Troubleshooters 02 The Defiant Hero

by Suzanne Brockmann

  “I’m so sorry about that,” she said.

  She was trying not to cry and the sight of her standing there, chin held high despite the fact that she’d been completely trashed by whatever that asshole had said to her, broke his heart.

  He opened his mouth and uttered some of the most difficult words he’d ever said. “Are you sure you want to leave? If you really want to get back together with him, Meg, maybe you should bring him home with you. You know, to talk.”

  “He has an important meeting in an hour—something that can’t wait until tomorrow.” She laughed as she climbed into the cab, but it sounded brittle and thin. “He wants me to go home with you tonight. He actually thinks I should sleep with you.”

  Nils stared at her through the open door, certain he’d misheard.

  “Get in the cab, John,” she said. “It’s your lucky night.” And then she burst into tears.

  --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Thirteen

  EVE STROKED AMY’S hair. “Ralph didn’t leave for the army early,” she told the little girl. “He stayed and helped me nurse Nick. He was there around the clock for a full week, no complaints, always willing to do the nastiest jobs. He was always there, covering me with a blanket if I drifted off to sleep, forcing Nick to keep drinking, helping him fight that terrible fever.

  “He was there when the fever broke, too.” Eve shook her head, remembering. “That was a day, I’ll tell you.” She smiled at the Bear, wishing he would stop scowling so. “I cried more that day than I did the entire week that Nick was so sick. And Ralph was there. Somehow he knew just to hold me, to let it all come out. And then he tucked me into my bed and made me sleep.

  “He was still there, sitting beside my bed this time, when I woke up.”

  It was extremely improper, Ralph alone with her in her bedroom. But the Johnsons and Doc Samuels all thought she and Ralph were lovers. They thought she and Ralph had . . .

  She sat up. “Where’s Nick?”

  “He’s fine. Mrs. J. is with him. He’s sleeping now, but . . . He had two whole bowls of her chicken soup, Eve. I give him two days before he’s out of bed and running around again, good as new.”

  She sank back against her pillows, suddenly shy, hearing the echo of her own voice, shrill and ugly, telling him to go to hell. “Thank you so much for everything you’ve done,” she said. “I don’t think I could’ve made it through this without you.”

  Without you.

  If this had happened two weeks from now, she would have had to. He was leaving.

  Tears flooded her eyes again. How could that be? Surely she’d cried herself as dry as Death Valley last night.

  “Hey,” he said, sitting beside her on the bed, taking her hands in his. His hands were so warm. “Everything’s okay now.”

  “But it’s not,” she said, and no matter how hard she tried to call forth the spirit of her mother, this time she couldn’t do it. This time the tears spilled down her cheeks, and her lip trembled. This time the words escaped. “Don’t leave me! Please, please, don’t leave me!”

  And she was sobbing, again. This time not for Nicky, but for herself.

  “Oh, Eve,” Ralph whispered, holding her tightly. “I don’t want to—you have to know that the last thing on earth I want is to leave you!”

  She knew nothing of the sort. She only knew that he’d been so cool again after telling her he was leaving. She only knew he’d asked her to marry him a week ago as if it were an impending jail term, a life sentence.

  “Marry me,” he said again now. “Not because we have to, but because we want to—because I want to. God, Eve, I do want to. I love you.”

  He pulled back to look at her and there were tears in his eyes, too. “I did it all wrong when I asked you before. I thought you didn’t want me, I thought . . . That day by the river when I told you about the letter from my father—I wanted to ask you to wait for me to come back, but I couldn’t. You’re so young and so beautiful—it just wasn’t fair. So I sat there, hoping, praying, that you’d offer to wait for me, that you’d promise to wait until I came back home. I couldn’t ask it of you, Eve, but see, if you offered . . . But you didn’t, and I thought—”

  “I will wait for you,” she said. “Ralph, I’d wait for you forever.”

  He laughed at that, laughed and kissed her. His mouth was warm and he tasted of butterscotch. “There’ll be no waiting. Not now. I’m not leaving you with the entire town talking about you and . . . You’re marrying me— I mean . . .” He took a breath. “Please, Eve, I love you, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife? I’ve already filed for a special license. All you have to do is say yes, and we can be married tomorrow.”

  Eve looked down at Amy and over at the Bear. “How could I say no,” she asked, “when the one thing I wanted more than anything in the world was to say yes?”

  John was almost completely silent as he drove—except for one finger that tapped out a Latin sounding beat on the steering wheel.

  Meg knew that he loved salsa music even more than he loved country—although he’d never admit to liking either, not in a million years, not even to her. He pretended to listen to classical music, and had actually done his homework. He could tell Mozart from Haydn and could name pieces and movements and opuses. But classical music never lit his eyes on fire the way a fifteen-piece salsa band could.

  Meg wanted to ask him what he was thinking, but she didn’t dare. She was afraid of what he might say.

  Of course, maybe she was flattering herself. Maybe, unlike her, he didn’t spend hours of his life thinking about that night. That awful, terrible, wonderful night.

  Daniel had been at the embassy party. She’d been surprised to see him. Surprised, and yet not surprised, too. It was completely like him not to call from the plane. It was his MO to assume that whenever he appeared, other people would simply change their schedules and rearrange their lives to accommodate him.

  Daniel had taken one look at her there at the party with John, and he’d jumped to rather obvious conclusions.

  Meg couldn’t afford for this to get ugly, not careerwise, nor emotionally. So she’d asked John to get her a cab. He didn’t like leaving her there, alone with Daniel, but he’d gone out front to do as she’d requested.

  “So how long have you been sleeping with him?” Daniel asked tightly once they were alone. “You do know he’s just using you to get back at me.”

  “I’m not sleeping with him,” she’d told her husband evenly. “That’s something you might’ve done—sleep with a friend. Not me. Not even if I wanted to.”

  And she had wanted to. Daniel was good at reading between the lines, and she knew he hadn’t missed that implication.

  Tears came into his eyes. But were they real tears? She honestly didn’t know.

  “You’re right,” he said quietly. “Forgive me. I’m . . . jetlagged and jealous of everyone who’s even had the chance just to talk to you these past few months.”

  She wanted to believe that he meant it. But it had the same tone of his usual bullshit. Just once, she wanted the truth from him.

  “God, I’ve missed you.” He reached for her, and she stepped back. “Okay,” he said. “We’re still there, huh? Not over the anger yet, apparently.”

  “We have a lot of talking to do,” she told him. “You didn’t think you could write me a few emails, send a few presents, and then just move back in, did you?”

  But he had thought that. “I’ve already apologized more times than I can count,” he said. “I’m not sure what else I can say. I can’t take back what I’ve done.”

  He wasn’t being flip. He seriously didn’t understand why she didn’t just welcome him back into her arms. After all, he’d said he was sorry.

  Sorry.

  God.

  She’d let him in one evening, back while they were still in Kazbekistan. Amy had been asleep, and Meg had let him weave his apologetic words around her. She�
�d let him back into her bedroom, and the entire time they’d made love, she’d pictured him with Leilee.

  And wasn’t that fun?

  Damn straight she wasn’t over the anger yet.

  “Here’s what we should do,” Daniel told her now. “You should go home. I’ll convey your regrets to the ambassador and—”

  “I’m not sure tonight is the best time for us to talk,” she interrupted.

  He looked at his watch. “No, I can’t tonight. I’ve got a meeting in about an hour. I think tonight you should go home with your SEAL friend.”

  She stared at him. “Excuse me?”

  “Yes,” he said. “You heard. That’s what I think you should do. Go home with him. You want him? He’s a good-looking kid, and I’m sure he’s been very nice to you. So do it. Have a revenge affair, Meg. Get back at me by screwing Junior’s brains out.”

  She couldn’t believe what he was saying. Her mouth was hanging open.

  But Daniel was serious. “Get it out of your system—all the anger you’re carrying around. Just . . . do it. Get back at me, and then we can both just let it go.”

  “You actually want me to . . . ?”

  “I don’t want you to,” he said. “Of course I’m going to be jealous.” He had to blink hard to keep from crying. She’d never seen him like this—certainly not in public. Dear Lord, it was possible he was finally being completely truthful. But, God, what a truth. “I don’t know what else to do. I love you and I want you back. And I know you love me. Maybe if you do this, you’ll feel better and you’ll get over some of the anger. And then we can move forward with our lives.”

  He kissed her hand again, and walked away. Meg drained the glass of champagne she was still clutching, grabbed another from a passing tray. God, she needed a real drink.

  Somehow, she made it out to the front of the embassy, and there was John, looking majestic in his formal dress uniform, with his hat and gloves. He had such concern on his face, such worry in his eyes, she almost didn’t make it into the cab before she started to cry.

  She was so inappropriate—the things she said to him. But he got into the cab anyway, and just held her while she cried on his shoulder.

  She couldn’t tell him all of what Daniel had said—not in the cab. She couldn’t bear for the driver to overhear.

  It wasn’t until they were back upstairs, in the privacy of her apartment, that she told him.

  Meg had one bottle of alcohol in her kitchen. A bottle of rum she’d bought to make daiquiries last spring, when Nancy, her college roommate, was coming to visit. Only Nancy the party girl had come bearing stories of rehab and sobriety—thank God—and they’d had virgin daiquiries. And Meg had hid the rum in the back of her cabinet.

  She found it now and took it into the living room with two glasses.

  “I think I’m going to pass on that,” John said as she held one of the glasses out to him. “I have this sneaking suspicion it’s not going to help.”

  But he’d gone ahead and poured himself a stiff drink when she’d told him what Daniel had said to her in the embassy.

  “I know that he wants me to sleep with you only to cancel out his own guilt,” she told him, trying not to cry. “But how could he even suggest this?”

  “He shouldn’t have,” John told her. “He was completely out of line. If you want my opinion, you should ditch him for good.”

  The rum burned a numb path all the way to her stomach and she poured another glass. She wanted to feel that numbness all over.

  “Tell me the truth,” she said. “Did we run into each other by accident two weeks ago?”

  John sighed and shook his head. “No. I knew you were going to be there at the foreign service office.”

  “And was I, um, was I supposed to be like . . . some kind of means for you to get back at Daniel for the trouble he’s caused you?”

  He was silent, looking down at the drink he held in his hands, and Meg felt the world start to slip even more sideways beneath her feet. “Oh, God . . .”

  “It might’ve started that way,” he said, looking up and straight into her eyes. “It did start that way. And I am so, so sorry about that. I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about you, about that kiss, and Moore’s been relentless about this pain-in-the-ass inquiry, and I think I probably thought . . . But it changed so fast—it changed the second I saw you again, Meg. When you smiled at me, I knew everything else was bullshit. I just wanted to be with you. That’s all that counted, all that mattered. There was no motive to it after that point, I swear to God.”

  Meg wanted to believe him. But how could she?

  “Think about it, Meg,” he implored her. “If I really only wanted to seduce you to get back at your husband, I wouldn’t have spent two weeks saying good night to you at your door.” He managed a weak grin. “That tongue down your throat thing would’ve happened a whole hell of a lot sooner.”

  That had to be the truth, didn’t it? God, she was so sick of having to guess.

  “How much trouble are you really in?” she asked, wanting to know what else he’d lied about.

  He shook his head. “None,” he said. “Not really. It is just an inquiry, and no matter what Moore says, it’s not going any further. I’m going in there and I’m going to apologize for the methods my team and I used to get Abdelaziz out of K-stan. But I’m not going to apologize for the fact that we got him out. Considering what we were up against, we executed our mission successfully, and in private, I’ve been thanked and rewarded for getting the job done. In public, I’m taking the blame, and I’m being chastised to appease all the assholes. I’m going to be denied promotion for a year. That should make Moore happy. Don’t tell him, but to me, it’s no big deal. In return, behind closed doors, I’m getting some extra perks that more than make up for it.”

  She believed him. She chose to believe him. “So. My husband wants me to have sex with you.”

  John knocked back some more of his rum. “Yeah, I’m still feeling a little weird about that.”

  “This has the potential to be devastatingly painful.” Meg poured herself another glass. “I mean, even if I wanted to, how could I be so cruel to you? To just use you, like some kind of toy . . . ?”

  “There are, well, there’re worse things you could do,” he said. “I mean, being used—in that way, as a sexual plaything—it’s not really that awful an idea considering that I’m dying for you to use me any way you want.”

  She stared at him.

  “Kidding.” He smiled weakly. “I’m kidding. That was my Woody Allen impression. How’d I do?”

  Meg started to cry.

  He moved next to her on the couch. “Oh, come on, it wasn’t that bad.”

  “Doesn’t he know me?” she asked. “How could he think I’d sleep with someone else, even with his permission? God, that’s so sick! Doesn’t he know that those vows I made are sacred? Hasn’t he heard anything I’ve said to him all those years we were married? If he thinks I could just . . . God, maybe he never bothered to get to know me at all!”

  He gently took the glass from her hands, pushed the bottle out of her reach. “Maybe he knows you too well,” he countered. “Maybe by telling you to have an affair, he gets to relieve some of his own guilt. Yet at the same time, it’s a double win for him because he knows you’ll never do it. Permission slip or not, he knows you’re not going to sleep with me tonight.”

  God, John was probably right.

  She turned to look at him, and realized that he was sitting right next to her. Right next to her. Up this close, his eyes were more than light brown. They were filled with flecks of green and gold and darker brown. They were filled with . . . desire.

  He looked away, embarrassed, as if he were aware of what she’d seen in his eyes. “I should go.”

  Meg knew exactly what she should do if she wanted to shake up Daniel, if she didn’t want him to get away with playing those kinds of head games with her.

  She should make love to John.

>   Not sleep with him or screw him or however crudely Daniel had put it. She should make love. She should love him.

  She put her hand on his knee. “Don’t go.”

  He looked at her hand, looked back into her eyes. “Hmmm. Yeah. I’m thinking, um, that I should, you know . . . definitely leave. And now would probably be a good time.”

  Meg snatched her hand away, closed her eyes, horrified and embarrassed. “I’m sorry. Oh, my God, I’ve become Mrs. Robinson!”

  “What?” John laughed. “Wait, are you nuts? How old are you? Thirty? You’re only five years older than me. That’s nothing.”