Under Fire: The Admiral (22 page)

“It’s three a.m., pretty lady. Already
tomorrow.” He pressed against her. “Meet me at the café we just
left tomorrow at two, that will give me plenty of time.”

“Yes.” She barely got the word out before he
delivered another long, slow, smoldering kiss that turned into a
hard desperate one with her arms locked around his neck and his leg
jammed between her legs. Ben stepped back. They both groaned and
gasped to fill oxygen-starved lungs.

He licked his lips to taste her. “Tomorrow,”
he choked out, turned and disappeared down the stairs.

* * *

Ben arrived at the café early and selected a
table with a good view of Notre Dame, arranging the chairs so he
could see her approach. When she sat, she would see the cathedral
behind him. He ordered a coffee when what he really wanted was a
cognac. He gave the waiter a ten-euro tip, telling him there would
be more after he delivered a bottle of champagne to the table as
soon as his lady settled in. He pulled the black box from his
pocket, flipped back the lid and stared at the ring. A single ruby
circled with two rows of diamonds. Yesterday, while
window-shopping, her face lit up as she admired it in the window.
When she told him her birthday was the Fourth of July and rubies
were her birthstone, he knew this was the one he’d give her. He
intended on carrying it around, and when a moment presented itself
he’d give it to her. As soon as he slipped it into his pocket he
knew there would be no waiting. He had to give it to her today.
Gawd, he was nervous. Giving her a ring and asking her to marry him
wasn’t exactly taking it slow. There was no rush on the getting
married part. That was her decision. They could wait six months or
a year. Have a small wedding or a lavish affair, whatever she
wanted. That is, if she would marry him.

The sex part was a whole other issue. He
didn’t know how much longer he was going to be able to put that
part off. Last night he’d gotten so hard the walk to his hotel had
been painful. They kissed like that again and he doubted if he’d be
able to take it slow. He practiced bringing the jeweler’s box
effortlessly from his pocket to the table and opening it. Today his
always rock-steady hands had the smallest of tremors. Once more.
This time with the words. He smoothly pulled the velvet box from
his pocket. “Gemma, I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life
with you,” he said, then looked around to see if anyone overheard
him. He set the box on the table. “Will you marry me?” And he
fumbled the opening, thanks to the sound of brakes locking and
tires laying down rubber coming from around the corner.
Let’s
hope that doesn’t happen again
. He jammed the box back in his
pocket and checked his watch. Straight up 2:00 p.m. She’d be coming
around that corner any second. She was a spot-on-time person.

Pedestrians headed the direction of the
screeching brakes. Must’ve been an accident, but he hadn’t heard
any metal on metal. His waiter and another man from the café stood
at the corner craning their necks. That guy better be keeping an
eye out for Gemma. He shook his head. People were the same
everywhere. Had to get a good look at somebody else’s misery.

Police sirens sounding like a stuck bagpipe
recording, playing two notes saying come on, come on, get out of
the way, get out of the way, drew near. Several people now stood at
the corner, all peering in the direction of the accident. He
checked his watch again. Gemma was coming from that way and must be
having problems getting through the crowd. He considered texting,
then dismissed the thought. Checking the phone and answering would
delay her.

A police car followed by an ambulance
appeared in the intersection and disappeared down the narrow
street. Ben noted how fast the emergency services had appeared and
nodded approval. A young woman obviously upset pushed through the
knot of people at the corner and came his direction.

“Mademoiselle, please, what happened?” he
asked in French.

“A woman crossing the street was hit. It is
awful. She is dead,” she replied in English.

Been pushed to his feet so fast his chair
tipped over. He bolted to the corner, shoving through the people
with a brusque
sorry
and
excuse me
, earning a stream
of cusswords for his rudeness. Running on shaky legs, panic fueled
him. He scanned the crowd for Gemma at the center of the block
where the ambulance stopped. She wasn’t there.
God, please,
please don’t let it be her.
He ran and prayed, searching his
memory for names of any doctors he knew in the States who had
connections with Paris hospitals. Each step felt like an eternity.
He desperately searched the bystanders, hoping he would see her
standing among them. The ambulance was nosed up to the back bumper
of the police car, lights flashing and sirens wailing on both
vehicles. He made no attempt to be polite and shouldered through
the crowd, moving people out of his way. On the other side, lying
on the cobblestones, was the shawl he’d bought for Gemma.

His world tilted off its axis. “Gemma.” His
yell was lost in the noise made by the damned sirens. He climbed
the bumper of the police car and jumped down near where a form lay
covered by the shawl. His gut turned to a ball of concrete. He’d
lost her. Lost her before he had the chance to tell her he loved
her. The concrete spread, hardening blood, muscle, and bone. He’d
thought he had the rest of his life. There was so much he wanted to
tell her. He couldn’t take his eyes from the small form under the
shawl. His breath hitched. A sliver of hope cracked the concrete.
The form under the shawl was too short to be Gemma. The concrete
was jackhammered away when he recognized the cane lying a few feet
away. A cane that only two days ago poked him in the side and this
morning had granted him a wish.
Gemma?
Had she been with
Madame? Ambulance?
He forced his feet to move and head for the
rear of the ambulance. She was there. Standing on her own. No
blood. No bandages. Talking to a female gendarme. She looked up and
saw him. He didn’t know how he closed the distance between
them.

“Are you hurt?” he said gently, taking her
into his arms.

“No.” She shook her head. “But Madame is . .
.”

“I know.” He worked on getting his breathing
back to normal. “Were you with her when it happened?” He wanted to
be absolutely sure she had not been hit.

“No, I was down the street, I saw . . .”

“Okay.” That was all he needed to know. She
was safe.

“You are?” the policewoman asked.

“Ben Walsh, I’m a friend of Madame
Hendrickson.” No sense adding the doctor. In some cases it could
complicate things and Madame was beyond help. Gemma was his
concern. He took her icy hand in his, then released it to strip off
his jacket and drape it over her shoulders.

When he finished the policewoman said,
“Madame, if you will tell me one more time what you witnessed.”

Gemma was calm but clearly shaken. “I was
coming up the street from that direction,” she said and tipped her
head, then shoved into the sleeves of his coat and reached for his
hand, lacing her fingers between his. “I was on my way to meet Ben.
I saw Madame standing there between the cars.” Gemma pointed to a
space between a gray car and a red car. “She bent forward like
this”—Gemma leaned slightly from the waist—“and fell to her face
right in front of the car. She made no attempt to catch herself.
The young man driving didn’t have a chance to stop.” She paused to
look at a man leaning against the ambulance taking deep drags from
a cigarette. “There was no way to avoid . . . hitting her.”

The officer made more notes in her yellow
binder. “Thank you for your help. Would you look this over.” She
handed Gemma the notebook. “Be sure the addresses and telephone
numbers you have given are correct.” The woman’s English was quite
good.

Gemma took the book and carefully read what
had been written. “Yes, everything is correct.” She handed it
back.

“Thank you for your assistance, Madame
Hendrickson.” She closed the book. “You are free to leave.” She
took a card from her pocket and held it out. “My card.” Gemma took
the offered business card. “Call if you have questions. Should we
have more questions someone from police headquarters will call.”
Gemma nodded.

You are free to leave
was all Ben
needed to hear. He wrapped an arm around Gemma and hustled her down
the street.

“My God,” Gemma said. “The woman fought for
the resistance. Survived the Second World War and its aftermath and
dies falling in front of a car.” She looked up at him. “There was
nothing I could do.” She stopped and looked back over her
shoulder.

He took her by the hands. “Look at me.” He
waited until she was looking into his eyes. “You’re right. There
wasn’t anything you could do. From what you described, it sounds
like she had a massive stroke, a heart attack, or a cerebral
hemorrhage. It’s reasonable to believe she was dead before she was
hit by the car.”

Gemma looked back at the accident scene.
“There are no guarantees in this life.” Her gaze returned to him.
“Are there?”

“Not a damned one.” He circled an arm around
her shoulder. “Let’s get you back to your place.”

He took the key from Gemma’s hand and
unlocked the door, pulling her inside. He kicked the door closed,
holding her to him. He was never going to let her go.

Chapter 17

Ben kicked the door shut, pinning her against
it. His hands on the wood on either side of her, his forehead
rested against the door, his cheek pressed against hers. His jaw
began to quiver then his whole body quaked. Gemma worked her arms
around him, his weight and his leather jacket she still wore making
it difficult for her to move.

“I thought I’d lost you again,” he said,
shifting enough to get his arms around her.

“I’m okay . . .” She couldn’t finish. Hell,
she couldn’t even remember what she’d been going to say. Ben’s face
was a kaleidoscope of emotions. Fear, relief, need and . . .
love
.

He kissed her and the heat, the intensity,
scrambled her brain. She hung on until he broke the kiss and was
glad he had her pinned or she would have slid to the floor in a
puddle.

“I thought I would never get,” he said
between breaths, “to tell you I love you.” He delivered a
lip-bruising kiss that opened the floodgates to her desire. Her
fingers dug into his back, her body melded to his. Her tongue
flirted with his. “Not get to spend the rest of my life with you.”
He delivered another dizzying kiss.

“Help me elp meHeget out of this damned
jacket,” She said when they came up for air. He yanked her away
from the wall, exchanging places as she stripped the offending
jacket from her shoulders, unceremoniously letting it drop to the
floor. He leaned against the door, pulling her close. His hand
found the small of her back, moving her hips against his. Her
breath came faster as her hands roamed his body. And what a body it
was. She skimmed her leg up his side, pressing the heat between her
legs against his leg. His one hand caressed her breast, the other
dropped to her ass, squeezing. The world swirled around her. Her
body throbbed. Every muscle ached for him.

“What about,” she kissed him, “taking it
slow? Waiting a few days before”—he kissed her neck—“we get naked
together.”

“Fuck taking it slow. You and I are going to
live every moment as it comes.”

“Bedroom,” she moaned.

“Yeah.” His voice was raspy. She tripped on
the discarded jacket and kicked it away. They shuffled, twisted,
and turned down the hall, banging one side of the wall then the
other as they held each other kissing desperately. They reached the
guest bathroom door and Ben tried to disentangle himself from
her.

“Condoms,” he said.

Gemma yanked him back against her. “My room,”
she said against his mouth, at the same time tugging his shirt from
his waistband. Their feet tangled and they bounced off the wall
again. Ben clasped the backs of her thighs and lifted. She wrapped
her legs around his hips, hooking them at the ankles, her arms
tight around his neck. They both hissed in a breath as those
all-important body parts came together. He thrust his hips and she
rolled hers, the cloth between them doing nothing to dull the heat.
Ben got them through the door and hesitated.

“What?” she gasped.

He set her down on the low dresser next to
the door. She kept her legs around him and pulled the shirt the
rest of the way out, sticking a hand down the front of his jeans.
He grabbed her hand and went still.

“What?” she said between gasps. “What’s
wrong.”

“I . . . want . . . to take this . . .
slow.”

“Slow?” She jammed her hand in farther,
finding the tip of his erection. “But you just said . . .
I
don’t want to wait any longer
.” Her voice was frantic. “I want
. . . you now.” Her fingers slid over him. “You want me.”

Ben let out a strangled laugh. “Not . . .
that kind of slow. I mean . . .”

She rubbed her breasts against his chest and
a storm of fire and ice engulfed her.

“I want to go slow . . . so I can remember
every second of our first time . . . our first night together.”

And wasn’t that the sexiest thing anyone had
ever said to her?

“Okay?”

She bit her lower lip and did a bobble-head
thing. He laughed again. “Is that a yes or no?”

“Both. I want you so bad my teeth hurt, but I
want to please you and if going slow pleases you”—she gave him a
long kiss with a lot of tongue—“then going slow is what we’re
doing.” She reached under his shirt and ran her palm up across dark
hair to a nipple and pinched.

Ben put his hands on the hem of Gemma’s
pullover and inched it up slowly, finally getting it over the cups
of her purple and black lace bra. The sight of her breasts rapidly
rising and falling damned near made him come. He dipped his head to
kiss them. Gemma stopped him, holding his head with her hands.