He reached for her, and she moved into his arms. They kissed and then caressed, their hands slipping into a languid rhythm. It was like dancing on a wave, floating on the edge of a dream. Yes, he thought. She was a mermaid, a goddess of the sea. And be couldn't keep her. Nor would he try.
After tonight, he would let her go.
"Kathy," he whispered her name, and she lifted her hips to accept his penetration. His deep, warm strokes.
There were no urgent thrusts. No groping or fumbling. No torn clothes or breathy pants. This was quiet, gentle loving – a joining that came from the heart.
And one Dakota would never forget.
* * *
Two days later Kathy held a gold vase, a gift from Queen Nicole and King Bertram. It was truly over. Albert Payune, the other revolutionists and the hired assassin were in jail. The cabinet member who had cooperated with the police would receive a lesser sentence for exposing the murder plot.
She studied the sparkling sapphire imbedded in the vase. King Bertram was a gracious man. Both he and the queen had thanked Dakota and Kathy personally, offering a valuable gift in honor and gratitude. The Asterland government had also promised that Payune would not be able to spread the word that the Lone Star jewels actually existed. The legend would be protected.
"Kathy?"
She turned to the sound of Dakota's voice. He hadn't stepped foot in the master bedroom since the night they'd made love. She had awakened that morning to find him gone. Later she'd discovered he'd left the cottage to roam the hills, then tie up the loose ends of their mission.
"Have you finished packing?' he asked.
"No, but I'm nearly done." She tried to avoid his gaze, but couldn't quite manage. Those Comanche eyes held her captive, trapping her in deep, dark emotion.
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" He motioned to the vase. "Kind of an unusual shape, though."
Should she tell him? Kathy wondered. Tell him why her vase had a curved indentation and his rounded on one side? Apparently he hadn't examined them closely enough to make the connection. "They're a set."
He blinked. "What?"
"The vases."
He reached for the jeweled object, a small frown creasing his brow. She watched as he ran his hand over the gold, following the shape. "It means something, doesn't it? Something significant?"
Kathy released a quiet breath. "They represent love. They're very old and valuable. There aren't that many in existence, and in Asterland when they're given as a gift, they're always given to a couple, sometimes on their wedding day."
Kathy glanced down at her hand and realized she still wore her wedding ring, the diamonds and emeralds Dakota had given her. She noticed Dakota still wore his, too. But he had chosen white gold and onyx. A design that didn't resemble a wedding band – a ring that rarely interfered with his undercover work. It was a piece of jewelry that looked natural on an Indian man, whether he wore it on his left hand or switched it to his right.
"Love." Dakota cleared his throat as if to clear away a sudden huskiness. The discomfort in his eyes wasn't hard to miss. "You didn't tell the queen about our cover, did you? She thinks we've reconciled. That we're making a fresh start in our marriage."
"I didn't have the opportunity to tell her." Kathy folded a blouse and placed it in her suitcase, giving herself something to do. "And after she and the king gave us the vases, it seemed too late. The gesture had already been made."
Shifting the object in question, Dakota's frown deepened. "Mine fits against yours." He lifted his gaze. "Like our bodies."
"I think that's the idea." She knew her voice sounded rigid, but she couldn't relax her throat. He had practically abandoned her after they'd made love. But then what had she expected? For him to say that he would retire for good? That their marriage was more important than the next mission? Sex wouldn't change that, no matter how incredible it had been.
To ease some of the tension building in the room, she took the vase and placed it on the bed. "I don't think the symbolism was meant just for us. I think the gift was also the queen's way of saying that she and the king are trying to work through their differences." And for that, Kathy was deeply relieved. Not only did the monarchs truly love each other, they had a child to consider – a ten-year-old boy.
"That's good." Dakota stood with impeccable posture, a military stance that fit his tall, broad stature. "They're a nice family," he said, revealing an affection for Prince Eric that mirrored her own.
"Yes, they are."
Telling herself not to dwell on dark-eyed children, she glanced at the wilting wildflowers on the nightstand and realized the extent of her loneliness. She hadn't been in the mood to walk the cliffs, enjoy the scent of the ocean or pick lavender flowers. All of those pleasures reminded her too much of Dakota Even the garden was a sad reminder. Making wishes and imagining fairies seemed foolish now.
"Are you going back to D.C.?"
She looked up. "No, I'm not. I'm leaving the Bureau."
"For good?"
"Yes. I gave my notice before we came here." A decision that had been a long time coming.
Dakota hooked his thumbs in his jeans, suddenly looking more like a cowboy than a retired air force officer. Why hadn't she noticed his Wranglers and embroidered Western shirt before? His lizard-skin boots and tooled leather belt? He had well-dressed Texan written all over him.
Kathy closed her suitcase. Maybe she hadn't wanted to notice. Maybe she found the image just a bit too sexy.
"So what are you going to do?" he asked.
"Head up a satellite office for my parents' business." Her grandfather had founded a successful import/export company. Kathy's family had been living abroad for as long as she could remember. So joining the Foreign Service had seemed like a natural step. But now she wanted to live in the States, someplace other than the Capitol.
"So where are you going to set up shop, so to speak?"
She lifted her chin. "In Royal."
His jaw nearly dropped. "You mean Texas? Where I live?"
She narrowed her eyes. "As you may recall, I lived there once, too." After Dakota had retired from the air force, Kathy had taken an extended leave of absence from the Foreign Service, hoping for a quiet, domestic life at the ranch, one Dakota had never given her. In spite of his retirement, the dangerous missions continued. "I like Royal. I have friends there."
"Of course you do." He softened his voice. "So you've rented an apartment already?"
"No, but I intend to. I've already arranged for a moving company to ship my belongings to Royal."
"Oh."
They stood in awkward silence after that, Dakota staring at his boots and Kathy reorganizing cosmetics in her makeup bag, hoping to look busy enough for him to just leave her be.
Finally he lifted his gaze and broke through the quiet. "You're welcome to stay with me. You know, just until you find a place."
Her heart leaped forward with a hard thump. "Do you think that's wise?"
"Why wouldn't it be?" he responded a bit too easily. "Since we've already gotten each other out of our systems, it just might be possible for us to be friends. There's certainly no harm in trying."
Gotten each other out of our systems. Maybe Dakota was right. Maybe it was time to accept him as a friend. She had lived in limbo long enough. And so had he. They both needed to come to terms with their broken marriage and move on with their lives.
"Thank you." She forced a casual smile. "I promise I won't wear out my welcome."
"Don't worry about it." He returned her smile, then offered to carry her suitcase out to the car. This tall, gorgeous man who still made her heart beat much too fast.
* * *
Chapter 6
«^»
Dakota was back in Texas and wondering if he'd gone crazy. He'd left Asterland behind, but he'd brought Kathy with him – to the ranch, the house they'd once shared. She was in the guest room he'd offered, and she'd been holed up in there all day.
He squared his sh
oulders and headed in the direction of her room. They couldn't hide from each other. Both had agreed to embrace friendship.
He knocked, then stepped back a little. Embracing friendship wasn't the same as embracing each other.
She opened the door, and he cursed a sudden, unwelcome jolt of lust. Her hair, damp from a late-day shower, fell loose about her shoulders. And she wasn't wearing a bra. He could see the faint outline of her breasts through a printed cotton dress.
"Hi," she said.
"Hi." Dumbstruck, he couldn't think of another thing to say. Why had he gone to her room? What had he hoped to accomplish?
"Are you settled in all right?"
"Yes. Thank you."
So polite, he thought, so proper. Even with damp hair and no bra. "Are you hungry? It's lunchtime," he added hastily. Her nipples were erect, poking against the flowers on her dress.
She tucked a lock of wet hair behind her ear. He could smell her shampoo. "Are you fixing lunch? Or are you going out?" she asked.
"I thought I'd fix something here. Mrs. Miller did some shopping for me this morning." And he didn't have the slightest idea what to make. Lunch had been an afterthought, just something to talk about.
Kathy let the door fall open. Behind her Dakota could see the unmade bed. The sheets probably smelled like strawberries by now, like her hair and her skin.
"So Mrs. Miller still works for you?"
He pulled his eyes away from the bed. "Yes, and she hasn't changed a bit"
Kathy smiled. "Same starched gray hair, same white uniform, same squeaky white shoes?"
"That's her." And the housekeeper's non-meddling, get-the-job-done personality suited him just fine.
"Can you give me a few minutes before lunch? I still have to dry my hair."
"Sure. No problem."
He made his way to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and rummaged through the groceries. What in the hell had possessed him to invite Kathy to stay with him? Self torture? He hadn't gotten her out of his system. Not by a long shot.
Forcing himself to concentrate on food, Dakota decided on grilled cheese sandwiches and a black bean salad. The salad took a lot of dicing and slicing, but it contained some of his favorite ingredients: bell and jalapeño peppers, onions, cilantro, parsley and Roma tomatoes.
Kathy entered the kitchen just as he poured the Southwestern mixture over a bed of lettuce and garnished it with lime wedges.
"I should have known you would make something spicy."
He glanced up to acknowledge her, and when she turned toward the dining room, he noticed her dress was one of those great little backless numbers. Talk about spicy. "You know me. A creature of habit." Hot food and sleek redheads. His tastes would never change.
While she took it upon herself to set the table, he grilled the sandwiches. Maybe spending time together at the cottage had made things easier on them. They fell into a domestic pattern as if it were routine. But then, it used to be. They had always shared kitchen duties.
They sat across from each other at an early Texas table scarred with over a century of wear. It suited Dakota's lifestyle as well as the rugged surroundings. His home wasn't a showcase for wealthy living, nor was it actually a working ranch. He owned horses because they gave him pleasure and steers because he enjoyed hosting an occasional Friday-night jackpot for amateur cowboys. And since his ranch hands tended to the animals as nonintrusively as Mrs. Miller tended to the house, he was able to protect his personal life. No one gossiped about Dakota Lewis. Not anymore. He had worked damn hard to be regarded as something other than a billionaire's half-breed, bastard son. High society, he knew, wasn't always kind.
He looked across the table at Kathy. She ate the food he'd prepared, even scooped a diced jalepeño into her mouth. In spite of the disciplined, air force officer image he'd carved out for himself, she used to tell him that he liked everything hot and fast, that he lived on pure heat and adrenaline.
Dakota watched her sip a frothy glass of milk. As if Miss proper-and-pretty had room to talk. The woman was downright wicked in bed, and the stuffy society types she'd dated before him hadn't satisfied her need for hot, fast sex.
"When is Mrs. Miller coming back?" Kathy asked.
Dakota blinked. Answering a question about his no-nonsense housekeeper while he had been thinking about hot-and-fast sex with his gorgeous wife wasn't an easy transition for his male brain to make.
"Wednesday afternoon." He reached for his coffee, hoping the caffeine would snap his senses back in order. "Her schedule hasn't changed." The older lady didn't live at the ranch. Instead she worked four days a week, whether Dakota was home or away on an assignment.
Kathy lifted her napkin. "Does she know I'm here?"
"Yes, I told her."
"So she understands it's just a temporary stay?"
He tried not to frown. "Yes." It hadn't been easy telling the housekeeper that his wife was sleeping in one of the guest rooms. His pride, he supposed, along with his heart, had taken a bruising just saying the words out loud. "There won't be any misunderstandings." Nor would he pressure Kathy about why she had left in the first place. Eventually he would ask, but for now he would do his best to concentrate on friendship.
* * *
Dakota tilted his head, pushing the brim of his Stetson back a notch. West Texas was a sight to behold, even before the break of dawn. The moon peeked through a menagerie of clouds as they moved across a vast, deep-blue sky.
Dakota turned toward Ben Rassad. "Do you paint?" he asked, wondering how someone would go about capturing a crescent moon or a shifting cloud.
"No," the sheikh answered. "But I appreciate those who do."
Ben, too, seemed mesmerized by the sky. But Dakota supposed once a man lived in Texas, there was no turning back. The Lone Star state flowed through his veins, whether he was an Amythrarian sheikh or a Comanche pilot.
"The others should be here soon," Dakota said, focusing on their purpose. The Texas Cattleman's Club didn't normally hold pre-dawn meetings in the middle of a park, but this meeting was probably the most significant gathering this group would ever have. The recovered Lone Star jewels would be hidden on this brisk May morning. The private park, which housed the Cattleman's Club and an old adobe mission, also offered acres of greenery. Neither the exclusive gentlemen's club nor the historic mission was visible from the spot they had chosen, but the park, with its tree-lined paths and seasonal blooms, was as familiar to Dakota as his own home.
"Tex is waiting," Ben noted.
Dakota smiled. In 1901, Tex Langley had founded the Texas Cattleman's Club, and these days the rugged oil baron stood in the form of a prestigious bronze statue erected just a few feet away.
Dr. Justin Webb and Matt Walker arrived together. And like Dakota, both the surgeon and the horse breeder sported Western hats and boots. Minutes later diplomat Aaron Black joined the group, and the men greeted each other quietly.
Other than nesting birds and curious squirrels, there wasn't a sign of life seen or heard within miles. The gated park was deserted, and the road that led to it as dark as the night sky.
"So this is it," Matt said, studying the designated location.
Dakota nodded. A small reflecting pool was under construction. The forms had already been set and the rebar was in place, leaving rows of soil between round metal rods. All they had to do was bury the tiny, sealed case containing the priceless gems and wait for the unsuspecting contractors to arrive to pour the concrete.
While the other men stood in the shadows, Dakota dug a deep, narrow hole with a small camper shovel, and Matt placed the airtight case inside. Their only light was a solitary beam from a flashlight. Even the moon respected their silent task, its crescent shape slipping behind a cluster of trees.
The jewels had been originally hidden in a secret passageway in the old mission, and securing them this time seemed simple by comparison. But Dakota knew what each man had risked in an effort to recover the gems. Their lives, as well as tho
se of the women they loved, had been laden with danger. The triumphant moment belonged to all of them.
Dakota stepped away from the burial site. The moon had resurfaced, bathing the ground with a soft silver glow. It seemed fitting somehow – ceremonial to a Comanche who believed Mother Earth provided all things sacred.
Leadership. Justice. Peace. Those three words shone in the eyes of every man present. The Lone Star jewels. A red diamond, a black opal and a two-carat emerald, represented an unspoken mantra – lifelong values they vowed to uphold.
With satisfied nods, Ben, Matt and Justin departed. They had agreed beforehand that Aaron and Dakota would wait for the construction crew.
The diplomat headed out to his truck and returned with a thermos and two plastic cups. He placed them on a nearby bench. "Shall we?"
"Sure," Dakota answered. "And I'm glad it was you and not Justin who supplied the coffee."
Aaron poured the steaming brew, and they grinned at each other in the dark. It was a running joke that the doctor had acquired a taste for week-old sludge that accumulated in the bottom of a pot.
"So how does it feel to be back on American soil?" Aaron asked.
"Good. It's where I belong, I suppose." Even if an edge of restlessness had begun to set in. For Dakota the end of an assignment often left him anxious.
The other man lifted his coffee. "If you get hungry, my wife sent along some pastries. They're in the truck."
"Thanks. Maybe later." Although Dakota considered Aaron a close friend, they went on to discuss insignificant things. Aaron wasn't one to pry, and Dakota wasn't one to offer details about his personal life. Aaron already knew that Kathy had left the Foreign Service and was staying with Dakota until she found a suitable place of her own. What else could be said of his broken marriage? Dakota had offered Kathy a guest room at the ranch so they could pursue friendship. He wasn't supposed to want her so badly, wasn't supposed to hurt every time he thought about the past. Admitting how he felt would solve nothing.
An hour after the sun came up, Aaron opened the gate for the construction crew, a trio of men who routinely repaired the landscape at the park.
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