Soldier of Fortune Read online

  "Where you're safe," he replied thickly. "Because if I did this anywhere else, I couldn't help what would happen. I want you so much."

  'This is only making it worse," she told him. She leaned her forehead against his chest. She could smell the tangy soap he used, the clean scent of the shirt he wore. Her hands spread over his hard muscles.

  His breath quickened at the almost imperceptible movement. "Unbutton it." He breathed roughly. 'Touch me there."

  "There are people...!"

  "Yes." His lips touched her closed eyelids, her forehead. "Touch me."

  She could hardly breathe at all. He was drowning her in sensation, and she loved him so much it was torture. It was just going to be harder to leave him, but how could she fight this? Part of her was frightened of his strength, but a larger part remembered how it had felt when he was tender, when he'd been so careful not to hurt her.

  "I won't ever hurt you again," he whispered, lifting her fingers to the top button. "Not ever. I won't over-

  power you, or make crude remarks to you. I'll teach you to trust me, if it takes the rest of my life. Gabby..."

  She closed her eyes. Tentatively her fingers fumbled the first button free. He tensed as she found the second, and the third. She stopped there, resting against him, and eased her fingers just inside. They tingled as they came in contact with firm muscle and curling hair.

  He caught his breath, shifting his chest so that her fingers slid farther under the fabric.

  "You did that," he reminded her in a sensuous undertone, "when I started to touch you under your nightgown, at the finca. Remember? You shifted and moved so that I could touch you more easily."

  What she remembered most was the way it had felt when he'd touched her. Her eyes slowly opened, and he turned her face so that he could look into them.

  His own eyes were black with desire; his face was hard and drawn, his lips were parted. "Yes, I like that," he whispered as she curled her nails against him and dragged them softly over his skin. "I like that." His chest rose and fell heavily and still his eyes held hers. "If we made love, you could do that to every inch of me. And I could do it to you, with my mouth."

  She trembled. He felt it and drew her slowly into his arms. He stood like that, just holding her, in a strangely passionless embrace while the world became calm.

  "Words," he said over her head, his tone light and solemn at the same time. "So potent... Until you came along, I'd never made love to a woman with my mind."

  She stared out at the sailboats on the lake and involuntarily one hand pressed closer against him. "We're at an impasse," she said after a minute.

  His cheek nudged her dark hair. "How?"

  She laughed bitterly. "J.D., I'm leaving next Friday."

  "Maybe," he said, and his arms tightened.

  "Definitely." She pulled away from him, and he let her go immediately. She looked up. "Nothing has changed."

  He let his eyes roam over her soft body. "At least you've stopped cringing."

  "Thank you," she replied. "For removing the scars. Now I can go on to a lasting relationship."

  "Why not have it with me?" he asked. "I'm well-off. I'm sexy—"

  "You're unreliable," she said, interrupting him. "I want someone who doesn't know an Uzi from a blender!"

  He sighed heavily, and his dark eyes were thoughtful. "I need a little time."

  "Time won't help," she said. "You're hooked again. It's like the cigarettes, only worse. I can't live my life standing at windows and waiting for telephones to ring."

  "You'll do that regardless."

  She stopped dead and turned around, gaping at him. "What?"

  "You'll do that anyway," he said matter-of-factly, watching her. He pulled a cigarette from his pocket with a what-the-hell smile and lit it. "You'll miss me. You'll want me. You're leaving the office, but the memories are portable and indestructible. You won't forget me any more than I'll forget you. We started something we haven't finished, and it's going to be between us all our lives."

  "It's just sex!" she yelled at him.

  Two young men walked past, grinned at J.D., and winked at Gabby, who was wishing she could sink into the sand. She hadn't even heard them approach.

  She turned and fled back down the beach at a trot. J.D. was right beside her, effortlessly matching her steps and still smoking his cigarette. He finished it just as they reached the car, and he crushed it out before he joined her in the luxurious interior.

  "It isn't just sex," he said, turning to face her, one arm across the back of the seat and an odd expression on his face. He smiled slowly. "But sex is going to be one big part of our relationship in the not-too-distant future."

  She glared at him. "You'd be lucky!"

  "No, you would," he said, cocking an eyebrow. "When I mind my manners, I'm a force to be reckoned with. What I did to you in that bed was all bad temper and irritation. What I did to you the morning before was what it's really like."

  She couldn't control her heated response to that intimate remark. Her breasts tingled at the memory. His eyes dropped slowly to her breasts, and he smiled wickedly. Following his gaze, she saw why and crossed her arms over her chest.

  "Too late," he murmured. "Your body will give you away every time. You haven't forgotten what we did together."

  Her nostrils flared. "There are other men in the world."

  "Sure," he agreed pleasantly. "But you don't want other men. You want me."

  "Conceited ass," she enunciated clearly.

  His fingers touched her mouth and parted her lips, as

  if their texture fascinated him. "You risked your life for me," he said absently. "Why?"

  She laughed nervously. "Maybe I just wanted to try out the gun."

  He tilted her face up and leaned over to brush his mouth tenderly across her trembling lips. "Maybe there was a reason you don't want me to know," he murmured. He drew back and looked at her. "Hungry?"

  The change of topic threw her. He had switched from lover to friendly companion in seconds. She managed a smile. "Yes. What did you have in mind?"

  "Cheeseburgers, of course." He chuckled and started the car.

  "I like those myself."

  He glanced at her. "Let's talk," he said unexpectedly. "Really talk. I want to know everything about you. What you like to read, how it was to grow up in Texas, why you've never gotten involved with a man.. .everything."

  That sounded intriguing. It suddenly occurred to her that she knew very little about him. What he liked and disliked, what he felt. She tried to read his face.

  "Curious about me too?" he asked, glancing sideways. "I'll tell you anything you want to know."

  She laughed uneasily. "'Anything' covers a lot of territory."

  "And requires a hell of a lot of trust on my part," he added with a smile. "Anything, Gabby."

  Total honesty. She stared down at her hands and wondered why they were trembling. She wasn't sure of his motives, of where this was leading. She looked up and all her uncertainty was on her face.

  He reached over and caught one of her hands, lifting it to bis thigh. Her palm tingled at the contact.

  "Make me stay here," he said unexpectedly.

  "What?" she asked.

  "Make me stay," he repeated. His eyes caught hers briefly. "You can give me something that all the unholy little wars on earth couldn't. If you want me, show me. Give me a reason, half a reason, to settle down. And I might surprise you."

  She stared out through the windshield and felt as if she were floating. It was a beginning that she wasn't sure she wanted. She might hold his interest briefly, until he tired of her body. But what then? He was offering nothing more than a liaison. He wasn't talking about permanent things like a house and children. Her eyes darkened with pain. Perhaps it would have been better if he hadn't gotten rid of her fear of him.

  Her troubled eyes sought his profile, but it was as unreadable as ever. The only thing that gave her hope was the visible throbbing of his pulse and th
e searing desire in his eyes. He wanted her so desperately that she couldn't help wondering whether he didn't feel something for her, too. But it would take time to find out, and she wasn't going to withdraw her resignation. As much as it might hurt, in the long run it would be saner to leave him than to try to hold him. Gabby wasn't built for an affair. And she wasn't going to let him drag her into one, just to occupy himself while he decided between practicing law and soldiering.

  CHAPTER TEN

  THEY SAT IN A BOOTH at a nearby fast-food restaurant, where J.D. put away three cheeseburgers, a large order of french fries, and two cups of coffee before Gabby's fascinated eyes.

  "I'm a big man," he reminded her as he was finishing the third one.

  "Yes, you are," she agreed with a smile, running her eyes over the spread of muscle under his cham-gray shirt.

  His eyes narrowed with amusement. "Remembering what's under it?" he said softly, teasing her.

  She flushed and grabbed her coffee cup, holding it like a weapon. "I thought this was a truce," she muttered.

  "It is. But I fight dirty, remember?"

  She looked, studying his hard face. "What was it like, those four years when you were a mercenary?" she asked.

  He finished the cheeseburger and sipped his coffee, leaning back with a heavy sigh. "It was hard," he said. "Exciting. Rewarding, in more ways than just financial." He shrugged. "I suppose I was caught up in the romance of it at first, until I saw what I was getting into. One of the men I joined with was captured and thrown

  into jail the minute we landed in one emerging African country. He hadn't fired a shot, but he was executed just like the men who had."

  She caught her breath. "But why?" she asked. "He was just..."

  "We were interfering with the regime," he told her. "Despite all our noble reasons, we were breaking whatever law existed at that time. Shirt and I managed to get away. I owe him my life for his quick thinking. I was pretty new to the profession back then. I learned."

  "He told me his name was Matthew," she remarked with a smile.

  He cocked an eyebrow. "Be flattered. It was three years before I found that out."

  She toyed with her crumpled napkin. "I liked him. I liked all of them."

  "Shirt's quite a guy. He was the one who pushed me into law," he said with a laugh. "He thought I needed a better future than rushing around the world with a weapon."

  "You think a lot of him," she observed.

  He shrugged. "I never knew my father," he said after a minute. "Shirt looked out for me when we served in Vietnam together. I don't know—maybe he needed somebody too. His wife had died of cancer, and he didn't have anybody else except a brother in Milwaukee who still doesn't speak to him. I had Martina. I suppose Shirt became my father, in a sense."

  She cupped her hands around her coffee mug and wondered what he'd say if she told him that Shirt had said the door to the past was closed for J.D. Probably he'd laugh it off, but she decided she didn't want to find out.

  He looked up. "How about your family? Any sisters, brothers?"

  She laughed softly. "No. I was an only child. My father owned a ranch, and my mother and grandfather and grandmother had gone to San Antonio on vacation. Mother met Dad then and ran away to^narry him over the weekend." She grinned. "My grandparents were furious."

  "I can imagine." He searched her face. "You look like your mother. How about him? Was he big?"

  She shook her head. "My father was small and wiry and tough. He had to be, you see, to put up with Mama. She'd have killed a lesser man, but Dad didn't take orders. There were some great fights during my childhood."

  He cocked an eyebrow. "Did they make up eventually?"

  She sighed. "He'd send her roses, or bring her pretty things from town. And she'd kiss him and they'd go off alone and I'd go see Miss Patty who lived in a line cabin on the ranch." She grinned. "I visited Miss Patty a lot."

  He chuckled. "They say the making up can be pretty sweet."

  She studied his hard face. "Yes, so I hear."

  He lifted his eyes to hers. "We've had a royal falling out. Want to make up?"

  She hesitated, and he concentrated on finishing his coffee and reaching for a cigarette.

  "Sorry," he said quietly. "I'm rushing things."

  Hesitantly, she reached across the table and touched the back of the big hand resting there. It jerked. Then it turned and captured hers in its rough warmth.

  "J.D., what do you want from me?" she asked.

  "What do you think I want, Gabby?' he asked in turn.

  She gathered all her courage and put her worst fears into words. "I think you want to make amends for what happened in Guatemala, before you fly off into the sun. I think you want to have an affair with me."

  "That's honest, at least," he said. His eyes fell to their clasped hands, and he watched his thumb rub softly against her slender fingers. "You want something more permanent, I gather."

  She couldn't answer that without giving herself away. She drew her hand away from his with a light laugh. "Aren't we getting serious though?" she asked. "I need to go home, J.D. I left the laundry in the washing machine, and I've got a week's cleaning to do."

  His face hardened. "Can't it wait until tomorrow?"

  'Tomorrow's Sunday."

  "So?"

  She lifted her eyes to his. "I go to church on Sunday."

  He frowned slightly. "I haven't been to church since I was a boy," he said after a minute. He studied the smoking cigarette in his hand. "I don't know what I believe in these days."

  It was a reminder of the big differences between them. She frowned too, and got to her feet slowly.

  "It would bother you," he murmured, watching her. "Yes, I suppose it would."

  She half turned. "What would?"

  "Never mind." He sighed as he put the remains of their meal into the trash can and replaced the tray in the

  rack on their way out. "Just a few adjustments that have to be made, that's all."

  That didn't make sense, but she didn't pressure him. He didn't pressure her either, leaving her outside her apartment building with a rueful smile.

  "I hate being stood up for the damned laundry," he muttered, hands in his pockets.

  "New experiences teach new things," she murmured dryly. "Besides, I can't finish out the week in dirty clothes."

  That put a damper on things. Her smile faded at the memory of how little time they had left together. His face grew harder.

  "Well...thanks for lunch," she said awkwardly.

  "We could do it again tomorrow," he said before she went inside.

  Her eyes lifted. She wanted to. She wanted to, desperately. She tried to convince herself that it would be a mistake, but her body tingled and her heart surged at the idea.

  "Yes," she said under her breath.

  His chest rose and fell, as if in relief. "Suppose I pick you up about ten-thirty?"

  She hesitated. "Church is at eleven."

  "Yes, I figured it would be," he said with a rueful smile. "I hope the angels won't faint at having me in their midst."

  All the color drained out of her face as she stared up at him, and she couldn't have said a word to save herself.

  "Well, I won't embarrass you," he muttered curtly. "I do know not to stand up and yell 'Hallelujah' every five minutes or to snore in the front pew."

  "I didn't say anything," she said.

  "I still have a soul too, even if it has taken a few hard knocks over the years." He lifted his shoulders and let them fall. "I.. .need to go back. All the way back." His eyes held hers. "Gabby?"

  "I'm Methodist," she said.

  He smiled. "I used to be Episcopalian. The denomination doesn't matter so much, does it?"

  She shook her head. "We can walk from my apartment."

  He nodded. "See you tomorrow."

  He turned to get back into the car, but she moved forward and touched his arm. The light contact of her fingers froze him. He looked down at her.

&nb
sp; "Would you.. .bend down a minute?" she whispered.

  Like a sleepwalker, he bent his tall frame and she stood on tiptoe to put her mouth warmly, hungrily to his.

  He moaned, starting to reach for her, but she drew back with a wicked, warm smile.

  "Try that again when we aren't in a public place," he said, challenging her.

  Her heart jumped. "Dream on."

  He lifted an eyebrow. "I've done very little else this past week," he said, letting his eyes roam over her slender body. "Gabby, have you ever thought about having children?"

  She could hardly believe what she was hearing. Her face burned with pleasure, her heart sang with it. "Oh, yes," she whispered huskily.

  "So have I." He started to speak, caught himself, and smiled hesitantly. "See you in the morning."

  '"Bye." She stood there and watched him drive off.

  It was probably all some wild daydream and she'd wake up back in the office, typing. But when she pinched herself, it hurt. She went upstairs and put the clothes in the dryer and tried to convince herself that J.D. had actually said he was going to church with her.

  But the next morning, she was sure she'd misunderstood him. She dressed in a pretty Gibson Girl-style white outfit with matching accessories and at precisely ten-thirty, she started out the door. Of course, J.D. wasn't going to church, she told herself firmly. What a stupid thing to...

  The doorbell rang as she was opening the door. And there he was. He was wearing the same vested gray suit she'd seen him in earlier that week, but he looked different now. More relaxed, more at ease, much less rigid.

  "Shocked?" he asked wickedly. "Did you expect I'd changed my mind and gone fishing instead?"

  She burst out laughing and her green eyes sparkled. With her long hair piled in an old-fashioned coiffure, she seemed part of another era.

  "Little Miss Victorian," he murmured, studying her. "How exciting you look. So demure and proper."

  He looked as if he'd give a lot to change that straight-laced image, and she dropped her eyes before he could see how willing she felt.

  "We'd better get started," she murmured, easing past him.