by Rachel Lee
Shower and bed, she thought wearily. The radio on her hip reminded her that the night might be interrupted, but for once she allowed herself to believe that fortune would favor her.
Just as she was entering her room, however, she remembered Butcher and Frankel, the men who’d been arrested for brawling on duty. Damn and double damn! All sleepiness fled as she realized she had to deal with them first thing in the morning.
After flinging clothes this way and that in her annoyance, she stepped into the shower and turned her face into the hot spray. With her eyes closed, however, it was not Butcher and Frankel she saw, but Colonel Alisdair MacLendon. Why did he have to be so almighty attractive and virile? She couldn’t afford to be attracted to him. He was her commanding officer, her superior, her…
Nemesis. The word floated into her weary mind like a whispered warning. So much for sleep.
Chapter 3
“How’d it go?”
Andrea turned from the window where she’d been staring out at the leaden sky and found Colonel MacLendon standing in her doorway, leaning against the doorjamb. This morning it was she who was decked out in blues, her tunic and pants sculpting a lean figure, and MacLendon who wore civvies: gray slacks and sweater.
Irritation flared in Andrea. Couldn’t the man leave her alone? He was sticking to her like a burr. What the devil was going on? She turned back to the window, folding her arms beneath her breasts, just plain not caring that tomorrow morning he was going to be her CO.
MacLendon saw her irritation, but before that he had seen her loneliness. There was nothing quite like the isolation of command, and when the decisions became tough, the isolation was virtually absolute. For a little while, when Andrea hadn’t known she was being observed, her shoulders had slumped and her head had drooped. Just now MacLendon was feeling a little sympathetic.
“Demotion?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“No other way?”
She turned, green eyes blazing, furious that he was questioning her judgment. “Does the Colonel see another way?”
“Is the Captain requesting my opinion?”
Her lips thinned. Funny, MacLendon thought, he hadn’t noticed just how soft and appealing her mouth was until she made it thin and hard.
“Yes, sir,” she said, the words falling into the room like a thrown gauntlet. The sharp lift of her chin defied him to criticize her decision. She’d lain awake half the night agonizing over this, well aware that she was about to stigmatize the careers of two young men. That enormous, frightening power was hers by virtue of her command responsibility, a duty to protect the security of the United States. No amount of sympathy or understanding could permit her to abrogate that duty. It sure hurt, though, she found herself thinking as she braced for MacLendon’s answer. And all of a sudden she realized that it mattered what he thought of her decision.
“In my opinion,” he replied quietly, “there was nothing else you could do. It wasn’t the brawl, it was the situation they were in.”
Something in her relaxed, and she turned back to the window to conceal her relief from him. She hardly knew the man, and it unsettled her to realize that his opinion was important.
“That’s the devil of it,” she said presently. “If they’d been on almost any other kind of duty…” She left the sentence incomplete. The military put up with a lot of things because many of its members were very young males. A brawl in the barracks would at most earn a reprimand. A series of brawls might lead to a day or two in the stockade. A brawl between two guys who were guarding warheads was something else altogether.
“Is there something I can do for you, Colonel?” she thought to ask, wishing he would just go away. She needed solitude to sort out her strangely tangled feelings. Worse, his presence seemed to be tangling those feelings even more.
“Actually, no,” he answered, stepping farther into her office. “The fact is, I’ve been exactly where you are. Not every commander faces a decision like this, but too many of us do. I figured you wouldn’t be feeling any too happy about it, so I dropped by. I realize I can’t say or do anything to make it easier. Doing your duty isn’t always easy.”
“No, it’s not.” Why was he being so sympathetic? Andrea wondered. Yesterday he’d seemed determined to drive her crazy.
Staring at her rigid back, MacLendon decided this visit hadn’t been one of his better ideas. “You know where to find me if you want to talk.”
“The colonel is very kind,” Andrea said stiffly.
MacLendon laughed. “Minx.”
Andrea spun around. “I beg your pardon?”
MacLendon’s lips twitched. “Just so you know, Captain, your little zingers don’t pass me by unnoticed.”
Hot color started to flood Andrea’s cheeks, but MacLendon had already begun to turn away.
“Oh, Captain Burke?” He glanced back.
“Sir?”
“I also stopped by to tell you that I always thought your father was a horse’s ass.”
Andrea’s mouth was still hanging open when MacLendon’s footsteps had faded from the building. Only then did she start to grin. “A horse’s ass?” she repeated out loud, and decided she liked that description a lot. In fact, merely imagining how Charlie Burke would have looked if he’d heard himself called that by a man of MacLendon’s stature was enough to make the day a whole lot brighter.
Throughout the following week, winter edged more deeply into North Dakota. Monday morning there was the change of command ceremony for MacLendon, followed by a formal luncheon at the Officers’ Club. That night there was a Hail and Farewell reception for the incoming and outgoing commanders. Colonel Houlihan, MacLendon’s predecessor, practically danced through the whole thing, excited about his new posting to the Pentagon and eager to be off.
Andrea hated this kind of stuff and trudged her way through it grimly, hoping her radio would rescue her. For once the damn thing was utterly silent, issuing not a single squawk.
All week long her radio remained uncharacteristically silent. It was as if the fight at the depot had infused her sometimes reckless troops with a new sobriety. The pall of the demotion hung over everything.
MacLendon had left her alone all week, except to nod when he saw her. He was interested in other elements of his command, and the rest of the base’s units had the dubious honor of his undivided attention. Evidently he had made up his mind about Andrea.
Friday night she worked late. Darkness arrived early in North Dakota in early November, and the temperature had edged down into the teens. Outside, the ceaseless wind moaned, a forlorn sound that suited her mood perfectly.
“Do you work all the time?”
Andrea looked up and found MacLendon standing in her doorway. The sight of him both surprised and amused her. She was glad of the distraction from her gloomy thoughts.
“Do I make you feel guilty, Colonel?” she asked.
His lips twitched. This time she saw it, and a small answering smile came to her face.
“I’ve been wondering,” he said, “what you do with your free time.” Actually, he’d been wondering a whole lot more than that about her, but this was the only question he felt certain wouldn’t make her snap his head off.
“Free time?” Her tone was enough to answer the question.
“Captain Burke,” he said, “I’m giving you a direct order.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Find somebody to replace you this weekend and leave that damn radio on your desk.”
“If I can.”
He straightened. “You do have a deputy commander.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then call him. Now.”
Standing there and waiting for her to obey, he left her no alternative. Mildly irritated, she picked up the phone and called Lieutenant Dolan. He sounded as thrilled as she felt. Then she called Operations and informed them. How the devil, she wondered, was she going to stand a weekend cooped up in the BOQ with nothing to do?
When she h
ung up the phone, there was a spark of defiance in her green eyes. MacLendon was glad to see it. It had been missing all week. He began to zip up his parka.
“I’m going to the mall,” he said.
She studied him in silence, wondering why he’d told her that. It was none of her business, surely, where he chose to go. There was something personal in his presence here, she realized with a fluttering sensation in her stomach. When he finished zipping his parka, his blue eyes locked with hers, and she saw something that made her feel oddly edgy, as if she were craving something but couldn’t tell what.
“I have thirteen nieces and nephews,” he remarked, “and it’s almost Christmas.”
“Don’t you like Christmas, Colonel?”
One corner of his mouth lifted. “I like the idea of Christmas. I always think of roaring fires and brandy and good company. In my entire career, I haven’t spent one Christmas like that. I’ve eaten more chow hall Christmas turkeys than I want to think about. The worst of it, though, is buying gifts for the kids. I just don’t seem to know what they’d like. It’s hell, Captain.”
“It sounds like it,” she managed to answer steadily, although the fluttering in her stomach now felt like rising bubbles of laughter.
He regarded her with an elevated brow. “Are you laughing at me, Captain Burke?”
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Colonel.” But she could feel the corners of her mouth tugging upward and knew he saw it by the smile that suddenly creased his cheeks and crinkled the corners of his eyes. It was, she thought with a swiftly indrawn breath, an unfairly devastating smile in a man who was already unfairly attractive.
“What about you?” he asked. “How many nieces and nephews do you shop for?”
Andrea ran a rapid mental check. “Nineteen.”
“A fellow sufferer, I see. Do you find it difficult?”
“No, sir.”
He looked at her steadily for a moment. “I don’t suppose—” He bit off the sentence and turned to leave. “Good night, Captain.”
“Colonel?”
Her cool voice caught him before he took his third step away. He walked back.
“Yes?”
Her face felt odd, and her stomach certainly felt odder, as she said, “My car’s been acting a little funny lately. Could I possibly hitch a ride to the mall with you?”
He allowed himself another smile. “On one condition, Captain. That you help me figure out what to buy for all those kids.”
“I’ll be glad to help. I enjoy shopping for children.”
The remark surprised him. He’d figured that Andrea avoided anything that sounded even remotely feminine, as if femininity were a plague.
“I’ll pick you up in an hour, then,” he said. “What’s your room?”
“225,” she answered.
Two doors down from him, he thought as he walked away. Interesting.
Andrea had learned enough about the loneliness of command, particularly in the past week, to recognize it in MacLendon when she saw it. He’d been about to make a simple, friendly request for her assistance, then had dropped it because she was his subordinate officer and under no circumstances could he make such a claim on her private time. Particularly when that request might be viewed as sexist, although it had been perfectly natural when she professed herself an experienced shopper for nieces and nephews.
Andrea sighed and picked up her parka. Sometimes being a woman in a man’s world could be a royal pain. Most of the time she managed simply not to think about it, but other times it reared up and stared her in the face. Why did this tension have to exist? It had always been present with her father, but with her brothers it had been completely absent. Most of the time it stayed out of her relationships with her troops and fellow officers. Every so often, however, she was reminded that she was an anomaly, that what she was and what she wanted to be were not always how the rest of the world viewed her.
Damn! she thought, and slammed her office door behind her. Double damn!
When MacLendon knocked on her door an hour later, she was ready to go. Dressed in jeans, wool sweater, and a commercial survival parka that was considerably warmer than government issue, she wasn’t surprised to find MacLendon dressed similarly. Stepping outside with him, she pulled up her hood and tugged on her mittens.
“There’s another cold front coming through tonight,” he remarked as he turned onto the highway toward town. “Supposed to get down to around zero.”
“That’s warm for this place. Or would be, if it were January.” The car’s heater was beginning to catch up with the chill, and she pulled her hood off.
“What’s wrong with your car?” he asked.
“Choke’s sticking, I think. It stalls at stop signs and other convenient places.”
“I’ll take a look at it tomorrow.”
Andrea swiveled her head to look at him. “Colonel—”
“Dare,” he said patiently. “We’re off duty, and you can call me Dare.”
“Oh. I wondered about Alisdair. It’s a mouthful.”
“Old Scottish name,” he chuckled. “There’s one in every generation of MacLendons.”
“About my car—”
“If it’s a sticky choke,” he interrupted, “I can fix it in about thirty seconds. No problem.”
“No, it’s not a problem,” she agreed. “I can fix it myself. I just haven’t gotten to it.”
There was a pregnant silence. They seemed to share an awful lot of those, for some reason, Andrea found herself thinking irritably.
Finally he spoke, his voice silky. “Did I just step on your feminist toes, Andrea?”
“No, sir. It’s just that I can’t see letting my CO do something I’m perfectly capable of doing for myself, especially when it involves his free time.”
“And I suppose you think your CO is incapable of deciding for himself how to spend his free time?”
“No, sir.” Her cheeks were growing warm. “It never entered my head.” She seemed to have an absolute genius for saying the wrong thing to this man.
“Did it occur to you that since you’re doing your CO a favor he might want to return it?”
“I thought you were doing me a favor. You’re giving me a lift to the mall.”
“Andrea…” His voice had grown dangerous.
“Sir?”
“Shut up.”
“Yes, sir.”
And damn it, he thought, if she didn’t stay silent as a clam all the way to the mall. It wasn’t until they were strolling to the toy store that he realized she was going to stay quiet all night because he’d told her to. He glanced at her with frustration.
“Andrea.”
“Sir?”
“Talk.”
“Yes, sir.” She cocked her head, and he caught the gleam in her eye. “About what, sir?”
“Anything that takes your fancy. And stop calling me ‘sir.’”
“Yes, sir.”
A muffled sound escaped him. She was utterly unable to tell if it was rage or laughter. Certainly the ice in his blue eyes was suddenly replaced by fire.
“Andrea,” he said, drawing up short to face her.
“Sir?”
“Has anyone ever told you that it can be dangerous to drive your CO crazy? He just might be tempted to make your life miserable.”
Her expression became one of perfect innocence. “I’m only trying to follow orders.”
“We’re off duty, Andrea.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Act like it.”
“Yes, sir.”
He took a menacing step toward her. “I told you to stop calling me ‘sir.’” Her mouth opened, and for an instant he thought the imp in her would drive her to say “yes, sir” anyway, but suddenly a laugh escaped her, and humor filled her hazy green eyes with warmth.
“Okay,” she said.
“Thank God,” he said with exaggerated relief. “I was beginning to think I’d have to strangle you to get you to stop that.”
&nbs
p; “No, sir,” she said, and darted away laughing just as he turned on her. “I promise,” she said, grinning, holding up a hand and backing away from him. “Not again. I won’t do it again!”
“If you do, I’ll leave you to walk back to base,” he growled, his anger belied by the twinkle in his eye.
“Scout’s honor. I won’t say the s-word again this evening.”
Her eyes sparkled, her cheeks glowed pink, and for the first time since he’d met her, Andrea Burke didn’t look like a woman who was trying her damnedest to be someone else. No, he corrected himself, she’d also been herself the night she aided him after the accident. Her imp had come out then, too, and her concern for him had been genuine and warm. Too often, however, she appeared to be inhibiting her natural liveliness in favor of some sexless, sterile image of her role. But then, he reminded himself sternly, how well did he really know her? Just because he’d spent the better part of his evenings for a week wondering how to get behind that facade…
Andrea’s attention was suddenly caught by the sight of a small artificial Christmas tree in a shop window.
“Maybe I should get one of those for my quarters,” she said almost wistfully. “I really miss having a tree.”
“Just once I’d like to get out of having to put one up.”
Andrea glanced up at him in question.
“I’ll be moving into family housing in two weeks,” MacLendon explained. Rank had its privileges, like a three-bedroom house for a bachelor colonel. “I’ll be expected to do the usual holiday entertaining, so I’ll have a tree and all the rest of the trimmings.”
“Don’t you like Christmas trees?” He was beginning to sound like Scrooge, Andrea thought with amusement.
