“Maybe.” Izzy shrugged. “We’ve got…issues, in case you didn’t notice.”
“You’ll work it out,” Trace said. “A really smart person told me that sometimes you have to hold on and sometimes you have to let things go.”
Trace saw Duke paw at the small backpack he carried in training sessions. Trace realized that the dog had to have hidden Gina’s silk top inside the pack that morning.
Schemer.
“By the way, Gina’s leaving the ship next week. She’s got a vision assessment in San Francisco.”
Trace stifled a wave of anger. Ryker was reconsidering his personal policy for all Foxfire team members, but until he’d made a decision, Trace was under orders to have no contact with Gina.
For the moment, he was complying. But Izzy relayed small messages that neither man mentioned to Ryker.
Sunlight filled the arroyo, Duke panted happily and a quail chirped noisily from the shadows beneath the fallen cottonwood tree while the desert drowsed in lazy contentment.
The snap of a twig made Duke’s ears prick forward.
His tail wagged as Dakota Smith appeared at the top of the arroyo. “Sounded too quiet up here. Something wrong with the dogs?”
“No, everything’s fine.” Trace stretched a little, then looked closely at Dakota. “Maybe you should lay off the burritos, Ace. You look a little off.”
Dakota made a dismissive sound. “Probably that new strain of flu Ryker told us about.” The SEAL hunkered down and scratched Duke’s head thoroughly. “By the way, Ryker’s down in the Jeep and he’s getting impatient.” Dakota smiled as Duke bumped his hand, urgent for more scratching. “Come on, you two miscreants. Let’s hit the trail.”
The dogs shot off through the sunlight while Dakota followed, laughing.
This was what you had, Trace thought.
Now.
Not yesterday, not tomorrow. Just a long string of nows. If you were very good and very careful they made something unforgettable.
Marshall would have agreed with that.
The sun felt very warm on his back as he shouldered his pack and started up the slope with Izzy close behind.
“Did you hear about the test Ryker’s got planned for the dogs tomorrow? He’s got a new medical expert coming in to observe.”
“The dogs will do fine.” There was pride in Trace’s voice. “Count on it.”
Birdsong filled the air. Lavender swirled up, drifting through the wash behind the two men as sunlight shimmered.
Then all was quiet.
EPILOGUE
Las Vegas
Four months later
GINA KICKED off her shoes, dropped her purse and tossed her white chef’s jacket onto the closest chair. She was tired and hungry, but she’d never felt better.
Her eyes ached a little. She sat down near the window and rubbed them gently.
The day she had dreaded had come. In the past month her peripheral vision had declined steadily. She couldn’t drive now. Walking alone in a strange place required her full attention.
But in an unusual compensation, her nonperipheral vision was sharper than it had ever been. Though her new doctors couldn’t explain it, she could see clearly in the dark.
She had been astonished when Trace’s civilian boss, Lloyd Ryker, had come to see her aboard the cruise ship. During his visit he had directed her to a new doctor as a way to thank her for her assistance aboard the ship. Soon after that, she found out that Tobias Hale was leaving to work for Ryker as soon as his replacement could be found.
Her life had changed overnight.
None of it was expected.
None of it had been easy.
But Gina knew this was the place she was meant to be—at least for now. Part of her new job was organizing select cooking weekends at the best resorts in Las Vegas. In the process she discovered she had a flair for performance as well as teaching. And though she missed her friends aboard ship, she didn’t miss the grueling, nonstop pace of production.
She didn’t miss skirmishing with Blaine, either. Though her old nemesis had survived the attack on the ship, she faced long months of rehabilitation, most of it in prison, due to her involvement in the shipboard murders. Imogen was still facing questioning.
Not that her new job was laid-back. Today she’d finished an eight-hour workshop on advanced pastry techniques, and now she was exhausted.
Her stomach growled loudly.
She gave a silent prayer of thanks for room service.
Someone tapped at the door. “Room service, Ms. Ryan.”
She stood up and straightened her blouse, then opened the door. A man in a white uniform backed toward her, pulling a cart loaded with dishes.
“Hold on. I didn’t order steak.” Gina sniffed the air. “I didn’t order fettucini Alfredo, either.”
The man sidestepped, then leaned around her to close the door.
Her heart began to pound.
She grabbed her knitting needles from the table near the door and backed up. It wasn’t possible. The man from the ship had been arrested. Tobias had assured her of that after the SEAL team had left the ship.
She still had nightmares about being locked in the freezer, and in every one she saw the cold, crazed eyes of her captor. Could he have escaped and come back for her?
She was groping for the phone on the bathroom wall, her knitting needles leveled as weapons, when the uniformed hotel attendant turned.
And his crooked smile sent her heart racing out of her chest.
“Trace,” she whispered.
She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t keep the heat from swirling through her cheeks. She ran an anxious hand through her hair, certain she looked like a mess.
She had sworn to be fresh from an uninterrupted spa weekend, polished and gorgeous, when she saw him next. Instead she was shoeless, her hair wild after a long day in the kitchen. “What are you doing here?”
“Serving you steak, apparently. And there’s a whole lot more on the agenda tonight, honey.” He pulled off his room-service jacket. “Izzy told me where you were. If your class had gone on any longer, I was going to pull you out of there under pretense of an emergency in the hotel kitchen.”
Gina just stared at him. “I don’t understand.”
He threw the bolt on the door and pulled her into his arms. His fingers moved gently, tracing every detail of her face. “You look tired. You did too much at your class today. When that jerk started arguing with you about the proper temperature for making ganache, you should have walked out—or decked him.”
“You were there?”
“Most of the time. I sat in the last row. I wasn’t going to say hello in front of thirty strangers.” His hands tangled in her hair. “Room service to the rescue.” He slanted her head slowly while his eyes filled with dark hunger.
The force of his look made Gina’s mouth go dry.
She leaned against him and held on hard, afraid this was another of the many restless dreams she’d had over the past months.
“You’re a damn good teacher.” Trace reached around her and took a white linen napkin off the tray. Stepping back, he snapped it open crisply and guided her to a wing chair, spreading the napkin on her lap.
“But—”
“The teacher’s gotta eat, kid, and I’m the man to see that she does. As usual, your nose was excellent. We’ve got lasagna, fettucini Alfredo and steak. I brought you chocolate espresso cheesecake for dessert. Figured I’d cover all the bases.”
He pulled the clips from her hair and ran his hands through the warm strands. “God, I’ve missed you.” He took a harsh breath. “I think that food may have to wait.”
Gina saw the urgency in his eyes, felt the barely leashed hunger in his body. Not a dream, she thought.
He was here, absolutely real.
“Izzy told me you were in good shape.” His voice was low, uncertain. “I hated to go without saying…without explaining.”
She touched one finger to his lips. �
�Tobias told me all I needed to know. You had one more month, anyway.”
“One month before what?”
Her chin rose defiantly. “Before I loaded my old Smith and Wesson, tracked you down, shoved you against the nearest wall and brought you to your knees.”
His mouth curved in a sudden grin. “No shit. You were going to do that?”
For answer, she pulled off his belt and unbuttoned his shirt. With a few deft movements she sent his pants flying.
“Patience, focus and excellent reflexes,” Trace muttered, kissing her fiercely as he carried her to the big, silk-covered bed. “I hope you haven’t got anything planned for the next three days, because you aren’t leaving this bed.”
“I’m all yours,” Gina whispered.
“Damned right you are.” His eyes were hot and possessive as he stripped away her blouse and slacks, savoring the sight of her naked body. “You’re still wearing my St. Christopher medal.”
“I never take it off. I just wonder about that day aboard the ship.” Gina frowned, sorting through the memories that were already blurred. “I dropped it somehow. If it hadn’t fallen where and when it did…”
His fingers tightened. “Put it away. It’s done, Gina.”
She took a deep breath. “There was something that smelled like lavender. I think I must have been hallucinating by that point.”
Trace’s eyes narrowed. “You smelled lavender?”
“No question about it. It had to be from the stress, right?”
Trace was silent. Then he nodded slowly. “Maybe. Or maybe there are some things that we can’t even imagine. I’m starting to believe that.” He looked down and shook his head. “You’re even more beautiful than I remembered. Hell, I didn’t think that was possible.”
Gina caught his palm and nibbled until he pulled her closer. “Not you. You’re exactly the way I remembered.”
“That bad?”
“I wouldn’t change one detail.” She hesitated. “But there’s something I have to tell you. My eyesight…” She forced out the words. “I’ve lost most of my peripheral vision.”
“Hell.” Trace pressed a slow kiss against her hair. “That means you can’t drive.”
She looked up, nodding gravely. “No work over open flames, either. Does that…change anything?”
“Yeah, it definitely does.” Trace looked thoughtful. “It means I’ll have to find you a good chauffeur. Anything else I need to know?”
Gina felt something bubble up, hot and light in her chest. For days she had worried about how to break the news to him, and now it was done. But she wanted to be sure that he understood the full picture. “My peripheral vision may be gone forever, Trace. No one seems to know what to expect.”
“In that case I need to find a really good driver for you. I’ll put Izzy right on it.”
Gina bit back a shaky laugh. “Can’t you be serious about this?”
He looked at her intently and then shook his head. “Afraid not. You’re alive. We’re together. Nothing else matters.”
Gina sighed as he kissed the curve of her neck. “Your friend Izzy says my night vision is abnormally strong. He said it may even become stronger.”
Trace’s hand stilled on her hair. “Night vision? That’s interesting.” Her breath caught as he bit the curve of her ear.
“Stop. I want to finish.”
“Go ahead and talk, honey.” Trace’s voice was rough. “I’ll try to listen.”
“Izzy says it may have to do with that package I had in my mouth. He didn’t explain too much, but he thought I should know that. By the way, your boss is very nice. He’s come to see me several times, and he arranged for me to see a new eye specialist last week.”
“Lloyd Ryker, nice?” Trace stared at her thoughtfully. “So he approves.”
“Approves of what?”
Trace pushed her back onto the bed. “Everything, I’d say. Score one for the home team.” He skimmed her waist and brushed her tight nipples slowly, fitting his hands to her breasts. “Enough about Ryker. We’ve got more important things to do. I only have four days of leave, and I plan to make every minute count.”
“Hear, hear,” Gina whispered.
He kissed her with slow, biting nips while he explored her wet heat.
She trembled, reckless with the memory of too many dreams. Ryker had mentioned he might have some work for her, something connected with the research institution where Tobias Hale had gone. He didn’t give her details, but Gina gathered it involved top security clearances.
The work would give her more opportunity to see Trace, Ryker had explained. At the same time she could do a valuable service to her country by participating in further study of her changing vision.
But she’d think about all that tomorrow.
Tonight was for a man with shadows in his eyes. Tonight was for making him know they had an unshakable future.
“So what did you have in mind for your leave, Lieutenant? Sightseeing? Poker, maybe?”
“Something better.” His fingers teased and inflamed as he brought her up and held her on the knife edge of pleasure. “Starting with this, I think.”
He cupped her hips. Pressing her back onto the bed, he eased her legs apart. Then he savored her with his mouth.
Every slow, expert brush of his lips and tongue made Gina’s breath catch. Her nerves seemed to stretch taut as his tongue met her trembling skin.
The room blurred. Reality faded.
Caught in a wave of need, she drove her body against his and dimly heard him mutter her name.
But she meant to draw out this pleasure for them both.
Her hands tangled in his hair as she wrapped one leg around him. “No poker? Can’t you be more specific?”
Trace whispered a fierce, graphic phrase that lingered in the sexually charged air. Then he brushed her with his tongue and she came apart against him again.
His hands stroked her with a care that bordered on reverence.
“That’s what I had in mind.” In the quiet room Trace watched her face, caught by her honesty and her passion. This was as serious as it got, he realized. “A whole lot more after that. I’m going to be damned inventive about how many ways I can make you moan my name, honey.”
She didn’t see the small velvet box shoved inside his jacket pocket. He had hidden it there several hours before, feeling its weight in every movement he’d made.
Trace had agonized over the ring in two cities and five different shops. He’d wanted something different, something she would always remember. In the end he’d chosen a single diamond surrounded by dark tanzanite chips because they reminded him of her eyes when they made love.
He didn’t realize that any stone would have been precious to her. That homes or cars or salaries didn’t matter.
The future was what mattered, and that future was starting here and now.
Not yesterday, not tomorrow. Just a long string of nows. If we are very good and very careful we’ll make something unforgettable, Trace vowed.
He knew that Marshall would have agreed with that.
Then Gina circled his neck and pulled his body against hers, and Trace forgot about everything but how beautiful she was and how much he needed to feel her against him again.
The ring could wait.
The things he felt in his heart couldn’t be put aside any longer. Meanwhile, the look in Gina’s eyes was open, giving.
And just a little teasing.
“About your comment, that day we met. You mentioned chocolate and sex.”
Trace felt her rising need, her lush heat. “I remember.”
“You were definitely right.” She fitted her body to his. “But don’t tell anyone or I may be out of a job.”
ISBN: 978-1-4603-0273-6
CODE NAME: BIKINI
Copyright © 2007 by Roberta Helmer
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