Midway Between You and Me (Harlequin Super Romance)

by Rogenna Brewer

  Tam scribbled furiously, wanting to get the encounter down on paper while still fresh in her mind. The tiny Chelonia mydas dug their way out of the holes and raced down the beach toward the water.

  “’urry.” Tam took the penlight out of her mouth. “Hurry, follow them with the camera,” she directed Will. Easing her cramped muscles from sitting to standing, she followed the parade.

  Remembering exactly why it was she had to re-shoot this particular video made her warm all over. It also made her think about Bowie, who had gone to Hawaii on battalion business. She wasn’t exactly sure when he’d be back.

  He hadn’t come right out and told her his hidden agenda, of course. But he’d hinted that by connecting her with her past he’d uncover her long-buried heart. The question was, what were his intentions after that?

  Once she and Will were finished filming, they loaded up their equipment. She headed back to the boat with the first load. A good twenty feet from the dock she spotted the shadowy figure of a man propped against her schooner. She came to a stop.

  Instant relief washed over her.

  The shadow had a long, lean, athletic build.

  Relaxed.

  She felt the tension ease from her own tight muscles. “Hello?”

  “Hello,” the shadow responded. The deep resonance of his voice registered even before his answer. If she expected him to say something more, he didn’t.

  And she couldn’t. Her mouth had gone dry.

  He pushed away from the boat. Heaven help her, she couldn’t move her feet. Water lapped her ankles and rushed away again.

  Having closed the distance by half, he stopped. They were simply two silhouettes in the pale moonlight, one male, one female. Neither moving. Neither breathing.

  Except she had to be breathing.

  The cloying perfume of gardenias filled her nostrils. Above that she could pick up his unique scent, all sand and sunshine, salt and sea. She wanted to close her eyes and breathe in deep.

  He carried flippers and had obviously just been in the water. His wet suit glistened with reflected light. Unzipped to the navel, it gave her a glimpse of muscle only hinted at in the parts covered by skin-tight neoprene. In the daylight his slicked-back hair would be blond. Right now his features were simply shades of gray.

  Reality check. So were his motives.

  “Is that thing loaded?” he asked, the barest hint of amusement in his voice. He moved in closer until he stood just out of range of the inadequate spotlight on her video camera.

  She looked at the camera in her hand and blushed.

  “I thought I told you not to come out here alone,” he said, changing the subject and sounding stern.

  “I brought Will,” she said in her own defense, even though the young man was apparently lagging behind.

  “Hi, Lieutenant,” Will said, walking past them both to load the equipment into the boat.

  “Go ahead and take my schooner back, Will. The professor and I have unfinished business.” He was talking to Will, but he looked at her when he said it.

  Leaving Tam no doubt as to what he meant by “unfinished business.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.” Will chuckled and gave a mock salute before hopping aboard the schooner and heading for Sand Island.

  Bowie grabbed for the blanket, then headed toward her.

  “Is that how you say hello? Grab a blanket and go?” she admonished as he slung an arm across her shoulders and led the way to their spot.

  “I already said hello. Besides, I’m in a hurry.”

  “What’s the rush?”

  “There’s no rush, no rush at all. We have the whole night ahead of us. Except I’m having a hard time waiting to give you this.” He unsheathed his knife and presented it to her.

  “Your knife?”

  “It’s an heirloom. And heirlooms should be passed on to heirs. I’m giving it to you so you never have any doubt of my intentions. Even if I take some time getting around to other things.”

  She stood holding his knife while he laid out the blanket. When he had it just the way he wanted it, he stripped her of the knife, her satchel and the camera. Then there was nothing between them except his wet suit and her clothes, and even that seemed like too much.

  “Did you miss me?” he asked, pulling her to him.

  “Yes.”

  “I missed you, too.” He dipped his head and kissed her until she thought she would drown. He felt warm and wet and wonderful in her arms. He tasted of salt and sea and was the fulfillment of every craving she ever had.

  “I finally figured something out,” he said finally. “Toi khong biet.”

  Her breath caught and she pulled away. “Would you please tell the master chief to quit teaching you how to talk hookers into your bed?”

  He just laughed at her.

  “Do you have any idea what you just said to me?”

  Her heart pounded against her breast as she looked into his eyes and waited for his answer.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Then say it to me in English,” she said, still not sure she believed him.

  “I love you, Tam. And I want to make love to you, not some hooker.”

  Her lower lip began to tremble. He brushed his mouth across it. “No tears,” he said. “Don’t you love me?”

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  “I need to hear you say it,” he coaxed.

  “I love you, Bowie Prince.”

  “Say it again and again and again.” With each again, he rewarded her with a kiss. “Are you going to let me make love to you tonight?” he asked. “Because I can be a patient man, but I don’t think I can be patient about this.”

  In response, she tugged his zipper lower. “I’m not a very patient woman.”

  He stood back and divested himself of the wetsuit in record time, leaving him in his swimsuit and her overdressed.

  She lifted her tank top over her head, and he reached out to slide his hand along her body. She came alive under his gentle touch.

  She hadn’t even unhooked her bra before he was slipping the straps from her shoulders.

  “You are so beautiful,” he said in a husky whisper.

  She pressed into him, tugging his trunks down his thighs as far as she could reach before her hands trailed back up to his perfect backside.

  “I hope to hell you left those condoms in your bag.”

  “About a half a dozen or so. I’ve been stocking up.” She teased him with her words and tortured him with her touch.

  He undid her shorts and pushed them and her panties past her hips, letting both fall to the sand.

  Kicking off his trunks, he sat back on the blanket. Holding her hands he urged her closer, but when she stooped to join him, he said, “Not yet.”

  He didn’t touch her right away, and just when she thought she would die if he didn’t touch her, he slid his hands to her hips and pulled her to him. She had nothing to do with her hands except hold on.

  When she threw back her head and cried out, he tugged her down to his lap with a hot trail of kisses that ended at her mouth. She didn’t know which one of them remembered the condom first, but they both fumbled for her satchel and they both came away with a prize.

  She opened hers first, but she put it on so frantically it tore. He tossed it aside and managed to get the other one on. By that time she was more than ready for him, but he took things slow.

  “Am I hurting you?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Then tell me what I am doing to you,” he encouraged.

  Heat flooded her face, and she buried her head into his neck.

  “Not comfortable with pillow talk, huh?” he asked. “I like it, but mostly I just want you to set the pace. So we’ll do whatever you’re comfortable with.”

  Could she love him any more? “I just want to move or die.”

  TAM DIDN’T KNOW WHAT TIME it was when she awoke with a start. She thought she’d heard something, but then she realized her bladder had probably woken her u
p. Sand made a comfortable bed at night, but it was cold in the early morning. She managed to leave the warmth of Bowie’s body behind, but just barely.

  He was so adorable in sleep.

  She was too embarrassed to just do her business nearby even if he was unaware, so she slipped on her tank top and panties and grabbed tissue from her satchel, then headed for a bush.

  Silly really to get dressed on a deserted island just to take a pee, but even after the most amazing love-making of her life, she was not an exhibitionist. Not yet, anyway. Maybe with a little more tutelage from Bowie that could change.

  She finished, now able to relax just a little bit. The moon hung overhead, but dawn had begun to lighten the sky.

  The hand that closed around her mouth took her by surprise. At first she thought it was Bowie playing around. But these hands weren’t gentle.

  “It’s been a long time, Tam. Have you missed me?”

  She recognized the voice from her nightmares.

  She struggled, making as much noise as she could, but it wasn’t enough to wake Bowie. Then a terrible thought crossed her mind. What if he couldn’t wake up? His body had been warm when she left, but…

  Xang dragged her inland as she fought to be free.

  Her feet scraped over lava rock until they were raw and bleeding. Then there was no more rock beneath her feet, only runway.

  Xang relaxed his hold as he dragged her toward the Cessna, and it was enough. She was able to get out one good scream.

  Xang laughed at her. “Go ahead if you want him to die.” He pulled out a handgun that looked very much like her own 9 mm Glock. “But don’t worry. You and I are just going for a little ride.”

  He led her at gunpoint toward the plane, finding it no longer necessary to put his hand over her mouth. His threat had worked.

  Tam didn’t know whether to pray that Bowie had heard her scream or pray that he still slept. She just knew if she got on that plane with Xang, she’d die.

  Then Bowie was between them and the plane. Thank God he didn’t have the same problem with modesty that she had.

  “Surely, Lieutenant, you could have put on some pants before you came to rescue the girl.”

  “Let her go, Xang. If you need a hostage, take me instead.”

  “That would be awkward, now wouldn’t it? Since I don’t need a hostage, I need bait. Care to tell her about the big fish I’m trying to lure, Lieutenant?”

  Regret shone in Bowie’s eyes. What were they talking about?

  “No?” Xang continued. “Then I will. Ask your young man about your father.”

  Tam’s heart dropped as she tried to comprehend what Xang had just said.

  Bowie pleaded with his eyes. “Tam—”

  “Then again, Tam knows all about secrets….” Xang caressed the side of her face with the gun barrel. “She once came to me begging for work…didn’t you, my little ba muoi lam? Amazing what hunger will drive a girl to do.”

  Tam felt the sickening lurch in her stomach. She closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see the look on Bowie’s face when he realized what Xang had just revealed about her.

  “Of course, virginity fetches a higher price than a used whore,” Xang said harshly. “But Tam still belongs to me, and I don’t give up what’s mine easily.”

  Tam forced herself to look into Bowie’s face, but the pity there was worse, much worse than condemnation. How could he love her now that he knew the truth?

  Bowie had been inching his way closer as Xang spoke.

  “That’s far enough, Lieutenant.” Xang pointed the gun at him and then at her. And Tam realized what Bowie was trying to do. He was trying to get Xang to point the gun at him. And Xang was taking the bait.

  “Don’t be John Wayne!” Tam shouted. “You can’t get the girl if you’re John Wayne!”

  Bowie hesitated just long enough for Xang to push her inside the plane. But she wasn’t sure he got her message because he still looked ready to spring into action.

  And then Xang pulled the trigger, and Bowie fell to the ground.

  Tam fought to reach Bowie, but Xang overpowered her and cuffed her to the seat with her own handcuffs.

  “Don’t worry, Tam. I don’t want to kill the messenger, just slow him down a bit. Of course, if I did kill him, I suppose it would get my message across just the same.”

  Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

  AFTER THE FALL OF SAIGON, Tam and her mother were taken to a North Vietnamese Reeducation camp. Until she was seven years old, Tam didn’t know what it was like to live without being surrounded by barbed wire. The soldiers in their green fatigues were as familiar to her as the weapons they carried.

  Her playground was a dirt exercise yard, but she never played for fear of drawing attention to herself.

  Her home was a tent. Her bed, a mat she shared with her mother.

  She had rice to eat, but never enough to fill her belly.

  General Xang would come to visit them inside the camp. After they were released, he set them up in an apartment in Ho Chi Minh City, though her mother always referred to the city as Saigon in private.

  They shared the small two-room apartment with another woman and her two children and the other woman’s mother. Mama-san Tong would watch the children while the two women went off to work in the textile factory. It was hard work, but honest work, her mother would say. She was grateful to Xang for getting her the apartment and the job.

  Tam learned she was different once she started school. She would go off every day in her traditional ao dai uniform, negotiating the bustling streets of Ho Chi Minh City to get to school.

  And there she would be teased and taunted unmercifully. The other children spat on her and called her bui doi, dust of life. After her differences were pointed out, they were all Tam could focus on. She was taller and rounder than the other children, but what really gave her away was her round eyes. Maybe not round by Western standards. But round.

  It was then that she started to notice other children with round eyes, street urchins mostly. She began to grasp the extent of what her mother had sacrificed in order to keep her.

  When Xang came to visit, usually late at night, Tam was sent into the other room. She never questioned this. Having grown up around soldiers, she’d known what went on between men and women from a very young age.

  Shortly after she turned fifteen her mother had arranged for her to get a job in the textile factory. A fortnight later, Xang came to visit, waking her and her mother as usual.

  Her mother looked tired, but she nodded for Tam to leave the room. But before she could go, Xang grabbed hold of her wrist. He looked her over then sent her away. Tam hadn’t liked the way he’d looked at her.

  That night Xang and her mother fought.

  The next morning they were turned away from the factory. The same thing happened when they got back to the apartment.

  Xang’s orders.

  They had nowhere to go and no food in their bellies. Nothing but the clothes on their backs. So they found themselves living on the streets.

  Tam couldn’t help but blame herself. If it wasn’t for her, Xang and her mother would never have fought. She knew what they had fought about, knew what he wanted from her.

  And also knew that her mother wanted her to have a better life than she’d had. She’d always told Tam stories about her father and about America. Even after all they had been through her mother had never given up hope that one day he would return for them.

  Her mother looked for work every day, doing even the most menial of tasks. The one thing her mother had never considered was selling her body.

  She would lecture Tam as they passed the ba muoi lam on the street. The girls were so pretty, and they wore the most beautiful silk ao doi. But sometimes they had blank stares from hanging around the opium dens.

  What good was all their money if they spent it on drugs? And what good were their pretty clothes when their faces and bodies were worn out?

  So Tam heeded her mother’s
warning.

  She knew about the ba muoi lam and the opium dens, because Xang was in the business. It was her mother’s threats to turn him in to the authorities if he touched her daughter that had caused him to turn them out. And by this time Xang was more powerful than any authority.

  One day her mother found a good job as a live-in laundress. But the mistress of the house would only take one of them. So her mother wanted Tam to take it. Tam didn’t want to take the job if it meant being separated from her mother.

  With a great deal of persuading on Lan’s part, Tam finally agreed. After a tearful goodbye, her mother left. It was later in the day that Tam met the master of the house. She didn’t like the way he looked at her, but as she didn’t care much for the way any man looked at her, she didn’t pay much attention.

  That night he tried to force himself on her and she ran back to the streets, back to her mother, like a child. But she was no longer a child; she never really had been.

  Tam was tired of being homeless and hungry, and she was a realist. Their situation was hopeless. It was time she did something to elevate her status.

  There was only one man she could go to for help. Xang.

  So she went and begged him to take them back.

  He agreed. He got them another apartment. Bigger and better than the other one. And though her mother seemed less than pleased with the whole situation, she accepted his help.

  He showered them with gifts. And like any teenager, Tam took the new clothes and makeup without question. She didn’t realize Xang was making her over for a reason.

  Her mother did, however, and urged Tam to reconsider, especially once the rumors began about people looking for bui doi to take them and their mothers to America.

  Tam was having too good a time to pay much attention. She had the life she’d always dreamed of. Then came the day Xang expected a return on his investment.

  The evening had started out nicely. She’d gotten dressed up. He’d taken her out to dinner. But then they’d ended up at an opium den.

  When she resisted, he forced her inside. No one seemed to notice or care that she was being dragged through the door. They were oblivious to everything.