by Alison Kent
“Better?”
He nodded, unwound the scarf. “The rest of me is a bit chilly still.”
It took a second for that to sink in and she made a face. He chuckled, then said, “Get yourself on the other side, woman, and let’s make some quick work here.”
She snickered to herself, yet obeyed, holding Sam’s skin closed as he stitched. She still wore gloves and though she was dressed warmly, he noticed everything was cinched down, nothing to catch, and her rifle would collapse. It was a weapon he’d seen in spec, a prototype of the MP5. Not in production, yet she had one. And if the bodies outside indicated, she knew how to use it. It was at her right, by her knee with a bullet chambered.
“You’re Company.” CIA. Probably attached to NATO.
He had to give her credit, she didn’t look up or make even a single nuance. If she was any good, she wouldn’t give anything away.
“Tell me how an Irishman got to be in the Marines.”
Okay, he could go that direction. “I was a runner for the IRA and my older sister caught me. Dragged me home by my ear, she did.” His lips curved with the memory as he took another stitch. “My parents, fearing for my immortal soul, sent me to America to live with relatives.” He shrugged.
“So dodging bullets comes easy, huh?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Then he went and chose a career in it. He glanced at Sam, knowing this would cost him what he held dear. His Marine enlistment. But he couldn’t let the one man who treated him like a friend instead of his superior die in the frigid Serbian forests.
“I saw the jet go down.”
His gaze briefly slid to hers.
“He was doing some amazing flying before the missile hit. I’ve been behind you for a day.”
“So you’re the reason the patrol didn’t catch up to us?”
Bless her, that blank expression didn’t change a fraction.
“Thank you for our lives.” He clipped the thread. “I’m Riley.” He held out his hand. She bit off her glove and shook it. Her skin was warm, her palm smooth and dry.
“Safia,” was all she offered with her disarming smile.
He wondered why someone so young was in the field alone. She helped him work the inflatable air cast over Sam’s upper thigh, then wrapped him in rags and curtains Riley’d found to keep him warm. Sam’s fever would spike and he had to get him some antibiotics. He’d used his last just now.
The woman unwound from the floor, strapped her belt back on, then dug in her pack like a purse and blindly reloaded her magazines. He recognized C4 packs and some gadgets he didn’t. She was a little fire team all by herself, he thought, smiling. Armed, she went to each opening. He reached for his gun when she disappeared out a gap in the wall. He waited, chambering a bullet and aiming.
Tell me I can’t be that much of a sucker. Icy wind spun through the building. Seconds ticked by. She reappeared and stopped short, then cocked her head. She smiled almost appreciatively, and he lowered his weapon. She moved to him with an elegance that defied her crude surroundings and the two pistols in her belt. Her exotic features and tanned skin puzzled him. Without head scarves, she looked completely out of place.
Then the radio hooked on her belt buzzed and she brought it to her ear, listening. The language sounded Albanian. She didn’t make contact, only listened, then said, “We need to go.
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J o breathed in slowly through her nose. What had she just agreed to? Seeing this man every day? She pulled in another slow, even breath, telling herself to shake off her reaction to this man’s proximity.
Sure, he was attractive. And he had—a presence. But she wasn’t some teenage girl who would fall to pieces under a cute boy’s attention. Not that cute was a strong enough word for what Maksim was. He was—unnerving. To say the least.
But she wasn’t interested in him. She decided that quite definitely over the past two days. Of course that decision was made when he wasn’t in her presence.
But either way, she should have more control than this. Apparently should and could were two very different things. And she couldn’t seem to stop her reaction to him. Her heart raced and her body tingled, both hot and cold in all the most inappropriate places.
“So every morning?” he said, his voice rumbling right next to her, firing up the heat inside her. “Does that work for you?”
She cleared her throat, struggling to calm her body.
“Yes—that’s great,” she managed to say, surprising even herself with the airiness of her tone. “I’ll schedule you from 8 A.M. to”—she glanced at the clock on the lower right-hand corner of the computer screen—“noon?”
That was a good amount of time, getting Cherise through the rowdy mornings and lunch, and giving him the go-ahead to leave now. She needed him out of her space.
If her body wasn’t going to go along with her mind, then avoidance was clearly her best strategy. And she had done well with that tactic—although she’d told herself that wasn’t what she was doing.
“Noon is fine,” he said, still not moving. Not even straightening away from the computer. And her.
“Good,” she poised her fingers over the keys and began typing in his hours. “Then I think we are all settled. You can take off now if you like.”
When he didn’t move, she added, “You can go get some lunch. You must be hungry.” She flashed him a quick smile without really looking at him.
This time he did stand, but he didn’t move away. Instead he leaned against her desk, the old piece of furniture creaking at his tall, muscular weight.
“You must be hungry, too. Would you like to join me?”
She blinked, for a moment not comprehending his words, her mind too focused on the muscles of his thighs so near her. The flex of more muscles in his shoulders and arms as he crossed them over his chest.
She forced herself to look back at the computer screen.
“I—I don’t think so,” she said. “I have a lot to do here.”
“But surely you allow yourself even a half an hour for lunch break.”
She continued typing, fairly certain whatever she was writing was gibberish. “I brought a lunch with me, actually.” Which was true. Not that she was hungry at the moment. She was too—edgy.
“Come on,” he said in a low voice that was enticing, coaxing. “Come celebrate your first regular volunteer.”
She couldn’t help looking at him. He was smiling, the curl of his lips, his white, even teeth, the sexily pleading glimmer in his pale green eyes.
God, he was so beautiful.
And dangerous.
Jo shook her head. “I really can’t.”
He studied her for a moment. “Can’t or won’t? What’s the matter, Josephine? Do I make you nervous?”
Jo’s breath left her for a moment at the accented rhythm of her full name crossing his lips. But the breath-stealing moment left as quickly as it came, followed by irritation. At him and at herself.
She wasn’t attracted to this man—not beyond a basic physical attraction. And that could be controlled. It could.
“You don’t make me nervous,” she said firmly.
“Then why not join me for lunch?”
“Because,” she said slowly, “I have a lot of work to do.”
Maksim crossed his arms tighter and lifted one of his eloquent eyebrows, which informed her that he didn’t believe her for a moment.
“I don’t think that’s why you won’t come. I think you are uncomfortable with me. Maybe because you are attracted to me.” Again the eyebrow lifted—this time in questioning challenge.
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“D r. Ericson.” Lana adjusted the angle on the microscope. Yes. Right there. Perfect. “Amazing.”
“Lana.�
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She reached out blindly for the stylus to her handheld. Got it. She started taking notes on the screen without looking away from the microscope.
“Dr. Ericson!!!”
Lana jumped, bumping her cheekbone on the microscope’s eyepiece before falling backward, hitting a wall that hadn’t been there when she’d come into work that morning.
Strong hands set her firmly on her feet as she realized the wall was warm and made of flesh and muscle. Lots and lots of muscle.
Stumbling back a step, she looked up and then up some more. The dark-haired hottie in front of her was as tall as her colleague, Beau Ruston. Or close to it, anyway. She fumbled with her glasses, sliding them on her nose. They didn’t help. Reading glasses for the computer, they only served to make her feel more disoriented.
She squinted, then remembered and pulled the glasses off again, letting them dangle by their chain around her neck. “Um, hello? Did I know you were visiting my lab?”
She was fairly certain she hadn’t. She forgot appointments sometimes. Okay, often, but she always remembered eventually. And this man hadn’t made an appointment with her. She was sure of it. He didn’t look like a scientist, either.
Not that all scientists were as unremarkable as she was in the looks department, but this man was another species entirely.
He looked dangerous and sexy. Enough so that he would definitely replace chemical formulas in her dreams at night. His black hair was a little too long and looked like he’d run his fingers through it, not a comb. That was just so bad boy. She had a secret weakness for bad boys.
Even bigger than the secret weakness she’d harbored for Beau Ruston before he’d met Elle.
She had posters of James Dean and Matt Dillon on the wall of her bedroom and had seen Rebel Without a Cause a whopping thirty-six times.
Unlike James Dean, this yummy bad boy even had pierced ears. Only instead of sedate studs or small hoops, he had tiny black plugs. Only a bit bigger than a pairs of studs, the plugs were recessed in his lobes. They had the Chinese kanji for strength etched on them in silver. Or pewter, maybe. It wasn’t shiny.
The earrings were hot. Just like him.
He looked like the kind of man who had a tattoo. Nothing colorful. Something black and meaningful. She wanted to see it. Too bad she couldn’t just ask.
Interpersonal interaction had so many taboos. It wasn’t like science, where you dug for answers without apology.
“Lana?”
The stranger had a strong jaw, too, squared and accented by a close-cropped beard that went under, not across his chin. No mustache. His lips were set in a straight line, but they still looked like they’d be heaven to kiss.
Not that she’d kissed a lot of lips, but she was twenty-nine. Even a geeky scientist didn’t make it to the shy side of thirty without a few kisses along the way. And other stuff. Not that the other stuff was all that spectacular. She’d always wondered if that was her fault or the men she’d chosen to partner.
It didn’t take a shrink to identify the fact that Lana had trust issues. With her background, who wouldn’t?
Still, people had been known to betray family, love, and country for sex. She wouldn’t cross a busy street to get some. Or maybe she would, if this stranger was waiting on the other side.
The fact that she could measure the time since she’d last had sex in years rather than months, weeks, or days—which would be a true miracle—wasn’t something she enjoyed dwelling on. She blamed it on her work.
However, every feminine instinct that was usually sublimated by her passion for her job was on red alert now.
BRAVA BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 2009 Alison Kent
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
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ISBN: 0-7582-4475-4
