Bound by Danger (24 page)

Dave didn’t do what he was supposed to do. He didn’t laugh. He didn’t even chuckle. He slowed his already slow step and leaned his head against hers. “I thought so,” he said softly.

She laughed. “You know, Dave, you’re pretty cute. Want to be my permanent bodyguard?”

“That’s the best offer I’ve had all year. How much does the job pay?”

“You mean I’d have to pay you, too?”

Deidre closed her eyes as her forehead tightened. Blast these visions. She fought the picture trying to poke its way into her subconscious. Her temple hurt with fighting the image. She gripped Dave’s hand tighter to avoid the temptation to stroke her wrinkled brow. He kissed her hand, and she lightened her touch.

The man, whose black hair grayed at the temples, tilted his head back and took a gulp of his drink. His flushed face turned red. He gasped for air.

Deidre turned her attention to the men seated about the bar and tables drinking their drinks. She didn’t see the man in her vision. Either he hadn’t arrived yet, or he was dancing. She surveyed the dancers, but couldn’t see all of the men on the other side of the dance floor in the darkened club.

Dave kissed her cheek. “Something wrong?”

He’d noticed her looking for the man. She realized her posture had tensed, and she immediately relaxed in his arms. Still, he didn’t take his eyes off her.

The man reappeared in her head. The night was going to drag on at this rate. If he could just do whatever it was he was going to do, she could notify someone to help him. Then she’d enjoy the rest of the time with Dave wholly undistracted.

She took another look at the tables, then rested her head against Dave. “Are your ribs okay for me to do this?”

“The upper ones are fine. It’s the lower ones that hurt slightly.”

“But when we took Ricky into the hospital, the doctor said your ribs were okay?”

“Just bruised, luckily.”

He brushed her cheek, and she turned her mouth up to meet his. Grinning, he obliged with a warm and willing kiss, his hands stroking down her arms, her hands cupping his face for more. She wanted to give into what she felt for him. If she wasn’t his responsibility, if he couldn’t be pulled from the case if he took this too far with her, she wanted to…

What? Make love to him?

Yeah, that’s just what she wanted to do. And she wanted him to make love to her right back, just as passionately as she thought he’d be if the way he’d kissed her before was any indication.

He wasn’t holding her quite as close as he’d been in the Texas club. She wasn’t sure if that was because he was really hurting, or because more of his men were here, and he had to play it by the books a little more. But she loved the way he moved with her to the tune and dreamed what it would be like to be old and gray and still dancing with the cowboy like this.

When the dance finished, Dave waited with her on the floor. As soon as the music played another slow waltz, he moved her across the dance stage again. His leg slipped in between hers as if he claimed her for his own. Okay, so maybe he was just working up to getting close again. She could deal with that. She welcomed his attentions as she pressed closer to him, felt that part of his anatomy rise to the occasion whenever they were in close proximity like this.

Then the vision began again. She ground her teeth.

She should have stopped dancing to sip her drink, anything to allow her time to focus on the visions and the danger that lay ahead. But Dave wouldn’t have wanted to stop, not when they played the kind of music where he could hold her really close. And she couldn’t explain that what she saw was true. A glimpse of a very real future event.

The man was choking. Nobody noticed. Everyone around him busied themselves watching the dancers. No one saw.

Deidre twisted her head too quickly and winced in pain. Then she saw the man in his forties bent over his small round table, gasping for air.

“Be right back.”

Before Dave could respond, she pulled away from him and dashed through the dancers to the man who was choking.

Deidre wrapped her arms around the man’s waist and locked her hands into a doubled fist below his ribcage. Pressing into his abdomen three times with a quick upward thrust, she finally dislodged the pretzel. Clapping resounded and she looked up to see the agents surrounding her while Dave stared at her.

Yeah, now did he really believe?

Certain the man would be all right, she hurried to take Dave’s hand. She led him back to the dance floor where the band music had abruptly ceased.

There would be no more interruptions for the night as she snuggled close to him. This was what she desired from him more than anything else in the world at the moment—his arms wrapped around her in a loving embrace and never letting go.

He leaned over and kissed her head. “How do you do it?”

“Do what, Dave?”

He sighed deeply. “It’s my job to rescue people. How do you manage to always do it?”

She laughed. “All right. I promise I’ll let you have the next case.”

“You know, I’m serious about Hawaii.”

“Sure you are. I can see the whopper of a bill I’d have after paying for our rooms and meals and drinks and well, whatever else we wanted to shell out the money for.” She smiled at him as he grinned at her.

“Could be an education. We could take a trip to the Pearl Harbor Memorial.”

“Yes, I’ve always wanted to see that.”

He nestled his cheek against hers. “Why would you think I’d want you to have Marilyn as your roommate?”

“You know, just because you barged into my bathroom to kill a snake, and slept on my couch and yours, doesn’t mean I’m going to take this any farther.”

He laughed. “You can’t resist me anymore than I can resist you.”

“You’re right of course. It’s a terrible struggle. But life isn’t always easy. Take that awful boss of mine—”

“Leave the service. You could shack up with me in my condo.”

“If you didn’t already hurt so, I’d slug you for that remark. I’m not the shack-up kind of girl.”

Dave laughed, then groaned.

“Serves you right.” Deidre stroked his cheek, then held him close, her head resting against his chest, her arms fastened securely around his body. For now, he was all hers.

When the dance club closed for the night, Deidre sauntered back to the room with her arm looped through Dave’s. She sighed deeply. “About the sleeping arrangements—”

“Already arranged.”

She looked up at him. “Oh?”

“I’ll sleep in your room. Johnson and Bill will take turns sleeping in the living area.”

“There’s only one bed in my room.”

Dave waggled his brows up and down.

“You’re sleeping on the floor?”

He chuckled. “A cot. The things I do for you.”

***

Dave had to continually remind himself he was on a job and that seducing Deidre was not part of the mission. But damn, if that was getting to be harder to keep in mind. The longer Dave was with Captain Deidre Roux, the more he wanted to be with her for the long term. She was fun, sexy, and great, if he ever needed a rescue. He loved everything about her. She cared so much for her brother, protecting him, loving him. Most of all, he loved her sense of humor.

He still worried about her headaches. When he’d talked to her brother, believing she wouldn’t want Dave to know anything about it, Charlie had waffled. He said she didn’t have migraines, but there was something he wasn’t telling him.
Something.

He thought of her remark about having future visions. He didn’t believe in stuff like that. He figured she was teasing him, like she often did. Yet, he couldn’t help thinking about all the crises they’d been through. The way she’d looked into the swimming pool at her apartment complex, Charlie at her side, worried about her. Saying nothing was there. Asking if she wanted to return to her room. And then her finding the nearly drowned boy.

Her knowing the man was coming for them as Dave returned her to the hospital, asking if he had his gun right before the guy caused their accident. He assumed she’d seen the truck before he had. But she couldn’t have. The truck wasn’t there when she’d made the comment.

When they were in New Hampshire, she had asked if his gun was loaded. The comment was loaded—and that had made the guys all think of sexual innuendoes and how much he would have loved to have taken her someplace private to show her his loaded weapon. But she’d told them they were in for trouble and right afterward, they were, the vehicle attempting to ram them if it hadn’t been for Johnson’s fancy driving that kept them from colliding with it.

Her warning cry, too, before the tree fell into the windows, as she told them to run away when everyone rushed to see what made the awful sound out back of the safe house in Florida during the storm. She wasn’t even in the same room, couldn’t have seen what was about to happen.

She warned them about the washout of the bridge as they’d tried to cross it. No one had seen what they were in for, yet she knew, warned them in a panic to back up, to get them out of there right before they were hit by the onslaught of the river.

Yet, was it just mere coincidence? No one could have future visions. He didn’t think.

When he had held her close on the dance floor, he couldn’t help thinking about the towel slipping off her body while she was trying to keep the snake held at bay. She was a total distraction. Yet, there was something about her. Something unusual that he couldn’t quite figure out.

Had she seen the man choking while they danced? Or had she seen it happen before…it happened? He had to learn the truth.

She was reluctant to make a commitment to him though. No way was he giving up on them. He knew she loved him. Her smile when he asked her if she did convinced him of that. But she could be stubborn about her career. He could be more stubborn. She was the only one for him, and he’d prove he was the same for her.

***

That evening with the brilliant white moon smiling down on them, Deidre floated with Dave in the pool, their arms wrapped around each other, just relaxing, loving the incredibly beautiful moment. “How did you ever manage to get the management to agree to open the pool this late for us?”

“My charming ways.” He kissed away a water droplet on her cheek.

“Your badge, don’t you mean?”

“It certainly can help.”

“I’m surprised Charlie and Marilyn didn’t join us.”

“Marilyn had to get her sleep. She’s got guard duty later tonight.”

“Ah, and Charlie?”

Dave smiled. “Guess he needed a little sleep, too.”

Bill and Johnson sat back in their chaise lounges while they stared at the lights twinkling in the buildings across the city. Turning her head to Dave’s touch, she reached for his fingers tracing her throat.

He intertwined his fingers with hers and raised them to his lips. “Their attention’s occupied.”

“I can see. You had this pretty well planned.”

“Most assuredly.”

“Not a bad job at all.”

He chuckled. “There have been quite a few perks this time around, I must admit.” Like a boa constrictor finding his mate, he wrapped his arms around her and held her tight. “If I had any doubts before about becoming an agent, when I met you, they all faded away.”

The moment couldn’t have been more touching with his freshly-shaved cheek caressing hers. He considered her hair, then his fingers combed the strands. She’d never been this drawn to a man before and she hated keeping her distance with him, but she kept reminding herself Dave was on a job. And fooling around with him wasn’t part of it. She didn’t want to get him in trouble over her. But he was sure hard to resist.

He leaned her against the pool’s side and kissed her with a hot, sensual fervor as if he was afraid if he didn’t hurry, she’d dissolve into the water and disappear. She felt the hardness of his muscular body pressed against hers, the sexy blitzkrieg of his kisses making her feel beautiful, needed, desirable. And in that instant, she felt reckless, no longer caring. If they had been alone in the rooftop pool with no witnesses about…

His mouth trailed down her throat but as he neared her breast, she stopped his chin with her hand, coming back to her senses. He had a job. She was his duty. He could be reprimanded or fired if she allowed her own rash craving to carry them away.

She kissed his cheek. “Maybe we ought to swim a bit, then head on in.”

Poor fellow. His eyes clouded over with desire. He could barely contain himself. She was certain he’d have to take a cold shower when they retired to the room.

After trying to swim and being tackled in the water several times by Dave, she finally pulled him to the stairs. “We’re going to wake up the whole hotel with my squeals.”

Dave pointed at Johnson and Bill. “Yeah but at least we kept them awake and entertained for a while.”

The two men glanced back at them, grinning.

***

In the middle of the night, Bill shook Dave awake from a sound sleep as he reclined on the cot near Deidre’s bed. “Dave, Miss Roux is standing at the door to the hotel room. I don’t know what’s wrong with her.”

Dave jumped from his cot, left the bedroom, and strode across the living room. He took Deidre’s arm. “What’s wrong, Deidre?”

She gave him the same faraway look as she’d given him on the patio of his apartment in Killeen. He smiled. “She’s sleepwalking.”

“Marilyn said her climbing on the sand dunes was due to the medicine. You mean, she doesn’t need the drugs to make her slip out of here? She just has to be asleep, and she can walk out of the place on her own, without even knowing it?”

“That’s another reason you need to keep your eyes peeled.” He glanced over at Johnson still sleeping on the couch. “Just mention it to Johnson when he takes the next shift on watch.”

Dave led her back to the room and closed the door. He pulled her covers aside and nudged her into bed. Her pink chemise trimmed in Irish lace—the store clerk had said—rose up Deidre’s leg, and he smiled. “You, young lady, need to quit wandering about now that my men are here to see you like this.” He pulled her covers over her and kissed her cheek. She smelled like peaches—sweet and delectable, and he desired nothing more than cuddling with her the rest of the night. “Sweet dreams.”