Stranded with the Sergeant

by Cathie Linz

  At the first touch of his lips against hers, something inside of her melted. Her heart gave a strange little leap as she tasted the sweetness of the apple they’d just shared on his warm lips.

  His kiss was surprisingly hesitant, which both shocked and delighted her.

  He wasn’t sweeping her off her feet as if she were one of the many women he’d no doubt charmed in the past. This was different. He wasn’t storming her defenses, he was gently seducing them. His mouth brushed across hers with slow and reverent strokes, each gentle exploration creating a new sense of expectancy.

  Gradually increasing the pressure, the kiss lost all tentativeness and blossomed as he coaxed her lips to not only cling to his but to part, allowing him the liberty of dipping his tongue into the warm depths of her mouth.

  It certainly wasn’t the first time Prudence had ever been kissed this way, but it was certainly the first time she’d ever responded this way. She’d secretly never understood the appeal of French kissing until this very moment. Now, as he teased her with the tip of his tongue, she shivered with unspoken delight.

  She could easily get addicted to this. She’d waited all her life for this.

  Parting her lips even more, she murmured with pleasure as Joe tasted her, his tongue swirling, probing and exploring as if she were some incredible delicacy that he couldn’t get enough of.

  The sudden sound of a sleepy murmur startled her. Quickly breaking off their kiss, Prudence scooted away from Joe, almost falling off her chair. Silently berating herself for her momentary lapse in cautious judgment, Prudence returned to the fire and comforted a restless Rosa until the girl fell back into a deep sleep.

  But Joe remained in the shadows, as if he didn’t think he was worthy of coming into the light and the warmth.

  The next morning the worst of the storm had broken. Snow blanketed everything, making rocky outcroppings indistinguishable from drifts. The temperature rose above freezing and some of the snow began melting.

  By noon the sky had cleared enough for a watered-down stream of sunlight to peek through. Joe spent every moment preparing for their rescue.

  Just a little longer, he kept telling himself as he hacked branches from a few of the snow-covered evergreens that stood like majestic sentinels. Just a little longer…

  “You’re not supposed to chop down trees in a national park,” Keishon yelled at him from the cabin’s covered front porch. “Sir,” she added as he ducked to avoid having a pile of melting snow dumped on his head from one of the higher branches.

  “I’m not chopping down trees,” Joe replied, brushing wet snow from his face. “Just a few branches.”

  “This land belongs to everyone,” Keishon primly reminded him. “So we should be careful not to damage it.”

  “I’m not damaging it.”

  “I don’t think that tree would agree with you,” Keishon declared. “You shouldn’t be chopping off branches. You’re going to get into trouble.”

  Too late. Joe was already in trouble.

  “What are you doing?” Keishon yelled again.

  Yeah, that was the question all right. What the heck was Joe doing—kissing his commanding officer’s daughter the way he had last night? He shouldn’t have been kissing her any which way, but certainly not as if she was his last hope of salvation on earth.

  “You better get back inside,” Joe ordered Keishon. “It’s too cold out here.”

  “You’re out here, sir.”

  “Because I’m trained to do this.”

  “To cut down branches?” she asked doubtfully.

  “To make sure we get rescued today.” That’s what Joe was hanging on to. With the clearing weather, a helicopter should be able to start the search. He had no doubt that Prudence’s father would make sure that a search party was started as soon as possible. And chances were they’d search in all the likely places first, like this deserted ranger’s cabin.

  But just to be sure, Joe laid the dark green boughs out in the pristine white snow so that they formed a huge X. This way a rescue helicopter would be sure to find them. And the sooner that happened the better as far as Joe was concerned.

  His orders were to take care of Prudence. That meant getting her off this mountain and away from him. He was no good to any woman in the shape he was in. And he was certainly no good to the one woman who was off-limits to him.

  The helicopter arrived later that afternoon. Joe was waiting on the front porch, gathering more firewood. He heard the whirring sounds as the helo came closer. For one moment, as the sun bounced off the metal rotor blades, he was thrown back to that moment six weeks ago when he’d stood watching another chopper.

  Joe swore, low and harsh, cursing the memories that wouldn’t disappear. He fought down the rising emotion, fearing that if he let it out it would consume him.

  Narrowing his eyes, Joe shifted his gaze to Prudence who’d just joined him on the porch. He should never have confessed as much as he had to her last night. Survivor guilt—a neat and tidy name for a gritty and messy emotion.

  Running out into the snow, Joe waved his hands, indicating the best landing place. The snow had melted in a relatively flat area. The hovering helo softly touched down there a few moments later.

  “Sergeant Wilder?” the copilot asked as he jumped out, bending low to avoid the downdraft.

  “Affirmative,” Joe replied.

  “Any injuries?”

  “Negative.”

  “There’s more bad weather moving in, Sergeant,” the copilot said. “So the faster we can get this rescue mission accomplished the better.”

  Joe nodded his agreement before rushing back to the cabin. Prudence was gathering their backpacks onto the porch but Joe stopped her. “We need to move everyone out ASAP. Forget the backpacks, just get in the helicopter.” Since the snow was still up to his knees near the shadowy front of the cabin, he simply picked up Rosa and headed out to the helo, handing her over to the copilot who helped the girl inside the passenger compartment.

  Joe returned for the other students until all were aboard the helo. Joe then turned back for Prudence, but the copilot stopped him with a hand on his arm. “That’s all we can carry this trip, Sergeant. We’ll be back for you two.”

  “You don’t understand,” Joe barked. “That’s Sergeant Major Martin’s daughter. You have to take her. Now.”

  “I don’t care if she’s the First Lady,” the copilot, clearly not a Marine, replied. “We’re packed as much as possible. Putting anyone else on board would put us all at risk. Just sit tight, Sergeant. We’ll be back as soon as we can.” He hopped into the helicopter and shut the door.

  Joe ducked and hurriedly moved away as the rotors turned to full power and the helicopter took off. He closed his eyes rather than shield them against the blast caused by the helicopter’s downdraft. Loose snow flew in his face, mocking him. Just when he thought he was out of the woods, things got worse.

  Sure, he’d gotten rid of the VCRs. But now he was snowbound in an isolated cabin in the mountains with a woman whose kiss packed the punch of a 40 mm grenade launcher.

  Not for long, he reminded himself. Not for long.

  “They’ll be back.” Joe shouted the reassurance to Prudence. He repeated it even louder this time. “They’ll be back!”

  “And do you plan on standing out there waiting for them?” she asked as if she knew why he was keeping his distance.

  Was she laughing at him? No one laughed at a Marine. She should know better, after having been raised by the Sergeant Major. “No, I don’t plan on standing out here waiting,” he replied, stomping onto the porch and brushing the snow off. Too bad he didn’t have any arctic gear with him. But then who could have known that the weather in North Carolina in early May would get so temperamental?

  No wonder they referred to Mother Nature and not Father Nature. Only a female would be this unpredictable and recalcitrant.

  “I was just making soup when the helicopter arrived,” Prudence said as she ush
ered him back into the cabin. “Want some? It’s just instant chicken noodle.”

  “I’m not hungry,” he lied, his stomach growling in protest. He’d skipped breakfast so that Prudence and the kids would have more food. While there were several cans of baked beans and pasta in the cabin, the preadolescents had a bottomless appetite.

  “I can’t possibly eat all this by myself,” she protested. “It’ll go to waste otherwise. Besides I could use some help getting the place back in order before they return for us.”

  Us. What was she doing referring to them as an us? Just because he’d kissed her last night, that didn’t mean there was an us here.

  Prudence knew Joe had been avoiding her all morning. And she’d let him. Her own thoughts were still too jumbled to sort out logically.

  Being alone with him in the cabin was infinitely different than having her students there. The very air seemed to vibrate. Something was happening between them, had already happened when he’d kissed her last night. And now she was still struggling to come to terms with what it all meant.

  Did he regret kissing her? Did she regret kissing him? Logically she might, but in her heart there was no contrition at her incautious behavior. Being kissed by him had simply felt too good, too right.

  Which was a very dangerous thing. Joe Wilder was a man who knew how to treat women, knew how to seduce them, definitely knew how to kiss them. It didn’t necessarily mean anything and she’d do well to remember that.

  She and Joe ate their soup in silence and then began cleaning up. Neatness was a requirement in the Marine Corps. It had become second nature to her and she suspected to Joe as well. They worked well together, until he turned and bumped into her.

  His hands automatically came out to hold her upright. In an instant, awareness flared, making her want him with a hunger and desperation that shocked her. And intrigued her.

  Their gazes met and held. Shivers danced down her spine. She wasn’t cold, however. No, she was definitely warm and getting hotter by the minute. All because of the way he was looking at her. His blue eyes searched her face, lingering on her lips in a way that told her he was thinking about that kiss last night. His gaze caressed what his mouth and hands could not.

  Then the man became the Marine once again as he stepped away from her. Heading to the window, he looked outside. “That rescue team should have been back by now,” Joe muttered.

  Prudence shrugged. “Maybe they had others they had to rescue. We’re probably not the only ones caught unprepared by this blizzard.”

  Caught unprepared. A cardinal sin for a Marine.

  Stepping outside, Joe scanned the sky and swore. The wind had picked up while they’d been inside and dark storm clouds were billowing to their west, moving in fast. It looked like the bad weather the copilot had told him about was moving in faster than expected.

  Fifteen minutes later it was snowing heavily again. As Joe feared, the storm wasn’t over yet. They wouldn’t be going anyplace today…or tonight, either, for that matter.

  Chapter Seven

  “What should we dine on this evening?” Prudence inquired in her best pseudohaughty maître d’ voice. “We have a lovely selection of pasta on the menu. Would you prefer canned spaghetti or canned ravioli?”

  “I’d prefer to get off this mountain,” Joe growled, pacing the floor like a caged tiger.

  “Anyone ever tell you that you can be quite crabby?” she inquired as she attempted to use a manual can opener on the ravioli.

  He appeared a bit affronted by her comment. “If you think I’m crabby you should meet my friend Curt. He’s always been the crabby one. I’m the…”

  “The what?” she prompted over her shoulder. “The charmer? The ladies’ man?”

  “What gives you that idea?” he demanded, whisking the can from her hands and using the stubborn can opener with ease.

  “Probably your practiced routine when we first met.”

  “That was no routine,” Joe replied, plunking the now-opened can onto the counter beside her. “I’ll have you know that my routine is much better than that.”

  “And I’m sure it’s usually successful with members of the opposite sex. Put a guy like you in Marine dress blues and there’s really no contest, right? Women swoon at your feet.”

  He frowned at her. “What do you mean, a guy like me?”

  “You don’t need me to tell you that you’re good-looking.”

  “But you’re immune, right? Marines don’t do anything for you.”

  “That’s right.” She wasn’t lying. Marines hadn’t done anything for her…until now.

  “I would have thought that being raised as a Marine brat, you’d embrace the Corps values.”

  “Honor, courage, commitment. I believe in those, but I didn’t and still don’t believe that only Marines have those qualities. And I rebelled against the tight rein my father kept on me. Then there was the fact that we moved a lot, all over the U.S. and even overseas once. We were stationed in Okinawa when I was nine.”

  He gave her a startled look. “Really? My dad was stationed there, too. The whole family was with him.”

  “When was that?” Prudence asked.

  When he gave her the date, she blinked at him in surprise. “That’s when we were there.”

  “Along with several thousand others.” Joe sat on one of the folding chairs and balanced his plate of ravioli on his lap. The cabin had no table.

  Sitting beside him on her own chair, she stared at him more closely. “Did you have a nickname?”

  “Did you?” he countered.

  “Yes, but I’m not telling you what it is.”

  “My brothers and I used to hang around with a girl we called Princess Pug,” he noted almost absently.

  Her strangled cough made Joe pause. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, I’m just stunned.”

  Narrowing his eyes, he gave her an intent look before shaking his head. “No way. You’re not…you’re not Princess Pug?”

  She turned her profile to him. “You don’t recognize the nose, Flyboy?”

  “You had a cute little nose,” he noted slowly, staring at her as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “That’s why we gave you that nickname.”

  “Which I would never have tolerated from anyone else,” she informed him. “But you and your brothers were very nice to the new kid on the block when I first moved there. It was the first overseas assignment I’d ever been on with my parents and I had trouble adjusting at first. I was scared and alone and you made me feel better. Then you were gone.”

  Joe nodded. “My dad’s tour of duty was over and we headed back to the States.”

  “I never even knew your real name. You all went by nicknames. Flyboy, Ranger, Eagle and Champ. You were going to be a pilot.”

  “I changed my mind. You were going to be a princess.”

  “I changed my mind,” she replied with a grin.

  “It’s a tight job market in the princess business, huh?”

  She laughed and nodded. “Then there was the fact that I went to boarding school for a while, an all-girls high school, and met a real princess from a tiny European principality. She was so smooth and confident that I knew I’d never be able to compete. We ended up friends, though.”

  “You’re still a princess in your father’s eyes,” Joe told her.

  She just rolled her eyes.

  “Princess Pug.” He stared at her in amazement. “After all this time. Tell me more about what you were like as a teenager.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m having a hard time picturing you as a wild rebel.”

  “Trust me,” Prudence said. “I was wild. I didn’t take orders from anyone.”

  “You still don’t do that very well,” he noted dryly. “At least not from me.”

  “I’ve tried very hard to become a more cautious person,” she informed him.

  “Since the car accident, you mean.”

  Prudence nodded and her exp
ression turned serious. “I would have done anything to make up for what I did. The accident was my fault. That’s a fact, not a feeling.”

  “Marines don’t have feelings,” Joe said.

  “The few, the proud, the unfeeling?” she misquoted the recruiting line. “I don’t think so.”

  “Marines must not fail.”

  “And you think you failed by not getting on that helicopter that crashed?” she said astutely.

  Joe clenched his jaw. “You have no idea what I think.”

  “Then tell me.”

  “No.” Just like that he ended their conversation and focused all his attention on his meal, which he consumed with quick efficiency.

  She couldn’t believe how he was able to turn his emotions on and off the way he did. And she couldn’t believe that he was the Flyboy she’d known as a young girl. But it did explain the connection she’d felt with him.

  Wow. Flyboy. After all this time.

  They finished the dinner just as they had their lunch. In silence.

  Great. She was really getting aggravated now. They’d just discovered a shared childhood past and the guy clammed up. Fine. Let him brood. She wasn’t going to beg him to speak to her. She had bigger fish to fry.

  Right after dinner, she set her plans into action and by the time Joe returned with a new batch of firewood she was just about ready.

  “Since we’re stuck here anyway, I’m taking a bath,” Prudence announced. “While you’ve been pouting, I’ve been boiling water.”

  Pouting? Joe thought to himself, immediately defensive. There was no pouting in the United States Marine Corps.

  Her accusation momentarily distracted him from the rest of her declaration. Her taking a bath. That would probably require her taking off her clothes. Definitely not a good idea. Besides, there was no hot water.…

  Which was why she’d been boiling water. The woman was serious. She was clearly out of her mind.

  “Listen, princess, this isn’t a health spa here. Take your bath when you get home.”

  It was as direct an order as he could possibly have given her, delivered in his best drill sergeant voice.