Under Fire (14 page)

She snorted, so magnificently natural and without pretense. “You call working search and rescue a stress reducer?” Rachel leaned back against his chest, his arms sliding naturally around until his hands rested on her stomach. “You
are
seriously screwed up.”

“No argument there.” The echoes of old explosions, images of friends he’d lost, flashed through his mind, setting him more on edge than ever. “Saving on occasion felt good. Although it still didn’t keep me from sabotaging myself in three marriages. So I didn’t get off scot-free. Or as you so eloquently said, I am seriously screwed up. Not very technical, but apt.”

“Liam,” she said softly, but firmly. “You can’t blame yourself for everything. Back in the Bahamas you told me that wife number two was unfaithful.”

Cheated with everything in pants, anytime he was deployed or on base. Or hell, she could sneak in a quickie cheat when he stepped out to pick up pizza.

Disco yawned, stretching and inching forward until he head-butted Liam’s leg. He patted the spot next to them on the sofa and the dog jumped up. He scratched the Labrador’s sleek nose. “I was no picnic to live with.”

“That doesn’t excuse her cheating on you—” Her voice rose sharply, then she touched her lips as if realizing she’d spoken too loud. She continued, softer this time, “If she wanted out, she should have done so honorably.”

“You’re right.” He leaned back to give himself space from the tempting scent of her. “Hey, let’s give this a rest. The day’s sucked enough already. And all the dating websites say it’s bad form to ramble on about the ex. Or in my case, exes.”

“We’re past the initial dating stage… not that we’ve actually had a date.” She touched his hand lightly and she might as well have stroked up his leg for how hot and hard that one simple contact made him. “But we’ve kissed each other and even faced a gunman together. So talking about your ex-wives doesn’t qualify as bad first-date etiquette. And honestly, I want to know.”

Her eyes brimmed with curiosity and something else he couldn’t place but made him certain he needed more of that distance. Fast.

“My first wife—Whitney—and I met in high school.” The words came easier than he’d expected. “We mistook puppy love for the real thing. When I enlisted, we didn’t want to be apart, so we eloped. Of course then I went to basic and ranger training and deployed, so we spent no time together anyway.”

He reached for Disco again before he registered the thought, and sure enough the dog rested his chin on Liam’s knee. “Once I got home, I was a mess from combat and she’d been left alone in a strange city with no support system. Even with counseling from our pastor… we’d grown in different directions.”

“I’m sorry, Liam.” She rubbed his hand in much the same way as he’d stroked Disco’s head in comforting circles. “First love is special.”

“At least Whitney’s second marriage has gone a helluva lot better than mine. She married a cop.” And he was happy for her. She deserved better than she’d gotten first go-round. “Whitney was already well versed in the stress after being married to me, but she says at least her new husband’s home at night to have supper with her and their three kids.”

“You keep in touch with each other?” She blinked in surprise.

“Christmas and birthdays, she sends cards and photos. That therapy at least helped us part amicably.”

“And her husband’s cool with that?”

“I’m no threat to what they’ve got.”

“Oh.” Her eyes went even wider. “Okay, then. You don’t love your
first
wife anymore. And what about the next one… the bitch… um, I mean the cheater.”

Her scowl made him grin.

“My second wife—Priscilla—I married on the rebound.” He stretched an arm along the back of the sofa, just to prove to himself he could be close to her now, almost touch her, and still restrain himself. “Huge mistake, by the way.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“We met in a bar. She came home with me that night and stayed.” Not his finest or smartest move, and he wouldn’t make excuses. “We ended up in front of a justice of the peace a month later, and partied our asses off when I was in town. Problem was, for her, the party kept right on going when I left. And it wasn’t like she fell for someone else. Any guy would do. She told me the affairs were just about sex, scratching an itch, that her heart belonged to me.” Priscilla still left him drunken messages to this day, no matter how many times his phone number changed with moves.

“That had to hurt,” she whispered.

“It pissed me off,” he hissed back automatically. “Talk about a double standard. Can you imagine if a guy said that? Tried to write off multiple affairs as scratching an itch?” He shook his head. “Bullshit.”

“So you really never cheated? Not on any of your wives?”

“Never.” He chuckled lowly. “I just married all my women.”

Shifting, she cupped his face in her hands. “Hello? I’m not laughing.”

Her cool, soft skin felt so damn good against him, too good. He wrapped his fingers around her wrists and eased her arms down slowly. Restraint. He could—he would—hold back tonight even though the more he talked about his past screwups, the more he wanted to forget.

“So, on to wife number three. I was determined to get it right that time.” But he wasn’t known for his relationship savvy. Like now, when he still held on to Rachel’s hands, thumbing the speeding pulse along her wrists. “I mean, hell, two divorces behind me? I had to accept my share of the blame.”

“How did you meet…?”

“Dawn? Her name’s Dawn.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, right over the building headache. “I figured since I’d met my last wife in a bar and it hadn’t gone well at all, I should try something completely different.”

“And that would be?”

“We met in church.”

She laughed. Clapped a hand over her mouth and leaned into him. Then laughed again between her fingers, an all-out sexy and uninhibited sound that filled the room with musicality. “You went to church to pick up chicks?”

The way she said it made him sound calculating, but he couldn’t argue with her point. So he shrugged it off the way he always did with things that made him uncomfortable. Jokes. Sarcasm. Anything to avoid something that dug too deep. “Hey, I’m baring my soul here and you’re making fun of me. That’s harsh.”

She swatted his chest. “But seriously, you went to church to get laid.”

“To find a wife. In those days—”

“In those days?” She crinkled her nose. “You make yourself sound ancient, when I know full well you’re not. You’re all of what…?”

“Thirty-eight.”

“To my thirty-two, and I prefer to think of myself as young, thank you very much.”

He hated talking about his age. Age was different in the military, when a man’s useful years evaporated as fast as a pro athlete’s—and the stakes were life and death rather than a touchdown.

“Fine. My point is, for me, it was always about getting married then.” He folded his arms over his chest. “Why is that so surprising? There are men out there who want to get married and have kids.”

“Do you have children?”

“Nope. Never worked out for me.” His biggest regret after each divorce, because he’d wanted kids. And his biggest relief, because he wouldn’t be upsetting tiny lives through his own failures. “The first two times, we weren’t married all that long. The third, it seemed like I was always deployed or out on maneuver right during her, uh, peak fertility time.” His ex had even busted the bank on Victoria’s Secret lingerie and froufrou heels… although best to leave that part out of the discussion. “We were even talking about going the artificial-insemination route—using some of my frozen swimmers. But the marriage fell apart before we got around to thawing them.”

“And what happened to break the two of you up—if you don’t mind my asking something so personal?”

That she would ask meant a lot to him, that she didn’t just assume he was a screwup. By the third divorce, he’d decided it had to be him. Pretty much the consensus. That third hit him the hardest because he’d realized that was it—he wasn’t going to have the gold ring, picket fence, and two-point-two-kids future. “Nothing hugely earth-shattering. She was a nice person. I like to think I’m a decent guy. We just had nothing in common. Zip. Other than both wanting to settle down and have children. I went in with my eyes open. I knew it was a long shot…”

“The breakup still left its mark on you.”

He stayed silent, his eyes locked on John Wayne on the flat-screen TV, kicking ass and taking names—while still winning Maureen O’Hara at the end. Thinking about how hard that last breakup hit him was one thing. Saying it out loud? He swallowed hard.

“You loved her?”

“Yes, I loved her.”

“And now?” she pressed, keeping her voice so low it was barely even a whisper.

“I wasn’t the right guy to make her happy.”

“Or she wasn’t the right person to make you happy.”

He looked over at her sharply. Again, she hadn’t just assumed it was his fault, a three-time loser at happily ever after.

Christ, this woman was drawing him right in, making him want everything all over again even when he knew losing her would leave him gutted in the end. And for him, it always ended. Damn it, he’d gone into this conversation looking for a libido killer, and even after trotting it all out, he still wanted Rachel.

He untangled himself from her and shoved to his feet, away from her and the urge to peel her clothes off, stretch her out on the sofa, and likely propose before the orgasms faded. “You should get some sleep. Take the first bedroom on the right. There’s a guard outside the window. I’ll be out here asleep on the couch.”

***

Rachel wished she could sleep.

She was exhausted all the way to the roots of her hair. But sometime after she’d changed into generic exercise shorts and a T-shirt with an air force logo, she’d found her second wind. All the same, she forced her body to rest, stretching out on the four-poster bed and hugging an itchy, fat pillow sham.

The ringing in her ears grew louder by the second, so loud it almost drowned out Disco’s light snores from across the room, where he sprawled asleep in front of the door. She stared out the half-open miniblinds at the shifting shadows outside. A squat palm tree shook like a pom-pom in the wind. A welcome flag flapped from a porch rail.

And a reed-thin figure sat in the A-frame swing in the front yard. The guard, pretending to be hanging around outside for a smoke. A tiny red light moved from side to side with each puff. Not a bad cover, so those passing by wouldn’t notice anything out of the way. Did the neighborhood realize exactly what this house was used for? Of course the same question could be asked of any safe house in any community—military or civilian.

Liam had come through for her. She was safe and Brandon’s concerns were being investigated. Brandon would be looked after.

And who would look after
Liam
?

Her eyes slid closed as she thought back to their kiss in the Jeep, so much better to think about than what they’d been through that led them to the kiss. The way he had of distracting her from everything was scary and tantalizing. Always had been, even back when she’d first known him during those frenetic weeks in the Bahamas…

An aftershock rattled the ground clear up through her toes until it rattled her teeth and her nerves after an endless day on the pile, searching for survivors in the rubble. She tossed down her toiletries, tossing aside all hopes of a bath as well. She snagged up Disco’s leash and he trotted into step alongside her as she ran for the door, bursting out onto the beach cabin porch, down the steps.

The
narrow
street
filled
with
rescue
workers
and
locals, pouring from the houses left standing—or half standing. The structure next door tilted at an angle toward the seaside cliff. And big buff guys pushed through the door, angling sideways to get out ASAP.

Big
buff
guys
wearing
nothing
but
towels, shower time apparently interrupted.

Her
eyes
locked
on
one
guy
in
particular. The major she’d met earlier, when she’d first arrived. The ground settled under her feet and she breathed easy enough to allow herself a more leisurely look. She didn’t date or even hook up very often, but this guy had been a serious temptation from the get-go, even fully clothed in grimy camo.

And
now, seeing him in nothing more than an insubstantial bit of white terry cloth? Ho-ly cow, he was hot, hot, hot at a time when she could seriously use a distraction. His dark blond hair was even browner, glistening wet from a shower. His chest was like carved bronze muscle. He seemed totally unself-conscious that he stood in the middle of the road wearing nothing more than leather flip-flops and a towel.