by Caro Carson
He turned toward the doors. She clenched her own jaw against the sexual arousal and stepped back from Tom. He didn’t need to know her secret weaknesses. She was a good soldier, a strong soldier, but around a man like Tom, she’d love to just surrender and embrace every feminine stereotype, to be soft and sweet and delicate, even fragile...
He turned back to her. “But you need to be prepared for your secret to get out.”
Damn. She hadn’t been expecting him to turn back around. She hadn’t schooled her features into her army face. Her mouth was dry; she wet her lips.
He narrowed his gaze on her, eyes crinkling just a bit at the corners. Whatever he saw, it made one corner of his mouth lift in something that looked a little bit arrogant. He swept his gaze down her body and back up, as if she were standing there in silky lingerie instead of baggy camouflage and sturdy brown boots.
“You look good in uniform, by the way. Not fragile at all.”
Fragile? It sounded like he knew what she was thinking. It was frightening, not knowing what this man knew about her. It made her angry as hell, too. “I don’t care what I look like. What do you mean, I need to be prepared for my secrets getting out?”
That mouth that had kissed so generously lost its arrogant tilt and turned serious. “Someone is going to notice that we have the same address at some point, Helen. We’re not making an announcement, but there are going to be questions sooner or later. What do you intend to say?”
She threw her hands up in frustration—and took another step back from Tom. Pheromones or sex appeal or animal magnetism, whatever it was, the man had it in spades. “This is the kind of thing I wanted to discuss in counseling.”
“But instead we talked about fame.”
With a sigh, Helen gestured toward the doors. “This is ridiculous. We might as well head out to the parking lot.” She put her patrol cap on and beat him to the door to push it open herself.
In the setting December sun, he walked alongside her as if it was no big deal. “Your answer was better than mine. You used your fame for a great trip to New York, then decided it didn’t need to exist after that. That’s thinking outside the box.”
She shrugged off the compliment. “Might as well get some fun out of it before you have to give it back, right?”
He gave her a look at that, such a look, she couldn’t help but imagine Tom and herself having fun—very adult, conjugal fun—before they had to give that Vegas license back.
“I’m parked over here,” he said, and that cocky lift at the corner of his mouth was back. “I’ll see you back at the house.”
Helen decided that was a very, very bad idea. “Oh—I’m going to—I’ve got to stop at the commissary and pick up some groceries. Do you need anything? Milk or bread or whatever?”
Don’t say whipped cream, don’t say whipped cream.
Why was she thinking about Tom and whipped cream?
“I’m good, thanks.”
“Okay, bye.”
She watched him walk away, feeling like a small creature that had managed to escape a big jungle cat. One thing was for certain: she might not remember why she’d married the man, but there was no doubt that she’d enjoyed the wedding night in a gold bed full of rose petals.
And he knew it.
Chapter Six
Tom waited for his bride to walk in the door.
And waited.
One hour turned to two. He told himself he didn’t care. She was an adult, an extremely competent and self-sufficient adult, in fact. If she didn’t want to tell him where she was, then he didn’t care.
But he’d cared two hours ago. He’d cared enough to listen to a bunch of touchy-feely stuff about emotional intimacy. He’d cared enough to agree to let a counselor facilitate an exploration in the hopes of building a personal connection with Helen that had nothing to do with love or sex.
He chucked the remains of a frozen pizza into the kitchen trash can. Cardboard and crumbs, that was all that was left. Crumbs—he was begging for crumbs from his wife, for any little bit of his Saturday marriage that might be left this Friday.
I could have more.
When they’d stopped in the lobby, when he’d turned around and caught her staring at him...he knew that look on her face. Whether she felt emotionally intimate with him or not, she was attracted to him. She’d said that sex with him had made her remember something. If he facilitated that attraction, then their exploration of emotional intimacy might be unnecessary. If her memory returned, then all of the intimacy would return—emotional, romantic, sexual. They’d had it all. That was why he’d gotten down on one knee and proposed to her.
Dear God, he would have Helen back.
He hadn’t married her for the sex, but if sex would jog her memory, he was game. Hell, he’d stand around in his own house without a shirt on and lick whipped cream off his fingers, if that would help. He’d already been thinking along those lines as they’d walked out of the lobby, because her desire for him had been as easy to read as a book.
He turned to place his glass in the sink, and there was her wedding ring, twinkling at him on the windowsill, mocking him. You think you know her? You think you can take your shirt off and she’ll fall into your arms?
He’d been willing to try two hours ago. Tom looked at the clock. Make that almost three hours ago.
She was avoiding being alone with him. If he could read her, it occurred to him now that she could probably read him like a book, too. Had she known that he had known her desire for him was still smoldering? Had she known that he’d already been thinking about starting a fire tonight?
Probably.
And less than an hour before that, when they’d first sat in the counselor’s office, she’d looked frightened, and he hadn’t been able to stand that. He’d nearly walked out of the session rather than see Helen afraid of him.
She was keeping a safe distance tonight.
He glared at the ring, then he glared at the clock. She was keeping a safe distance where? She wasn’t spending three hours at the commissary, grocery shopping. She must have eaten dinner somewhere. The commander of III Corps and Fort Hood expressly prohibited service members from dining at restaurants in town while wearing their ACUs past 1900 hours. That was 7:00 p.m. It was past eight now.
Maybe she’d run into old friends and stayed to have a drink. She’d been in the army for eight years. It was inevitable for her to run into old friends from previous duty stations. That kind of thing happened all the time on every army post. But Helen was wearing her ACUs. No soldier could drink at an establishment off post while wearing ACUs at any time of day. Which meant, whether she was having dinner or drinks, whether she was alone or with a friend, Helen had to be on post.
That narrowed down the possibilities considerably. Given the military’s clear distinctions between ranks, there were two bars on post. One was for enlisted soldiers who’d achieved the rank of corporal, sergeant or higher. The other bar was for commissioned officers, including captains like himself—and like Helen.
She was probably at the Legends Pub, then, once known as the Officers’ Club. Enjoying herself. Catching up with old friends. Making new friends over beer or cocktails.
She wouldn’t drive herself home. Driving under the influence could be deadly to everyone on the road. For MP officers in particular, it was also an instant career killer. Helen knew that. She’d call a car service or catch a ride with a sober friend at the end of the night. She could call him to come and get her no matter how much emotional intimacy they shared or didn’t share. Did she know she could count on him?
Hours ago, Tom had changed into his usual lounging-around-the-house clothes: track pants and a T-shirt. He wasn’t dressed for a night out, but he could drive by the Legends Pub’s parking lot and look for her Volvo. If he saw it, he’d leave a note under her windshield wiper, something short and fr
iendly that told her she could call him if she needed a ride. If he left now, he’d be there and back in twenty minutes, tops.
He nodded to himself. It was a good plan. The motto of the military police was Assist-Protect-Defend, and one MP officer should certainly assist another.
Especially because the last time she had a few drinks, she blacked out.
Tom turned on the faucet and started filling his glass with clear water, remembering the Vegas bartenders filling glasses with clear vodka, clear gin, the showy ways they’d flipped bottles over their heads. God, he and Helen had thought it was all so fun. But they’d enjoyed the show as they’d each had one vodka and tonic at that bar. One.
For the first time, it hit him: Helen hadn’t had that much to drink in Vegas. He’d been with her the entire time. She’d had less to drink than he had.
Why hadn’t he thought of that sooner? Helen must be extraordinarily susceptible to alcohol’s effects. Some people were like that, born with a metabolism that was off, a liver that didn’t neutralize the alcohol at the normal rate. What if, even with only a drink or two, Helen became too incapacitated to make good decisions?
He drank the water in one slam. Helen was all grown up. She knew her limits by now. She’d be fine.
Tom told himself that as he stared at her wedding ring so hard his vision blurred.
He shook his head sharply, vision clearing as he stalked toward his bedroom to change into jeans and stomp into his cowboy boots.
Assist-Protect-Defend blurred too easily with Love-Honor-Cherish. Put them all together and it meant one thing: he was going to spend the evening at the Legends Pub.
With his wife.
* * *
“And then he said, ‘I’m the sausage king of Chicago!’”
Every woman in Helen’s circle squealed, laughed, shrieked and generally fell on each other in hysterics.
It had been a pretty funny story, the funniest one yet. They’d been shooting pool and telling tales of past dates from hell. Helen raised her glass in a toast. “Ladies, I think we have a winner. To the sausage king of Chicago.”
They all clinked glasses and only two of the five of them spilled a little bit of their drinks while doing so. Unfortunately, Helen’s friend Lizzy was one of the two who spilled hers, and since she had her arm around Helen’s neck, it was Helen’s ACU trousers that caught the frozen piña colada. Helen stomped her boot to shake off the slush. At least nobody had spilled anything on the green felt of the billiards table. Yet.
Lizzy was a captain in the transportation corps, same rank as Helen, different branch within the army. She’d also been Helen’s next-door neighbor for a while at Joint Base Lewis-McChord. She’d been moved by the army to Fort Hood over a year ago, so Helen had been happily surprised to run into her here at the officers’ pub. Lizzy had come for a Friday night out with two friends, also captains, who were rapidly becoming Helen’s friends, as well. Lizzy and her friends had dressed for the night in civilian clothes. About half of the bar was in uniform, half in civvies.
The fifth woman was a lieutenant rather than a captain, her rank easy to know because she was still in her ACUs, like Helen. The lieutenant was younger than they were by a few years—okay, by seven or eight years—but one of Lizzy’s friends had been the lieutenant’s instructor at her Basic Officer Leadership Course, so all four of the captains had decided to “mentor” the lieutenant tonight.
Young Chloe was still in her first year as an officer, and she was having the time of her life, basking in the free beers they’d provided. Captains’ salaries were higher than a new lieutenant’s by a couple of thousand each month, so they were picking up the tab for their new mentor-ee. Chloe’s enthusiasm was contagious. She was also basking in the sisterhood, if Helen guessed correctly. Women were so greatly outnumbered in the military, it was always a treat to spend a girls’ night out with girls who’d also raised their right hands and pledged to uphold the Constitution with their lives.
But hands weren’t being raised tonight. Glasses were. Lizzy’s friend Michelle raised hers and proposed another toast. “Here’s to all the sausage kings of all the lovely cities where we’ve ever been stationed. May they all join a monastery and never subject another woman to their craziness again.”
“Hear, hear.” Lizzy thumped her pool cue on the floor.
But Michelle wasn’t done yet. “And here’s to our future husbands. May they have the good fortune to find us and start sweeping us off our feet soon!”
Helen raised her glass with the rest. But don’t marry him just because you think it’s time to get married. She’d had months to wonder how she’d been so foolish as to marry Russell when she clearly hadn’t been ready for marriage. According to Russell, she would never be. So why had she said I do? More and more, she was beginning to think she’d married him because he was the man she’d happened to be dating when her peers had started pairing off and it was time to think about settling down.
“Listen to me, Helen. Listen. Listen to me.”
“I’m listening.” Helen picked up Lizzy’s arm and moved it to rest on Helen’s shoulder instead of choking her neck.
“Don’t be sad about Russell. We’re drinking to the better guys we’re going to find. I can tell you’re thinking about Russell. He wasn’t good enough for you. I’m glad you divorced him.”
He divorced me.
But Helen smiled. “Thanks.”
“You’ll get married again, Helly. I know you will.”
Already beat you to that.
Mrs.—Stroke.
Tom—Stroke.
Cross.
If she was only going to have one memory from Vegas, she didn’t know if that one was a blessing or a curse. It didn’t tell her why she’d married the man after the hard lesson she’d learned with Russell. It only made her feel hot and bothered. Good Lord, Tom could kiss. And he could...move. Maybe she’d married him just to sleep with him. Would she have been such a Puritan about that? Would she have demanded a ring and a license before sleeping with the guy?
How silly of her. This was the twenty-first century. She should have just jumped into bed with Tom Cross. And stayed there. All day. All night.
“What are you giggling about?” Lizzy asked with coconut-scented breath.
“Me? Giggle?”
“Yes, you.”
“I’m just having a good time.” Helen deposited Lizzy on a stool and started racking up the balls for the next game. Stripes, solids, the black eight ball. She fit them all into the triangular frame as an even more incredible point came to her: if she’d demanded a ring and a marriage, then Tom must have wanted to have sex with her very badly to agree.
Ha. If that were the case, she’d love to rub Russell’s face in it. Russell had said she was attractive for a soldier. As if she only cleared some lower bar for beauty. As if she couldn’t hold her own against...whom? Civilians? Supermodels?
Helen pushed the triangle full of pool balls to the proper spot on the table. She leaned over to keep her hands on the triangle frame. “Okay, ladies. Are we ready?”
The women debated who should play this round. Helen silently debated whether or not Russell had been right or had been an idiot. The fact was, Tom Cross had married her, and it was possible that he’d done so because he’d found her so attractive, he’d married her just to get her in his bed.
But probably not. He could have gotten a woman for the weekend easily. Tom was hot. No matter how much Helen drank for the rest of her life, she didn’t think she’d ever forget the way Tom had looked Sunday afternoon as he’d tied that white towel around his waist, the way it had left a slit up his thigh. Not that Russell was ugly or anything. He had a good body. He was in his twenties, and since he was in the army, he was physically fit. Nothing to complain about. But Russell was no Tom Cross. That towel...
“Here we go.” Helen lifted the fram
e, leaving the balls in their perfect formation. Then she lifted her gaze, and there was Tom. In the flesh.
He was leaning against the wall, drink in hand, looking like heaven in well-worn blue jeans, with that talented mouth of his curved just slightly in a smile as he watched her.
She lifted the frame higher, so that it framed her face as she looked at him through it. She winked at him as she turned around to put the frame in the rack and retrieve her drink. You’re flirting. What was that? That was flirting.
Tom pushed off the wall and started walking toward her. Had he looked good all week in uniform, in the same baggy camouflage pajamas she was still wearing? Yes. But she devoured him now with her eyes, head to toe. He was the reason God had invented blue jeans. A sacrilegious thought, perhaps, but when she’d gotten lucky in Vegas, she’d gotten really lucky. I slept with that.
He stopped just a little too close to her. An inch too close. “Are you having a good night?”
“Yes.” She swallowed. “And you?”
“Better now. It got lonely at the house without you.”
That wasn’t what she’d been expecting him to say. It was too personal. It made her sound important in his life. In his home.
It wasn’t flirting. It was...emotionally intimate.
I don’t know you. Back off. You’re gorgeous, but I was just flirting.
They weren’t on the same page at all. He wanted her to act like a wife. She’d only wanted to wink at him, a cute guy at a bar.
Tonight’s girl posse surrounded him.
“Well, hello.” Lizzy actually batted her eyelashes at him.
“Who are you, and are there more of you?” Michelle made a show of counting the women. “There are five of us. We need five of you.”
“Hello, ladies.” Tom seemed more amused than overwhelmed. He looked at Helen and did the eyebrow-lift inquiry thing. How are you going to introduce me?
