by Jan Irving
Bullets sprayed the vehicle.
Something stung my neck.
Caleb went down and I threw myself from the Hummer.
Grunts. A sound like a donkey kick.
Huge shadows writhed against the wall thrown by Caleb and his adversary.
I watched as Caleb struggled for the gun.
The man he was fighting hit his kidney.
Caleb drove his elbow into the other man’s face.
They hit the ground. More smacking sounds. Caleb’s head swung back on impact and then he leapt upright, shot his leg out…and was thrown through the air to crash into a Jeep. He panted, teeth bared, launched himself.
Caleb was on the other man’s shoulders, fingers dug deep into his eyes.
The man screamed, a scream I knew I’d hear in nightmares.
Bleeding, Caleb took a step towards me, fell—
I grabbed him, helped him to the Hummer, threw him inside and ran to the driver’s side. The thing roared to life like a pissed off lion.
Oh, Jesus, the man was on his feet, hand cupping his ruined eyes, gun pointed at us—
I yelled. What, I have no fucking clue.
The Hummer mowed him down.
We shot for the closed metal doors and I didn’t even think about it.
I drove straight into them.
As a peel of metal slid off the fractured glass of our windshield Caleb was already calmly reloading another clip.
“Are you hurt?” I demanded.
He gave me a blank look.
“You’re bleeding over the seat.”
“We have to get some distance. Now. Floor it, Doc.”
We flew over gravel, hit concrete and the big machine skittered and then dug in.
“What’s going on, what am I missing?” I wiped a hand over my mouth and came up with blood. My hands were shaking so much on the wheel it was a wonder I could steer.
“Clean-up crew,” Caleb said. “They’re here to clean up the site.”
Clean-up.
Clean. Up.
The words jumbled in my head like dancing dice as we roared through another gully and then sprang up a hill. The Hummer was no race car, but it had mother-fuckin’ traction going for it.
Behind us fire mushroomed soundlessly in the rear-view mirror before the heat and noise caught up like a freight train.
Our ride skidded, revolving, black marks on asphalt—
Caleb grabbed the wheel.
I was screaming at him but I couldn’t hear myself over the noise.
We shuddered to a stop halfway off the road.
I was lying against Caleb. He was holding me, holding on so tight.
“I’m going to make a call,” he said in that distant voice.
“You… You remember who you are,” I panted.
“Enough.”
Behind us another fireball crescendoed across the horizon.
“They destroyed the site. Blew it the fuck up.”
“Yeah.” He hit speed dial on his phone. “It’s me. Yeah, I know it’s been a while since my last check-in—”
He looked at me. His eyes were blue and burning and suddenly my stomach tightened.
I knew that look. He was memorising my face.
“I want to come in but you have to do something first.”
Caleb covered the phone. “Drive,” he ordered me.
“Caleb…”
“Drive, God damn you, Doc. You think those men went up with the building?”
No, of course they hadn’t. That would be too easy.
I pulled the Hummer back onto the road.
Caleb made a couple more cryptic statements into the phone then shoved it into his pocket.
“Doc, I—”
“Save it.” Did he think I was stupid? “You’re going to ditch me, aren’t you? There’s that little town we passed through. I guess that’s a good place as any to leave me.”
He made no effort to deny it.
Don’t say it. Don’t. Have some fucking pride.
But I couldn’t stop myself. I had no pride, no dignity where Caleb was concerned.
“Am I going to see you again?” My voice broke on the words. Perfect, just perfect.
Caleb’s jaw flexed as he faced the road, his face hard and young and brutal and his fingernails red with the half-moons of dried blood and his eye swelling and he was the other half of me, God damn him, the half that made everything make sense.
He’d already left me behind.
* * * *
At the bus station two towns over, Caleb gripped my arm. “Call Lilah, Doc. You call her and lay low for a couple of days. This should be tied up by then…”
We were at the bus station. I was about to climb on the bus going…I don’t fucking remember. Did it matter? Away from him, which was what he wanted.
I looked at him, his body hunched against the cold wind, his bruises colouring up like a sunset.
“I want to help you finish out this mission.”
Exasperation and something like tenderness moved over his face. “Don’t you get it, Doc? All along, you were my mission.”
Keeping you safe.
I climbed into the bus, settling carefully down in a seat, my body sore and creaking and my freaking hand swollen. Oh, yeah. Maybe two of the fingers were busted.
I closed my eyes.
They snapped open a second later. Tired, I was so freaking tired, which was my only excuse. Why hadn’t Caleb wanted me to come with him? Because he knew he’d do anything to protect me.
You are my mission.
Including kill anyone who threatened me.
Jesus. It was a long time before I could trust my voice to speak to Lilah but when I could I called her.
At least I’d soon have that pancake breakfast I’d been dreaming about.
Epilogue
Finger Springs, Montana, wasn’t a metropolis, but it was perfect for my needs. I’d even made time to hike over to the small hot springs that gave the town its name. They weren’t much bigger than a finger’s width, but they provided some nice pools to lie in and close my eyes and put my ears under the surface so I couldn’t even hear the trails of aeroplanes as they went over head.
It made me feel like I was living a hundred years ago.
Yeah, a hundred years ago Caleb would probably have been a US Marshall or a town sheriff. He would have been trouble with guns riding low on his hips and a black, tall, crowned hat.
Because thinking of my cowboy hurt and could make me crazy with worry I inhaled deeply, trying some of the breathing techniques I was picking up in the local yoga studio.
Trying fricking yoga.
It was definitely the sign of a man with a broken heart.
Seven months had passed since I’d last seen Caleb at the bus station. I’d expected… I don’t know what. But definitely not to be in limbo this long. Not that I’d allowed myself to live that way.
After leaving him I’d hooked up with Lilah and we’d holed up together for a week in a dingy little motel room. I’d had my pancakes at Denny’s, but finally we’d been on the verge of running out of money and I’d needed to get back.
At least renovating my life had given me something else to think about other than the fear that Caleb was dead or that Caleb had fully recovered and realised I wasn’t as important to him as he’d thought or—
Yep, happy thoughts to keep a man from sleeping at night.
I sighed and forced myself to sit up in the water.
I’d changed more than just where I was living over the past few months.
After my experiences with science-gone-wrong, I’d recognised that I didn’t have the emotional distance prized by my surgeon mentor. I’d gone into general practice, hanging out a shingle in a small town the way I’d always wanted. Here I was just about the only doctor in a good fifty miles so it kept me busy, which was good.
Lilah had also come with me, taking a pay cut to become my nurse and office assistant. She was crazy to do it but, damn, if
I wasn’t glad she and her oversized dog had followed me out West.
She was family and right now I needed family.
I looked over to where I’d left my clothes. I was wearing only a pair of boxers since I’d forgotten to bring a suit with me on this first hike. Well, I hadn’t known the water would be so soothing I’d be tempted to go in.
Guess I should get out soon.
“Doc.”
The voice was raspy with feeling, deep and dark like a chocolate sin cake.
A voice I heard in my dreams.
A voice that couldn’t possibly be here.
Jeez, could I get no relief? Caleb haunted me everywhere.
“Go ‘way,” I muttered.
“Doc, God damn it.” The irritation in the voice had me snapping my eyes open. Fantasy men were rarely irritated.
And sweaty, dirty and grumpy looking.
Caleb Black stood at the edge of my pool wearing scarred cowboy boots and dusty jeans. His black T-shirt moulded a body that had filled out in the months since I’d touched him, ran my hands over him.
“It’s hot as hell.”
I blinked. Oh, he didn’t mean his body but the temperature out here.
“I got lost once trying to find this place. The map isn’t accurate.” He dragged off one of those boots as I watched him.
“You got lost,” I echoed. Then anger came to my rescue. “For months?”
His lips twisted. “I figured you might be a little pissed off at me.”
“You figured right!” I was halfway out of the warm water. So much for my relaxation therapy. My body was vibrating. My heart was pounding and my blood pressure had no doubt risen to a dangerous boil.
Yep, Caleb was back in my life.
“Now, Doc.” He raised his palms, backing away as if he was afraid of me. Yeah, right. But he soon would be!
Hands on my hips, I glowered at him.
His lips twitched again.
I considered flattening him and dragging his unconscious body into the pool. “I couldn’t contact you,” he said. “I couldn’t risk it.”
“I didn’t know if you were alive or dead,” I said through my teeth. “I didn’t know what happened to those poor men we found or if those assholes who tried to kill us were still roaming free—”
“They aren’t.” His face hardened. “What’s left of them are in custody. Jeffries is dead.”
“Good.”
He looked a little taken aback by my bloodthirsty tone. Well, hell, Jeffries had tortured people, including Caleb, then tried to kill us.
“I’m, ah, proud of you, Doc.”
I cocked a brow.
He looked a little deflated by my continued attitude. “You went after what you truly wanted, redefined your dream.”
“If you mean coming out here and following my bliss, then yeah. But I didn’t have any options that included you since you were poof—gone.”
“I didn’t have any right to ask you to change your life for me. Not after what I put you through.”
“I think that would be my decision.” I sighed. “Sit down. We need to talk.”
“I thought we could—”
I pointed at the ground and snapped my fingers.
He grinned. “Pushy, Doc. I could get into it.”
I had a vision of his wrists tied to my bed. He would be a pushy bottom, making me please him. And I was getting hot thinking about it.
“I need a few of the blanks filled in.”
Caleb pulled off his second boot and tossed it aside before sitting down and folding his legs. I sat closer to the water, wanting a little distance between us so I didn’t just up and jump him.
He removed his cowboy hat. His flattened and slightly damp hair should not have been appealing, but he looked like a mussed-up range worker, fresh from riding cattle. I hadn’t lost my yen for cowboys.
“What happened after I left you?”
“I didn’t want you brought into it,” Caleb said. “I met with my contact, came in from the cold.”
I’d read enough Le Carré novels to know he meant returned to the fold of whatever agency he’d been working for. “And then what?”
“I handed over the files we collected, filled them in as much as I could remember. I still have…gaps. Things I don’t remember.”
I nodded. It made sense, since he wasn’t a machine, but a person who had been through a traumatic experience. From the reading I’d done since we’d parted ways, he might remember things all at once or over time, in dreams and snatches. “Were the people you worked for able to help the men in the woods?” Those men had haunted me almost as much as Caleb.
Caleb nodded. “They have slowed the progression of the illness. Turns out that packet we found in the locker had the formulas for all the wonder drugs Jeffries had dreamed up. And… I pushed for the men to be reunited with their families. I thought you would approve.”
“Oh, yeah. People get better if they have hope.” I swallowed, getting lost in his intense burning blue eyes. “What about you, are you back with the SEALs?”
He shook his head. “I am getting older and being a SEAL is a young man’s game. I’m twenty-nine years old. If I stayed with them, sooner or later I’d have to leave the fun part behind.”
Being a SEAL was fun? Who was this guy I was so totally, completely gone over?
He grinned and I saw the reckless heart of him.
“I guess settling down in a small town is going to be a big let-down.” From my reading, I knew someone like him could make a very good living working for security firms.
“That depends on you.” He took my hand, rubbing his callused fingers over my smoother ones. I felt that touch light me up. “Since I couldn’t stay away from you any longer and I didn’t want to re-up, I thought I’d take some contract work. I have a few contacts out in the real world. And… I’ll do some ranch work again, maybe invest in a small spread. It’s what I did before I joined the Navy.” He let out a long exhalation and I imagined he was shedding years of living a very specific and dangerous life.
“I rarely sleep through the nights, since I’m always on call out here,” I warned him.
“I might have to go in and do a little, uh, freelance work from time to time,” Caleb said.
“I’ve never lived with someone for more than a year.”
“The longest I’ve lived with someone is just over a week.”
“I’m a morning person.”
He winced. “I can work around it.”
“I take up most of the bed.”
“I remember.” He leaned close. “Doc, there is all this shit goin’ on in our lives. And it won’t stop and it won’t be easy but one thing I know is I want you. I just want you in my life. When everything went dark, and I was lost and confused, I came to you.”
“And you made sure I was safe.”
“That’s all there was for me. Now… I don’t know how I’ll do, trying to live the happy ending, you know?” Uncertainty in his gaze now. He loved me but he was being honest with me. We were total opposites and he had never had a real relationship.
But he was willing to try.
For me, he was willing to try.
“Come here, cowboy.”
Caleb wasted no time. I was crushed against him, smelling man and leather and the hot day and fresh grass.
He kissed me and oh…the lights went back on. The engine revved. Places opened inside me that had been shut down, boarded up.
“Let’s give the happy ending a shot,” I said.
Also available from Total-E-Bound Publishing:
His Landlady
Jan Irving
Excerpt
Chapter One
Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks within, awakens ~ Carl Jung Diana Moore hesitated outside the kickboxing studio, her attention caught by a poster of the sleek body of a young male kickboxer, his leg straight up in a martial arts kick.
Although every muscle was warrior defined, it was the expression on his face
that fixed her attention. He was gazing into the distance, a half smile touching his lips, a look of transcendent pleasure that didn’t make her think of the martial arts…
“Perv,” she muttered to herself. She had better things to do than stand here lusting over a beautiful man who was probably too airbrushed to be true. She adjusted her grip on her attaché case and almost walked into another young man, this one short and covered with black-and-red tattoos.
“You here for class?” he demanded. “Come back in an hour.” His street accent made the word ‘hour’ a match for ‘sour’.
Di gulped and stopped herself from taking a step back. The stranger had an aggressive energy that she could feel like a force field.
“No,” she said. “I’m strictly a yoga person.”
The man stared at her, unblinking, and Di felt as if she’d told a proud Doberman owner that she was the golden retriever type.
“We don’t do yoga here,” he said, crossing his arms.
“No, I know that…” She was flustered and it was stupid. But the studio so wasn’t her thing. “I’m the landlady of this strip mall. I’m here with some paperwork for the owner.”
“Huh.” He didn’t look impressed.
“Nath, behave!” a mellow voice interrupted.
There was a thread of laughter in it that stroked down Di’s spine.
“Hello, landlady. I’ve been waiting to meet you.”
A tanned hand was held out and when she automatically took it, callouses brushed her palm. The grip was strong, confident, and didn’t crush her fingers; this was a man with no need to prove anything.
“Uh…”
He was also the man from the poster. Except he was stripped down to black shorts and his dark hair was sweaty against his forehead. He regarded her with almond-shaped, amber-brown eyes, hinting at a slight Asian heritage while his unshaven jaw and shaggy brown hair were sexy mongrel.
“I’m Diana Moore,” she said.
“My landlady is a Roman goddess, Diana the Huntress,” he said.
Although those dark eyes didn’t move down to her full breasts, Diana felt as if they had. Her nipples peaked through her thin, blue silk tunic.
“Sloan Kent—owner and operator of Soul Kickin’.”
“Soul Kickin’,” she repeated, seeing with relief that the other man, Nath, had disappeared into the studio. He’d been a bit intense for her to handle before she’d had her morning espresso. “So you decided on a name.”
