FEARLESS (16 page)

In that way, she was as guilty as he was. But his tendency to hold back went so much deeper.

Still, she needed to tell him the awful truth. Keeping it from him hadn’t been from spite or even anger. It just happened. When he returned she was home from the hospital and determined to make him understand how staying in San Diego had crushed her. He blew off her concerns and left her no choice but to reach for her packed bags and get out.

The time to tell him had never been right after that, and she’d been so lost in her mourning of the baby she’d already loved and the man whom she’d love forever, that she couldn’t see a way out of the pain that blanketed her.

She’d switched jobs and tried to start over. By the time she’d emerged from the crushing despair she couldn’t see what telling him would do other than shift part of her burden to him. If she did that and he shrugged it off as he did every other moment of emotional discomfort, she didn’t know if she’d recover.

He stirred under her gentle caresses of his bare chest. “Why are you awake?”

“I love you.” She said it because she wanted to and because she thought he needed to hear it.

His eyes popped open. “A man could get used to waking up to that sort of declaration.”

“It matters?”

“It means everything.” Those big eyes brightened. “I love you, too.”

The words washed over her, smoothing out the rough parts. “I think we should—”

“Oh, wait. I have an idea.” With his hand over hers, he slid her fingers lower. His erection pressed against her palm and his body thrummed with a sudden awareness.

They’d made love twice already that night and he was still ready to go. Now, that was the Davis she remembered.

He rolled over, pushing her to her back as his head dipped to that ticklish place right behind her ear. He made this appealing little moaning sound as his mouth moved over her and he whispered her name.

The explosive combination zipped through her senses, pushing out the exhaustion. Her hand slipped into his hair before she could stop, but she made one last grasp for common sense. “Davis, we—”

His lips hovered over her eyes, placing nibbling kisses on her nose and cheeks. “Can talk later.”

And then his mouth covered hers and all she wanted was more.

Chapter Seventeen

The next morning Davis finally felt as if his life had adjusted and slipped back on track. He’d gone from being on edge about Lara’s safety to feeling calm and relaxed. It was about more than good sex, which was spectacular. Though he hated the idea and they wouldn’t mean anything or feel as good as being with Lara, he could find other women. This was about a deeper connection with that person who brought the right mix of comfort and shocking heat. With Lara he got it all—sexy, smart, giving and loving.

The only casualty to restarting their relationship might be sleep. He yawned for the fourth time and looked across the conference table to find Pax glaring at him.

“Now you’re just showing off,” he grumbled.

Davis refused to feel guilty. He’d spent some of the worst months of his life replaying every minute of his time with Lara, desperate to figure out where it all went wrong.

He couldn’t wrap his head around her complaints about the danger. She knew about his life and work going into the relationship. He’d been honest and disclosed more than was safe earlier than he should have to prevent a claim of bait and switch.

He pushed the details out of his mind and just enjoyed the morning after. “I took your advice. Well, yours and Connor’s.”

Pax closed the file in front of him and put it on the checked stack. “I’m happy for you.”

“I can tell by how ticked off you sound.”

Joel spun his chair around and used his feet and the rollers to drag it from the bank of computers to the conference table. “If you two don’t stop talking about sex I’ll get my gun.”

Davis picked up on the load of male grumpiness in the house this morning. For some reason the angrier they got, the more he wanted just to laugh. “No one said
sex.
”

Footsteps creaked on the hardwood floors. They all looked up to find Lara, fresh from a shower and in white jeans and one of those slim-fitting tops women wore to torture the males of the species.

He sometimes feared a heart attack from just looking at her. She shot him that megawatt smile and his chest ached from the power of it. From across the room he could smell her, read every gesture and watch as her skin flushed remembering last night.

She put the tray with the new pot of coffee and pile of toast in the center of the table. Joel and Pax dived for the food. Davis grabbed the coffee before they knocked it over.

“It sounds like a locker room in here.” She rolled her eyes. “Kind of looks like one, too.”

Pax pulled out the seat next to him, the one that put her right across from Davis. “Technically, that’s your fault.”

“Pax, shut up before I let Joel shoot you.” No woman wanted to be a punch line. Just because Joel and Pax were too stupid to know, that didn’t mean Davis had to suffer.

“I can take it.” She winked at him. “Where’s Connor?”

Off breaking the law, but Davis decided not to phrase it that way because Ben was lurking around somewhere and the guy still had an oath to adhere to. “Taking one last run at some FBI files he’s not supposed to have access to.”

Joel held up a finger. “Hypothetically taking a run.”

“Got it.” She ran her hand over the side of the tall pile of files next to Pax. “Where are we in here? Looks like you’ve done a lot of gathering and reading while I was doing lazy things like sleeping and showering.”

And other things, but Davis kept that quiet. The heated look he shared with Lara let him know she was thinking about those things, too.

“That’s the bad news.” Joel leaned back in his chair and talked while he munched on the toast. “I’ve been through the Naval Academy records and newspaper articles over a span of a few years. No school scandals and nothing in the background of Martin Coughlin, Steve Wasserman or the NCIS deputy director. They’re linked by school, but not by anything that got the attention of the police, school board or media.”

“And it gets worse. I used Connor’s FBI contacts to dig deeper. Looked at juvenile-court records and academic files and transcripts, even went back to high school on those three, combing through all the stuff I shouldn’t have access to. There’s nothing.” Pax tapped his hand against the top of his stack. “I even pulled the twenty years since college and, while I still have more to look at, so far I don’t see anything.”

Joel picked up the bad-news trail. “Their security-clearance records don’t show issues either.”

Lara’s eyes narrowed. “How did you get ahold of those?”

Joel smiled. “I’m resourceful.”

Like that, Davis’s good mood slipped away. The lighthearted calm gave way to something dark and furious that was much harder to control. It took all of his concentration to stop his jaw from tightening, all his focus to keep his mind on track and not be derailed into what-if territory.

His future actually depended on it.

Giving in to some of that brewing frustration, he tossed the notepad in his hands harder than he’d intended and watched it slide across the table. “We’re missing something.”

Pax shook his head. “I can’t see where.”

The men started throwing out ideas. Each possibility Davis put forward, Joel or Pax shot down and vice versa. They discussed other databases and the unlikely possibility that this tied to something that happened overseas during military service. That should be in the files they had, but Ronald had a lot of power. He could bury pieces, but it was hard to imagine him being able to make a big issue completely disappear.

Lara paged through the notepad, rarely glancing up or getting sucked into the adrenaline flow surging around the room. If the argument and raised voices bothered her, she sure didn’t show it. She didn’t even flinch when Pax slapped a hand against the tabletop to make a point.

After a few minutes she put the pad down and stared at them. Her lips curled in the start of a smile as she glanced around the table. Ben jogged down the stairs and into the room, and she shot him a conspiratorial look.

Many of the questions died before they got to an answer. One discussion trailed off entirely. One by one all eyes turned to her.

She waited until silence fell and only the low rumble of the police scanner on Joel’s desk filled the room. “The nonschool records.”

Davis knew she had more than just the confusing phrase. The look of pure female satisfaction told him that.

Joel frowned at her. “I said—”

“You’re searching school records and criminal records. What about the other stuff?”

Pax grabbed another piece of toast. “You lost me.”

It was as close to an
aha
moment as Davis had ever experienced. The light clicked on and he heard the snap in his brain. He’d missed the hole and shouldn’t have. They were running around searching but skipping crucial steps. He swore at his unusual lack of finesse on this one. They were all guilty and it took a nonexpert to see it.

Rushing right behind the temptation to kick his butt came a surge of pride. Most people would have been rocking in a corner after being attacked and seeing dead body after dead body. She didn’t run or panic or even burst into tears, though she was entitled to do all of those. No, she dug in and didn’t hold back even when it meant challenging them all.

No wonder he loved her. It was a miracle no other man had swooped in while he was stumbling around waiting to figure this all out. And he knew that was true because he’d watched over her from afar, dreading that day. He said a silent thank-you to the universe that that had never happened.

He winked at her. “The beautiful and equally brilliant Lara is right. We’re going about this the wrong way by searching for an incident and trying to work from there. We need to look for a missing piece. Forget what’s there. Find the hole.”

That smile of hers turned up even brighter and she aimed it right at him.

He had to swallow twice before he could continue. The urge to drag her upstairs was that strong. Talk about bad timing. “Whatever this is won’t be in an obvious record because it has never been found out. It’s hidden. It looks innocent or at the very least not problematic.”

“Interesting.” Pax put down the toast and grabbed the files again. “We need to spread out over Annapolis and all of their hometowns in case whatever this is happened on vacation. Go through their families, expand to parents and siblings.”

“Add Martin’s wife.” They were the first words Ben said since he’d walked in the room.

“Why?” Lara asked.

He leaned over and grabbed an empty mug and the full coffeepot. “She’s a socialite from a wealthy family who plays the role like a pro, yet she married a blue-collar guy and agreed to travel around from base to base with him? I don’t think so.”

Lara shook her head. “Maybe it’s true love.”

Davis was inclined to go with Ben’s gut feeling on this. Davis believed in love, but he also knew other emotions drove a lot of weddings these days.

Washington, D.C., being a purely political town made marriages-of-power-convenience all too common. If power could drive people together, maybe a scandal could, too.

“
Disdain
was more like it.” Ben took the seat next to Davis, but not before he grabbed a few of the files from Pax’s pile. “Something doesn’t check out. She is a stereotypical all-for-show type but lives in a nice house but not a mansion, even though she could afford one and that life better fits her personality. I can’t get a handle on her.”

Lara’s head fell to the side as she glanced at Davis. “Do you ever wonder what people say about us as a couple?”

“That he is one lucky bastard,” Pax said.

Joel didn’t even look up from his papers. “Pretty much.”

Ben shrugged. “I didn’t say it out loud because we just met, but I definitely thought it.”

* * *

R
ONALD
DISCONNECTED
THE
line on his regular Monday-morning videoconference with the field offices’ heads. A knock sounded at the door before the images blinked from the screens. That could only mean his assistant had hovered at the door waiting for the two-hour meeting to end and decided a one-second break was sufficient. Because he wanted in and didn’t use the intercom, the interruption could also mean bad news.

“Come in.” Ronald got up from the couch and walked over to his desk. He didn’t bother to sit down because he had back-to-back meetings all morning. “What is it, Wayne?”

“There is an issue.”

“There always is. Be more specific.”

Wayne glanced at the paper in his hand. As usual, he hung by the door and raised his voice to talk across the room. “We’ve had a security alert.”

“Sit.” Ronald mentally watched as his schedule disintegrated. He pointed at the chair right in front of his desk and sat down in the big one behind it. “Be more specific.”

“It would appear someone is looking into your background.”

Not the news he expected. His mind still focused on the work discussion he had just had about Naples. He forced a topic switch.

“A security-clearance update?” Although that didn’t make much sense because his update wasn’t due for another year.

“This is off the books.” Wayne tucked the note into his pocket as a trickle of sweat broke out on his forehead. “The flag you put on your academy files tripped the warning.”

Ronald’s stomach dropped, which was a good thing because he needed room for the fury boiling in his blood. “When?”

“Over the past twenty-four hours.”

“Trace it back.” Ronald knew where it would go, or he assumed he did. Somehow this would trace back to Martin and the killings and that damn Lara Bart and her boyfriend.

Ronald balanced his chin on his fingertips and blew out a shaky breath. He’d served his country with distinction. He’d made sacrifices and paid his dues. The idea that a twenty-year-old decision, one that wasn’t even his, could rise up and slap him in the face refused to compute in his mind. He should be above this, his behavior unquestioned.

Martin had done this. Martin and Nancy. They’d left the girl that night and sent them all careening down this road.

Wayne cleared his throat. “That’s the thing, sir. We can’t.”

It took an extra second for the words to settle in. “That is an unacceptable answer and you know it.”

“I already talked with the tech experts—”

“You did what?”

Wayne was moving around and swallowing, his face blanching a scary white. Much more and the guy might pass out.

Not that Ronald cared. He wanted work done correctly and all signs pointed to a disaster from the beginning of this Steve Wasserman mess. Ronald never liked that guy and could not mourn his death, no matter how violent it had been.

“I didn’t reference your situation specifically or give any clues that could lead back to you,” Wayne said.

“You’re my assistant. It’s a logical leap.”

“I took precautions to prevent anything like that from happening.”

If he had, he was the first one associated with any part of this disaster to have done so. Even Davis’s oldest friends failed on that score. “Continue to talk to whatever experts you need, keeping my name out of the picture, and find another avenue to track this down.”

“We’re going to get the same answer. The person breaking in is an expert. Like, can-beat-the-Pentagon’s-security type of expert. This isn’t just about a firewall.”

“Wayne.” For some reason his assistant was not understanding the import of this assignment. Ronald decided to make his position clearer. “Just do it. You have until the end of the day or be prepared for a new assignment in the worst detail you can imagine.”