"Open the damn door, Taylor. I know you're in there!"
Wes was the one person he should have been able to run to, the one person who could have helped him sort this out, to figure out what to do now that he'd completely messed it up by falling in love.
"I love her." Bobby said it aloud, to the door, knowing Wes couldn't hear him over the sound of his own knocking. "I'm in love with Colleen."
Still, it was a shock to speak the words, to admit these powerful feelings that he'd worked overtime to deny right from the very start.
Right from her nineteenth birthday, when he and Wes had taken Colleen and a group of her girlfriends from college to Busch Gardens. Bobby hadn't seen her in a few years, and suddenly there she was. All grown up. He'd gotten into an argument with her about some political issue, and she was so well-informed and so well-spoken, she'd convinced him that he was backing the wrong party. He'd fallen for her then—a girl-woman who wasn't afraid to tell a man that he was wrong.
Yeah, he'd loved her for years, but it wasn't until this past week, until they became lovers, that his love for her had deepened and grown into this complete, everlasting
force. It was bigger than he was. It was all-consuming and powerful. He'd never felt anything like it in his entire life, and it scared the hell out of him.
"I can't say no to her," Bobby said to Wes, through the door. "She wants me to meet her tonight, and I'm going to be there, because, damn it, I can't stay away from her. It's tearing me up, because I know this isn't what you want for her. I know you wanted better. But if she came to me and told me she loved me, too, and that she wanted to marry me, I'd do it. Tonight. I'd take her to Vegas before she changed her mind. Yeah, I'd do it, even though I know what a mistake it would be for her.
"But she doesn't want to marry me." Bobby wiped his face, his eyes. "She only wants to sleep with me. I don't have to worry about her waking up seven years from now and hating her life. I only have to worry about spending the rest of my life wanting someone I can't have."
Bobby sat on the edge of the hotel room bed, right where Colleen had sat just a short time ago.
"God, I want her in my life," he said aloud. "What am I going to do, Wes?"
No one answered.
Wes had stopped knocking on the door. He was gone.
And Bobby was alone.
As the TV news cameras arrived, Colleen glanced at her watch. It was about :.
Bobby and his friends were already there, already in place—Thomas and Jim Slade seemingly casually hanging out on the sidewalk in front of the church parking lot, Rio and Mike up near the truck that held the camera.
Bobby was sticking close to her in the crowd.
"There's a good chance if Morrison's going to try anything, he's going to target you," he explained. He was
dressed in jeans and a white button-down shirt with a jacket over it, despite the heat.
"Are you wearing a jacket because you've got on a gun under there?" She had to ask.
He laughed. "I'm wearing a jacket because I'm here posing as a member of Relief Aid, and I wanted to look nice."
Oh. "You do," she said. "You look very nice."
"So do you." His gaze skimmed appreciatively down her denim skirt, taking in the yellow daisies that adorned her blouse. "You always do."
Time hung for a moment, as she fell into the bottomless depths of his eyes. But then he looked away.
"I'm sorry," Colleen said. "About this afternoon."
"No." He glanced at her. "I was the one who was—"
"No," she said. "You weren't."
His eyes were apologetic. "I can't come over tonight. I'm sorry, but..."
She nodded. Had to ask. "Are you sure?"
"No." He met her gaze again, smiled ruefully. "I mean, five minutes ago, yeah, I was sure. But here you are and..." He shook his head.
"Well, if you change your mind, I'll be home." Colleen tried to sound casual, tried to sound as if sharing this one last night with him didn't mean so much to her. She cleared her throat. "I should probably go inside pretty soon. If John Morrison were coming, he'd probably be here by now."
Famous last words.
"Hey! Hey, hippie chick! Nice party you're throwing here. What are we celebrating? The fact that you're going away and won't be around to annoy us for a whole week?"
It was John Morrison, and he was drunk, holding a bottle wrapped in a paper bag.
As Bobby stepped in front of her, he seemed to expand, and Colleen realized that a baseball bat was dangling from Morrison's other hand.
"How about we let those cameras cover some real news?" Morrison asked loudly—loudly enough for heads to turn in his direction.
Loudly enough for the other SEALs to move toward them. But the crowd was thick, and they were having trouble getting through the crush. As were the police officers who'd been assigned to keep traffic moving.
"I'm going down the street," Morrison continued, "just a block or so over, to that AIDS Center they're building down there. I'm going to break the windows in protest. We don't want it in our neighborhood. We don't want you in our neighborhood."
He pointed at Colleen with the baseball bat, swinging it up toward her, and just like that, it was over.
She barely saw Bobby move. Yet somehow he'd taken the bat away from Morrison and had the man down on the ground before she even blinked.
The other SEALs made the scene a few seconds before the police.
Bobby lifted Morrison to his feet, handed the man to Spaceman. "Take him inside. There are some empty rooms upstairs." He turned to Rio. "Find Father Timothy. Tell him it has to do with that matter I discussed with him earlier this week." He looked at Colleen. "You okay?"
She watched as Spaceman hustled Morrison inside. "Yeah. I don't think he was going to hurt me."
"What's going on here?" the police officer—a big, ruddy-cheeked beat cop named Danny O'Sullivan—planted himself in front of them.
Bobby touched her arm and lowered his voice. "You want to press charges? Lifting the bat like that could be considered assault. At the least, we could get him for drunk and disorderly."
She met his gaze. "No." Not if Father Timothy was getting involved. Bobby had talked to Timothy earlier in the week, he'd said.
Be compassionate, she'd told him, just that afternoon. Obviously, he hadn't needed the reminder.
"Just a little outburst from a friend who had too much to drink," Bobby told O'Sullivan. He squeezed Colleen's arm. "You want to take it from here? I want to go inside to talk to Morrison."
She nodded, and he pulled Thomas King over. "Don't let Colleen out of your sight."
"Aye, aye, Chief."
The crowd parted for Bobby as Colleen turned back to the cop. "Really, Dan," she said. "Everything's fine. We'll see John gets home safely."
O'Sullivan looked at the bat that Mike Lee had picked up through narrowed eyes. "What, did Johnny want to get a game going or something?"
"Or something," Colleen agreed.
"Sometimes it does a body more harm than good to be protected by friends," O'Sullivan said.
"He's had a recent tragedy in his family," she told him. "He doesn't need a night in jail, Dan. He needs to talk to his parish priest."
O'Sullivan smiled as he shook his head. "I wish I were twenty-something and still believed I could save the world, one poor loser at a time. Good luck on your trip to Tul-geria." He nodded to Thomas, who was still standing beside her.
She glanced at Thomas, too. "Let's go inside."
Bobby was in an upstairs storage room, talking to John Morrison about Vietnam. He was much too young to have been there, but he must've been something of a historian, because he knew the names of the rivers and the towns and the battles in which Morrison had fought.
John Morrison was drunk, but not as drunk as Colleen had first thought. His speech was slightly slurred, but he was following the conversation easily.
As she listened, lingering with Thomas King just outside the door, the
two men talked about Admiral Jake Robinson, who'd also served in 'Nam. Morrison knew of the man and was impressed that Bobby thought of him as a friend. They talked about Bobby's career in the SEAL units. They talked about Morrison's bar, and his father who'd served in a tank division in World War II—who had died just two years ago after a long struggle with cancer. They talked about elderly parents, about loss, about death.
And suddenly they were talking about Wes.
"My best friend is still jammed up from his little brother's death," Bobby told Morrison. "It happened ten years ago, and he still won't talk about it. It's like he pretends the kid never existed." He paused. "Kind of like what you're doing with John Jr."
Silence.
"I'm sorry for your loss," she heard Bobby say quietly. "But you've got to find a way to vent your anger besides taking out the windows at the AIDS Center. Someone's going to end up hurt, and that will make my friend Colleen Skelly—and you know who she is—unhappy. And if you make Colleen unhappy, if you hurt someone, if you hurt her, then I'm going to have to come back here and hurt you. This is not a threat, John, it's a promise."
His friend. She was his friend Colleen—not his lover, not his girlfriend.
And Colleen knew the truth. He'd told her right from the start—he wanted to be friends. And that's all they were, all they ever would be. Friends who had hot sex.
Despite his promise to hurt John Morrison, Bobby was, without a doubt, the kindest, most sensitive man she'd ever met. He was too kind to tell her again that he didn't love her, that he would never love her.
The sex they had was great, but he was the kind of man who would want more in a relationship than great sex.
She could hear Father Timothy coming, puffing his way
up the stairs to talk to John Morrison, to try to set him on a path that would lead him out of the darkness into which he'd fallen.
The cynic in her knew that a talk with his priest probably wouldn't change anything. Morrison needed serious help. Chances were when he sobered up he'd be embarrassed and angry that the secret about his son's death had slipped out. Maybe he'd be angry enough to burn down the center.
Or maybe he'd go to grief counseling. She could almost hear Bobby's gentle voice telling her that maybe John Morrison would find peace and stop hating the world—and hating himself.
Father Timothy had almost reached the landing.
Colleen stepped closer to Thomas King, lowered her voice. "I need you to do me a favor and give Bobby a message for me."
Thomas nodded, his face serious to the point of grimness. That was his default expression. He was very black, very serious, very intense. He now turned that intensity directly upon her.
"Please tell him that I thought he probably shouldn't come to my place tonight." Good Lord, could she sound any more equivocal? "Tell him I'm sorry, but I don't want him to come over."
An expression outside of his serious and grim repertoire—one of disbelief—flashed across Thomas King's face and he suddenly looked his actual, rather tender age. "Maybe that's something you should tell Chief Taylor yourself."
"Please," she said. "Just give him the message."
Father Timothy had cleared the top of the stairs, and she went down, as swiftly as she could, before she changed her mind.
Chapter
They'd won.
Well, they weren't going to be able to bring the orphans back to the United States at the end of the week, but no one had really expected that. The Tulgerian government had given the Relief Aid volunteers permission to move the children to a location near the American Embassy. Paid for, of course, with American dollars.
The other good news was that the government was making it possible for American citizens to travel to the capital city, Tulibek, to petition to adopt. The older children in particular would be allowed to leave, for exorbitant adoption fees.
It was a victory—although it was a bittersweet one for Colleen. She was sitting, looking out the window, her forehead against the glass, as the bus moved steadily north, into the even more dangerous war zone.
Bobby watched her, well aware of what she was thinking. In a matter of minutes they would arrive at the hospital
where the children had been taken after the orphanage had been destroyed. As they went inside, Analena wouldn't be among the children who rushed to greet her.
Yes, it was a bittersweet victory for Colleen.
It was a city bus—this vehicle they were in. Some of the hard plastic seats faced forward, some faced the center of the bus. There was space for people to stand, bars and straps to hold on to.
Colleen was facing forward, and the seat next to her was empty. He sat down beside her, wishing for the privacy that came with seats that had high backs. He lowered his voice instead. "You okay?"
She wiped her eyes, forced a smile. "I'm great."
Yeah, sure she was. He wanted to hold her hand, but he didn't dare touch her. "The past few days have been crazy, huh?"
She gave him another smile. "Yeah, I've been glad many times over that you and Alpha Squad are here."
God, he'd missed her. When Thomas King had given him her message—don't come over—he'd known that it was over between them. Right up until then he'd harbored hope. Maybe if he went to her and told her that he loved her... Maybe if he begged, she'd agree to keep seeing him. And maybe someday she'd fall in love with him, too.
"You and Wes are on friendlier terms again," she noted. "I mean, at least you seem to be talking."
Bobby nodded, even though that was far from the truth. The final insult in this whole messed-up situation was the damage he'd done to his decade of friendship with Wes. It seemed irreparable.
Wes was talking to him, sure—but it was only an exchange of information. They weren't sharing their thoughts, not the way they used to. When he looked at Wes, he could no longer read the man's mind.
How much of that was his own fault, his own sense of guilt? He didn't know.
"Life goes on, huh?" Colleen said. "Despite all the disappointments and tragedies. There's always good news happening somewhere." She gestured to the bus, to the four other Relief Aid volunteers who sat quietly talking in the back of the bus. "This is good news—the fact that we're going to bring those children back to a safer location. And, oh, here's some good news for you—I'm not pregnant. I got my period this morning. So you can stop worrying about Wes coming after you with a shotgun, huh?"
She wasn't pregnant.
Colleen tried to smile, but just managed to look...almost wistful? "You know, it's stupid, but I imagined if I was, you know, pregnant, the baby would be a boy who would look just like you."
She was kidding, wasn't she? Bobby tried to make a joke. "Poor kid."
"Lucky kid." She wasn't kidding. The look she was giving him was fierce. "You're the most beautiful man I've ever known, Bobby. Both inside and out."
He didn't know what to say. He didn't know what to think.
And Colleen went back to looking out the window. "Funny, isn't it, how one person's good news can be someone else's disappointment?"
"You're disappointed? About..." He had to search for the words. "You wanted to have a baby? But, Colleen, you said—"
"Not just any baby." When she looked at him, the tears were back in her eyes. "I wanted Analena. And I wanted your baby. I'd make a terrible mother, wouldn't I? I'm already playing favorites."
"Colleen. I'm..." Speechless.
"I had this stupid fantasy going," she said in a very
small voice, almost as if she were talking to herself, not to him, "that I'd be pregnant, and you'd have to marry me. And then, after we were married, I'd somehow make you love me, too. But real life doesn't work that way. People who have to get married usually end up resenting each other, and I'd hate it if you ever resented me."
Make you. Love me. Too. Bobby wasn't sure, but he thought it was possible he was having a heart attack. His chest was tight and his brain felt numb. "Colleen, are you telling me—"
"Heads up, Taylor. We're getting close," Senior Chief Harvard Becker's voice cut through. "I need your eyes and ears with me right now."
Damn.
Colleen had turned her attention back to the drab scenery flashing past, outside the window.
Bobby stood up, shouldering his weapon, using every ounce of training he'd ever had to get his head back in place, to focus on the mission.
Rio Rosetti was nearby, and he caught Bobby's eye. "You okay, Chief? Your shoulder all right?"
His shoulder? "I'm fine," he said shortly. Dammit, he needed to talk to Wes. Just because Colleen loved him— and she only maybe loved him, he didn't know it for sure— didn't mean that gave him the right to go and ruin her life by marrying her. Did it?
"Okay, listen up," Captain Joe Catalanotto said for the benefit of the Relief Aid volunteers, the bus driver and the Tulgerian guard who was leading them down the unmarked roads to the hospital.
All of the SEALs knew precisely how this was going to go down. Swiftly and efficiently.
"We sent a small team in early, to do surveillance," Joe Cat continued. "One of those men will meet us on the road about a mile from the hospital, tell us if there's anything
unusual to watch out for. If it's all clear, we'll pull up right outside the hospital doors, but everyone will stay in their seats. Another team will go in to check the place out, join forces with the rest of the surveillance team. Only when they secure entrances and give the all-clear do any of you get off this bus. Is that understood?"
A murmur of voices. Yes, sir.
"At that point," Joe Cat said even though they'd already gone over it dozens of times, "you'll move from the bus to the building as quickly as possible. Once inside, you will stay close. You do not wander off under any circumstances."
"You all right?"
Bobby turned to see Wes right behind him.
Suzanne Brockmann - Team Ten 10 - Taylor's Temptation Page 20
