The Ides of Matt 2015

by M. L. Buchman

  He was not a complex man. It wasn’t that he was simple; it was that he was uncomplicated. Most men Donya met wanted to bed her for power or marry her to enhance their own status. They all had an agenda, a plan of their own that her star power would somehow feed.

  With Lee Ames she suspected that he was as she saw him. He had simply cared for her and kept her conscious through the long wait. He flew for his team, his country, and his family.

  He’d held the little girl like she herself was precious. No man did tha—

  The girl!

  Donya looked over at the rumpled but empty bed beside her. Twisting and trying to raise herself, which sent a sharp pain that told her that had been a truly foolish action, Donya spotted her. The little girl lay asleep on Lee’s chest. He in turn leaned back against a wall, his boots up on the corner of her own bed, fast asleep as well.

  She propped her pillow up so that she could watch him. Last night the night-vision goggles had given her no clear view of him. When the thin moon rose, she’d seen blond hair beneath the straps of the night-vision goggles and that he was clean-shaven, a rarity in her culture. It looked good on him, strong.

  And with the darker-skinned child curled up in his arms he was about the cutest thing she’d ever seen. Calling six feet of American pilot—who had carried her to his helicopter last night as if she was weightless—cute might be inappropriate. But despite making her living with words, it was all she could come up with.

  7

  Lee knew he was hovering but couldn’t help himself. Over the next few days he spent most of his non-mission time with Donya and Sughraa—not knowing her name they’d taken to calling her “Little One.” Once Donya could get out of bed, Lee always carried the girl to make sure that Donya didn’t pull open her wound.

  Sometimes Dilya Stevenson took the little girl for a while.

  “Why is there a teenager on a ship of war?”

  Lee smiled at Donya, “Threw me the first time too.” He’d led her up onto the upper deck of the eight-hundred foot long helicopter carrier. A number of people were wandering among the tied-down and covered helicopters in the cool dawn morning, taking a stroll before heading to their bunks. There was a light breeze as the ship drove south.

  Her hair caught and fluttered. Her niqāb was down on her shoulders and she didn’t appear to care. Unable to help himself, he brushed a hand over her hair, touching her for the first time since he’d brought her aboard. It was as soft as he’d remembered.

  “Sorry,” he pulled his hand back. “You have no chaperone. No person of your culture to make sure…”

  She watched him closely with those dark eyes that he could so easily get lost in. They halted at the stern of the ship and the breeze brushed her thick hair forward, partly hiding her face.

  Subject change. He needed a subject change. The next time he touched her it would be much harder to stop.

  “This is a very odd ship,” he found a new subject. “It was retired by the Navy, but kept active exclusively for our helicopter company.”

  “The 5th Battalion D Company,” she acknowledged. She said it as if it wasn’t something she’d merely overheard.

  “Yes,” he said carefully.

  “And under several of those tarpaulins are stealth aircraft that no one is supposed to know about.”

  He knew she hadn’t seen them personally. She, like all guests, was kept strictly below decks during night operations.

  Donya pulled her hair aside and looked up at him. She stood five-four, taller than average for a woman of her race. Her western clothes revealed how perfectly she was proportioned for that height.

  “I know a great deal about your company, Sergeant Ames. Possibly more than you do.”

  A spy? He’d brought a spy into their midst. Except…he’d only handled the exfiltration. Someone else had cut the orders.

  “Yes,” she nodded. “I have been, shall I say, consulting for your government for some time. I was approached by a man who claimed he worked for CNN. I am a very good reporter and I know that he is not in their employ. Yet if it helped my country,” her shrug was eloquent. “I became an analyst on Egyptian and North African affairs. I have seen many changes for the better in the region this year, but never knew how they happened. Not until I saw this ship. Even wounded and faint with blood loss, I knew what this was.”

  Lee had never faced a national security risk from a foot away.

  “And whatever happens next, I wanted to say thank you for taking care of me.”

  Then she rose up on her toes and kissed him.

  In that moment Lee knew two things.

  He had to turn her in.

  And he was totally lost as he pulled her into his arms.

  8

  Donya tried not to be amused. Didn’t they understand how much even their questions revealed?

  They were in the ship captain’s office, yet he was nowhere to be seen. The room had a view of the Flight Deck. A large desk dominated one end of the room, but a circle of comfortable chairs and sofas spoke to the many meetings that were held here.

  To one side sat Lee Ames. He had refused a direct order to leave her side—which had been accepted instead of having him arrested. A curious ship indeed. He sat close beside her on a couch, practically hovering in protection as if he could halt the might of military justice should it turn against her, which she found incredibly charming. She’d thought she was long past being charmed by any man.

  In front of her sat the inquisition. Four women of SOAR, all pilots. Lola Maloney their commander, Claudia Casperson, Kara Moretti, and—because they apparently couldn’t keep her out any more than they could make Lee depart—Trisha O’Malley.

  To her left stood a man who had neither spoken nor been introduced. He was clearly a warrior, not a spook, so he must be Delta Force—it was the only explanation.

  They were smart. They questioned more than her knowledge; they also questioned her methodology. She answered them willingly enough. With her homeland closed behind her, her future would lay with these people or ones like them. She would step forward in trust.

  “All of the Somali pirate’s hostages were freed on two separate nights. A clean sweep north and south.”

  “A ship, this ship, moving from trouble spot to trouble spot unescorted, separate from any carrier group. I don’t know if anyone else took an interest in an old ship past retirement making high speed runs from the Black Sea to the Gulf of Guinea and back to the Arabian Sea. But I did.”

  “Add that to the complete lack of reports from land. Massive endeavors with a complete lack of news coverage, except for hostages who consistently reported being rescued by Navy SEALs. Yet the SEALs, who have become notorious for their lack of circumspection, had no comment when asked.”

  That’s when the silent warrior confirmed he was Delta Force; he made a poor effort at covering a snort of laughter. Now she knew who had spread those news-hound diverting stories.

  “Lady has a brain,” Trisha the redhead spoke up. “I like her. Can we keep her?”

  Lola the commander rolled her eyes. “She’s not a puppy, O’Malley.”

  “She’s as cute as one.”

  “No,” Kara spoke with a thick New York accent that reminded Donya of her college days, “not cute, she’s beautiful. And we don’t need Lee’s besotted gaze to tell us that. Women are beautiful.”

  “Then explain me,” Trisha was as cute as a puppy. She was petite and radiated attitude right down to her cliché fists-on-hips and mock defiant scowl.

  Donya scanned the others’ faces and answered for them. “Believe me, they wish they could.”

  That won her a round of laughter. Even Lee, who’d been looking more worried than a puppy, smiled. She’d had big strong men try to sweep her off her feet before, only to learn that Donya Nakhla didn’t sweep. But she’d never made a big strong man weak in
the knees before either.

  She sighed. For all the good ignoring it was doing her, he had the same effect on her. She reached out to take Lee’s hand and took strength from it. Donya wished she could stay. She would take any bet that the more she knew about Lee Ames, the more she would want to be with him. But that wasn’t an option. She was a civilian on a ship of war. They would be getting her off the Peleliu as fast as they could.

  She was a civilian…on a ship of war…

  “How did I get here?”

  The women looked at her in confusion.

  “I flew you,” Lee answered in his absolutely forthright way.

  “No,” Donya shook her head. “Me. On this ever-so-quiet ship. I shouldn’t be here.”

  She scanned the faces, and that’s when she spotted the small but very self-satisfied smile on the silent warrior.

  “You live up to your reputation, Ms. Nakhla,” his voice was deep and surprisingly soft.

  Donya bowed her head in brief acknowledgment, unsure what else to do.

  “I have friends at Fort Bolivar near Washington D.C. who think you might be very helpful to our endeavors in this region. You have shown clear vision, exceptional analytical abilities, and a willingness to fight for peace even at risk of deadly peril. They would like to recruit you back to the States, but I think you could serve exceptional utility here aboard the Peleliu as an operations advisor. It is your choice.”

  Everyone was staring at him in surprise. The quiet blond who Donya suspected was his wife appeared particularly wide-eyed.

  “Doesn’t ever talk that much at one time, does he?” Donya asked.

  They all shook their heads in unison.

  “I appreciate the compliment,” Donya slipped together a few more facts she’d “acquired” in the past, “Colonel Gibson.”

  He nodded, confirming her guess.

  She had hoped to find some small way to fight back, to help her people and her country. This was an opportunity beyond imagining.

  9

  Lee sat in the middle of Lieutenant Commander Boyd Ramis’ office and tried to understand what had just happened.

  They were alone. Everyone had left except he and Donya. Holding hands on a leather couch on a retired ship that had found a whole new purpose after forty years at sea.

  “I—” he clamped down on his tongue. He barely knew her, yet he could imitate her speech patterns as if they came from the same village, not from opposite sides of the world. He wanted so much to—

  “Are you going to say something, Lee, or just sit there in petrified silence?”

  He blew out a breath and took in another, but it didn’t help.

  Donya waited him out.

  “I—” he stalled again, then stumbled ahead in a mad rush. “I don’t want to lose you. I mean I know that you aren’t mine to lose, but I like you so much. You are too beautiful, too important for me. There are a million places you can go. I’m just a pilot who—”

  “Is flying for the most elite helicopter company in all of the 160th SOAR,” she rescued him from himself.

  “But you’re—” he waved a hand helplessly. “And I barely know you, not really. And you barely know me, I can’t ask what I want to ask.” And then he bit down hard on his tongue. Clamped down on it hard enough to hurt; he’d already said too much. And he could see on her face that she knew exactly what he’d left unsaid.

  “It is fast.”

  He nodded vigorously in agreement.

  “We need to take time.”

  He nodded a little less emphatically this time. “How much time?”

  “Enough, but no more than that.”

  “Why no more?” Lee was once again feeling lost; a step behind this woman who did indeed know more about the 5D and the Peleliu than he did, though he’d been aboard for months.

  “Because I don’t want to wait too long.”

  “For what?” Did he dare hope? No. He’d been right the first time, he was just being stupid.

  When she looked down at their joined hands, her hair fell forward over her face. He needed to see her face. With a light touch, he raised her chin and tucked back her long fall of silky hair.

  “Don’t want to wait too long for what, Donya Nakhla?”

  Her eyes were wide as if she spoke with fear in her heart.

  “For family, Lee Ames. Please tell me you want family.”

  He nodded, what else could he do? And then he knew. He brushed his thumb over her lips.

  “I do. With you? A hundred times over I do.” The smile that he had seen so many times on television was nothing compared to the one now growing on her features just for him.

  There had to be some way that he could describe just how deeply he meant that. Perhaps with simple truth.

  “There are two conditions.”

  Her eyes stayed wide, her smile fading only a little.

  “We must find a name for our daughter better than Sughraa. She will not always be a Little One.”

  At Donya’s quick nod, her eyes began to fill with tears.

  “And Donya?”

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  “We’ll have to pick out a good name for a son as well.”

  He kissed away the last of her sorrow through the salt of her happy tears.

  Where Dreams Are Sewn

  Angelo’s Hearth was my first big romance series. It is set in a favorite place of mine, Seattle’s immensely charming and equally popular Pike Place Market. Angelo’s is a fine Italian restaurant where a small group of female friends gather, face life’s challenges, and find that when they share their hearts with the right man, that’s when they truly come alive.

  Opening with Where Dreams Are Born, the series ended up being five novels about three women. Okay, it was supposed to be only three women, but two more insisted on shouldering their way in. And I’m glad they did.

  Maria, Angelo’s mom, is a total sweetheart. And Melanie the supermodel was the one who ultimately pulled the whole series together and created closure.

  Or so I thought.

  The strong women I created as side characters had a few other thoughts on that point.

  Melanie, the supermodel heroine of book #5 Where Dreams Are Written, helped Perrin, the clothing designer of book #4 Where Dreams Are Sewn (and the real heart of the whole series), to hire a new seamstress. I thought nothing of it.

  Kari Jones had something different to say about that.

  1

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “The woman is a demon,” Clem agreed with her. Anna, Kristin, and Mitchell leaned in to look over their shoulders.

  Kari Jones flipped up the hem of the dress to inspect the lie of the fabric. “Look at this seam work.”

  “Beyond demon,” Anna agreed over Mitchell’s low groan.

  “Am not a demon!” Perrin stood at the entry to the sewing room. Her designs were always immaculate and technically a challenge, but this one took it to a whole new level.

  “Then what are you?” Kari wanted to grow up to be like Perrin. Too bad it was never going to happen. That Kari was three days older than her boss was the least of the problems. She had learned the skills and could pattern and sew as well as her boss, perhaps even better, but the talent and vision that had struck down like a lightning bolt and launched Perrin into the fashion design firmament had somehow bypassed Kari.

  Her own designs looked…serviceable.

  Perrin’s designs had walked runways and were splashed across major magazines.

  When she took the job almost a year ago, Kari had hoped that some “designer magic” might rub off Perrin and onto her, but it hadn’t happened so far. However, the amount she’d learned about construction was huge.

  “How did you even do this?” Clem was still inspecting the dress. Kari could see the secrets and
looked to be the only one of the four sewers who had.

  “I’m a demoness!” Perrin did a football end-zone style dance around the dress form.

  Kari snorted, “That’s for damn sure. A very pregnant one.”

  Perrin rubbed her belly and smiled. She wasn’t due for another couple months, but the blond was already spectacularly round-bellied rather than her normal waif-slender self. Another reason Kari would never grow up to be Perrin; Kari was already six inches taller and far more curved—well, than Perrin’s normal shape. Her non-descript dark hair curled to her shoulders instead of being a golden bob.

  Still, she wished she could grow up to be Perrin someday.

  Perrin continued a cha-cha toward the doorway of the room where the five sewers worked to reproduce Perrin’s designs in necessary sizes for the shop and custom orders. The others continued deconstructing the new dress, learning from Perrin’s prototype. Anna was a wizard with pattern-making and Clem was almost as good a seamstress as Kari was. They’d figure it out. Kristin and Mitchell were so fast that, once a design was understood, they could reproduce it as many times as necessary.

  Perrin tipped her head for Kari to join her in the main design studio.

  Kari loved this space. Folded fabrics shimmered along three walls, peeking out of floor-to-ceiling cubby holes abundant with color and texture. To the right a doorway into the storefront cut through the shelving and to the left a bank of high windows let in the Seattle sunshine, which today was of the typically autumn gray-and-wet variety. Down the center was a sprawling cutting table and another pair of sewing machines below the windows. Design heaven.

  Tamara, Perrin’s step-daughter, sat at the cutting table amidst a sea of fabrics. Even though they weren’t related by blood, it was easy to see that the bolt of brilliance had landed on the fifteen-year-old’s head as well. Tammy was piecing together a teen clothing line and it was some of the coolest work Kari had ever seen. With Tammy’s work, she didn’t feel envy; she felt awe.

  Perrin perched carefully on a stool and Kari sat down facing her. Tammy looked up at her for a moment from across the table, but then returned her attention to the fabrics as if embarrassed; not even looking up long enough to offer a hello. Tammy Cullen was usually as effusive as her adoptive mother. And Kari had thought she was really close with the girl…but not at the moment.