Blue Forever (Men in Uniform)

by Bruhns, Nina

  She took a deep breath. “But you’re wrong. I’m not against marriage.” She tore her gaze away from his, looked down at her dusty shoes, and admitted, “I’d really like to get married. Someday.”

  He was silent for several long moments. “Okay. So, just not to me.” It wasn’t a question. “Why? What’s wrong with me?”

  He was like that darn dog and the stick. Always coming back to that. Maybe his ego was more fragile than colossal.

  “Kip, believe me, it’s not you, it’s—”

  “Oh, God, spare me the it’s-not-you-it’s-me speech,” he said impatiently. “What’s the real, no-bullshit, no psycho-babble reason?”

  He actually sounded upset. Why, she couldn’t fathom. He’d just told her he had no interest in a real relationship with her! But if he wanted a straight answer, she’d give him one. Not that he’d accept it.

  “Because,” she said, “you’re a Marine.”

  He snorted. Then he saw that she was serious. His face went stony. “I asked you that once before. You denied having a problem with the Marines.”

  “No, I denied having a problem with you.”

  His eyes narrowed to slits. “All right, then. Spill it. What’s so terrible about the Marines?”

  “The Marines? Not a thing. Men in the Marines?” She battled back a flood of emotions. Mostly bad ones. “Plenty.”

  She did not want to talk about this with him. With anyone, really. She whirled, and started marching through the underbrush. “When are we going to get to the trail again? Is this even the right direction?”

  He was in front of her, blocking her path, before she could draw a breath.

  “Okay, so what have you got against men in the Marines?” he said between his teeth. “Because I sure as hell didn’t notice any aversion on your part last night.”

  “I do not want to talk about it.”

  “Well, I do! Is it because we’re too low class for you? Is that it? A wealthy socialite FSO is too good for the likes of us lowly grunts? Except to fuck, of course. We’re good enough for that.”

  Her face burned with indignation. “Kip, move aside.”

  “No.”

  “I mean it. I don’t want to talk about this.”

  He leaned way down into her personal space. “And I don’t give a flying shit what you want. Answer the goddamn question!”

  His words, his tone, even his posture, were all sickeningly familiar. She swallowed down the bile and drew a sharp breath.

  “And that”—she poked her finger into his chest hard enough to push him back—“is exactly what I have against Marine men. You are nasty, violent”—she poked again—“arrogant thrill seekers”—another poke—“who just can’t wait for the next battle, so you’re always picking fights”—poke—“and you lie—”

  “DeAnne, what the—”

  An even harder poke. “And you cheat on your wife”—poke—“and you desert your kids.” She gave him one last, big, five-finger poke that was more like a shove. “All you Marines do is hurt the people you’re supposed to love and take care of.” Her voice cracked when she finished with, “And that’s what I have against men who are Marines!”

  Kip gaped down at her, stunned speechless.

  To her horror, she realized there were tears streaming down her face. “Damn it,” she muttered, and swiped them off. She whirled away from him and started running blindly.

  Immediately, she felt his hands on her shoulders from behind, pulling her to a gentle halt. “Sweetheart, stop. You’re heading right into the bushes.”

  She swiped at her face again, which was just as wet this time, and shuddered out a mortified sob. “Told you I had issues.”

  He didn’t try to turn her, just tugged her gently back against his chest and put his arms around her from behind. He pushed out a long breath, stirring her hair.

  “Your husband?”

  Had she been so transparent? Well, duh.

  “No. Father.”

  He grunted. “Bastard.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You understand, not all Marines are like that.”

  Tears continued to leak out, and she sniffed them away. “In my head, yes. My heart, not so much.”

  He made a noise low in his throat. “Well. That explains a lot.”

  She couldn’t believe she’d just tossed her emotional cookies all over him. She had to get hold of herself. This was not his problem.

  She hiccoughed. “And for the record, I’m not a wealthy socialite. I was raised by a mom who had to work two jobs just to pay the rent.”

  His breath stirred her hair again. “Sorry. I made assumptions based on your appearance. Stupid of me.”

  She thought about that. She’d worked so hard all her life to project that false image of herself—to appear privileged, sophisticated, well-educated. And had worked even harder to achieve it in reality. So she wouldn’t be tainted in people’s minds by her crummy past. Funny, she’d never considered that image might be doing the opposite with some people—driving them away from her. Isolating her. Was that why she always felt alone?

  Maybe it was time to downgrade the picture a little.

  “It’s true about the fucking, though,” she said, shocking them both. “You are good at that.”

  After a wry cough, he asked, “You talking about me, or Marines in general?”

  “You,” she whispered, her cheeks flaming. She turned in his embrace, putting her arms around him and burying her face against his chest. “I’m sorry I’m such a mess. You don’t need this right now.”

  He laid his cheek on the top of her head. “Sounds like you’ve had a rough go. That sucks.”

  “Good thing you’re getting rid of me today once we reach Sanya, huh?”

  She felt his lips brush her hair. “Not how I look at it. DeAnne, I meant what I said about seeing you later, in the States.”

  What could she say to that? Every warning bell in her head was going off.

  And yet, she was torn. She really had loved sleeping with him. And he did seem different from her father, for the most part. But . . .

  “Kip, just because my issues are out in the open doesn’t mean they went away. And we haven’t even started talking about yours.” She held up a hand. “Not that I want to. The point is, why start something we both know isn’t going anywhere?”

  He kissed her hair. “Why does it have to go anywhere? It’s nice right where it is.”

  “We’re back to the great, no-strings sex, aren’t we.” But this time there was no heat in the accusation. Not the angry kind, anyway.

  She felt his smile against her temple. “Maybe.”

  “You are such a m—”

  “Watch it.”

  “Man.”

  “Hmm. I seem to recall you liking that part about me . . .”

  She smiled against his chest. “Maybe.”

  They fell silent, and for a few minutes just stood there under a canopy of sweet-fragrant white blossoms in an orchard in China, holding each other. So much potential; so little future.

  But no matter what happened, she knew she would remember this moment for the rest of her life.

  “Anyway,” he said at length, “who knows if I’ll even make it off this island. I could be spending the next twenty, thirty years in a Chinese prison. Dating may be a moot point.”

  She knew it was a very real possibility. The Chinese didn’t take kindly to spies. But she just couldn’t allow herself to think of him locked away in one of those awful places.

  “Don’t say that. You’ll make it back to the States.”

  “Tell you what. If I do, promise me one date. We can both make up our minds then.”

  She swallowed. It seemed a small concession. An added incentive for both of them to make it out of here. “One date?”

  “Dinn
er and a movie.” He bent to whisper in her ear. “And breakfast. What do you say?”

  But before she even had a chance to think about her answer, they suddenly heard shouts in the distance. Male voices, harsh and excited. And a dog barking.

  She and Kip jerked apart, their eyes meeting in alarm.

  “Damn it to hell,” he ground out. “I knew that dog was trouble.”

  “But how could it—?”

  “Doesn’t matter. They found us.”

  “What’ll we do?”

  He grabbed her hand. “I vote for run like hell.”

  17

  Kip and DeAnne ran through the forest for nearly a mile, dodging trees and doing their best not to leave a visible trail. All the while Kip could hear the shouts behind them. The good news was, it wasn’t the PLA guys in Jeeps, and no guns were blasting. Yet, anyway. Their pursuers were on foot and didn’t seem to be getting any closer. The bad news was they weren’t losing them, either. And Kip could hear their pal the dog bellowing in the lead.

  Shit.

  He scoured his memory of the map for a possible route to escape. They were heading down to the more populated jungle lowlands where they would find roads and villages with structures where they could hide, scattered among the orchards and fields. That held promise. But they had to throw that damn dog off their scent first.

  “Kip, I can’t run much farther,” DeAnne gasped between ragged pants of breath.

  “There,” he said, pointing to a place up ahead where the terrain dipped and he could hear the faint sound of water tumbling over cobbles. “Make for the stream. We need to lose the dog.”

  It could work. Maybe. Or at least give them a little more lead time. Hopefully their pursuers were simple farmers who didn’t do a lot of hunting. Or watch TV.

  They sprinted to the edge of the stream and DeAnne halted, sucking in lungfuls of air. Kip whipped his rucksack around to his front and turned his back to her, bending his knees. “Climb up, piggyback.”

  “No, I can—”

  “The bottom is treacherous. It’ll go faster this way.”

  She hesitated a moment, then did as he asked. She was still breathing heavily, and her hands were shaking, but she managed to grab his shoulders and he boosted her up, grabbing her around the legs.

  Their pursuers would most likely expect them to go downstream toward the coast and Sanya, so he turned upstream instead. He’d backtrack just far enough to shake them.

  “Hang on.”

  He plunged into the water. It wasn’t too deep, but the bottom was all smooth and slippery river cobbles. He was wearing his combat boots, so the treads helped keep him upright as he picked his way upstream as fast as he dared.

  “I’m holding you back,” DeAnne said when her breathing slowed enough to speak. “You should leave me here. I can distract—”

  “Hell, no,” he said gruffly. “I’m not leaving you anywhere.”

  “I’ll be fine. It’s not the PLA, and these people don’t have guns. I can speak to them and—”

  “No.”

  “I don’t want you to get caught.”

  “Me, neither. But no.”

  She stopped talking when he hit a stretch of sandy bottom and picked up speed, jogging as fast as he could manage through the water. He could still hear their pursuers, but they’d halted, and the sounds of a heated discussion rang through the trees. The dog was barking nonstop, frustrated. They must have reached the stream.

  He sent up a prayer they’d fall for his simple ruse.

  Sure enough, the shouts turned downstream, getting more and more distant, and eventually the noise of their pursuers ceased.

  Kip let out a breath of relief, and climbed up the bank. Back on dry land, he eased DeAnne down to her feet.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said in consternation as she rearranged herself. “You really didn’t have to—I must weigh a ton.”

  “Nah, I’m used to carrying much heavier packs,” he said easily. He was barely winded. “You’ve obviously never been a Marine.”

  He winced. Damn.

  “No, thank goodness.”

  He grabbed her hand. “Come on. Let’s get moving. We’ve fooled them for a while, but they’ll catch on quick.”

  “How do we get past them?”

  He surveyed the vee of mountains surrounding the small valley, and oriented himself on his mental map. He pointed at a nearby hill. “On the other side we should hit a footpath down to the main road to the coast. It’s more populated over there, though, so we’ll have to be careful.”

  She nodded. “What about checkpoints?”

  “There’s only one left between us and Sanya. We should be able to avoid it if we stick to the smaller paths.”

  They struck out at a fast clip, his waterlogged boots squishing underfoot, and in an hour they were standing on top of the hill. Below them, an undulating checkerboard of fields spread out in the morning sun. As they rested, ate some fruit, and drank water, he got out his camera and took some shots.

  “Wish I had the telephoto lens,” he murmured, taking in the sweeping panorama. “Nothing’s going to show up.”

  She watched him, a mildly puzzled look on her face. When he asked her what she was wondering about, she just shook her head. But he knew what she was thinking. He was used to the reaction.

  “What? Can’t a Marine be artistic?” he asked, aiming the camera at her.

  Her eyes widened in alarm. “Don’t you dare take my photo!” She turned her face and covered it with the water bottle she was holding. “I’m a mess!”

  He grinned, clicking away. “A beautiful mess. I love how you look.”

  She peeked out from behind the bottle, her eyes soft and vulnerable behind a façade of skepticism. “You’re such a liar.”

  He clicked off a series of shots. “Am not.” He reached out and shifted aside a tangle of chestnut curls from her flushed cheek. “Mmm. Like you just got out of bed after a night of making love. Makes me hard just looking at you.”

  He fired off some more shots as she dropped the bottle to her lap, forgotten. “You are so bad,” she murmured in embarrassment, but he could tell she secretly liked it.

  He winked. “Hell, no. Bad would be if I asked you to take off your clothes and let me photograph you naked.”

  She let out a small gasp. “Kip!”

  “Maybe when we’re not running from bad guys,” he said with a mock sigh, and stowed the camera in his rucksack. “Ready?”

  Nodding, she capped the water bottle and slid it into her shoulder bag. As she turned to him, he gathered her in his arms and kissed her.

  It was their first kiss since they’d awakened and had to start the day running for their lives. He made the kiss long and deep, mating their mouths as he’d mated their bodies last night. She melted into him like she belonged there. He liked that. A lot.

  After the long, sensual kiss, she moaned and pulled away. “Kip—”

  “I know. We need to get going. I just had to do that first. It’s been too long since I tasted you.”

  She licked her lips, uncertainty shining in her eyes. “You’re complicating things.”

  He touched the tip of her nose. “No. You are.”

  With that, he turned, hefted his rucksack, and started down the other side of the hill, his lover following on his heels.

  His lover.

  It had a nice ring to it. He liked thinking of DeAnne that way. As his lover. His lover.

  No one else’s. Just his.

  Except that it was, he reminded himself, not true.

  But it could be. She’d already agreed to see him again when they got back stateside. How hard would it be to talk her into being his steady lover? A hot, undemanding relationship they could both enjoy.

  Of course, there was her job to consider. She’d no doubt chang
e her mind about quitting the State Department, so she’d be posted God knew where out in the world. Getting together could be tough.

  And then, there was that whole crazy Marine thing. Not that he was too worried about that part. Her father sounded like a real bastard, but Kip was not a bastard, and he was sure she’d see that pretty quickly.

  It could work.

  Assuming he made it out of this godforsaken country alive.

  Which led him back to thinking about his mission. Ever since Jake had clued him in to its true nature, he’d been getting more and more steamed about the situation. Had Colonel Jackson known Kip was sent in merely as a decoy for the real mission? He didn’t think so. The colonel could be hot-headed, demanding, and severely old-school, but he was a straight-shooter. And he respected his men. He’d never send his troops into battle without all the facts.

  One thing was for damn sure, if Kip ever met up with that navy jerk again, the guy was toast.

  But that would only happen if they could get down to Sanya, and he could find a way off the island.

  “Kip! Slow down!”

  At DeAnne’s winded call, he halted and turned. And realized he’d been double-timing it down the path, leaving her in his dust.

  Whoops.

  “Sorry,” he told her when she caught up.

  “Gathering wool again?” she asked with a little smile.

  “Something like that.” He looked around and saw they were nearly at the foot of the hills, approaching a small village.

  “How much farther?” She wiped a sheen of sweat from her brow.

  He did a quick calculation. “Barring trouble, five or six more hours on foot.”

  Her face fell and she looked as though she wanted to groan, but she didn’t. She just let out a long breath. “Five or six. Okay. But I swear, you better make sure I get a long, hot—”

  Suddenly, he spotted something that put a big smile on his face. “Hello.”

  She broke off, frowned, and glanced around. “What?”

  “That.”

  He indicated the narrow dirt road that wound out from amid the ramshackle buildings. Along its verge, leaning precariously on a rusty kickstand, was an equally dilapidated motorcycle.