Roberts, Sarah - Action Hero Junkie [Movieland] (BookStrand Publishing Romance) (10 page)

Mia felt numb. Aiden took her arm and urged her to movement. She didn’t know what she did with the coffee cup. She might even have dropped it. Without opening her mouth even once, Mia let Aiden guide her out of the headquarters building and into the hot sunlight.

They walked the short distance to Aiden’s quarters. Neither one of them said a word. Mia couldn’t seem to wrap her mind around it. She had to leave
tonight
. Just before she stepped inside, she looked up at the skies. The sun was already starting to sink, streaking pink and gold across the clouds. They didn’t have long. She was shrieking inside.
What happened to my happy-ever-after?

Mia began to feel frantic. “It isn’t supposed to end like this! Not so soon!”

Aiden guided her to the sofa and sat her down. He dropped down beside her. His weight squished the cushion, and she fell against him. He took her hand and laced his fingers through hers. He sighed heavily. “Mia, I’m being sent out on a mission. I have to see that you get safely back home before I go.”

Mia clutched his hand really hard. “But you proposed to me!” she blurted. “I can’t go
yet!
” She had gotten tears in her eyes. She swiped them away with her free hand.

Aiden looked pained. “You’ve got to know I still want to marry you. That hasn’t changed.”

“But how? When?” Mia wanted answers, good ones that she could live with. Mia felt like her insides were cracking open and she was oozing out. It hurt, a lot.

Aiden shook his head slowly. When he looked at her, his gorgeous electric-blue eyes looked bleak. He abruptly muttered a nasty curse under his breath. “This is what Caesar was really trying to warn me about.”

Mia leaped up. She was furious. She balled her hands into fists. “Don’t give me that civilian versus Special Ops bull, Aiden! I don’t want to hear it! Just say what you really mean! You don’t want to be with me!”

“
My heart is being ripped out of my chest!”

All of her anger deflated. “Oh!” Hot tears spilled out of her eyes. Mia dropped to her knees in front of him and tried to hug as much of him as she could get her arms around. He hugged her back, really hard. Mia suspected he might be crying, too. She couldn’t see his face because it was pressed against the top of her head.

Then Aiden eased her away from him, his strong hands gentle on her. “Mia, I want you to have this.” He reached up and pulled a silver chain out from under his shirt collar. There was a small medallion hanging on it. “It’s St. Christopher, the patron saint of travelers and soldiers. Will you wear it for me, Mia?”

Mia nodded, too choked up to say anything. Aiden undid the clasp and then put the silver chain around her neck. The medallion fell in the hollow between her breasts. Mia reached up. She wrapped her fingers so hard around the silver disk that the little carven image indented her flesh. It was a powerful talisman. She was a traveler from out of her own world, and Aiden was a soldier. It meant a lot that Aiden had given her the St. Christopher medallion. “Will I ever see you again?” She sounded so pathetic and knew it, but she didn’t care.

Aiden bent down and lifted her right up into his lap. He didn’t strain at all. She gulped. She was so going to miss those muscles! Mia snuggled against his broad shoulder. When he wrapped her up in his big arms, she felt his chest rise in a huge sigh. “I’ll try, Mia.”

She started to cry again. Aiden raised her face and kissed her. Then he pressed his forehead against hers. “Don’t cry, Mia. Please. I can’t stand it!”

“I’ll c–cry if I want to!”

Aiden gave kind of a choked laugh and kissed her again. Mia grabbed his head and opened her mouth, desperate to taste him. Their tongues tangled together. One thing led to another. She clutched him. He clutched her.

Their clothes flew apart and littered the floor.

Aiden and Mia came together like heat-seeking missiles. They rolled around on the rug, knocking up against the furniture. Mia felt the bruises coming up, but she didn’t care, as long as he made her part of him. Aiden was hard and hot and frenzied. His mouth, his hands, and his sex all branded her. It was heart-slamming, scorching,
explosive
. It was absolutely the best good-bye sex of Mia’s life. She had only one coherent thought left.

Damn it, I don’t want to get a nice cuddly cat!

Chapter Seven

The first thing Mia knew about ‘the plan’ was when she went out the exit door of the theater into the night, and Aiden and Caesar followed her. She was startled and suspicious. “What are you doing?”

She watched Caesar scurry lithely across the theater parking lot, his black shadow moving across the moonlit asphalt. His big gun was in his hands. Mia was distinctly alarmed. She pointed after his retreating form. “What is
he
doing?”

“My assignment is to make sure you get home. Caesar will appropriate a vehicle to follow us. When I’ve made certain of your safety, Caesar will use that transportation to bring us back here, where the rest of our team has secured the gate in anticipation of our return.” Aiden’s emotionless voice was clipped. He was also watching Caesar’s swift progress, and he also held a big gun.

“This is crazy, Aiden!” Without answering her, Aiden took her elbow and started to steer her swiftly toward her car. He held his gun ready in his other hand. Mia balked, trying to slow down. She needed time to think. “Wait, Aiden! Just wait!”

Aiden urged her on with his hand. He gestured with his gun toward her car. “Come on, Mia!”

It occurred to her that one of the movie features could let out while Aiden was waving that big gun of his around. All of those people walking out into the lighted parking lot, catching sight of a big man with a big black gun. She could just imagine what would happen then! Panic…911…SWAT. All with Aiden—and Caesar —right in the middle of it. And this was the real world, where the bullets and the blood were real. There wasn’t any movie land hospital where dead people were brought in and were miraculously patched up, all ready to fight another day.

She shivered, knowing it was in fear. But she preferred to blame it on the night’s cool temperature.

She didn’t want to think about what might happen if they stuck around in the parking lot.

Mia picked up her pace. She was dressed in her own clothes, of course, and she decided she was glad for her sweater. She had forgotten she had left the chill of fall behind her. It now seemed a lifetime ago since Aiden had thrown her up into that roaring helicopter.

They reached her car. Aiden let go of her elbow, and Mia just stood there, biting her lip in indecision. Aiden went around to the passenger side and waited. Looking at her over the top of the car, he silently nodded down at the vehicle.

Mia tried again to be the voice of reason. “What if the owner of the vehicle comes looking for it? What then?”

“We’ll be back in under an hour. It’s a calculated risk. Now unlock your vehicle, Mia.”

Mia blindly fished for her keys and dug them out of her purse. She felt all huffy. “Oh, great!
Appropriate a vehicle
—you mean steal! He’ll be stopped for grand theft auto, and it’s not like I could post bail, not after everyone sees that big gun of his. The FBI and the CIA and Homeland Security will all be called in! He’ll be detained as a psycho or a terrorist or a psychotic terrorist or—”

Mia heard the powerful rev of an engine and looked over the roof of her car. She stared in horror. “He goes to appropriate a vehicle and he brings back a
Mustang?
”

Aiden grinned at her. No black streaks disguised his face, making him look scary, which suddenly struck Mia as weird. “There’s an art to hiding in plain sight.”

She really looked at him then, and saw he was wearing a shirt and soft-faded jeans. He looked like an ordinary, uber-hot guy out with his date. Except for the casually hefted semi-automatic weapon, cocked on his hip and pointed at the night sky.

“I give up!” Mia unlocked her car. She and Aiden got in and pulled the doors shut in echoing slams. Mia secured her seat belt with a click. She noticed that he was just sitting there.
Oh, right! Let’s just red-flag a cop!
She narrowed her eyes and barked at him. “Buckle up, Aiden! I
don’t
want to get stopped.”

He looked surprised then nodded and set his gun down, butt-first, between his knees. She watched him as he pulled the strap tight across his broad chest and anchored it. Then he picked up the big gun and rested it across his knees. The barrel was pointed away from her.

Mia started the car and shifted, grinding the gears, which made her mad because she knew better. “Well! This is just like old times. Except you aren’t threatening to blow my head off!”

Aiden slanted a pained look at her. “Just drive, Mia.”

Mia grinned. Even if she was worried about this stupid stunt of Aiden’s, she couldn’t help that she was beginning to enjoy herself. It just felt right that she and Aiden were doing something crazy like this together.

She glanced in her rear view mirror. It reassured her to see the Mustang following at a discreet distance. Then another vehicle turned into the lane directly behind her. Red-and-blue lights started flashing. “Oh no, oh no! I’m not speeding! Why—oh, my God!
Aiden!
You’ve got to do something about the gun! If they see it, we’ll be arrested!”

* * * *

Mia was frantic. She looked like a crazed woman, with her wide, staring eyes and opened mouth. Her hair even seemed to be standing on end. Aiden quickly glanced over his shoulder through the back window. He cursed softly under his breath when he saw the flashing lights of the patrol. He understood instantly her concern. He understood, too, that she was more afraid for him than for herself.
Brave, brave Mia! You have my heart.
Swiftly, he broke down his weapon by feel and placed the pieces on the darkened floorboard between his feet. Then he eased out his hand weapon out of its holster and laid it alongside his thigh on the seat.

Aiden realized Mia was falling into a panic. That worried him. He hadn’t ever known her to show much fear. But she didn’t need to worry about him. He could handle himself. He could keep them both safe. “Pull it together, sweetheart! Breathe!”

She gave a sort of jerky nod and noisily sucked in her breath a couple of times through her pursed mouth. “I’m fine! You’re fine! Oh, we’re going to die!”

By the time Mia had pulled over and stopped her vehicle, he was sitting with open hands on his knees. He warily watched the patrol soldier approach the vehicle. Aiden took note that the man moved with stolid confidence, not the nervous uncertainty of a novice. The man was a professional. Aiden tensed, poised for trouble.

Mia had rolled down the window. When the soldier bent down to speak to her, the man flashed a small light into her face. She blinked, looking half-blinded. Aiden could see the nervousness in her smile. “Good evening, officer! What seems to be the problem? It’s a beautiful night, isn’t it? A little cool, though. There’s a great action movie showing. Have you seen it?”

Aiden tried to keep his face expressionless, but it was hard.
Action movie? What the hell is she babbling about?
As far as he knew, there wasn’t a single theater in business in the entire town. The people’s access to entertainment wasn’t one of the commandant’s priorities, yet intelligence was admittedly sketchy in many areas.

Under his alert awareness, Aiden’s mind moved swiftly. Mia had apparently heard of such entertainments being available to the soldiers, either in locations cut off from public access or inside the compound itself.
Wait a minute! Cadero had been sent off somewhere! Maybe that’s important!
Entertainment would be one way to ensure loyalty. It would serve as well to channel the ordinary restlessness that was common among soldiers of any stripe.

Aiden speculated about what other forms of entertainment the soldiers might be provided with at unspecified locations—booze, gambling, and women.
Maybe even cockfighting.
The possibilities for exploitation began to seem boundless. If they could infiltrate civilian spies—perhaps use the intel to create diversions—they could create confusion at certain designated targets at certain times! They might be able to eliminate some of the effectiveness of the opposition forces! The possibilities for exploitation began to seem boundless.

Aiden felt that he had stumbled on something important. He’d have to bring the matter to the general’s immediate attention. However, there was just the small matter of the patrol that had stopped Mia. It would have to be dealt with first. He had to finish his current assignment, and that meant whatever it took to get Mia safely home. He listened narrowly to their conversation in hopes of discerning that subtle hint—that split second—before all hell broke loose.

“Ma’am, did you know you have a broken taillight?”

“No, I didn’t! I’m sorry!”

“I’m going to need to see your license.” The soldier flashed the small light across her into Aiden’s face.

Aiden smiled and lifted his right hand in a friendly wave. Then he dropped his hand back onto his thigh, nearer the hidden hand weapon. He was confident that if he had to, he could draw the weapon, pin Mia against her seat with his stiffened left arm, and shoot the soldier dead through the open window. Then, of course, there would be the inevitable alarm raised and probably a careering car chase through the dark back streets, with multiple shots fired, ending in a few more dead soldiers.