She flopped back onto a bedspread that was solid black—how inviting—her stained T-shirt flying above her waist. She giggled.
He smoothed a hand over his gangsta’-style head—oh, the hotel manager had loved it when he walked in—and gazed at the trim slice of skin exposed by her disobedient shirt. All around pats on the back to him for not falling on her like a ravening sex beast. ’Course his cock swelled up against the front of his pants with a whole lot of the hell with ‘probably never’ drumming a fierce beat. But he had no say over what that fucker did. He nearly sighed. Considering he’d seen a lot more of Nicole’s bare flesh a short while ago, the sight of her slender belly shouldn’t have knocked the wind out of him with such force, but… yeah. Memories, memories.
Nicole rocked onto one elbow, then the other, and gave him the first sober look he’d seen in a while. “How much of this am I going to regret tomorrow?”
“None of it.” He augmented the assurance with a shake of his head. “I’m deleting everything from my memory banks as fast as it happens.”
A smile crossed her lips. “You’re so Star Spangled Banner, Eric.”
An ache twisted his heart into his stomach and back up again. Somewhere along the way I started thinking of you as Eric. And she was Nicole to him: sexy, smart-mouthed, tough and soft, caramel Nicole. He had no idea when that had happened, either. Probably the moment her lips had brushed his ear in a tender kiss, and it’d hit him how much he wanted the real thing with this woman. A date. Laughter. Conversation to explore the connection already sprouting between them.
It’s a bad habit of mine, pushing myself too hard, you know.
I do know.
“You were a good guy today,” she went on, something like a sigh escaping her. “A really good, noble man, and…” She trailed off, like she couldn’t find her words, but the sentiment was there in her expression, her gaze free of the conflict he knew he’d see when she was sober. I like you, but I so don’t want to… Here, now, alone in this bedroom, she drank him in, and he hoarded the sensation.
She sat up, chin down, and groaned, scrubbing a hand over her face. “I probably sound like an idiot.”
“No.”
“I never get drunk, not on assignment, but…” She looked up at him, her pupils deep dark holes in the center of irises that were melted Tootsie Rolls. Her voice scratched. “You’ve got my back, right?”
His bones slid out of his skin like they’d been lubed up with engine grease. He had the sense she’d wrenched those words up from her soul…that she rarely trusted anyone to watch her six. Him being one of the rare few made him feel…so damned worthy. A really good, noble man. “Absolutely,” he confirmed. “A team.” The word dug a foxhole deep in his heart. A team… Her and him together, in more than just a job. Doing the real thing. He crouched down in front of her. “You may have complimented me too soon, Nicole. I’ve decided I am going to take advantage of you.” Maybe nerves-of-steel Eric was a cardboard cutout fake-o.
She blinked once, then her eyebrows made a trip upward. “This conversation just got interesting.”
“I’m going to extract a promise from you.”
“Oh?”
“Date me.”
She snorted. “Funny.”
“Serious.”
She lightly touched a finger to his lips. “You don’t want to date me, Lieutenant Doodle Dandy.” She dropped her hand. “I chew men.”
He gusted a small laugh. “You what?”
“I chew men…I mean, chew through them. Dios mío. I’m trying to warn you off me.”
He brushed a thumb over her cheekbone. Her face, like the woman, was a mixture of soft and hard, velvety skin over solid bone. “I’ll consider myself duly warned and take my chances.”
“Estúpido,” she breathed out. Her eyes leaned sideways in their sockets. She was fading.
He grabbed her shoulders. “Promise me, Nicole.”
The color washed out of her face. “I really have to throw up now.”
“Then you’ll be heaving chunks into your lap, because you’re not moving from this spot until you’ve sworn that when this mission is over, I get some time with you.” Here’s hoping she wasn’t as close to upchucking as she looked. That never worked out well for him.
“Nasty little piss-drinker,” she growled in Spanish. “All right. I promise.”
He stood and helped her to her feet. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”
“Wait.”
He grimaced internally. She didn’t want him to hold back her hair for her, did she? Not that he minded aiding her in an hour of need, but… “Nicole, I’m a sympathy-puker. If something comes out of your mouth, guaranteed something will come out of mine.” That always made Dad so proud.
“Shut up, you big baby. I just want to give you something.” She crossed to her emergency duffel bag. “I dislocated my shoulder a few months ago on the job and still have some meds.”
He set his hands on his hips. What did this woman get up to at work? She’d suffered a gunshot wound and a shoulder dislocation?
She pulled a see-through orange prescription bottle out of her gear. “Here—” She gave it to him. “For the rotten little pervert.”
He stared down at the bottle, but before he got a chance to give her some well-deserved this is greats, she disappeared into the bathroom. He beat feet out of there before he accidentally heard anything, making sure to lock up.
Striding two doors down, floorboards creaking under his boots, he knocked on Mikey’s room. When his friend opened the door, Eric whistled low on his breath. “Wow, you look like dog shit.”
Mikey shrugged noncommittally. “The blow job was just so-so.”
Eric chuckled. “Skillfully put.” Pilots typically minimized how bad they felt because God forbid they should be kept from flying by a medical down-chit.31 Mikey would blame his ‘looking like dog shit’ on anything other than almost dying today. “Funky,” Eric added. “You’d think if that hooker was trying to extract America’s secrets, she would’ve given you one helluva hummer.” He drew the medicine bottle out of his back pocket and tossed it to his friend. “Vicodin.”
Mikey caught it out of the air. “What? Really?” An expression of sheer relief spread over his face. “I’m so having your babies, LZ.”
“You’ll have to have Gamboa’s.”
“You’re kidding?” Mikey squinted down at the prescription label. “She gave you these?”
“Yep.”
“Specifically for me.”
“That’s affirmative.”
Mikey rolled the bottle in his palm as he seemed to mull that over.
“I’m not going to officially down you,” Eric said. “But tomorrow you’ll take the copilot seat as an observer. Roger that?”
“Yeah,” Mikey agreed. “So…uh…Gamboa’s not a complete ballbuster, huh?”
“Looks that way.” Something squirmed inside Eric, and he itched to bolt. He’d lost all ability to hide his emotions in the last few days, and how tangled up he was about DEA Agent Nicole Gamboa was probably showing all over him in bruised shades of black and blue.
Put her on the table and fuck her.
We can fake this. Thrust your cock against the back of my thigh. It’ll be okay.
Eric shoved his hands into his pockets and stepped back from the door.
It’s all stuck inside my head.
Time to develop a secret handshake because they’d joined the club on that one. What had gone down in Carrera’s hacienda, every detailed minutiae of it, was Super Glued inside Eric’s mind, and it was anybody’s guess how long it would take for him to get his balance back.
It’ll be okay, she’d said. Okay…
A strange pressure landed on top of his chest. He wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out he was never okay again.
Chapter Seventeen
Nicole was doing relatively fine the next morning, with only a little added stiffness to her stride, until she hit the Hotel Windsor Cali’s rest
aurant/bar, and the reek of stale beer and mildew—along with memories of being a complete pendejo last night—bowled into her stomach. Nausea climbed her throat, the back of which was already scratchy and hot as if she’d eaten a bag of rock salt last night.
Moaning softly, she let her duffel bag drop to the floor, then pinched the bridge of her nose, closing her eyes. She immediately opened them again. Whenever she shut her lids, unwanted images paraded across the backs of them. Those needed to be kept in a secure lockbox.
“Here. Eat this.”
She jerked her chin up as food was thrust under her nose.
“It’s Huevos Pericos wrapped in an arepa,” Hammond told her. “Which I figured out is basically scrambled eggs, tomato, and onions in a corn tortilla. Nothing too spicy, right, ’cause, yeah…don’t want to be seeing this again.”
She just stared at the food as a swallow worked its way down her throat.
“It’ll make your feel better.” Hammond pushed the arepa closer. “I know it doesn’t seem like it, but it will.”
Grumpily, she accepted the food. “Why are you being nice?”
Hammond took a bite of his own arepa. “The Vicodin.”
She huh’d as she gave him a once-over. This morning he’d removed the bandage from his face, exposing a row of huge, knotty black stitches along his red and swollen jaw. “I don’t know how the rest of you feels, but your face is cutting it pretty close to zombie.”
He chewed. “I was thinking more like a creature off The Island of Dr. Moreau.”
Ha, that was funny. Too bad it would hurt to laugh. “Knock me over with a feather, you read books. I would’ve lost that bet.” She took an experimental taste of her arepa. The first bite hit her stomach like a brick wrapped in a brick. She grimaced.
“It’s either that or a Bloody Mary,” Hammond warned.
She made a pitiful noise at the thought of more alcohol. She was not a big believer in hair of the dog. She took another small bite. “So how was your hooker?”
Hammond shrugged. “She smelled funny.”
“You go for it, anyway?”
“Sure, why not? It was only ten bucks.”
Nicole gaped. “You slept with a ten dollar whore?”
“Actually, she only asked for five.” He grinned. “I’m a big tipper.”
She curled her lip. “Gross, Hammond.” The thought wasn’t a happy place for her stomach to go. “And I’m going to guess she wasn’t your first dick-dunk into the low end of the pool.”
“What do you expect from a rotten little pervert?” Hammond laughed, amusement crinkling the sides of his eyes.
She glanced away, his laughter making her hand tighten around the arepa. She was already too much of an open, bloody wound this morning without The Pervert turning into her pal. Why was she chatting it up with him, anyway?
A maid carrying a stack of towels bustled by. “Buenos días,” she greeted them.
Nicole cringed. “Was that woman just shouting?”
Hammond took a huge bite of his arepa. “’Fraid not,” he muffled.
Nicole caught sight of Eric descending the stairs, a bag slung over his shoulder, his head already darkened with a stubbly regrowth of hair. He was dressed in last night’s pants and shirt and managed to look great anyway. Was he a morning person? If she woke up next to him, would he be hot for a little lazy morning sex, sunlight slanting across the slow rise and fall of his hips while he…
Her throat balled and she glared at her breakfast. Not helpful, Nicole. A chunk of egg spilled out of the arepa. That’s what she was on the inside: just pieces tumbling down to the floor. She turned and slammed her breakfast into a trashcan. “I’m done.” How many different levels could those two words be interpreted on?
“You okay, Gamboa?” Hammond asked, still with food in his mouth by the sound of it.
Eric pulled up in front of them.
She directed her focus at a row of aguardiente bottles across the room, which, ugh, didn’t help her failing stomach, either. But looking into Eric’s eyes would be the worst thing for her belly.
She felt his gaze on her, probably checking to see how green around the gills she was. “I have today’s flight plan back to El Dorado International Airport,” he said. “Bomber is already at Marco Fidel Suárez airfield, pre-flighting the helo for—”
“I’ll pass,” she cut in.
Eric paused. “Come again?”
There were five aguardiente bottles. One, two, three, four, five. “I’m not climbing on board your helicopter again. The thing is a death trap.”
Eric muttered something beneath his breath. “Would you prefer to wait for a bus?”
She looked at him, blank-faced. “Maybe.” Smart guy.
A shadow passed by the open door, and they all turned just as Ryan Aagaard stepped inside. He stopped when he saw the three of them and planted his hands on his hips, his eyebrows stabbing together. Aagaard could blend into the local color whenever he wanted to—even as blond as he was—but today wasn’t one of those days. He was dressed in black fatigues, combat boots, and T-shirt, and if she wasn’t hallucinating, a Colombian Air Force decal decorated the side door of the car parked on the street behind him.
She faced her DEA partner. “Tell me you arrived from Bogotá in something other than a helicopter, Aagaard.”
Ryan’s brows screwed tighter. “We came in a Cessna.”
“Hallelujah.” She scooped up her duffel. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“Wait a moment,” Ryan snapped. “What’s going on? The only message I received was that your helicopter had mechanical troubles and you were stuck in this Cali hotel for the night.”
“Then you do know what’s going on.” Idiot.
Ryan cut a sharp gesture at Hammond. “Clearly not.” So the zombie hadn’t got past Special Agent Aagaard’s keen perception.
“Now is not the time,” Eric inputted, “for a debrief.”
“I’m aware of that,” Aagaard bit out. “But—”
“O’Dwyer and I achieved our objective,” she said coldly. “That’s the only relevant piece of information you need to know. The rest is nobody’s business.”
The three men went still.
She pinched her lips together, heat rushing into her ears. Could she come off as any more defensive? She’d just made it sound like something had happened on the mission, which, dur, it had, but she’d just as soon spend one week head-down in a porta potty than have everyone know she was obsessing about it. Turning on her heel, she stalked for the door. “I’ll meet you in the car.”
A hand gripped her upper arm.
She turned back around…but it wasn’t Aagaard being Aagaard.
“So that’s it?” Eric stared her hard in the face. “After everything that’s happened between us, you’re not even going to say goodbye?”
She pulled her arm from his grip. “It was just a job, remember?” Her heart was suddenly pared open and roasting on a barbeque. Eric’s expression did that.
“So much for promises,” he drawled.
You’re not going anywhere until you’ve promised that when this mission is over, I get some time with you. She flexed her hand around the strap of her duffel bag. “What do you want, Eric? For me to pop over to your Navy ship for a candlelight dinner?” Her jaw pulsed. “That promise was a bullshit in-the-moment thing, and you know it. As you said yourself, it’s over now.” And she was going to keep repeating that until she believed it. “I go back to Bogotá and you return to your deployment. But if you want a goodbye, this is it.” She turned and continued for the door.
“My office will be in touch with you about the second part of this project,” she heard Ryan saying in his official voice.
Poser. She jumped into the backseat of the Colombian Air Force car, although she’d almost rather climb into a helicopter again than have to endure Aagaard for the whole trip back.
Up front, a driver in a uniform glanced at her in the rearview mirror.
She turned to look out the window, watching a cockroach twitch by on the sidewalk. Her heart felt smaller than a cough drop sucked down to a bare, brittle sliver, and the skin on her face had never been tighter. Last thing she needed was an audience for that.
Ryan slid in next to her, and the driver took off.
Her partner was quiet, but tension rolled off him, and she knew it was only a matter of time before he—
“What happened, Nicole?”
Resting an elbow on the door’s armrest, she pressed a hand over her closed eyes…and the unwanted images assailed her: Eric’s gaze, dark with emotion when he’d touched her during their sex show, turning nearly wretched with panic when Carrera had ordered him to fuck her; the tempting beauty of his physique; the magnificent erection he’d gotten but hadn’t wanted because of the I-told-you-so look he’d get from her; Eric hauling both her and Hammond up the hill to rescue them; last night, crouched before her, showing her a desire that ran so much deeper than lust. Date me.
She groaned low in her throat. Emotionally she felt as wrecked as she was physically…probably more, like a body-sized bandage had been ripped off her flesh, leaving her terminally raw.
“You have to be my big, strong girl, mija.”
“But, Papa, I don’t want to move again! My school play is tomorrow…”
“Shush, now, and pack your suitcase.”
Everything inside Nicole screamed in rebellion. No! For once just let me feel!
“What did O’Dwyer do to you?” Aagaard’s voice held dark, angry edges.
“Nothing.” Nicole’s lips trembled and, before she could stop it, a single tear welled into her eye, threaded between her bottom lashes, and lazed a wet path down her cheek.
I’m deleting everything from my memory banks as fast as it happens.
When had anyone in her life ever offered her that kind of forgiveness?
Wings of Gold Series Page 12
