One Warm Winter

by Jamie Pope

  He had told her to bring casual clothing and she did, but nothing she owned was appropriate for here. For the middle of a rain forest. The sound of a bird made her look up, take in her surroundings. She was assaulted with color. With vibrant greens and clear blues. And noises too. She shut her eyes for a moment and listened to chirping and buzzing and the unmistakable sound of rushing water in the distance.

  She considered herself well-traveled, but she had mostly been to big metropolitan cities. Beach trips included summers in Maine and Nantucket. As an adult, it had been business trips, educational summits, and conferences.

  She had never been anywhere like this before. She could see why Cullen had made this place his home. Never in a million years did she suspect her silent, black-garbed bodyguard would return to such a lush place like this.

  There was so much she had learned about him in the past few hours. More than she had learned in the year that he had been with her.

  “Excuse me, ma’am. I’m not sure if you realize this, but this is private property. No tourists are allowed over here. We are not renting out bungalows at the moment.”

  A large barrel-chested man appeared from the forest. He was sweaty, with a streak of dirt on one cheek and a short, thick scar on the other. He also had an accent, one that she couldn’t quite place. But he was handsome, with silver hair and very green eyes. Some might even call him dashing.

  She knew immediately that this was another one of Cullen’s family.

  “Hello, I’m not trespassing. Cullen brought me here.” She stood up and extended her hand. “I’m Wyn.”

  “Cullen brought you here?”

  “This morning. We arrived about a half hour ago.”

  The man’s face bloomed into a smile and suddenly he turned from scary to friendly. “I’m Darby.” He grabbed her hand and shook it enthusiastically. “It’s good to meet you. Cullen didn’t tell us he was bringing a girl.”

  “It was a surprise.”

  “What are you doing out here by yourself? Cullen’s back. We’ve got to celebrate.”

  “Celebrate? Right now?” The last thing she felt like doing was celebrating. There was no reason for her to be happy. “I’m sure Cullen will be very glad to see you. I need to take a walk and get some air. It’s very cold in D.C. and I’ve been cooped up inside for days. I just need to be outside for a little while.”

  Darby nodded. “I understand what it’s like to be stuck inside somewhere when you’re itching to get out.” The way he said those words, the way he looked at her, told her that he understood, maybe in a deeper way than most. “Take your time, Miss Wyn. I’m sure I’ll see you later.”

  “Thank you, Darby. It was nice to meet you.”

  He left her alone and she took a deep breath. She told herself to just keep breathing.

  * * *

  Cullen sat at the counter in the kitchen of the community house. Most of the crew had assembled around him. They were all talking over each other, catching up, joking around as if no time had passed. He wanted to enjoy himself like he always did when he was here, sink into the comfort of his friends, but he couldn’t totally focus. His mind was elsewhere. On Wyn, specifically. He wondered if he should go looking for her. He knew she would be safe here, but in all the time he had known her, he had never not known where she was. It was unsettling in a way he didn’t want to examine. His principal was always supposed to be his number-one priority, but he didn’t think about his last principal the way he thought about Wyn. He took time off. He relished his free hours. But with Wyn, his free hours were spent wondering what she was up to and if she might need him.

  “Cullen!”

  “Huh?” He snapped to attention.

  “Your head was up your ass,” Kingsley said. “You didn’t hear a damn word that anyone said for the last five minutes.”

  “He was thinking about that pretty little girl he brought with him,” Darby said.

  “Yeah,” Jazz said, zeroing in on him with her feline eyes. “What is with you and little Miss Prim and Proper? You don’t seem like a couple.”

  “And what do couples seem like, Jazz?” Damn Jazz. He should have known she would be the hardest sell. She never took anything at face value. She never trusted anyone. Occupational hazard that all of them had at one point, but there were some people he had to learn to trust and it was important for him that some people trusted him.

  “Like they suit each other,” Jazz started. “Summer—”

  “Wynter,” he corrected.

  “—doesn’t seem like she fits you.”

  “I can see why he likes her,” Kingsley said. “She’s one of those posh types, keeps him from dragging his knuckles on the ground. Classes our boy up a bit. Cullen ain’t lying when he says he’s from pig shit. You should have seen him when I first met him. He wasn’t even toilet-trained.”

  “I wasn’t as bad as all that, you arsehole,” he said with a grin. “Wyn’s a good girl.”

  “She’s a snob.” Jazz rolled her eyes.

  “I don’t think so,” Darby disagreed. “She seems like she’s going through something, though.” He looked at Cullen for confirmation.

  “She got too close to an investigation in D.C. and she needed to get away. Plus, she’s had a falling-out with her parents.”

  “She said she was a linguist,” King said. “Heard her speaking Russian. I bet she knows some stuff.”

  He nodded. “She was translating the same document for the past week when I pulled her away. I don’t think she’s very happy with me at the moment.”

  “So, you’ve had a big fight?” Jazz perked up. “About what? Did you use the wrong fork at dinner?”

  “No, we haven’t had a fight. She’s upset that I pulled her away from her work. But she needed to get away. And what the hell was that back at my cottage? Why did you have to go and try to make her prove herself? I’ve never brought anyone here and the fact that I brought her should tell you something. You accused her of being a snob, but the fact of the matter is that you’re the one who came off like you thought you were better.”

  “Jazz is threatened.” Kingsley wrapped his massive arm around Jazz and pulled her into his side. “She doesn’t know how to play well with other girls. Especially pretty, dainty ones. Don’t worry, Jazz.” Kingsley gave her a loud smacking kiss on her cheek. “We’ll always love you the best. It doesn’t matter how many nicer, sweeter, more ladylike girls we bring around.”

  “Shut up, King. No one asked you.” She focused back on Cullen. “So, she’s well-traveled and well-educated and judging by those expensive flats, she has money. Not new money either. I’d bet she’s never worn underwear from a pack in her life.”

  “She makes her own money,” he told her. “Government contractors get paid very well.”

  Jazz was too damn smart for her own good. He wouldn’t be surprised if she already knew Wyn’s whole story. “She’s also a full-time college professor. She doesn’t depend on anyone else for her survival.” It was true. Her lifestyle wouldn’t change at all if her trust fund disappeared. Except for him. She wouldn’t have private security round the clock.

  Jazz rolled her eyes. “You’re with her because she elevates you. But the question is, Why is she with you?”

  It was a fair question. He hadn’t been with anyone like her in his entire life. And if they were together, it would be a question he would ask himself. “You don’t think I’m good enough for her?”

  “No,” they all answered at once, causing him to grin.

  “I’m a prize and you know it.”

  “Of course you are,” Jazz said. “I just don’t see you with her, that’s all.”

  “Start seeing it, Jazz. I brought her here to meet all of you.”

  “She must be special,” Darby said.

  “What did you tell her about us?” King asked him.

  “Not much. Just that we all are former military or agents for our respective governments.”

  “So, you didn’t tell her you br
ought her to the island of misfit toys, then?” Jazz asked.

  “That’s a stupid name for this place.”

  “Why?” Kingsley frowned at him. “It’s the truth. We’ve all got our shit.”

  “Does she know everything about you, Cull? Does she know about your shit?” Jazz questioned.

  Wyn didn’t, of course. No one knew all of it. Just bits and pieces that he chose to reveal at sporadic times. “She knows about my past.” It was a non-answer. Not exactly a lie. She knew the few things that he had told her on the ride up. He knew so much more about her. But he knew things that she never told him. Chinese was her favorite takeout. She loved children and going to the park when it was warm so she could people-watch. He knew that her favorite color was buttercream yellow and that she always checked twice to make sure she had her keys. He knew that she was quietly generous. That the only thing she had ever asked him to do for her was deliver things to some of the people she translated for. She paid legal fees and mortgages and once she covered the tuition for one of her students who was going to get kicked out of school because they could no longer pay. And she never said a damn thing about it.

  He had never asked her about it, but one time his expression—a raised eyebrow, a twitch of his lip when she handed him a large stack of cash—gave him away.

  “I was saved once,” she said simply. And then she smiled at him. One of those sweet, kind of saucy smiles that had knocked him off guard. “My father gives it to me. He can’t tell me how to spend it.”

  He tried not to have much of an opinion about his principals. But he decided that he liked her then. It must have been the nature of this assignment. She wasn’t like his last boss who sold weapons to bad people, who had meetings in the most dangerous parts of the world, and attended lavish parties. Then there was so much to focus on. There was so much that could and did go wrong. But Wyn’s life was simple and quiet. It was routine. He only had her to focus on. To worry about. He could anticipate her moves. He could read her emotions.

  He had an advantage and all she knew about him was next to nothing.

  It wasn’t fair. But he was still working. He was still protecting her.

  And then she walked in. All eyes turned to her. She walked over to Jazz and looked her directly in the eye. “Can you take me shopping? I don’t have the right clothes.”

  The request shocked the hell out of him.

  “I’ll take you shopping, Wyn.” He stood up and touched her arm.

  “Thank you,” she said politely, not taking her eyes off Jazz. “But I didn’t ask you. I asked Jazz. Will you take me?”

  Cullen was at a complete loss. Jazz had in-your-face sex appeal. She wore a crop top and little khaki shorts. Her long hair was loose and wild, showing off every inch its luscious texture. Jazz was the kind of woman you’d want to spend hours with—locked in a room. Wyn was the kind of girl you’d ask to help you with your homework.

  He wanted to step in, but he knew better. The urge to keep them separate was overwhelming, but they were going to be here together for what could be months. He had to trust Wyn to hold her own, to keep their secret, to keep her head up. And he had to trust Jazz. She was a hard-ass, but she was his friend and she had a good soul beneath all the hard surface.

  “Yeah.” Jazz looked Wyn up and down. “Your dumb-ass boyfriend should have told you where exactly you were going before you packed.”

  “Thank you.” Wyn nodded. “I’ll go get my handbag.”

  She turned away, but Cullen grabbed her hand. “Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?”

  “Yes. You go everywhere with me.” She went onto her tiptoes and gently kissed his cheek. Her lips lingered. They were smooth and warm. It was just how he imagined a kiss to be from her—if he had ever imagined what it would be like to be kissed by her. It was a shock to his system. Wholly unexpected. He had never been touched by a principal before, much less kissed by one. But then he remembered he wasn’t supposed to be her bodyguard. He was supposed to be her boyfriend here. It was a role he was going to have a hard time getting used to. “I won’t be gone too long.”

  “Okay,” he said, still knocked off guard. “I’ll see you when you get back.”

  Chapter 4

  If Wyn was being honest with herself—and she always tried to be honest with herself—she would admit that Jazz intimidated the hell out of her. Jazz was one of those tall, ethnically ambiguous gorgeous people who other people liked to stare at. Even on the island, where she must be known to the locals by now, she didn’t escape the looks. She didn’t seem to notice people staring at her either.

  It was the direct opposite of Wyn’s experience. She had never stood out in any way—not that she wanted to, of course, but no one had ever paid her much attention. She wasn’t short or tall. None of her features were particularly beautiful. She wasn’t popular in school. She wasn’t very good at anything except learning foreign languages, but that didn’t gain her any notice, just a career that she loved.

  A career she wasn’t going to be able to have for a little while. She felt a pang of sadness strike her deep in her chest. She wondered what her students must be thinking. Not the ones at Georgetown, but the ones she taught at the community center. The ones who didn’t call her Dr. Bates, but simply just Miss. She had seen them through so much. They had two more weeks left in the course and then they were going to have a little ceremony and a party afterward and she had just disappeared on them. Without a word or explanation. But maybe she hadn’t needed to give an explanation. The story of her father’s scandal had been splashed all over the television. They may not have known she was the daughter of a presidential candidate then, but they would know now.

  It would be hard to step back into that life after all of this died down. Could she ever get her privacy back? Her anonymity back? It was hard to imagine that she could. It was hard to think that people could look at her and not think she was the possible love child of her father, that her whole life up until then had been a lie.

  “Here.” Jazz tossed another sundress at her. She kept doing that during their shopping trip, not seeming to want or care about Wyn’s input. Wyn wanted to protest, but so far she had liked everything that Jazz had given her. They weren’t the understated neutrals she would have picked. They were bold colors, tighter fits, lower necklines. Things that would have shown off her body instead of covering it.

  “So how long have you been with my boy?”

  Her boy. Cullen didn’t think Jazz had a thing for him, but he was wrong. “We met a year ago. Things changed between us fairly recently, though.”

  “Must be serious. He brought you here to meet the family.” She nodded her head toward the dressing room. “You should try those on. They’re on clearance and you can’t return them.”

  “That’s a good idea.” She walked into the dressing room, Jazz on her heels. Jazz entered with her.

  “Go ahead. You don’t have anything I’ve never seen before.”

  She held up her head and undressed, not showing Jazz any emotion at all. “How long have you known Cullen?”

  “He was still in the British Special Forces. Not long before he was shot.”

  “You knew him then? Was he different?”

  “You mean was he less damaged?” She shrugged. “Probably not, but he is a highly trained solider. He’s not the type to go wearing his heart on his sleeve.”

  “He doesn’t give anything away.”

  She said he was damaged. There was nothing about him that would make anyone think that. But Wyn knew that he had been through a lot, that they all must have been through a lot.

  “I can see why he’s attracted to you now,” Jazz said, passing a critical eye over her underwear-clad form. “You’ve got a body.”

  “All humans have a body.”

  “Yours is hot.” The way Jazz said it, it wasn’t a compliment.

  “Mine is nothing compared to yours,” she said truthfully. “I wish I was as beautiful as you.” Wyn di
dn’t often look at herself in the mirror. She quickly got dressed and just checked to make sure she was neat and presentable. She had never felt very comfortable in her own skin. She had been chubby all her life. Her body never seemed to fit into the designer clothes that her mother always wanted to put her in. She wasn’t like her schoolmates. She had never been stylishly thin. Her skin wasn’t pale. Her hair wasn’t straight. She had never fit in.

  “My body was used like currency to gain secrets from powerful men. Don’t wish for shit you know nothing about.”

  Wyn stared at Jazz for a moment, surprised she had revealed so much of herself to a stranger. There was a reason that Cullen’s friends had escaped to this island. Perhaps it was to escape it all. Perhaps it was to heal. But this was more than just a vacation spot for them. “Cullen said I’m not allowed to ask you about your jobs.”

  “You’re not.”

  “I was mildly curious before, but now I really want to know who you people are.”

  “Suffer,” Jazz said, flashing her the most gorgeous grin. “Try the dresses on. I don’t have all day to stand here and look at you in your ugly underwear.”

  “Is my underwear ugly?” She forced herself to look at herself in the full-length mirror. She wore beige undergarments. Well made. Supportive. Plain. But she looked past them at her body. Her thighs were full. Her hips were full. Her breasts were always just a little bigger than she would like. Her belly ever so slightly rounded. It was far from a perfect body. It was far from Jazz’s body, but she didn’t hate what she saw.

  She did know why she had asked Jazz to come shopping with her. Maybe it was because she was beautiful. Maybe it was because she was a woman. Maybe it was because being with someone she knew didn’t like her was a distraction from her own life, from the mess that she had run away from when she came here.

  “It’s terrible. I’m surprised Cullen can even get it up, seeing you in those.”

  “I don’t wear them to bed.” The topic was making her uncomfortable. She had no idea what Cullen found sexy. She hadn’t been with anyone in years. Her last relationship was when she was a doctoral student. Her boyfriend was in her program. He was quiet and studious. They had always made love in the dark, under the covers. There was no sweaty sex. No grand passion like one would see in the movies. It was sweet. And then he moved away, halfway across the world when he took a job in Egypt.