Man Beneath the Uniform

by Maureen Child

  Three years ago, he'd tried planning a future. An old, tired ache pinged briefly in his heart, then disappeared. He'd thought himself in love, popped the damn question and had his own balloon popped when the lady said no. It seemed a Navy SEAL was good enough to sleep with, but she'd wanted more out of life than a military paycheck and a husband who was gone more than he was home.

  The worst of it was, once the hurt had faded, Zack couldn't even blame her for saying no.

  Zack had made it a point to keep his distance from the kind of woman who was currently making him nuts. Revolving-door relationships were a lot easier on the heart. He had no intention of giving up his military career—and really, what kind of life was that to offer a woman? SEAL spouses spent most of their time worrying. Who the hell would readily agree to that?

  His gaze focused on his own reflection in the window and he narrowed his eyes at himself. "There's nothing for you here, man. So pull it together already. You've only got three weeks left on this mission. Hell, you can do three weeks."

  He'd made it through SEAL training. Finished top in his class. He'd dived in shark-infested waters. He'd had a ship blown up under him. Hell, he'd survived a four-day trek through a desert armed only with a quart of water and a GPS.

  Zack straightened up.

  "Hoo-yah," he muttered. "You can live through all that, you can live through Kim Danforth."

  He turned his back on his own reflection and let his gaze wander the confines of his cozy prison.

  His newly purchased coffee maker sat on the gleaming kitchen counter alongside Kim's blender. While she whirled together disgusting concoctions of carrots and peaches and whatever else she found lying around, he enjoyed the rich scent of ground D&D coffee beans being brewed.

  She ate plain yogurt and bagels with enough stone-ground wheat in them to be still growing in a field somewhere. He ate frozen waffles dripping with maple syrup.

  "Complete opposites," he murmured, underlining their differences as he shook his head. So why, then, did he want her so bad?

  "They say talking to yourself is the first sign of dementia."

  Her voice, silky, soft, sly, brought him up short. "There're those big words again," Zack commented and pushed away from the counter. Damn good thing she couldn't read minds.

  She gave him a quick smile and he sucked in a gulp of air, hoping to ease the punch of it.

  Didn't help.

  "So what is it exactly that we're doing today?"

  She glanced up at him. "I'm driving to Tybee Island to take some pictures."

  "Of?"

  "The ocean. Kelp beds. Whatever."

  "Is this for your research project?"

  "Nope." She straightened, then reached up, gathered her long, black hair into a ponytail at the back of her head and carelessly whipped a rubber band around it. "This is for me."

  "Probably not a good idea, Kim," he said.

  Her hands dropped to her sides and fisted. "I need to get out of the house, Zack."

  "We're still going for those walks at night." Though he was planning on cutting them down to a couple of nights a week. Didn't pay to lay down a routine for a stalker, no matter what she'd like to think.

  "I'm starting to feel like a vampire," she snapped, then sent him a long look. "I know you're going stir crazy, too."

  "Does feel like the walls are closing in sometimes," he admitted. Although, he'd keep to himself the fact that she was the main reason for his jumpiness. Hell, he could be on an aircraft carrier and if she were somewhere aboard, the ship would feel too small.

  "Then let's go." She tilted her head and looked up at him.

  "Gonna storm."

  "I won't melt."

  Zack stared at her for a long minute. Most women he'd known wouldn't even think of going outside without layering on a coat of war paint. But Kim hadn't even checked a mirror to see if her ponytail was straight. She didn't have a trace of makeup on, yet her skin nearly glowed. Her eyes looked huge with her hair pulled back off her face and her stubborn chin looked a little more fragile than usual. Her eyes met his and he saw the skitter of nerves in their depths and he knew what it was costing her to hold it together. Maybe she was doing it out of pure stubbornness, but however she was managing it, she was close to the breaking point.

  Her gaze drilled into his and he felt that solid punch of awareness hit him low and hard and this time he didn't even flinch. He didn't have a clue as to what to do about his body's response to her … but he sure as hell couldn't seem to stop it.

  "What the hell."

  She grinned and relief flickered in her eyes just long enough to make him glad he'd relented.

  "Thanks."

  He grabbed up her black tote bag and his eyebrows lifted. "Weighs a ton."

  "Need help?"

  "Not likely," he quipped, swinging the straps of the bag up and over his shoulder. Heading to the front porch, he said, "I've carried fully loaded packs through jungles so thick you can't see and so dense you can't take a step without catching your foot on roots bigger than your arm … this little pack is no problem."

  "Jungles, huh?" Kim followed him out and stopped to lock the door behind them. "Is that where you were last? I mean before coming here?"

  "No," Zack said, remembering that last mission. No jungles. Just hills and forests and rivers and gunfire.

  "No? Just no?" She looked up at him. "You can't tell me where you were?"

  "I could," he said amiably, taking her elbow in a firm grip as he led her down the steps. "But then I'd have to shoot you. And you're just too damn pretty to shoot."

  She stopped and pulled her arm free.

  Frowning, he looked down at her. "What?"

  "Don't do that."

  "Do what?" He waited, wondering what the hell she was talking about. "Already told you I wouldn't shoot you."

  "No." She pulled in a sharp breath and blew it out again in a rush. "Not that. Don't tell me I'm pretty."

  A cold wind kicked up out of nowhere and tugged a few long strands of black hair free of her ponytail. They whipped across her eyes and she plucked them free with an impatient hand. Thunder rolled in the distance and echoed ominously around them.

  Zack shook his head. "Why not?"

  "Because I'm not pretty," Kim told him, lifting her chin and looking him dead in the eye. "And I know it. So I'd rather not hear your standard lines or recycled flattery, okay?"

  Well, he thought, so much for friendly banter and a nice release of tension. Looked like they were stacking up for a fight. And hell, a fight was as good a way as any to loosen up.

  He swung the bag off his shoulder and let it drop to the grass. The equipment inside the bag rattled in protest at the treatment, but he hardly noticed. "I wasn't giving you a line."

  "Right." She planted both fisted hands on her hips, cocked her head and glared up at him. "'You're too pretty to shoot.' Good Lord, Zack. That's right up there with 'what's your sign' and 'my wife doesn't understand me.' But you don't even realize you're doing it, do you? It's practically unconscious."

  "Now I'm sleepwalking?"

  "That's not what I meant."

  He glared at her. "Then say what you mean. You usually do."

  "Fine." She nodded sharply. "I have a name, you know. It's Kim. K.I.M."

  His eyes narrowed on her but he kept his voice low, quiet. "You know, I heard that somewhere."

  "Funny." Her eyebrows winged up sharply. "I didn't think you knew it."

  "Why's that?" Zack couldn't look away. First, it would have been dangerous to not keep an eye on her at the moment. She looked as though she was suddenly mad enough to chew him up and spit him out. But more importantly, she made a hell of a picture in her fury.

  Her eyes were giving off sparks. Fire flashed in those green eyes, until they looked like emeralds under a spotlight. She practically shook with the coiled tension inside her. What had he done to get her so damn mad? One minute, she's all smiles, talking about the ocean, the next she's jumping down his th
roat, kicking and scratching the whole way down.

  And what was wrong with him that he liked seeing her so damn mad?

  "Because you rarely use my name." She shifted position slightly, folding her arms beneath her breasts and Zack was just male enough to notice the movement. She noticed him noticing and gave a derisive snort. "Women are just interchangeable to you, aren't we?"

  "What the hell—"

  "It's like we're an all you-can-eat buffet—"

  His eyebrows lifted and Kim practically snarled. She'd stepped right into that double entendre.

  "You know what I mean," she snapped, then continued before he could speak again. "Blonde, brunette, redhead. Doesn't really matter as long as we have breasts, right?"

  "Hold on a damn minute," he countered, looming over her, trying for steely intimidation. It didn't seem to be working.

  "No, you hold on. You think I don't notice you calling me peaches or darlin' or honey or sugar?" She reached out and poked him in the chest with her index finger. "You think I don't know that it's your way of talking to a woman without actually having to remember her name?"

  He inhaled sharply, deeply, and then closed his mouth tightly.

  Irritation swelled inside her and mingled with the tension that had been coiled tight in the pit of her stomach for days. She'd felt like a tightrope walker trying to keep her mind on the research project due in little more than three months, while at the same time trying to keep her mind off the fact that someone out there was threatening her family.

  Then there was the whole Zack issue.

  She kept watching him. Couldn't seem to help herself. He was big and handsome and there all the time. She knew darn well that she wasn't the type of woman a man like him usually went for. Hadn't she been generally ignored by the male population for years? But that knowledge hadn't stopped her imagination from kicking into high gear when she least expected it.

  She imagined his hands on her. She pictured him, sweeping her up into his arms and carrying her off to her bedroom and making her feel all the things she wanted to feel.

  But the last time she'd given in to her fantasies, surrendered to her wants, she'd crashed into a wall of betrayal that still stung if she let herself think about it.

  So she wasn't about to stand here and let him say things he didn't mean only to have her heart dredge them up in the middle of the night just to torture her.

  "I'm not one of your little shore-leave SEAL groupies," she said quietly. She met his eyes, those greenish blue eyes that she spent way too much time thinking about, and told herself not to look away. "I'm not your latest bed warmer and I'd appreciate it if you'd keep that in mind."

  "Number one," he said tightly, "I don't have groupies, darlin'. I have women friends. Occasionally, I have lovers…"

  She winced. Oh, she really didn't want to think about him with other women. But men like him had women falling at their feet all the time.

  "Unlike you," he added, "I actually prefer people to fish."

  Her gaze narrowed. "I never said—"

  "You had your say, peaches," he interrupted, keeping his gaze locked with hers. "Now it's my turn. If I say I think you're pretty, then I mean it. I don't have to lie to a woman to get her attention."

  "No ego problems here," she whispered.

  "None at all," he agreed, giving her a quick, but lethal grin. "You want to believe I'm lying, there's nothing I can do about it."

  "Fine," she snapped. "You're not lying. You just need your eyes checked."

  He snorted a laugh. "You're a piece of work, babe."

  Kim gritted her teeth and swallowed the twinge of pain. Babe. Darlin'. No one had ever called her by an endearment. Not once. And to hear it now, when she knew it meant nothing, tore at her. Stupid, she thought, to let it hurt. To let it disappoint. To wish, even for a moment, that the words had meaning.

  She was a scientist.

  She, more than anyone, knew that wishes didn't equal facts.

  Zack started talking again and she told herself to listen. "For whatever reason, you decided to take a swing at me. Well, I'm not gonna stand here and get skewered because you're mad at Daddy for siccing a bodyguard on you."

  That stung, too. Mostly because it was true. "I'm not mad at—"

  "The hell you're not. Now who's lying?" Zack countered, grabbing her upper arms and dragging her close as the first few spattering drops of rain pelted them both. "But you know what the main problem is, darlin'?"

  "What?" She squeezed the word through a tight throat and told herself to ignore the blasts of heat skittering through her.

  He gave her a slow smile and let his gaze run over her features. "You want me bad."

  Damn it, he was right.

  Lightning flashed, thunder crashed overhead. Rain erupted and drenched them both. Kim blinked up at his watery image, and thought again that he looked like a pirate. Dangerous.

  And way too good.

  Her blood was boiling despite the damp chill snaking right down to her bones. His fingers dug into her upper arms and felt like ten separate little match heads. Her insides curled up and whimpered, and a low, throbbing ache pulsed in time with her heartbeat.

  Her breath caught in her throat, her lungs straining for air she couldn't seem to deliver. His eyes gleamed and even though her vision was blurred, she read the heat in those blue-green depths and shivered in anticipation.

  His breath dusted her face as he leaned closer, and closer and—

  He grinned, shook his head and let her go. Surprised, Kim stumbled backward.

  "Oh, you want me. And you can have me," he said, bending down to pick up her bag before giving her a wink and another smile. "As soon as you admit it."

  He bent down, picked up her bag of equipment and stared at her while the rain pummelled her. Shaking with want and frustration and trembling with a need so huge she hardly knew what to do with it, she watched him walk away from her.

  There would be no walk on the beach during a thunderstorm. Instead, they'd be trapped together in a house that seemed to be shrinking daily. It was going to be a long day.

  But she could do it. She could survive the wanting. She could be in that house with Zack and never admit just how much she wanted him. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction. Inwardly, she winced as she admitted that she'd be cheating herself of satisfaction as well.

  Soaked to the skin, Kim swallowed that regret, stared up at him and said, "It'll be a cold day in hell before I admit any such thing."

  Grinning again, he swiped one hand across his face, wiping the water off his skin. "Darlin', it is a cold day in hell."

  * * *

  Six

  « ^ »

  The storm raged outside, trapping them inside. For two hours, the wind howled and rain pelted the windows like thousands of arrogant fists demanding entry. The assault finally ended as the rain became a cold mist and the wind died into a soft moan that sighed around the edges of the house.

  Kim curled into one corner of the sofa and balanced a book she wasn't reading on her lap. Her gaze slid from the pages to Zack, staring at the television with all the concentration of a neurosurgeon tackling a brain tumor.

  He wasn't fooling her.

  She knew darn well he wasn't paying attention to the mindless chatter spewing from the TV. His hands, fisted on the arms of the chair were a big clue. And the grim set to his mouth. Her gaze fastened on that mouth and she wondered, as she had for the last few hours, just what it would have tasted like. What his mouth would have felt like, pressed to hers. She had a feeling that being kissed by Zack Sheridan was like nothing she'd ever experienced before.

  But she wouldn't be finding out anytime soon, since he'd said she'd have to initiate anything between them. And she'd be blasted before she'd inflate his ego that much more.

  Still, she wasn't going to sit in silence for the rest of the night, either. It was bad enough having a constant companion foisted on her. A surly, silent companion was even worse.

  "St
orm's over," she said.

  "Thanks for the update." His gaze never left the TV.

  Well, that was nice. Scowling at the inane game show, Kim thought, just for a minute or two, about throwing something through the television screen. She happened to know that she was way better company than the idiot woman cooing over a new refrigerator.

  "How can you watch that stuff?" she finally blurted.

  He slid a long, lazy look at her, swept her up and down, then settled on her gaze. One dark brown eyebrow lifted. "There some fish show you'd rather be watching?"

  She met his gaze and ignored the little jab. "You know, there's no reason why we have to be enemies."

  "Nope. No reason. Some things just are."

  "And that's how you want to leave it?" Kim challenged, watching him. She was sure she saw a flicker of emotion run through his eyes and then disappear.

  One corner of his mouth tipped up and Kim's stomach did a quick flip-flop.

  "Doc," he said, his voice caressing each word, "I already told you. You want things to change, all you have to do is say so."

  Her body jittered with anticipation, but Kim's brain willed it into submission. "I'm never going to—"

  He cut her off. "Never say never, darlin'."

  She took a deep breath, hoping to quell the fury that nearly blinded her. "You are the most—"

  A knock at the door interrupted her and Kim shot to her feet. Anything was better than trying to talk reasonably with a man who was so clearly unwilling to be reasonable.

  Edging around the couch, she headed for the door. But Zack moved even more quickly than she did. He stepped in front of her, holding up a hand to keep her back.

  "It's probably a neighbor," she muttered.

  "Just in case," he said. "I answer the door, got it?"

  "For heaven's sake…"

  He ignored her muttered complaints, checked the peephole, then laughed and yanked the door open. Kim looked over his shoulder at the men grouped on her porch.

  "Hey, boss."

  Three men, wearing worn, faded jeans and T-shirts in a variety of colors, stood on the porch, grinning.