.

  Epilogue

  Six months later

  After her flaming temper tantrum, Mother Nature turned benevolent. The air over San Diego had been scrubbed clean, the rolling hills—the grass regenerated by the fires—had regained their color, and the deciduous trees were wearing new spring-bright green leaves.

  The depression and anxiety caused by the Santa Anas had been replaced with feelings of anticipation and optimism.

  And nowhere was that more the case than in the three-bedroom condo overlooking the two-mile beach known locally as the Strand.

  Except for those few comfortable years living with his adopted parents in Texas’s oil patch, Dallas’s life had taken more twists and turns than the old wooden roller coaster he could see from the condo’s balcony.

  But even though he loved the O’Hallorans, had been grateful for their taking him in and giving him their name, never had he felt at home as much as he did here.

  It wasn’t the place, he knew, but the woman sitting beside him, her bare feet—tipped by peach-polished toes he had every intention of sucking before the night was over—perched up on the balcony railing.

  “It still seems like a dream,” she murmured, taking a sip of wine as they waited for the daily show of the sun setting into the sea.

  She didn’t have to explain what she meant.

  Their minds, which had been so linked from the beginning, were even more so six months after what some might have called their impetuous marriage.

  But they both knew, firsthand, how preciously short life could be, and hadn’t wanted to miss a moment of being together.

  “More a nightmare.” He reached out and took hold of her hand, his thumb playing over the diamond. She’d insisted she hadn’t needed an engagement ring. He’d discovered that, despite his years playing Spec Ops cowboy, deep down inside he was more traditional than he ever could have imagined. “But I’m not going to complain, since when I woke up, you were beside me.”

  “Forever,” she echoed what he’d insisted when they’d made love at the del Coronado. “I’ve tried to put it out of my mind, but sometimes I still try to figure out what Wright was thinking, having Merry taken hostage like that.”

  “He wasn’t thinking. The guy—and his little group of hangers-on—had put all their chips on Ramsey. He was their future, and when he screwed it up by getting the lieutenant pregnant, Wright, who was usually a super strategizor, panicked and went into major DEFCON mode. Then things got out
of control, and in the end, the only thing he could think to do was to either try to barter us into keeping silent—”

  “He would’ve had us killed, whatever. Merry was merely the lure to get us out there alone.”

  “Yeah. I suspect so.”

  “It’s also amazing how many women have come forward who were coerced into affairs with Ramsey.”

  Dallas could tell that was one of the revelations that had bothered her the most. She’d spent years prosecuting sailors for bad behavior. She hated the idea that anyone could’ve abused her precious Uniform Code of Military Justice for so long.

  “Rank has its privileges.”

  “I don’t believe Ramsey really didn’t know what his CDO was up to.”

  “He didn’t exactly look shocked when we showed up with the FBI and military police to arrest Wright and him when they got off the carrier,” he reminded her. “The deal was, he didn’t want to know.”

  “Ah . . . The wonderful excuse of deniability.” She shook her head. “Okay. This is it. The last time we’re going to talk about it.”

  “Works for me.” Dallas couldn’t think of anything Juls could ask for that he wouldn’t give her.

  They sat in a comfortable silence for a time, drinking in the sights. A parade of beachgoers were walking, skating, and biking on the narrow concrete boardwalk, providing constant entertainment.

  As he watched a guy in baggy Hawaiian-print Jams walking a golden retriever along the ruffled, foamy edge of water where the surf met the sand, Dallas felt every bit as relaxed, as carefree as both man and dog looked.

  They’d chosen this place mostly because his wife had wanted to be close to her sister. And to play Auntie Julianne to the twins, whom Merry had insisted on naming Dallas and Juls. Although born nearly a month premature, the babies had already caught up on the weight charts, and had their big, tough Marine dad twisted around their tiny, pink, dimpled fingers.

  Having not had anything resembling a home for the past thirteen years, Dallas would’ve been willing to move to Timbuktu, if that was where his Juls was. But this was turning out to be a perfect decision.

  A former ATF special agent, who lived up on the North Coast and had established a California branch of Phoenix Team, had been looking to set up a southern office. He’d jumped at the chance to have both Juls and Dallas be his first hires.

  Better yet, Phoenix Team had been able to promise them what the government couldn’t ensure: that they’d always be able to work together.

  The guy threw a stick into the surf for the dog, who bounded into the water after it, then returned, tail wagging wildly, enthusiastically waiting for the next toss.

  The next adventure. And couldn’t Dallas identify with that?

  Although Juls hadn’t gotten pregnant yet—not for any lack of opportunity—they’d sprung for the larger unit that gave them a bedroom, office, and that third room that the real estate agent had assured them would make a “darling nursery.”

  Meanwhile, they were enjoying this special time alone together. Just the two of them.

  And speaking of being alone . . .

  “I know that grin,” she accused as the sun sank into the sea, turning the water to flame. “That’s your ‘I want to get you naked’ look.”

  “I always want to get you naked,” he said truthfully.

  Before she could respond to that, a blinding green flash appeared just above the ball of flame, hovering for a good three seconds before disappearing.

  “I’ve heard of a green flash, even seen pictures, but that’s the first time I’ve ever seen it,” she breathed.

  “Me, too. Then again, there’s always a first time for everything. Which is what I was thinking just before the flash. Along with getting you naked.”

  “And that would be?”

  “That I’ve always been an adrenaline junky. Looking for the next great adventure.”

  “Why don’t you tell me something I don’t know?” Her teasing smile was dazzling, rivaling the brilliance of the sunset.

  “But you know what I’ve just decided?”

  He took the wine glass from her hand, put it on the table between them, stood up, and wagged a finger.

  “What’s that?” She took her feet off the balcony, stood up as well, and laughed as he swept her off her feet.

  “That being in love with you is turning out to be the greatest adventure of all.”

  The stunningly cool idea now shared, Dallas carried his wife into the condo.

  Where he had every intention of getting her naked.

  Read on for a sneak peek at

  JoAnn Ross’s

  RICOCHET

  Available soon from Signet

  A full moon floated over the bayou, creating silver ribbons of light and deep purple shadows that appeared to hang from the ancient cypress trees like Spanish moss as Sax Douchett poled the flat-bottomed pirogue through acres of blooming hyacinths that would have been im passible with a motorized boat.

  To outsiders, south Louisiana might appear to be an impenetrable maze of dirt roads and waterways.

  But to Sax it had always been home.

  When he’d been trudging through the snow up a steep Afghan mountainside with bad guys blasting away at him and his SEAL teammates, thoughts of Bayou Elysian had kept him putting one boot in front of another.

  When he’d spent another six days all alone on those desolate peaks, wounded, half out of his mind, and presumed dead, mouthwatering aromas of the jambalaya and crawfish gumbo he intended to fill up on when he got back to the bayou had kept him battling the Taliban assassins sent to finish him off.

  And during that lost time when he’d been held prisoner in an enemy village, memories of sitting out on the screened-in gallerie, sweat dripping from an icy bottle of Dixie in his hand, while listening to the rain on the tin roof had kept him sane.

  “Pretty ironic, eh, Chère?” he asked his companion. “Ending up back in a place named for where fallen heroes spend the afterlife, me.”

  Although everyone in town might have insisted on elevating him onto some gleaming marble pedestal, if there was one thing Sax knew he wasn’t, it was a hero.

  Just happy to be along for the boat ride, the wolf-hound mix he’d named Velcro answered with an enthusiastic thumping of her thick black tail.

  But, hero or not, after a few frustrating weeks held prisoner again—this time in Bethesda Naval Hospital—like Odysseus, he’d finally made his way home. Physically healthy and, well, mostly sane.

  And determined to put war behind him and get on with his life. Which was turning out to be a lot easier said than done. Especially with this weekend’s Welcome Home parade the town council and local VFW chapter had planned.

  “Maybe I’ll get to kiss me a beauty queen,” he said, trying to find something positive about the experience he knew would mean a lot to his parents. Which was the only reason he’d agree to go along with a celebration that, if reports were true, and he feared they were, was threatening to outdo Mardi Gras. “That might be cool.”

  It had been an age since Sax had kissed any woman. Let alone a current Miss Bayou Elysian, who’d been crowned during a Fat Tuesday he’d unfortunately had to miss. Being that he’d been tied up. Literally.

  In full agreement, as always, Velcro woofed; her sharp bark startled a heron, causing it to take to the sky above the gum and cypress trees with a flurry of wide blue wings.

  The house he’d grown up in had taken a hit by Ka trina, then given a knockout blow when Rita had come barreling through. When the second hurricane also lev eled Zydeco, his parent’s restaurant and dance hall, Acadia and Lucien Douchett had thrown in the towel and retired. Sort of. Currently they were running a bait shop on the bayou and seemed content with how things had turned out. Mostly, Sax thought, because they were so content with each other.

  However, like all Cajuns, they were proud and stubborn. It had taken every ounce of Sax’s considerable powers of persuasion to talk them into accepting the money to bu
ild a new house.

  Meanwhile, he’d moved into the Douchett family fishing camp, and although he was still toying with the idea, the thought of rebuilding Zydeco was growing more and more appealing. Since there wasn’t much opportunity to go shopping in the places the military sent SEALs, he’d accumulated a nice enough bank account during his years in the Navy.

  And God knows there were a lot of people in Bayou Elysian who could use the work. Along with the opportunity to eat themselves a good meal, kick up their heels, and have some fun, which seemed to be in short supply these days.

  He was still thinking about that as he pulled up to the floating dock and tied the piroque to a wooden post. The dog, moving damn fast for an animal with only three legs, took off like a shot through the woods, probably after a coon or maybe a nutria. One thing he didn’t have to worry about was her chasing after the gators which could often be found sunning themselves on the front yard, given that she’d lost that front leg in a too-close encounter with an alligator on Bayou Teche.

  The camp—a two-bedroom cabin with a gallerie and deep sloping tin roof surrounded by ancient oaks, willow, and palmetto trees—had been built on a piece of raised dry ground surrounded by white shells that glistened like pearls in the moonlight.

  In the distance, heat lightening flashed, turning the wind-capped waters of the Gulf a shimmering neon green.

  Sax was on his way into the cabin when Velcro, who never ventured far away, came racing back with what appeared to be a bleached-out piece of tree limb in her mouth.

  She dropped it at his feet and began wiggling her fuzzy black butt, her canine way of letting him know it was now time to play fetch. Having nothing vital to do at the moment, Sax put the bag of groceries down on a wooden table his great-grandfather had built from logs milled on this property and bent to pick it up.

  Then paused.

  “Hell,” he muttered.