First to Burn

by Anna Richland

  “Gotta go.” She licked her lips. “Call you later.”

  “Wait! Be care—”

  “Love you, Mom.” She disconnected as her tongue moistened her lips again. They hadn’t been chapped after her flights, but right now they’d become too dry.

  Wulf reached the landing below her and kept coming. She could spot a fellow soldier halfway across a concourse at Newark by relying on posture and haircut and a dozen other cues, but in the violet evening light Wulf looked nothing like an American. His thighs pressed the seams of his linen pants until she might have believed he was a German soccer player or an Austrian skier during the off-season. The flat front of the pants emphasized that his stomach and abs were as carved as the marble statue in the fountain. She knew how those muscles looked and how they felt under her hand. They felt whole and healthy.

  “Why are you here?” She held out a stiff palm to stop his advance, although she recognized his presence as inevitable. If the powers that be needed to keep tabs on her now that she knew about the hush-hush experiment, who better to send?

  “Theresa.” His voice rumbled up the six steps that separated them.

  She shouldn’t allow him to use her first name but—sayonara, self-preservation—she wanted to hear it again. “After our last discussion, I won’t believe you need a checkup.”

  * * *

  Although he was close enough to touch Theresa, Wulf suspected he’d have better luck if he stayed two steps lower to reduce his threat profile. He paused, eyes level with the hollow of her throat. Perhaps her swallow indicated nerves that matched his. “I had leave. Recalled you didn’t have a tour guide.”

  “You already have a job. Three thousand miles away.” She crossed her arms, unbending.

  “My boss thinks I need a break.” His voice came out as even as he intended, no hint of his racing heart.

  She countered with a raised eyebrow. “I don’t buy it.”

  “Can I convince you across a plate of pasta?” He touched his right hand to his chest, then held it out, palm open as if making an offering.

  “No thank you.”

  “There’s a wonderful restaurant on Via Margutta.” Let her agree, let her take his hand, because if she turned him down, he didn’t see how he’d persuade her to ignore what she’d seen on the helicopter. “Join me.”

  Shaking her head, she refused, and he dropped his hand to his side. He hadn’t prepared for the way her white shirt molded her waist and outlined her breasts. Maybe Cruz would have expected the visuals to be this much fuller than her uniform had let on, but he was struggling to focus facing her pair of high and tights.

  He’d been silent too long, staring, and her eyebrows had drawn together. Being civilized meant conversation, even if the Viking part of him wanted to throw her over his shoulder and run for a longboat, even if the red flowers printed on her silk skirt made him yearn to inhale her heady opium, even if she was sure to intoxicate more than any other contraband. “Poppies?”

  “My mother’s unintentional homage to Afghanistan’s cash crop. At least, I hope it was unintentional. Sometimes hard to tell with her.” The slight warming in her voice nourished hope that if he kept her talking about clothes or her mother, she’d change her mind about dinner.

  “Beautiful flowers.” She wore that skirt without knowing where he’d come from or where he had to go next week.

  “And a useful painkiller for injuries.” The edge returned to her voice.

  He’d come to Rome to win her trust, misdirect her if he could, mislead her if he had to, but not to argue. That wouldn’t help his cause. “Don’t.”

  “Don’t what?” She might imagine her crossed arms posed a barricade, but they also deepened the shadowy cleft between her breasts. “Don’t think about what I saw on the helicopter? I was stuck in Kuwait for twenty-two hours. The airport had free wireless.”

  She’d done the research he’d warned Deavers about. If he couldn’t convince her to stay silent, he’d lose his team. Loki had dangled her in front of his eyes to mock him, because no gods allowed men like him to have everything they wanted.

  “Did you know I was an undergrad molecular biology major?”

  That phrase, molecular biology major, carried a ring of doom.

  “My thesis was a study of oxygen-carrying capacity in the blood of certain mammals. Specifically, I researched hemoglobin.”

  “Ouch.” He let her see his wince. “You caught me.”

  “Somehow I don’t think it was the only lie you’ve told.”

  “I’ll concede one or two others.” He hoped his smile appropriately blended charm and contrition. “But I trusted you with the important stuff, remember? Helping Deavers with his wife, saving Nazdana and the twins. I never lied about them.”

  “You’re not playing fair.”

  Exploiting the softening of her mouth, he said, “Don’t forget Mir-Meena. If not dinner, what about a gelato?” He willed her to stop fiddling with her purse strap and agree, so he’d have a chance to salvage the life he’d built in Special Forces. “Have you tasted every flavor yet?”

  While she studied him, he wondered whether desperation worked for him or against him.

  “My favorite is nocciola, although I could be persuaded to try anything you want.” He gambled on her being too kind to kick him while he was down, literally, on a lower step.

  Her eyes answered before her mouth did. The brown warmed like rocks kissed by the sun and the tiniest lines gathered at the corners. “You think that will make up for the complete line you fed me about hemoglobin?” A smile flitted across her lips, then disappeared, but he recognized opportunity.

  “Come for one scoop, then let me know if you forgive me.”

  “If I agree—and that’s an if—” she inhaled as if preparing to dive. “Does the dinner invitation stand?”

  “It does.” He had his wish. He only needed one, but if granted a second, she could take another deep breath while he watched her shirt buttons stretch. A man in his position shouldn’t wish for too much, but maybe he’d be lucky.

  “You’ll stop the bullshit? First lie, and I’m gone.”

  “Promise.” He put his hand on his heart. Even to himself, his latest lie sounded sincere.

  * * *

  The three blocks to the vine-shrouded osteria left the hubbub of the Spanish Steps so far behind that Theresa pictured a Tuscan village. The restaurant’s interior was decorated in reds, blues and golds. Fringed lamps hanging between the ceiling beams cast light on a mix of paintings and gilt-framed mirrors. While she admired the decor, which felt more than slightly like a high-end speakeasy, Wulf requested a table, his Italian flawless.

  “How many languages do you speak?” she asked after they were seated. The phrases she’d learned from Nonna—mostly mangia, mangia—were as useful here as junior-high Latin.

  “Italian’s the most beautiful.” With his straight face undermined by the deepening smile lines at the corners of his eyes, he continued, “The language matches the women.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me—the number of languages is classified information.”

  “You said it, not me.” His full smile highlighted how ridiculous continuing to interrogate him across a vase of peonies was, but didn’t provide answers. “May I recommend the risotto?”

  After six months with pans of food on a steam table as a visual aid and two and a half days of airport food, using a menu, even the English one the hostess provided, overwhelmed her. She followed Wulf’s suggestions and chose risotto made with vodka and pistachios as a first course, and veal saltimbocca alla romana for her main dish.

  With the basics of ordering food and tasting the wine accomplished, they circled back to looking at each other and hunting for things to say that weren’t weirdly awkward. Every question she wanted to blurt out sou
nded crazy across a pressed tablecloth, but what she knew about him was crazy. They had to start somewhere.

  Her lips parted, but he jumped first. “Your name’s Italian, isn’t it?”

  If he wanted to exchange background tidbits as a warm-up, she’d play along. “My grandparents emigrated after World War II. One of my grandmothers came to America on the Andrea Doria, before it sank.” In college she’d crafted a version of her family story that she could share to appear normal when others inquired. “And you? What type of name is Wardsen?”

  “A Danish patronym. The ending sen means son of.” His shoulders twitched as if he’d startled himself.

  “Son of Ward?”

  “Ward’s a modern version of Wonred.” His eyebrows drew together in thought. “My...ancestor...was named Wonred.”

  “Your parents really chose Wulf? Or is it a nickname you adopted when you joined—”

  His brief head shake reminded her not to name his unit.

  “Wulf’s better than Wonred.” He shrugged. “That means lackwit or sloppy drunk. I’m officially a son of a drunk.” As he enunciated the last word, his eyes darted first to one edge of the table, then back to the flowers on the other edge, as if he’d become suddenly wary of an unexpected attack. She had the impression this anecdote might be one of the more truthful things he’d told her. “Don’t know why I still use it.”

  “Chiesa means church. Nothing like extra pressure in Catholic school.”

  They sipped wine until the shadows receded from his eyes. Drinking alcohol with enlisted personnel at unit functions wasn’t fraternization, but this restaurant, with its dim lighting and tiny tables, wasn’t a hail and farewell at Club Hood.

  Stay focused on questions, she chided herself. That’s the purpose of this dinner.

  “Your mother’s a wonderful baker.” Again, he changed the subject. “And an excellent judge of clothing. Do you have other family?”

  “Some.” She reached for her wineglass to cover her pause. She didn’t talk about her stepfather Carl or her stepbrother. Twenty years ago, when her mother had married her third husband, she’d drilled her daughter never to talk about her new family. Never tell our name to people who don’t know it. Never tell anyone where we’re going or where we went or who we went with. Not ever. As an adult the dictum had been easy to follow, because she’d tired of boyfriends who either dropped her when they suspected the nature of Carl’s business or made constant clichéd jokes about the mob. “You?”

  “About the same.”

  “Be careful. We shouldn’t get too personal. Anything you tell me might be a security breach.” She started laughing and had to set the blue cut-glass goblet down abruptly to avoid spilling wine. This was June in a lovely restaurant in Rome, and she’d already reminded him they were thousands of miles from everyone who knew them. Perhaps tonight she should enjoy a sample of what life for women outside the army was like. No deployments, no rank, no archaic rules—only dinner. Dress rehearsal for next year in the civilian dating scene.

  “Can you say all that again, slowly? I like watching the way your lips move.”

  “Then watch closely.” She leaned forward until the tabletop pressed into the space under her ribs. It brought her very near to him. “You’re. A. Big. Liar.”

  “Once more? I didn’t quite hear—”

  “Gladly. Biii—”

  He popped a tiny pickled gherkin into her mouth.

  She chewed. “Ohh, that’s good. Vinegary and salty and sweet.”

  “Thought you’d like it.” After the waiter refilled their wineglasses, he continued. “So why’d you decide to be a doctor?”

  “I drew a quartermaster assignment graduating from ROTC.” Her turn to shrug. “With my luck, I’d have ended up commanding a laundry, so I opted for med school. Fewer suds.”

  “Now who’s not being honest?” Their first course arrived, interrupting him, but he kept his gaze fixed on her face. “I thought I asked a fair question.”

  She looked down first, and studied her spoon and fork as if it mattered which she used for risotto. Talking about her father wasn’t like talking about Carl. It wasn’t betrayal. It was just...personal.

  “When I was five, my father died. He had stomach cancer, but no one knew until the end. Everyone thought he had ulcers, and some people said he drank too much, but he barely touched alcohol. He was a big Italian guy who delivered vegetables, you know. Strong. So he couldn’t be sick. And then he was gone. My first stepfather died after only a few years too.” What had made her share that? She tried not to revisit her past, but Wulf’s story about his name had seemed so personal. “Guess I want other kids to have their dads longer.”

  “Then you’re in the right job.” His voice was very soft.

  He didn’t know she was a short-timer with less than a year to go, so he couldn’t have intended to make her squirm, but she drew a furrow in the saffron-colored rice and stared at her food instead of him anyway.

  “Why not an E.R. somewhere? Why the army?”

  The emotions bottled in her chest shattered, leaving one: anger. “People ask women that all the time. They ever ask you?” Dammit, they’d been doing so well. “Who says, ‘Hey, badass guy, why are you in the army?’” Part of her registered his head shake, but she couldn’t stop. “Nobody gives your career choice a second thought unless you’re a woman, then they’re always asking why, why, as if it’s a mystery why a woman would want to serve her country. Well, I do. I’m an officer in the army. They paid every penny of my Princeton tuition and now I’m giving back. And I love it.” Her speech hung over the table, a sharp and angry contrast to the soft pink peonies, as she dropped her hands to her lap. Nothing short of traction could stop Italian hand-talking. And nothing, not even how much she believed in her mission for the army, was going to keep her from achieving her dream of a nine-to-five life.

  “Wow,” he said, staring at her with raised brows.

  “Oh, geez.” She wanted to slip under the table, but all she could do was cover her eyes with her palm. “You didn’t deserve that rant. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. I’m more sorry. I never realized how...sexist?...that question sounded. You’re right that no one ever asks me why I’m in the army. I deserved to be set straight.”

  Had he said she was right? She lowered her hand and looked into his face. She had heard him correctly. Instead of thinking she was a nutcase, he’d apologized for making chauvinist assumptions. Why was this paragon of a man still single?

  Jazz began at the piano across the room. Candlelight flickered in the wineglass facets and reflected off the silverware as they ate, and talked, and laughed about music and travel and food. When she imagined dancing with him, his gaze connected with hers, and he stared like he too imagined where they might go next. Just as well that the music stopped and after-dinner espressos appeared alongside their empty bottle. It was their second, wasn’t it?

  A tendril of sobriety returned, enough to prod her into one more try for answers. “You promished—promised—if I came to dinner, you’d tell me the truth.”

  “I promised I wouldn’t lie.”

  “That’s—”

  “Different.” He softened his refusal with a smile.

  She rolled her eyes. Semantics. But a night of wine and music made it impossible to be annoyed about anything except how little the two bottles affected him.

  “While the hemoglobin comment was a juvenile effort, and I deserved to be caught out, the rest of what I said about security breaches stands.”

  “You’re so...” Next to her empty glass, her fingers clenched into a fist. “Frustrating.”

  “I know.” He ran a finger down her knuckles, the first touch since she’d locked eyes with him at the Spanish Steps. He took his time circling each bump and into the dips, back and forth in an intricate tracery
on her hand.

  Her fist unfurled as her fingers sought his. While he limited his touch to her hand, she wanted to stretch like a cat, even wiggled her spine in her chair.

  “You’re afflicted with a powerful case of curiosity, aren’t you?”

  With her voice trapped in her throat, she answered by nodding. She couldn’t look away from where his hand stroked hers against the white tablecloth. Darkness had shrouded their connection at Caddie during the movie, but tonight she could see every caress as his fingers entwined with hers and his thumb circled on her palm.

  “Are you curious about...” His voice deepened as if he too were affected. “Us?”

  She nodded, speechless with the desire that flowed from the brush of his hands. She imagined his hands moving over her body, looking as strong and golden while unbuttoning her shirt as they did against the candlelit tablecloth. Her chest swelled with each breath as if he were already touching her breasts.

  He stood and helped her to her feet. “I look forward to satisfying that curiosity.”

  Her daze continued as they walked to her hotel with her hand tucked between his elbow and side, close enough to bump hips or shoulders every third or fourth step. She drifted across the lobby to the elevator. She hadn’t needed to tell him which hotel; he’d admitted his captain had asked her roommate for details under pretext of an anniversary vacation. As if that would’ve fooled Jennifer. It only guaranteed a bucket of questions she’d have to answer back at Caddie.

  “Which floor?” he asked.

  “Three.” Reality intruded with the ding of the elevator’s antique bell. Reality bit. “I can find my room.” She stepped over the threshold into the old-fashioned metal cage. “Alone.”

  “Nevertheless, as a gentleman I shall escort you.” The metal grille rattled closed, locking them in the tiny space.

  “Nevertheless?” The elevator jolted to a start, knocking her into his shoulder. “Who replaced Sergeant Wardsen with an English major?” At dinner she’d avoided using his name, but as each ding marked another floor, she had a deadline to remind him of their different ranks.