Kat was surprised when the guy who’d called her a chick in the Ops Center poked his head into Jeff’s warehouse/office a little while later.
“Captain Kim? Captain Steiger will meet you at the boat dock in fifteen minutes. I’m supposed to take you down there.”
She rose easily out of the cross-legged pose she’d been sitting in, meditating in a futile effort to relax and re-center herself. If she were being brutally honest, she’d been trying to erase the memory of Jeff’s kisses and her reaction to them. And frankly…it was not happening.
In less than a day, one man had undone twenty-five years’ worth of intensive training and self-discipline instilled by one of the great martial arts masters of his time. She didn’t know whether to be intrigued as hell or scared to death of Jeff Steiger. Either way, she was horribly discombobulated and out of balance.
If she couldn’t actually be calm, at least she could fake it. She spoke smoothly to the nervous man before her. “You can call me Cobra if you like.”
He smiled gratefully, acknowledging the offer of her field handle as the gesture of forgiveness it was. “I didn’t mean anything by that comment, you know. Maverick can whup all our butts. And the way you took him down today, I figure you can whup all of ours, too.”
No doubt she could. But she wasn’t about to comment on it. “All’s forgotten,” she murmured. She picked up her gear bag and rifle case. “Lead on…” She left the sentence hanging.
He obligingly filled in with his field handle. “Chain. Short for Chainsaw.”
She quirked an eyebrow. “Hmm. An evocative handle.”
“In BUDS, my trainers accused me of having the subtlety of a chainsaw. The name stuck.”
“Well, at least it didn’t have anything to do with your massacre weapon of choice.”
He grinned. “Can I take one of those bags for you?”
“No, thanks. I’ve got them. I didn’t know this place had a boat dock.”
“It’s left over from a smuggling operation that ran out of these caves briefly a few years back. It’s at the other end of the facility, though. Bit of a hike. Sure you don’t want me to get one of those?”
“I’ve carried these bags to hell and back. I’ll be all right.”
“Maverick said you’re a Special Forces type. Did you do the dreaded eighty-mile march, too?”
She rolled her eyes in recollection of the Special Forces training rite of passage. “Ugh. Did you have to remind me of that?” Normally, she wouldn’t be even remotely this talkative with a stranger, but the guy was trying so hard to make up to her that she felt obliged to throw him the bone.
“Yup, that was a bitch-” He broke off abruptly and started to stammer an apology.
She replied gently, “Unlike Maverick, I’m not going to bite your head off for using the B-word in front of me. I’ve been known to use it myself, and I’m sure I qualify to have it applied to me now and then. Captain Steiger seems to have a rather old-fashioned view of how women should be treated. But we Medusas aren’t tense about such things, particularly around our colleagues.”
From her, that was quite a speech. But the guy seemed sincerely sorry and also seemed badly in need of a little reassurance that he and she were square.
Chain glanced over at her curiously. “Is there really a whole team of you women operators?”
“Yes.”
“I gotta say, I’d like to see you all in action sometime.”
“Who knows? Maybe you will. We haven’t done much training in this part of the world. We may head down this way someday.”
“That’d be cool. As long as I didn’t have to spar with you. You moved like lightning in that gym.”
She suppressed a smile. She’d actually jumped Jeff pretty casually in the gym. Her move-now-or-die speed was quite a bit faster than that. They walked the rest of the way to the dock in silence. Chainsaw seemed satisfied that peace was restored between them, and indeed, in her mind, it was.
The Medusas had learned to have thick hides when it came to initial skepticism from their male counterparts. They’d also learned long ago to let their actions speak for them and not to rise to verbal baiting. The only thing perplexing to her about the whole “chick” incident was why Jeff had reacted so violently.
They arrived at the dock, and a burst of heat flooded her at the sight of Jeff waiting beside a sleek powerboat. Lord, he was good-looking. Head-turning handsome. Her hands itched with the memory of that muscular chest and washboard waist sliding beneath her palms. Conversing casually with the boat’s driver, he oozed confidence. Charisma. Ease with command.
When he saw her coming, he climbed aboard the vessel and reached out to take her bags from her. Their gazes met, and his gleamed hotly with inappropriate thoughts…no doubt the same inappropriate thoughts streaking through her head. She looked away hastily.
She started to climb aboard and wasn’t surprised when he held a hand out to help her. Normally, she’d ignore such offers. After all, her balance was superb. But she took Jeff’s proffered hand anyway. Of course, it had nothing to do with her ongoing craving to touch him, to feel his energy flowing through her, yin to yang, chi to chi.
His fingers were warm and strong and steady and sent a rush of something feminine fluttering through her. And then an awful thought struck her. He was her boss now. First order of business was to quit touching him. Regret stabbed her. And kissing-definitely no more kissing. Darn it.
“Buckle in,” Jeff murmured. “This baby can fly.”
The driver nodded over his shoulder at both of them and the vessel leaped forward, skimming across the black, glassy surface of the Caribbean, circling around Timbalo Island in mere minutes and pulling up at a wooden pier. She followed Jeff to shore, where a helicopter waited for them. With the ease of long experience with the birds, she stepped under the rotors and passed her bags to Jeff inside the sleek Eurocopter EC 155 with its distinctive built-in tail rotor.
She climbed inside and wasn’t surprised when Jeff took the seat directly across from her. The helicopter lifted off and she asked him, “How long to Barbados?”
“An hour and change at top speed.”
She nodded. Paused. Nope, she couldn’t resist. “Mind if I ask you a question?”
He flashed her those killer dimples of his. “Anything, darlin’. My life is an open book to you.”
“Why’d you get so mad at Chainsaw for calling me a chick? Believe me, I’ve been called a lot worse and I’m still in one piece.”
His eyes went a turbulent shade of sapphire. “Commander Hathaway asked me the same thing.”
“What’d you tell him?”
“I told him I expect my men to act like gentlemen and didn’t appreciate Chain calling you that. I mentioned the need for my guys to accept the reality of female Special Forces operatives, too, I think.”
“In other words, you didn’t tell him the truth. Did he buy your answer?”
Jeff’s dimples flashed. “Not for a second. But he didn’t press me on it.”
“Why did you jump him?”
He gave her a reproachful look. “Do you really have to ask? Even Commander Hathaway knows the answer to that one without having to hear me say it.”
An urge to gulp nearly overcame her. While it was flattering in the extreme to have a guy this charming and handsome and sexy laying claim to her like this, she wasn’t at all sure how it was going to impact their mission.
“What’s wrong?” he murmured.
Her frown deepened. She wasn’t even sure she could put it into words. “What have you done to me?”
The corner of his mouth tipped up. “I kissed you. And given how flummoxed you seem, I’d say I made quite an impression on you.”
“You don’t have to look so satisfied with yourself.” She grumbled.
His smile broadened, but he wisely made no reply.
“You don’t understand-” she started.
“Then explain it to me. What’s got your feathers so ruffled?”
She exhaled hard. “I’m…a warrior.” She paused, searching for words.
“So am I. And your point?”
She glanced up, relieved to see he wasn’t laughing at her. In fact, he seemed to be concentrating intently on her. Which was perhaps more unnerving. “My life is devoted to a principle. To discipline. To duty. To…honor.”
He nodded encouragingly, apparently still waiting for the big reveal.
“That’s it,” she huffed. “That’s the problem. I don’t have time for…other pursuits.”
“Why ever not? My life is about honor and discipline and duty, but I still have time for a personal life.”
“I don’t see you with a wife and two kids and a minivan.”
He shrugged. “I hadn’t met you yet.”
“But don’t you see? I’m not about having two kids and a minivan!”
He stretched his legs out until his ankles tangled with hers. “That is going to present us with some logistical issues, isn’t it? I understand your desire for a career. Hell, I’m not ready to hang up the old rifle yet. I guess we can wait until we’re both done with the Special Forces to start a family.”
Exasperation shot through her. “Will you quit talking like I’ve already agreed to marry you? I’m not even sure I want to date you!”
“But you want to kiss me again, don’t you?”
An urge to scream bubbled up in her throat. Damn if he wasn’t exactly right. She took a deep breath, held it for a count of ten and then released it very slowly. Familiar calm flowed over her, washing away the foreign emotions cluttering her thoughts.
She would face this problem head on. Calmly. Rationally. Honestly. “Yes, I do want to kiss you again. I want to do a lot more than that with you.”
He sucked in a sharp breath as she continued. “I also know it is not the right thing to do and it would interfere with the mission. Therefore, I shall set my desires aside and focus on the task at hand.”
“Just like that?” He sounded surprised.
“Just like what?”
“You can turn off your feelings like a light switch? No random imaginings of getting naked with me? No speculation on what making love with me would be like? No trouble keeping your gaze from going places it shouldn’t? You can just decide to set all that aside, and it’s done?”
She blinked, startled. She hadn’t really considered if the actual execution of her plan would be hard or not. She’d only gotten as far as it being the right thing to do.
He leaned forward abruptly, startling her. He popped her lap belt and dragged her across the space between them and onto his lap. She should’ve broken his wrist, but somehow she ended up sprawled across his thighs, his mouth slanting down toward hers, his hands plunging into her hair, and she let him.
Somehow she ended up arching toward him, her body taut with need. Somehow her mouth ended up plastered against his, her hands moving frantically across his chest, her entire being vibrating with uncontrollable need. Somehow the buttons of his shirt opened beneath her fingers, her palms flattened against his hot flesh. A moan escaped her throat and she all but crawled inside him. She turned in his arms until she faced him, straddling his hips with her thighs. How her own shirt fell open, she had no idea. But when his hands closed upon her throbbing breasts, she didn’t think twice about pressing more deeply into his hands, about writhing on the hard bulge between her legs, about making a good-faith effort to extract his tonsils with her tongue.
Jeff murmured laughingly, “Honey, my hat’s off to you if you can turn this off on command. There’s not a chance I can do it.”
Whether it was a sigh or a sob that escaped her lips, she wasn’t sure. But she knew she wanted him worse than she’d ever wanted anything in her life. Beneath his clever hands she danced, responding to every touch, every caress, every stroke and pluck upon her aching body. How her pants got unzipped, she had no idea, but she couldn’t fail to notice when his fingers invaded her most private space, driving her half out of her mind. Pleasure completely overtook rational thought, spinning her up and out of herself, to a place of heat and light and tingling sensation that took her breath away.
And Jeff was there, all around her, between her thighs, against her breasts, kissing her neck, breathing her in. And it felt…so…good.
Eventually thought stopped altogether, and she flung herself into the drowning glory of the moment.
“Honey, you’re killing me,” he muttered.
She pulled back to stare at him. “I’m not hurting you, am I?”
He responded with a pained laugh. “I thought you were the one who was supposed to be able to turn off this thing between us. Don’t count on me to be all noble and stop it. I’m not that strong.”
What was “this thing” between them, anyway? She struggled to form intelligent thought, but the current of her lust was incredibly powerful and sweeping her wildly forward toward oblivion.
“What have you done to me?” she managed to whisper.
“Bluntly put, I believe I’ve turned you on. And Lord knows, you’ve done the same to me. Ain’t it grand?”
She laughed ruefully and pressed her forehead against his. Grand didn’t even scratch the surface of it. “We’ve got to stop, you know.”
“Yeah. I know. Here I go, setting you off my lap, buttoning up our shirts and thinking serious, mission-related thoughts.” He didn’t move a muscle as he uttered those words, other than to run his fingers through her hair, smoothing strands of it lightly across her breasts.
How had her hair gotten out of its usual French braid?
“Okay, your turn to do something,” he muttered.
“Right. I’m climbing off you. Going back to my own seat. Meditating until my mind is clear.” Her fingers traced the line of his jaw, the outline of his ears, the shape of his mouth.
“We’re formulating our plan of attack for Barbados now,” he mumbled. “First order of business…take you to our hotel room and get you naked…”
She nodded soberly but couldn’t keep the twinkle out of her eyes. “And then we talk to the police and come up with a brilliant plan to trap the Ghost while lying in bed together watching the sun rise.”
He laughed. “I love the way you think.”
Gradually, sanity was beginning to return to her. She sighed. “And then the Ghost gets away, we fail at our mission, and we let down General Wittenauer and American citizens who are counting on us.”
The laughter in his eyes dimmed. “There is that.”
She looked deep into his cobalt-blue eyes. “What are we going to do?”
He sighed. “I suppose we’re going to try it your way for a while.”
His big hands spanned most of her waist as he gently lifted her off his lap and placed her back in her own seat. Abruptly abashed at her earlier boldness, she fixed her clothes and re-braided her hair. She ventured a gaze over at Jeff, and he was studying her inscrutably. Had he really succeeded at shutting down his lust? What was the world coming to when a fun-loving good ols’ boy had more discipline than a highly trained martial arts master?
He murmured, “Working with you is going to be a royal pain in the ass, you know.”
“Why?” she blurted.
“Because we’ve got to set this thing between us aside for now. And I’m going to spend every waking minute wanting to put my hands on you again and hear you make those sounds again and taste you again…”
She gulped. Oh. Yeah, that.
Okay. So deciding not to have any feelings for him and not to react to him hadn’t worked out so well. Time for Plan B. They might not be able to control what they thought or felt, but at least they could control what they did. And they both obviously lost all self-discipline once they touched each other. From here on out they were simply going to have to observe a strictly hands-off policy. No kissing, no handholding, no casual brushes against each other. Yup, it was going to suck rocks. But what other choice did they have?