He didn’t know how she did it really, standing there watching the numbers come in and being judged. Even when she delivered a flawless program there were times when a judge felt the need to give a lower score just to give one. Some people, he had said, just liked to try to tear people down. He would love to see that judge get out on the ice and try to do even a fraction of the things she could do.
He used the first aid kit to clean up her scrapes on the palms of her hand. He cleaned the dirt off her face and made sure there weren’t any injuries there—other than the ones she already had from the bastard who hit her.
He looked down at her, feeling the need to touch her once more he brushed the backs of his fingers along her cheek. “I’m right here. You’re okay,” he spoke softly trying to reassure her. He didn’t know if she could hear him and understand him, but he wanted her to know she was okay and that he was here. He wouldn’t leave her behind.
Precisely an hour later her eyes fluttered open and for a brief moment he saw the stark fear embedded within them. “It’s okay,” he leaned closer to her making sure she could see his face clearly as he used his body to try to block out some of the sunlight filtering into her line of sight. He knelt on one knee and placed one hand on her shoulder. “It’s me; you’re okay.”
She eased up onto her elbows. “I fell.”
“I know. You were unconscious for a little while. I carried you over here so we could have some privacy just in case those guys are driving around looking for us.”
“You know they are,” she looked at him. “You don’t have to sugar coat it for me, Jet. I know we’re in trouble. And I’m sorry I fell. I should have been paying attention to what I was doing.”
“I’m sorry I appeared to be sugar coating it. And don’t apologize for falling. It happens sometimes.”
“I slowed you down.”
He shrugged. “The most important thing is that you’re okay. Are you hurting anywhere?”
“A little sore from all the tumbling, but I’m okay. Nothing’s broken, or sprained. Trust me; I would know if there was any real damage.” She sat up completely bringing her lips within perfectly acceptable kissing distance. He shouldn’t be thinking of that right now. He was in the danger zone and his mind should be focused on his mission, not on his growing desire for this woman. “We should get going,” she said.
“You need to eat something first. I studied the map while you were unconscious. There’s not much regarding this section of land, but there’s enough to let me know we’ll need to head that way,” he pointed behind them. “Unfortunately that doesn’t leave us a lot of room for cover. But if what I have is accurate it should lead us back toward the main trail. I can find the way back down to the truck from there.”
She took the protein bar from him. “Did you get in touch with anybody?”
“No signal still,” he told her. “We need to get down the mountain more and I think that’s not going to be until morning. Well, it would have been about morning if we were still up there, but I don’t know about down here. It looks like a longer trek—smoother, but longer.”
She nodded. “I really am sorry, Jet.”
He placed his finger over her lips. “Don’t apologize.”
Her lips curved into a smile. “Okay. I should only eat half of this. You should take the other half.” She broke a piece much smaller than a half off the protein bar and then handed him the rest.
He shook his head no. “Eat the entire thing. I know we need to ration the water, but trust me when I say I have done enough hiking, climbing and nature rescue missions to know how to find food if we need more.”
She nodded as she retracted her hand and continued to eat. “Jet,” she looked into his eyes. “What did they want from my father? Do you know?”
“The demand hadn’t been placed yet.”
“But you know something. You’re a hard man to read, but I think I can tell when you’re hiding something from me now.”
“I’m not hiding anything. The call with the demand hadn’t come in the last time I talked to your father.”
“But you have an idea. Did they want money?”
“Maybe.”
“Jet,” she cautioned him.
“Your father donated some money to a task force that took down some really bad men. One of the guys who had you—the one who hit you actually—his brother was killed.”
Her eyes widened and he knew that she knew what these men really wanted. No matter what they asked for what they really wanted was revenge.
“They were going to kill me anyway; weren’t they?”
“I believe so.”
She placed her hand over her heart and he saw the visible tremor assault her body. He instinctively wrapped one arm around her and pulled her against his chest, holding her close and soothing her. “I won’t let that happen. I won’t let them kill you.”
“I know you won’t let it, Jet, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen.”
“Yes it does,” he growled.
She placed her hand on his back and gave him a gentle hug before pulling away. “I would love to stay in your arms forever, but we really should get moving.” She covered the rest of her protein bar.
“You really should finish that,” he insisted, not allowing her to put the bar away. “We have a rough road ahead of us and I don’t know when we’re going to be able to safely stop again.”
“Actually,” she looked at him. “I need to um…you know…go,” she mumbled. It took him a few seconds but he figured out what she was talking about.
“Oh, yeah…right. Sorry about that. I already went just over there by that tree so you can…”
“Go behind it,” she said. “I am so not letting you see my naked bottom right now.”
He grinned. He wouldn’t mind that at all, but he understood the need for privacy. If she hadn’t been unconscious he would have found a spot deeper into the area, preferably behind some higher bushes, but she was unconscious and he wasn’t letting her out of his sight. “Go on,” he took the protein bar from her. “I’ll hold this until you’re done. And I have a few wipes that you can use to clean your hands when you’re done.”
She nodded and blushed. “This is so embarrassing.”
“It’s just a natural process in life, Akira. We all do it.”
“Not in the woods. I’m used to toilets. It’s so easy for you since you have…” she pointed lower.
“A penis,” he said and almost laughed when her cheeks turned a deeper shade of red.
“I’m going,” she mumbled as she got to her feet. “And don’t peek.”
He wanted her to finish eating, but she was right about them needing to get moving. He was used to navigating by moonlight, in fact he would say his vision was pristine in those conditions, but she wasn’t. He would have to make sure he stopped and allowed her time to sleep too. He would need a couple hours of sleep himself. What difference could a few more minutes make; he thought as she walked back toward him. He handed her one of the alcohol cleaning pads for her hands and then discarded the waste in a Ziploc bag that he planned to put back in his pack after he discarded the wrapper from her protein bar the same way.
When she finished her meal, if he could call it that, she had a little water and he finished putting things straight in his pack before shouldering it and helping her up.
“I can carry the pack, Jet.”
“I have it,” he mumbled as he secured the other strap on his other shoulder so that he now carried the weight split between each shoulder and had the pack resting on his back.
“I’m not so weak that I can’t help.”
“I never said you were. But I have it.” The pack was heavier than she thought it was and he wouldn’t have it slowing her down, which would in turn slow him down.
“Whatever,” she shrugged. “Do you do this for all of your friends? Do you go rescue them and then not let them help? If I were one of your guy friends you would probably have given me a gun by now.”
He grabbed her arm, spinning her to face him.
“First of all, my guy friends are trained to use these guns; you’re not.” And she couldn’t try to fool him into thinking she was. Akira hadn’t handled a gun in her life, and of that he was certain. “Secondly, you’re not one of my guy friends.”
“No,” she said dryly. “I’m just a friend. It’s not that being a friend is a bad thing,” she quickly added. “I’d rather have your friendship than nothing at all. I mean it’s like—”
He silenced her, dipping his head and capturing her lips with his own. When her lips parted he eased his tongue inside her mouth, keeping his kiss slow, sensuous and lazy like they had all day to stand there and do this.
“Hmm,” she moaned as she pulled closer to him, placing her tiny fingers on his arms and holding on tightly.
The soft moans, the subtle ways she shifted her lower body to brush against his growing erection turned him on to the point of near breaking. If it weren’t for the danger around them he could imagine taking her clothes off, spreading the blanket on the ground and taking her right there. But they were in danger. There was a time and a place for everything and now was not the time, nor the place.
He pulled back just enough to look in her eyes. “I don’t do that to somebody who is just a friend,” he said. “Now that we’re clear on what I feel for you we should get moving.”
“Clear? I’m more confused than ever. Why…why wouldn’t you…”
“Do this sooner?” He finished her question. “Because I have been fighting this for months. If I’m being honest I have been fighting this since the day you started emailing me, maybe even since the day I first met you; maybe I just hadn’t realized it then. I wanted you Akira, make no mistake about that. But you’re young—too young for me, and I’m old and maybe not the best man for you, but I want to be the best man for you. I want to be the only man for you. And now that I have admitted that to myself I don’t want to fight this, us, any longer.”
She smiled. “I’m still the same age difference as before, but I can assure you I’m not too young. I’m not confused. I love you, and that’s not going to change—ever. You don’t have to say it back. I just want you to know that I’m not young and flighty. I’m not changing my heart or my mind. I want you, and knowing now that you want me makes me very happy, Jet.” She placed the palm of her hand on his chest. “I just need to know you aren’t doing it because of the situation. I need to know that you aren’t feeling this because you think I need it right now.”
“I felt it before, Akira. Like I said I have been fighting it for a long time now. I thought if I stayed away then things would change, but every day it was hard for me to not send you an email and open that door for you to come into my world. And when I tried to break away from you by not emailing you again I still thought about you. I watched your skating shows. God, I’d go home and pull up old footage online just so I could watch you move. This situation was just the slap to the back of the head that let me know I needed to stop wasting time. I needed to let you know that your love isn’t one sided. I do love you, Akira. I love you more than I can put into words. And when we’re off this mountain and away from this situation I plan to show you just how much you mean to me.”
She smiled at him and his heart wasn’t the only thing to stir within him. He wanted this woman, not just in his bed, but in his life. He could see forever with her. She was the first woman he had ever felt that for and right now he never wanted to walk away from that feeling. It scared him, but at the same time it drove him to something; pushed him toward something, and he wasn’t sure what. He just knew wherever he headed he wanted her with him one hundred percent of the way. That thought alone should have been enough to make him throw up the defensive walls to try to barricade her out of his heart, but it wasn’t enough. Even if he had put up those walls it would have been too late. She was already in his heart. Knowing he could have lost her had opened his eyes to the realness of his feelings. It wasn’t something he could push out of his mind, or even pretend to push out of it. His eyes were completely open and there was no going back. He didn’t want to go back. He wanted to move forward; he wanted to move forward with her.
He heard the low hum of an engine and he pulled her back behind some shrubs and a few skinny trees.
“Oh my God. How did they catch up to us so quickly?”
“We were out of commission for a little over an hour and they have a jeep. They don’t know we’re down here. For all they know we’re still up there.”
“Then why aren’t they up there?”
“I don’t know. They’d have no way to know about your fall. They shouldn’t be down here. They wouldn’t have wasted time to backtrack and get that jeep down to this level, though. I don’t know what brought them down here.”
She felt around on her neck as if suddenly aware of something. “My necklace,” she whispered. “I must have lost it in the fall. It was a little white gold and diamond skate pendant that my dad gave me after I won the gold at the Olympics.”
“They must have found it. It must have caught on something and I should have seen it.”
“It’s not your fault. I’m the one who fell. It’s my fault.”
“We’ll argue about it later,” he said softly. “Right now we need to move. Stay low.” He knew they couldn’t stay in their current position. They weren’t behind enough cover for that and these guys would no doubt see them. They might miss them on the first pass, but they would definitely spot them on the second. Akira wasn’t exactly wearing camouflage. Blue looked great on her, but it wasn’t great for hiding amongst a thin patch of shades of green. She had called the color cerulean blue once when he had seen her in a thick wool sweater that had white faux fur trimming the cuffs. She had said it was a good color for her and she was right. This particular shade of blue complemented her skin, but then she looked good in reds, deep greens and a sea of other colors too. He would guess she looked good in just about any color. But right now he would have preferred if she were not wearing a color that would stand out so much amongst their current surroundings. Not that he could talk. He had dressed for night movement, but at least he still could manage to not stick out as much as she was doing right now.
His skin was darker tanned than hers and somehow it worked to help him blend into his surroundings more easily than most of the guys he had worked with over the years. Charlie had always called him a “nicely tanned white guy,” and he had laughed at her words. He would guess he did look nicely tanned since the color most people saw was his natural color. If he spent a little time in the sun in the summer he managed a slightly darker tint, but nothing over dramatic. Heck, he couldn’t complain. Women always seemed to think he looked exotic, and when he went overseas on missions he didn’t seem to have any trouble blending in and not being singled out as an American. He had no problem owning his country, but in certain areas of the world his mission required more covertness than having somebody stalking him because they looked at him and saw a white American or Englishman. Preston had always said he looked like a man from the islands, but he never said which one. He had simply laughed and said, “no wonder the ladies flock to you.” He had been right too. Jet had no trouble with women being interested in him. What he had trouble finding were the sane women he preferred to spend his time with. He didn’t want the woman who saw his military history as some badge to pin on her headboard. He wasn’t a man who slept around. When he found a woman he was committed until it was over; it always ended up being over. But with this woman he wasn’t going to let go. He was holding on to her, but first he had to get her off that mountain alive and without any holes in her that God or her mother hadn’t already put there. Thinking about Akira’s mother and the gift she had given Akira at one of the parties he had been invited to made Jet take a look at Akira’s ears.
“Take the earrings off,” he told her quietly. He didn’t know why he hadn’t thought of that before. If the sun hit those things they would give aw
ay their position.
She quickly pulled the earrings off and he took them, depositing them inside a pocket on his cargo pants and securing it closed. He assessed her to make sure there wasn’t anything else shiny on her body to give away their location.
“I have on a black camisole under here, Jet. I can take off this top if you have somewhere you can put it.”
He nodded. He could put it in his backpack. They had stayed low enough to get inside some of the heavier tree coverage. It wasn’t dense, but it was better than where they had started. He could take a few seconds to put her top in the pack, but he wouldn’t take much longer than that.
On Thin Ice (Special Ops) Page 10
