At His Command

by Karen Anders

  The ceremony started and a number of Navy personnel were honored. Then, when her brother’s memorial was next on her program, she looked up to see the former and current captains of the U.S.S. James McCloud walk out onto the stage.

  Her breath caught when Chris stepped out after them and seated himself. He looked impossibly handsome, even with beard stubble, his clothes wrinkled and his hair a tousled mess. His gray eyes were filled with pride and sadness.

  The former captain of the McCloud got up and took the podium. “Today we are here to honor the fine men and women of the Navy. But there is one Naval officer who has been wronged by us. This we need to make amends for. Lieutenant Rafael Soto died when his fighter jet collided with Lieutenant Christophe Vargas’s jet on a routine training mission over the Pacific. Unbeknownst to the Navy investigators at the time, the accident was really an attempted murder. Both pilots were sanctioned and had their records marred by a pilot-error ruling. Their records have now been cleared and we are here today to correct our error and honor Lieutenant Rafael Soto.”

  The captain finished his speech and left the podium. Chris rose, shook his hand and gave him a sharp salute. When he reached the podium, he looked out over the audience. “I am Christophe Vargas. I’m here today to tell you about my friend and wingman, Rafael Soto. He liked jelly beans and thought that Christmas was the best time of the year, more because of the giving than the receiving. He liked to garden and grow vegetables, saying a little dirt never hurt anyone. I don’t have to tell any of you what it’s like to lose someone who is as close to you as a brother. Some of you have lost a brother, sister, best friend. I carried around a lot of guilt for living when he died. For moving forward with my life. But after I was part of the investigative team to apprehend the person responsible for his death, it’s been alleviated. I can’t go back and change what happened. But I can honor the memory of my friend until the day I die. He was out there defending his country and I was proud to be at his side. Rafael,” Chris said quietly, “I’ll always have your six.”

  As Chris spoke, the lump in Sia’s throat got tighter and tighter. Tears gathered in her eyes and she knew at that moment that she had been so wrong, even more than she had on the carrier when she’d tried to catch Chris. She had to talk to him.

  He left the podium and sat down. The ceremony came to a close. In the crush of bodies, she was blocked from the stage. She frantically tried to find him, but lost him in the crowd.

  Dejected and annoyed, she decided she would go to see Rafael’s plaque. Chris would return to NCIS eventually and she’d go over to his office if she had to.

  When she approached, she saw a man in rumpled clothing run his hand over the plaque, his head bowed. Her heart tripped and tears filled her eyes. Chris.

  She took a few steps forward, suddenly tongue-tied. It took her a moment to find her voice. “Chris.”

  His head jerked up and he spun around. “Sia,” he said, his eyes lighting up at the sight of her.

  She smiled and came to him, afraid that if she touched him, he would disappear. They stood there for a few moments in awkward silence.

  She looked up at him, her face carefully blank as she tried to assess the shift of feelings between them. “I’ve been looking for you.”

  “You found me.”

  “I wanted to thank you for saving my life. If you hadn’t caught me—well, it seems to me that you were there when I needed you. Why is that, Chris? Even after I treated you so badly.”

  “You were grieving, Sia.”

  “I was, but what I forgot was that you were, too. At the time, when it was ruled an accident, I should have stood by you. I made a terrible mistake pushing you away, blaming you. I just needed my brother’s life to have meant something, and you were part of what destroyed him. What I didn’t realize at the time was that his life did have meaning.”

  Chris slipped an arm around her shoulders and eased her against him, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. It was all he needed to do and she marveled at his capacity to care. She splayed her hand against his warm chest, right over his heart, hoping against hope that she still held a place there.

  “I know you didn’t kill my brother and that you had no control over what happened.”

  “No, we know that Maria…”

  She covered his mouth with her fingers. “No, Chris, it really doesn’t have anything to do with her. This is between you and me. I have to ask you for your forgiveness for not believing in you, for not trusting you, for pushing you away when you needed me the most.”

  For a moment he looked stunned. He just stood there, waiting, staring past her. His chin trembled as he pressed his lips into a thin line. “My forgiveness?” he choked out.

  “Yes. And if you can’t, I’ll wait,” she promised. “I’ll wait as long as you need me to wait. I want a future,” she said simply, the wish so precious. “I want to go beyond the past. I want you to go with me.”

  “I forgive you.”

  “Just like that?” she said, her throat aching with unshed tears.

  “Yes, because I already let go,” he said, his voice deep and raw, his eyes trained on Rafael’s plaque. “I refuse to let the past dictate how I will live my future. Not anymore. I forgave myself. So my forgiveness is easy. I never stopped loving you.”

  “What?”

  “I love you, Sia.”

  Sia cupped his face and looked into his eyes. Seeing the truth there made her realize she had been wrong. There was more than hope that they could move on. She gave a shaky sigh of deep relief. “I love you, too. I never stopped, either. You are right. We need to put the past behind us. Move forward into the future. Our future.”

  Her arms went around his neck, her heart overflowing. She pressed her cheek against his chest and let go of everything, the past, the pain, the heartache and the terrible loss. She would always miss her brother and her family, but now, now, she finally let him go, let them go. Her gaze landed on his plaque and the tears were finally released. As they flowed, he lowered his mouth to hers for a kiss that was both bonding and beginning, promise and fulfillment…and love.

  Hand in hand, they walked out of the building. When they hit the street, Chris smiled. “I sure hope you have a hotel room. I just got in from Afghanistan and didn’t have time to check in.”

  It was Sia’s turn to smile. She took his hand and this time she hailed a cab.

  In her hotel room, she pushed the worn leather jacket off his shoulders, tugged his shirt loose and lifted it over his head. He raised his arms, accommodating her, and soon she had his bare chest at her disposal. To do with what she wanted.

  And the hunger to do that was stirring in her blood.

  She took it slowly. Sweetly, deliciously slowly.

  He’d tasted her, taunted her, teased her, on several occasions. Now he would be at her command.

  Her entire world narrowed down to the smooth expanse of honeyed skin wrapped oh-so-tautly across his chest. She dipped her head and drew her tongue slowly from his collarbone down the valley between his pecs, and then teased her way over to his nipple.

  He drew in a sharp breath when she flicked her tongue across the sensitive tip. His hands came up to her hair, and she smiled as it came cascading down around her shoulders.

  “If you like that move,” he said, his mouth close to her ear, “you’ll love what else I can do.”

  She laughed and looked deep into his eyes.

  “Ambrosia,” he said, “my Sia,” his voice barely more than a rough whisper.

  “Chris,” she said, making his name a vow.

  He cupped her head and slowly drew her mouth up to his, his eyes on hers as their lips met.

  She took his kiss, letting her eyes drift shut as sensation after sensation poured through her. He slowly lowered them both to the bed, where he rolled her beneath him and continued his sweet seduction. Their clothes didn’t come off in a frenzied rush, but with slow deliberation. As if they both needed to offset the harsh reality of what they
’d been through with something pure and honest.

  They took turns slowly exploring each other, delighting in discovering again what made them gasp, what made them moan. It was slow but complete capitulation where nothing was held back, nothing was hidden.

  When she finally rolled to her back, taking his weight fully on top of her, it was as if she’d reached a golden point, a place she’d been trying to get to for a long, long time but could never quite find. That place where life suddenly became more complete and took on even greater meaning.

  Without a word, they locked gazes and he slowly pushed into her, not stopping until she’d taken him fully inside of her. She wrapped her legs around him, holding him there, taking a moment to wallow, to revel a bit, in the supreme pleasure and contentment of being joined to that person who was to be hers.

  And in that moment, despite all the fears, all the work yet to be done, and the promise of the future that lay before them, one thing was certain: her time spent with this man was going to mean something to her for the rest of her life.

  The rest she let go, and willed herself just to feel, to truly live purely in that moment and that moment only. She moved first, pressing her hips up into his. He began to move inside of her, so deep, filling her so perfectly. It wasn’t wild, it wasn’t frenzied; it was powerful and necessary. He slid one arm beneath the small of her back and lifted her hips even higher so he could sink into her even more deeply. Their gazes caught, held, and their thrusts came faster, deeper. She watched him climb, watched as his need for her strengthened, felt his muscles gather and bunch as he drew ever closer. She tightened around him, needing to know she could take him to that place, give him that sweet bliss that he so effortlessly gave her, and found herself shuddering, too, in intense satisfaction as he growled through a pulsing release.

  He kissed her, pressed another kiss to her temple, and then dropped another one just below her ear before rolling to his back, pulling her with him, and settling her body alongside his.

  She fell against him with her body as she’d fallen for him with her heart. She didn’t question it. Her eyes were already drifting shut as she shifted enough to press a soft kiss over his heart before tucking her arm across his body. Then she draped her leg across his, needing him as close to her as he could get.

  It was okay to let go completely; he was there to catch her.

  “Chris,” she said as the light faded from outside and the city quieted.

  “Yes,” he murmured.

  “In case I forgot to say it. I for—”

  He covered her mouth with a kiss, his lips soft and warm. “I know.”

  Epilogue

  “Chris,” she puffed, “wait for me.” He turned and smiled at her.

  “Well, come on, slowpoke.” He waited while she slipped her arm through his.

  She huffed in mock anger. “You’re not carrying around a bowling ball in your stomach, mister, so just be patient with your pregnant wife,” she said, laughing as she made the last few steps to the rotunda of the Navy Memorial.

  “I said to wait until after the baby was born to do this. You, on the other hand, acted quite unreasonable. ‘No, Chris,’” he mimicked in a high falsetto voice, “‘I have to be there on the anniversary of my brother’s memorial.’”

  She laughed until she was breathless. “You know this is important to me, so you even drove me all the way from Norfolk. It was just a few hours’ drive, anyway, and I’m not due for another two weeks.”

  He looked down at her enormous stomach and sent his hand lovingly over the huge mound. “It feels risky to me.”

  He held her hand as they made their way to the plaque. She stood in front of it and smiled at the handsome picture of her brother. Gently, she ran her hands over the words: In honored memory of Lieutenant Rafael Soto, loving brother and son, keeper of freedom and liberty, and lover of jelly beans.

  He would have been happy for his sister and his best friend. Sia and Chris had been married now for two years. Two wonderful years. It hadn’t been smooth sailing that whole time, mostly because she was stubborn, but Chris had always been there for her and she for him.

  Suddenly the dull ache she’d had in her back all the way from Norfolk intensified. There was a popping sound and a rush of water that left a puddle beneath her.

  Several people were milling around the other memorials and they turned to look at her. One woman covered her mouth as her husband whipped out his cell phone and dialed.

  “Oh, damn,” Chris said, looking down, then looking at her. “Is that what I think it is?”

  She smiled, not at all panicked as she took Chris’s hand. “Yes. We’re going to have a baby.” Chris didn’t move, just stared at her, dumbfounded. “Now, Chris.”

  “Right, hospital.”

  He took her hand and started to pull her when a strong contraction took hold of her, sending pain across her abdomen and stabbing into her lower back. She doubled over and several people asked Chris if he needed help. He just shook his head and waited out her contraction.

  When it was over, Sia knew. “Ah, Chris, we’re not going to make it to the hospital.”

  “Oh, damn,” he said again as he looked frantically for a place to set her down. “That bench.” He dragged her over and helped her lie down. He settled her jacket over her hips and legs as he removed clothing to make way for the baby.

  “I think I’ve been in labor all day,” she said, breaking off as another searing contraction tightened her stomach into a hard knot of pain. She cried out and Chris went white.

  “Hang on, honey.”

  “I didn’t know it was labor pains,” she panted. “They were so mild.”

  “You’re just one of the lucky ones.”

  She cried out as another strong band of pain contracted and she felt a pressure in her groin. “I feel the need to push,” she said, the unmistakable feeling of bearing down overwhelming her.

  “Then push, honey. I’m here.”

  Sia let her body take over, since it seemed to know what it wanted to do.

  After several minutes, Chris cried out, “I can see the head. Keep going.” He ripped off his jacket and his T-shirt.

  Sia continued to push and Chris asked her to stop momentarily as he navigated the shoulders. She could hear the sound of an ambulance in the distance. She remembered someone had called for one when they saw her water break. But they were going to be too late as she felt her child slide from her body. Chris caught the small bundle in his hands and wrapped the baby in the soft cotton of his shirt as Sia heard the first cries.

  “It’s a boy,” Chris said, looking up at her with a joyous expression on his face, wonderment in his eyes. And Sia reached down and touched her son. The little boy turned his head, and, like lightning, Sia was struck with instantaneous love, a bond that filled her with the same wonder she’d just seen on her husband’s face.

  She stroked his head and said softly as the paramedics rushed up to them, “Hello, Rafael.”

  * * * * *

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  Chapter 1

  The Wyoming woods atop the tall mountains that cradled the town of Cold Plains were just beginning to take on a fall cast of color. This worked perfectly with the camouflage long-sleeved T-shirt and pants that Micah Grayson w
ore as he made his way through the thick brush and trees.

  Although a gun holster rode his shoulder, he held his gun tight in his hand. Despite the fact that he had only been hiding out in the mountainous woods for two days and nights, he’d quickly learned that danger could come in the blink of an eye, a danger that might require the quick tic of his index finger on the trigger.

  Twilight had long ago fallen but a near-full moon overhead worked as an additional enemy when it came to using the shield of darkness for cover.

  As an ex-mercenary, Micah knew how to learn the terrain and use the weather to his advantage. He knew how to keep the reflection of the moonlight off his skin so as not to alert anyone to his presence. He could move through a bed of dry leaves and not make a sound. He could be wearing a black suit in a snowstorm and still figure out a way to become invisible.

  The first twenty-four hours that he’d been in the woods he’d learned natural landmarks, studied pitfalls and figured out places he thought would make good hidey-holes if needed. He’d also come face-to-face with a moose, heard the distant call of a wolf and seen several elk and deer.

  He now moved with the stealth of a big cat toward the rocky cliff he’d discovered the night before. As he crept low and light on his feet, he kept alert, his ears open for any alien sound that might not belong to the forest.

  Despite the relative coolness of the night, a trickle of sweat trekked down the center of his back. During his thirty-eight years of life, Micah had faced a thousand life-threatening situations, the latest of which had been a bullet to his head that had sent him into a coma for months.

  When he finally reached the rocky bluff he looked down at the lights dotting the little valley, the lights of the small town of Cold Plains, Wyoming. His brother Samuel’s town. Micah reached up and touched the scar, now barely discernible through his thick dark hair on the left side of his head, the place where Samuel’s henchman, Dax Roberts, had shot him while Micah had sat in his car. Dax had left him for dead.