Chapter Seven

Carmen couldn’t sleep. She rested on top of her sleeping bag, under the mosquito net that Ledo had found at the markets. He’d bartered for a dozen of the nets, in exchange for his watch, which he saw as a win-win. “The watch loses time. Ten minutes every day. It was a good deal.”

The net allowed Carmen to sleep where the air reached her, rather than wrapping herself in the stifling bag, although the net itself halted some of the air flow. Everyone else in the camp slept, for the fire had burned low and the refectory was silent except for the occasional pop of embers.

It was the third night after their return from Valle Leñosa. Carmen hadn’t seen Garrett since he halted the Jeep at the back of the monastery, swung his long legs out and stalked off into the building. He had, she supposed, been working in the hospital.

He’d spared a thought for the war effort, though. The day after their return, he sent Archie and Ledo out to obtain a radio transmitter. They came back the day after that, a transmitter in their backpack.

Garrett also remembered Nemesis’ demand that the next shipment of silver be stopped. Llora taped a schedule of sentry duty shifts for the next week to the wall next to the kitchen area. Two people at a time, to watch the rail line. Efraín and Ismael had wiped their mouths of food and headed for the tracks immediately.

The night of their return from the meeting with Nemesis, Carmen found herself unaccountably sleepy, to the point where she couldn’t stay sitting up at the fire. Her head kept falling forward as she drifted off to sleep even though it was barely eight in the evening.

Llora and Angelo helped her to her sleeping bag and arranged the net over her, although Carmen didn’t remember that. She only realized the net was there when she woke up six hours later. She woke with a start, panic threading hot slivers through her blood and making her heart lurch.

It was two in the morning and the camp was as still as it was now. She had been disoriented, that first night. She barely remembered being helped to her bed. She rested, breathing heavily, her heart hurrying along as she tried to calm herself. Had she been dreaming?

The snatches of images and emotions that lingered in her mind were from the café. The sense of inevitable capture, that her fate was sealed and there was nothing she could do to halt it, laid over her like a pall. Yet she was here and safe.

She couldn’t stop thinking about the near-miss, about how it might have gone horribly wrong, if not for Garrett’s quick thinking, and she would shiver. She tried to clear her mind and think of something else, something pleasant that would soothe her back into sleep. The moments from the café crowded out anything she tried to recall.

“Spineless woman!” she railed at herself. “Get a grip, for heaven’s sake!”

If the memory was going to haunt her, then she would use it. She would ruthlessly analyze every second of it, looking for alternative actions, better reactions. What could she learn from this?

She settled back onto her bag and considered each action and reaction that had happened, in their correct order, from the moment Nemesis glanced casually around him and breathed “Insurrectos.”

Doggedly, Carmen brought her attention back to the next second and the next, examining each one with cold detachment.

Until she reached the moment where Garrett kissed her.

Carmen curled up on her sleeping bag, humiliation flushing through her. She had liked it! She had liked his kiss. She had lost track of every external and let herself enjoy the kiss.

How could she be so damn stupid? For a start, the kiss meant nothing. It was a way for Garrett to shield her recognizable face. It was a smart move. The soldiers would instantly think of sex and she would be relegated to the minor label of ‘woman’ in their minds. The sergeant called her a whore, proving the ploy had worked. None of them looked at her properly. None of them identified her.

If she was a professional soldier, if she was doing her job properly, then the kiss should mean less than nothing to her, too.

How could she enjoy a kiss from Garrett of all people? He had a chip the size of Texas on his shoulder, he was always angry and she couldn’t remember a single moment when he had been nice to her, just to be nice. He was an A-grade asshole.

His eyes say something different.

The little voice popped up in the middle of her deliberations, derailing her focus. Garrett’s eyes swam back into her memory. Without the dark stubble, he looked almost…sexy. His eyes, without the distracting scrubbiness around them, were more than that. She had been drawn to the depth in his eyes. The emotion there, hidden far out of reach. There was knowledge. Intelligence.

Well, she had always known he was smart. He was a fully qualified medical doctor and on top of that, he seemed to have lived a dozen other lives. He just knew things. Odd things. Dangerous things. When had he got so good with guns, just to start?

Yet she kept coming back to his eyes. The way they had looked as he leaned over her in the café, just before his mouth touched hers.

Carmen shuddered on top of her sleeping bag. It wasn’t distaste that caused the tremor. She was wound up tight, her body throbbing with need.

“Damn,” she muttered. She rolled over on to her other side and firmly told herself to go to sleep, or she would be a slug in the morning.

It was a long time before sleep came, that first night. The night after that—last night—had been a repeat performance. She had gone to her bag early because the broken night had left her just as slug-like as she had warned herself she would be.

Garrett did not appear that day, which was a relief. She didn’t want to look him in the eye. He would read her thoughts far too easily. He would read them and then deride her for them.

She had fallen asleep quickly last night. Then she woke just past midnight, only to toss and turn on her bag, wretched embarrassment flaring as she realized she wanted Garrett more than she had ever wanted any man.

She couldn’t understand why she was drawn to him, when he had the personality of an automaton. Why couldn’t she feel this raging need for Angelo? Angelo was kind and honorable. He was a good Vistarian and she knew he cared for her, even though he said nothing. Angelo barely moved her pulse, though.

Now she obsessed over a man who would laugh if he knew.

Sleep had been fractured last night. Garrett’s eyes followed her into her dreams. The dreams were shot with images she barely remembered when she woke, finally, to daylight, yet they left her pulse uneven and her body throbbing.

Carmen hoped that tonight she would sleep through. Sleep deprivation was a bad condition to have when moving through Insurrecto territory. It impaired judgment.

Yet here it was, two in the morning and she was wide awake and thinking about Garrett again.

She didn’t want him in a romantic way. The idea of him professing love was laughable and who had time for it right now, anyway? Nemesis had hinted the Loyalists would make a big move any time now. Their D-Day was coming. Falling in love was something people with spare time could afford to indulge in, not her.

Besides, if she was going to fall in love it wasn’t going to be with Garrett, God forbid! She wanted him, yes—her body seemed to have a mind of its own in that regard. She burned with the need to have him. It was purely physical.

I bet he’s good in bed—all that drive and passion.

Carmen rolled over again and brushed a small pebble out from under her bag, then hugged her arms around her. Sleep, she commanded herself, trying to ignore the flash image/sense of Garrett’s mouth on her throat, his hands on her—

“Sleep,” she whispered and dredged up the nursery rhyme that had broken her thoughts and let her sleep in the small hours of the night, last night.

Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow.

Snow. She had only seen snow for the first time in her life when she had gone to Harvard.

And everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go….

* * * * *

A hand on her shoulder woke her. Carmen jerked in surprise. Instantly, the heavy ache in her mind and limbs that said she hadn’t slept enough registered.

Remembering her training, Carmen rolled onto her back to see who woke her, instead of speaking aloud.

It was Garrett. The late night made him a shadow in the darkness, yet there was no mistaking his outline.

He reached under the net and picked up her wrist, curling his hand around it, then pulled her toward him. He lifted the net out of her way and she rolled onto her knees, then onto her feet and ducked under the net. She found the flat shoes she had worn to Valle Leñosa and pushed them on. She already wore a teeshirt and her jeans. Lying on top of her bag in her underwear would have sent entirely the wrong message to the men who slept around her.

Angelo had been another shield against possible overtures. While he shared her bag, no one else would try to horn in. She had sent him away for the last three nights, her lack of sleep killing any friendliness she felt toward him.

Garrett drew her to her feet, then he threaded his way through the sleeping camp, moving silently and bringing her with him.

What did he want? Was something happening? Had the Loyalists in Acapulco sent them a message? The radio sat on Garrett’s desk. He might have heard something that wasn’t urgent enough to rouse the whole camp.

Only, he led her away from the door into the monastery, out through the crumbling walls and around the building. This was the same route she had taken a week ago when she had gone looking for him.

Carmen held her tongue until they were far enough away from the sleeping camp that her voice would not stir them. “Where are we going?”

He kept on walking.

“Garrett?”

They rounded the northwest corner. The last of the waning moon shone upon the white, smooth walls of the monastery itself. Over to the left was the out-building where Garrett had hidden and drunk himself into a daze. This time, he stayed close to the wall of the main building, where the path was smooth and flat.

“Tell me what’s happening,” Carmen demanded. She tugged at the grip he had on her wrist. “Garrett!”

He turned and pressed her up against the wall, his body against hers. Carmen gasped and grew still. Her heart, though, thudded frantically. This was too much like her dreams.

The moon was behind him. All she could see of Garrett’s face was the black pits of his eyes and the edge of his jaw, rough with stubble once again.

His hand came up close to her face and even in the moonlight she could see it trembled. He brushed her hair from her face, making her catch her breath, for it was a gentle movement.

Then he cupped her face. His hand was hot. His thumb brushed her cheek and the touch sent sparks flitting through her nerves. Carmen drew in a breath, starved for air. The breath shuddered.

“Garrett…?” she whispered. She didn’t want to hope…or guess…or anticipate.

“Don’t talk,” he murmured and kissed her.

This kiss was so much better than the first. This kiss was because he wanted to kiss her.

Garrett was kissing her. It was unreal.

Carmen moaned as his tongue slipped into her mouth, stroking hers, playing with it. This was much better than any dream or fantasy she had spun since Valle Leñosa. His lips were soft, yet the firmness was there behind the softness. Was that solidness his will, his body, the steel of his personality…? She didn’t know and didn’t care. She let him drive the kiss and let herself wallow in the pleasure it generated.

When he let her mouth free and his lips trailed down her throat, Carmen clutched uselessly at the wall behind her, her body exploding with raw hunger. She moaned again, a desperate sound. She had dreamed of this, yet the reality was so much better.

When he tugged at the hem of her teeshirt, sliding it up, sudden understanding dawned in her. He wanted her. Here and now. Her heart leapt. Yes, she sighed in her mind.

Unbelievably, he took her right there, against the wall. He stripped her of every inch of clothing and lifted her and drove into her. Carmen could do nothing but moan and let him.

It was glorious, it was hard, it was delicious. It left her trembling with the power of her pleasure.

It was exactly what she wanted and had laid awake for three nights wishing she could have.

Garrett rested his head against hers. Both of them breathed heavily. It was loud in the still night.

Carmen swallowed. Her mouth was dry. “Let me down.”

He lowered her to the ground and Carmen bent and picked up her jeans and thrust her legs into them.

“Carmen,” Garrett said.

“It’s fine. You don’t have to explain.” She yanked her top on and looked for the shoe she had dropped.

Garrett closed his jeans. “Now you know what I’m going to say?”

“Of course. This was just sex, Garrett. Don’t read anything in to it.” She smiled at him. He would be able to see her face in the moonlight. “It was good sex, but it was just sex.”

He pulled his shirt closed. “Then we’re on the same page. Finally.”

Carmen slid her foot into her shoe and straightened. “I have sleep to catch up on. Good night, Garrett.”

She didn’t wait to hear him say good night back. She went back to her sleeping bag and climbed into it cautiously, trying not to wake anyone around her. She didn’t want to sleep on top of the bag. She was cold. She snuggled into it, curled up on her side and her arms around herself.

After such a powerful orgasm, she thought she would sleep as soon as she lay down. Instead, sleep stayed out of reach. For the moment, she was satiated and her body quiescent, only now what haunted her thoughts was an odd sadness.

She fell asleep wondering why she would feel sad.

The next day was another fallow day when there was nothing to do but train, clean her gun and listen to the same sexist jokes the men of the unit always told. Garrett didn’t appear again that day and Llora took meals to his office, meals that came back barely eaten.

Carmen went to bed with the same low-grade melancholy wreathing her thoughts.

What on earth is wrong with me? she wondered.

When Garrett woke her in the dead of the night and pulled her from beneath the net, her heart leapt and she knew. Garrett wasn’t going to be a one-night stand. He couldn’t stay away any more than she could.

 

* * * * *

This time, Garrett’s patience lasted long enough to lead her around to the front of the monastery and in through the public entrance. The public entrance separated visitors from the monks’ rooms, keeping them contained and away from the monks’ devotions and solitude.

A door at the end of the wide room gave access to the back corridor where Garrett’s hospital was located, plus Garrett’s own office.

The only reason for going around the main building and coming in the front way was because he wanted to sneak her in so no one else would know she was there.

Carmen didn’t mind. She wasn’t sure how she felt about this herself, yet. Keeping it private suited her fine.

Her body tingled with anticipation.

Garrett pushed the door to his office open and stood back and looked at her. In the light that shone from the room, his gaze was blank.

Carmen stepped into the room and looked around. She had only been in here a few times. Most of those times, she had been so roiled up by Garrett’s sub-human responses she had failed to take much notice of the room itself.

It was as bare as any of the monks’ cells. There was a window high in the wall behind the small desk. Another tiny table had been added since she was last here. The radio transmitter sat on it. The walls were bare, smooth rock, bereft of any paint. The floor was plain tiles.

“Here?” she asked as Garrett closed the door behind him.

“There.” He nodded his head toward the bedroom. He opened the door and once more stepped aside. Carmen suspected he waited for her to make her own way into his room because last time he had given her little choice.

She stepped into the inner room and looked about. There was a bed and an old army footlocker and that was all. A gas lantern sat on the locker, turned down low, in defiance of Garrett’s orders that gas be preserved wherever possible. The colorful coverlet on the bed and the sheet beneath were tossed to one side.

It was an odd-sized bed, something the monks had made themselves, with little regard for standard mattress sizes. It wasn’t a single bed and it wasn’t quite a double. It didn’t matter if they both fit or not. Carmen didn’t intend to sleep there.

Garrett came up behind her. His arms moved around her. She felt the strength in them. He pulled her hair back over her shoulder and kissed her neck. His touch sent a shiver through her.

She turned in his arms so she faced him. She was back to wanting him again, only this time her need was stronger than ever. She trembled with it.

Garrett examined her face. A crease marred his brows.

“What?” she demanded.

He shook his head. “Nothing.” He bent his head and kissed her and Carmen sighed into his mouth. Until this moment, she hadn’t been aware that all day, in the back of her mind, she had been replaying his kisses, his touches. Replaying them…and wishing for more.

Is that what Garrett had been doing? The covers on the bed looked as though he had thrown them aside in frustration. Had his sleep been as fractured as hers? He was barefoot, the heavy army boots he wore tossed up against the chest, as they might be if he had shucked them off before going to bed. Had his wakefulness caused him to sit up in the dark, throw the covers aside and come to find her?

The questions faded as his kiss deepened. She didn’t hurry this time, even though she badly wanted to. She let the kiss extend and grow.

By the time Garrett let her go, she was breathless. Even her fingers throbbed.

Carmen reached for the buttons on his shirt. She wouldn’t hurry, yet she did want to touch his skin, to touch the warmth and softness once more.

She got three buttons undone, then he gripped her hand, halting her. He reached for the lantern.

“Don’t turn it off,” she said quickly. “I want to see you.”

He paused, his head toward the lantern, away from her. He let his hand drop. “No one has ever seen…me.” His voice was low.

Carmen’s mouth dropped open as she put it together. He’d never let anyone see his scars. If no one had seen them, had he blind-folded his lovers?

Then the secondary implication dropped into place.

He’d never had a lover. Not one, not since his family was murdered.

Carmen swallowed, pushing aside all her questions. Now was not the time. She held out her hand. “I want to see them. If you will let me.”

Garrett glanced at her. There was pain in his eyes. His jaw was tight.

“Show me,” she coaxed. “If I gag, you can shoot me. I’ll deserve it.”

His mouth twitched. Yet there was still an animal wariness in his eyes as he slowly unbuttoned the shirt. He watched for every little movement or reaction she made.

Carmen deliberately dropped her gaze from his face to the flesh that appeared. He pulled the shirt from his shoulders, dropped it to the ground and waited.

The scars were horrible. Carmen acknowledged that grim fact, then made herself look at them closely.

One large mark scored the side of his flat stomach, close to the left hip. It disappeared inside his jeans. The part she could see was a pink, crooked ridge of scar tissue, that zig-zagged across his flesh. Over his pectoral muscle on the right side was a white, mottled disk of flesh the same as the one on his face. The one on his face was smaller and all but invisible under the four day growth on his cheeks. There were more round scars on his belly, on his arms and shoulders. The pectoral one was the largest.

The scar that started at the base of his neck, that was always visible inside the open collar of his shirts, petered out just over the breastbone. It looked like someone had taken a cheese grater to the skin there.

Carmen swallowed. “There are some people who don’t qualify as human in this world.” She lifted her gaze back to his face.

“That’s not all of it,” Garrett said, his voice low. He turned his back to her.

Carmen caught her breath and tried to smother the sound. There were more white circles on his lower back. The flesh over his shoulders writhed with healed cuts and slashes. Some of them were an inch across and thick with scar tissue. Others were fine white lines. They laid over each other, a mishmash of lines.

Carmen didn’t need to ask what they had done to his back. She could see it in the way the scars laid over it. Someone had beaten him. She didn’t know what they had used. From the range of sizes and thicknesses, she could tell more than one implement had been wielded.

She drew closer. Gently, she touched one of the biggest scars.

Garrett flinched, then grew still again.

“The scar is just as warm as the rest of you,” she whispered. “I thought it would be cold. Dead flesh.” She stepped around him, to stand in front of him. “I can understand why you want to hide them.” She pushed up onto the balls of her feet and kissed him. “But if you don’t fuck me now, I will find Angelo and take care of business with him. I’m horny, Garrett. Stop teasing me and do something about it.” It was crude and challenging.

Garrett’s eyes narrowed and his scowl returned.

That’s better, Carmen thought, with satisfaction.

He moved fast. With a surge of power, he pulled her up against him with one strong arm behind her back. “Don’t tease unless you mean it,” he growled and kissed her. Hard.

She liked it hard. She liked any way Garrett kissed her. It made her body throb again.

He lifted her. Her shoes dropped from her feet. He lowered her onto the bed as he pushed the covers to the end of it. His mouth barely broke contact with hers. His leg tangled with hers and he leaned over her.

Carmen slid her arms around his neck and her fingers found puckered skin on the back of his shoulder. Curious, she traced the elongated scar and Garrett tore his mouth from hers and shuddered.

“Not good?” she asked quickly.

“Sensitive,” he said. His mouth picked up in a faint smile. “Good sensitive,” he added.

That gave her an idea. Carmen sat up, leaning on one elbow, which forced Garrett to sway backward. She pushed on his shoulder, forcing it even farther back, until he lay on the bed next to her.

“Stay there,” she commanded and flipped her knee over his hips, so she straddled him.

Garrett’s eyes narrowed. She saw his pulse, beating heavily at the base of his throat. He didn’t protest.

She licked the edge of his chin, tasting salt. The scrubby beard scraped against her tongue. Then she worked her lips down the underside of his chin, where the skin grew softer and the beard sparser, until she touched bare skin. She kissed her way down his throat. She felt his growl against her lips.

“Tell me to stop if you don’t like it,” she murmured, then deliberately ran her tongue over the pale, scarred flesh at the base of his throat.

He hissed, sucking in his breath between his teeth. His hips shifted beneath her thighs.

Smiling, Carmen pushed her knees farther back along the length of his thighs and rested upon him. She licked and stroked every single scar and the flesh in between, exploring the ridges and dips with her tongue and her lips.

Garrett squirmed, his chest rising and falling quickly. His breath grew ragged and from the corner of her eye, Carmen could see his hand fisted in the sheet, straining the cotton.

She moved backward, as she made her way down his long torso. His pelvis thrusted in reaction. She paused with her mouth over the button on his jeans. Then she got off the bed and looked down at him. “You’re wearing way too much clothing.”

She undressed him, taking her time. Then she studied him.

The scars were all over his body. His thighs had more of the same elongated ridges as his back carried and there were white disks everywhere. Not even the fine, delicate skin over his pelvis had been spared. The long, jagged scar on his left hip ended just above the pelvic ridge.

Garrett watched her, wariness adding more tension to his already taut body.

So, Carmen seduced him. She took her time, letting her fingers explore every little ridge and crease, as Garrett writhed beneath her, his breath harsh and loud.

She took him with languorous delight, riding him, until her pleasure tore away the pretense and she let her head roll back, blind to anything but the peak that gripped her.

Before she could recover, Garrett reared up off the bed. He gripped her waist and flipped her beneath him. He leaned over her, watching her, his gray eyes half-closed with pleasure.

Carmen tried to gain control of her breathing, for she panted heavily, but she couldn’t. She wriggled as she had made him writhe. She was just as helpless to stop.

“Tables turned,” he told her, his voice deep and rough.

This time, he drove her to the utter edge of oblivion, working his body against hers, measuring her responses and directing them. He controlled her pleasure, channeling it, until they climaxed together in hard, mutual waves.

As their hearts slowed, Garrett met her gaze. There was no animosity in his eyes, but a reserved expression shuttered them.

Carmen’s heart gave an extra hard jump. She knew what that reservation meant.

Garrett released her and moved onto the bed next to her. The bed was small enough they had to stay close together to fit, so he turned on his side. He trailed his fingers over her shoulder, making her nerves twitch.

The silence between them stretched onward. Carmen sought for something, anything to say, to break it. All the usual post-coital conversational subjects would be wildly inappropriate right now. Garrett wasn’t an average Saturday night date.

Garrett cleared his throat. “You said something about ‘next time’.”

“I did?” She frowned. “I don’t remember.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he said, indifferently. Yet his fingers stopped moving.

The halt of his hand alerted her. Carmen didn’t let herself stiffen or move. She didn’t look at him. Instead, using the most casual tone she could muster, she said. “Would you like a next time?”

He was silent for a long moment. Then his fingers stroked gently over the base of her throat. “Yes.”

“Okay, then.” She matched his soft tone.

After a moment, he laid down, his head pillowed on his arm. His hand came to rest on her arm. The silence settled between them again, only this time it held no tension. Carmen relaxed. A huge yawn caught at her.

“I should go.” She turned her head to check Garrett’s reaction.

His gaze was steady. “You don’t have to.”

She bit her lip.

“Stay, if you want,” he added.

“Are you sure?”

“I wouldn’t have said it if I wasn’t.” There was just enough of the sarcasm she was used to that she relaxed again.

She turned on her side. “A mattress. Luxury,” she murmured, sleep taking her fast.

She realized she had fallen asleep when she woke, startled by movement. A sheet and cover dropped over her and Garrett’s body settled behind her. His arm tucked over her waist and his hand slid under her breast.

Carmen stared at the ghostly moonlight coming in through the high window. What now? She wondered. What is Garrett thinking now?

Unlike any man she had ever met, she couldn’t fathom his motives, his desires. She never had. He had the upper hand.