Twenty-nine

Annie knew Dan was furious. What she didn’t know was whether he was angry with her. Did he blame her for the man getting a picture of him? She didn’t know why it was so horrible that he had done so; she just knew that it was. Actually, from the look on his face, it wasn’t just horrible; it was catastrophic. And they both knew that if he hadn’t come to her aid, none of this would have happened. Whatever had forced him into hiding had obviously been serious, and by helping her, he’d revealed himself.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

He shook his head, seeming to take away some of the anger with the movement. “It’s not your fault.” He reached out to take her hand. “Come on. We should get out of here, and I think we could both use a drink.”

That might be the biggest understatement of the week—which was saying something.

They walked quickly back into town. As he didn’t seem the hand-holding type, she was surprised when he didn’t release hers. Instead he wrapped it in his big palm and tucked it in his Baja sweatshirt pocket as if he wanted to keep her close.

Which was fine by her.

Though small by American standards, Oban was a decent-sized town in the Highlands. The harbor was at the center, and most of the businesses hugged a half mile or so semicircle of coastline with the ferry terminal to one side. There were a number of restaurants and hotels right along the waterfront, including the fancy-looking one that they went into.

“I thought we were on a budget,” she said after they walked by the imposing-looking doorman into a large reception hall that seemed to be wall-to-wall marble. Not the new and shiny kind, but the old and stately.

One corner of his mouth lifted. “I figured we could both use a few creature comforts, and I’ll have access to more funds in Glasgow.”

She would have asked about that, but the attractive woman behind the desk asked Dan if they were checking in. He smiled, obviously going into his charming mode again, which he was definitely better at than Annie would have anticipated. Although when a guy was that built and good-looking, he could pretty much smile and that would be enough.

He explained that he and his girlfriend—as she’d been downgraded from a wife, Annie guessed they must not be as traditional in Oban as they were on Tiree—had been caught unexpectedly in town and didn’t have a reservation.

“You must have been booked on the train to Glasgow,” the woman said with a smile. “You aren’t the first unexpected guests we’ve had tonight. It’s not a problem. We aren’t fully booked. One or two rooms?”

She looked at Dan as she asked, but her gaze slid over to Annie for a second—or maybe passed over Annie for a second was more accurate. Clearly she wasn’t impressed and thought he could do better—i.e., herself.

The woman was in her early twenties, but doing everything she could to look older with thick foundation, heavy eye makeup, and bright red lipstick. Her long hair was pulled back in a bun, but very heavy, long, dark bangs contrasted dramatically with her pale Scottish skin and light blue eyes.

Compared to how done up the woman was, Annie looked as if she’d been camping for a week. All right, she wasn’t exactly looking her best, but what part of “girlfriend” did the woman not understand?

“One room will be fine,” Annie said maybe a tad snippily, before Dan could respond.

He gave her a questioning look, which she didn’t answer. But he wasn’t that slow on the uptake. He figured it out and grinned. If the woman hadn’t been watching, Annie would have elbowed him in the gut.

He made it a little better by sliding his arm around her waist, tugging her in tight against him, and pressing a kiss on her head. The feel of his body against hers was still too new not to cause all kinds of tingly reactions.

The woman quoted a price that seemed outrageous for one night, but he paid in twenty-pound notes and she handed over the key—an actual key, not a key card—with a big wooden placard attached that Annie suspected made it difficult to walk off with. The room was on the second floor, which in Brit-speak Annie knew meant the third.

The elevator barely fit the both of them. Clearly these places hadn’t been built with guys sized like him in mind. His shoulders almost spanned the width. He took advantage of the closeness to drag her in against him again. “You don’t have any reason to be jealous.”

The tinge of amusement in his voice made her feel again like elbowing him.

She might have if he hadn’t added, “I haven’t looked at another woman since you landed in my lap.”

Okay, maybe she’d melt instead. She looked up at him, and their eyes met. “Really?”

He shook his head. “Have you taken a look in the mirror lately, Doc? You’re pretty hot.”

Usually a superficial comment like that would be an instant turnoff, but instead it made her obnoxiously happy. He was bringing out all kinds of weird reactions in her. She couldn’t ever recall being jealous before or needing reassurance about her looks. She’d arrived in Scotland a confident, self-possessed, newly minted PhD (admittedly with horrible taste in men), and he’d time-warped her back to high school as a moody teenager in constant need of reassurance. She’d lived through Mean Girls once; she didn’t need to do it again.

“Yeah, well, you’re a little too hot, so you can probably ease up on the smiles and go back to Mr. Stern and No Bullshit. Or grow back the mountain man beard.”

They’d arrived at the door by then, and he just looked at her and laughed. “I’ll remember that. But some women like the beard.”

There was something a little too wicked twinkling in his eye, and she decided she’d better not follow up on that one. It might make her angry—or curious. She couldn’t decide which was worse.

He flipped on the lights, and she sighed so deeply it sounded almost like a moan. The bathroom was enormous and fitted with a huge jetted tub. On rare occasions she enjoyed baths, and this was definitely going to be one of them. She might never get out.

But then she wouldn’t be able to put on the plush robe and slippers. Or use the fancy British Molton Brown toiletries.

“It’s all yours,” he said, obviously noticing her reaction. “I have to make a call.” He paused, giving her a long look. “You doing okay? I won’t go if you don’t want to be alone right now.”

She shook her head. “I’m fine.” Surprisingly she was. The numbness and coldness had faded to be replaced by . . . nothing. She actually felt a little guilty for not feeling horrible and falling to pieces. Wasn’t that what most people—especially women—did in books and movies?

She wasn’t making a feminist statement—although that did drive her nuts—nor was it that she didn’t value human life. She just valued his more. There had been a threat, and she took care of it. There was nothing else she could have done. If she hadn’t acted, he would have been killed. It was as simple as that.

Maybe she had more of her father in her than she wanted to acknowledge. For the first time in a long while, that thought didn’t make her sad. She had him to thank for that.

“Make your call, Tex.” She couldn’t call him Dan anymore. It felt too weird now that she knew that wasn’t his real name. “And you can bring me back that drink you promised. But no whiskey—with or without the e.”

He nodded, smiling at the reference to the Scot spelling of whiskey without the e that they were very particular about. “I remember.” He grimaced. “I have a feeling after this call that I’m going to need it more than you.”

•   •   •

The phone only rang one time before it was answered. No passwords this time. “Where the fuck have you been? I’ve been trying to call you for hours.”

“Busy,” Dean said. The LC might be his commander, but he’d been doing this too long to let him tear him a new asshole—even when it might be deserved. “I had to leave Tiree unexpectedly.”

He could almost hear Taylor narrowing his eyes and giving him the scowl of death through the cell towers. “What do you mean, ‘unexpectedly’?”

Dean filled him in on the two professionals on the beach, the boat ride to Coll, the ferry to Oban, and the attack near the train station. He didn’t get halfway through before the LC started letting off a string of curses that would do Miggy, who swore every other word, proud. As Taylor didn’t usually curse, it was even more impressive.

Dean wondered what the hell Ruiz was up to. But the LC had insisted that none of the guys know where the other survivors had gone. Taylor was the only one who could reach them. Dean understood operational security, but he didn’t always like it. They were used to working in teams; this solo bullshit sucked. It felt as if he’d lost the entire platoon. Dealing with eight deaths was bad enough. All seven of Lieutenant White’s squad and the kid. Brian. The death that was on him.

Although Annie had filled in well enough earlier. He still couldn’t believe that shot she’d made—or how cool and calm she’d been afterward. Weren’t women supposed to fall apart at things like that?

Okay, so maybe that was a little sexist.

Shit, she was already getting to him. Pretty soon, he’d be quoting Gloria Steinem and buying his future daughters GI Joes and Power Rangers rather than Barbies. Or maybe he’d buy them both and let them choose.

Fuck. He was losing his damned mind. Most little girls liked pink and Barbies, and most little boys liked trains and trucks. What was wrong with that?

Nothing. He could almost hear her voice. But what about the kids who don’t?

Shit, shit, double shit. He didn’t want to be evolved. He was fine primordial. He liked primordial. Liberals were too serious and uptight—they couldn’t joke about anything. Everyone had to be “the same.” But no matter how much you leveled the playing field, equal opportunity wasn’t going to bring equal results. Some people were smarter, some people worked harder, and some people were just fucking luckier. Dean hadn’t gotten a hall pass. He’d pulled himself out of a shit hole; why couldn’t other people be expected to do the same?

Life wasn’t fair, and you couldn’t make it so. Kids died of cancer. One kid is born in Africa to a life of starvation while another is born in England a prince. He didn’t understand why so many people fought against that incontrovertible fact. You had to play the hand life dealt you.

The LC paused his litany of swearing long enough for Dean to tell him the worst of it. “That isn’t all.”

“What? Do you have more dead bodies to tell me about? Five this week isn’t enough?”

“Five?”

“I’ll tell you in a minute. First you tell me what else I need to worry about.”

“They got a picture of me.”

The silence that followed was worse than he had anticipated. Dean had been a SEAL for twelve years, chief for three—senior the last year of that—and had been downrange on some of the most high-risk, no-fail missions in the world since 9/11, and he still felt like squirming. He’d blown it. Big-time.

“It wasn’t very good,” he added. “The cell phone was crap and it was taken from a distance, but if they hack into the right database, good facial recognition might be able to make a match.”

Finding pictures of active SEALs wasn’t easy, but Dean didn’t fool himself that someone who was determined—or lucky—might not be able to find something. He was careful about photos, but they existed.

“You got to be fucking kidding me.”

As that was rhetorical, Dean didn’t respond other than to apologize.

“It’s a little fucking late for that now. I can’t believe you fucked up like this. Dynomite, Miggy, Dolph, Jim Bob—especially Jim Bob,” he said, referring to Travis Hart. “I can see one of them doing this but not you. You don’t act stupid over women.”

Well, apparently he did. Annie was different, and Dean suspected he could act plenty stupid when it came to her.

“I hope to hell she was worth it, because you just put all of us on the clock,” the LC finished angrily.

“She was,” Dean said without hesitation. “Is.”

He’d finally succeeded in shutting the LC up. He didn’t say anything for a long minute. “I’m sorry to hear that,” the LC said.

“Why?”

“Because you have to cut her loose and get the hell out of there. Now.”

Dean’s reaction was visceral. He rejected it with every bone in his body. The hand holding the phone tightened to stone. “I told you I wouldn’t do that until she’s safe.”

“She’s safe.”

“How can you say that after what I just told you? There were two guys after her—two professionals. Jean Paul must have hired them to shut her up.”

“Well, he won’t be hiring any more men. That’s what I was calling to tell you. I heard from Kate. You and your girlfriend are in the clear. The Stornoway police still want to talk to her, but she isn’t a suspect. Kate gave them enough information to point them in the right direction and away from you. They think you are CIA working covertly over here, which they aren’t happy about, but Kate got it all worked out. They were suspicious of Jean Paul already. His story started to fall apart as soon as they started questioning him, and the doctors were able to examine his ‘injuries,’ which appeared to be mostly self-inflicted. He fled the hospital before they could arrest him.”

Dean hoped the LC hadn’t heard his sigh of relief. “Then Annie is still in danger if he’s out there.”

“She might have been, but in a spark of divine intervention, Jean Paul was hit by a car a couple blocks from the hospital. A tourist got confused, turned onto the wrong side of the road, and plowed into him as he crossed the street. The officer said the woman was beside herself with guilt until they told her he was wanted for murder.”

In other words she’d done them a favor.

“Oh,” Dean said. What else could he say? “That’s great.”

Of course it was. He and Annie could go their own ways. That was what he wanted, wasn’t it?

“So you see, she’s safe and doesn’t need a protector anymore. You can cut her loose with a clear conscience.” When Dean didn’t respond, he added, “And if it makes it any easier, that’s an order.”

It didn’t. Maybe it should, but it didn’t.

“Maybe if we get really lucky,” Scott continued, “Jean Paul’s phone was destroyed in the accident and the text with your picture never arrived. Give me the number, and I’ll have Kate check it out.”

Dean repeated the number he’d memorized. He’d pull out the SIM cards, destroy the phones, and toss everything in different trash bins before going back to the room to say . . . what? Good-bye? Nice knowing you?

Fuck.

“Where are you going?” the LC asked.

“I have someone in Glasgow who can get me a new ID.” They all had contacts. People who didn’t ask questions and didn’t care what his name was as long as he could pay. “Then fuck if I know. But Russian subs in the North Sea is a dead end.”

“I’m beginning to agree with you. Hang tight when you get to Glasgow, and we’ll figure something out.”

“You better figure all of this out soon, Ace,” Dean said, with a rare use of his code name. “I’m not going to live a secret life forever.”

Dean could hear the surprise in the LC’s voice. “Damn, this girl really got to you, didn’t she?”

She did. But there wasn’t a damned thing Dean could do about it. Annie was the first woman he’d ever wanted a relationship with, but he was going to have to let her go.

•   •   •

Annie was lounging on the bed in her comfy robe and slippers when “Dan” came back into the room. Her hair was still damp, and her skin had been rubbed with almost the entire bottle of lotion.

Right away, she could tell that something was wrong. He hadn’t brought her back that drink he’d promised, and his expression was grim—even for him. He’d stopped at the end of the short hall that led from the door and stood there just staring at her.

“Who died?” she said half jestingly, getting up from the edge of the bed where she’d been sitting.

“Jean Paul.”

Her eyes widened with shock. A moment later the relief came. “What? How? That’s wonderful. I probably shouldn’t say that, but after what he did to Julien and Claude, I’m not going to pretend otherwise.” She stopped, tilting her head to look at him. “Why aren’t you happier?” Suddenly an explanation occurred to her and she blanched. “Oh God, did they find them already?”

Were there police swirling all over the beach trying to find out who had killed the two men and then tried to dispose of them in the ocean?

He shook his head. “No, no, it’s nothing like that.” He explained what had happened to Jean Paul and how Dan’s contact had cleared everything up with the police.

“This must be a pretty powerful contact.”

He shrugged, not taking the bait. “I think the police were already figuring it out on their own. They’ll want to talk to you, but you are in the clear. You are safe.”

He held her gaze as if trying to tell her something. She drew in a breath that singed her lungs. She knew what this was about. “You’re leaving,” she said softly.

He nodded.

She shouldn’t be surprised. She’d known this was coming. He’d been clear with her from the beginning that he was going to leave, but there was still a small part of her that thought—hoped—it wouldn’t come to this. That maybe he would change his mind. That maybe this didn’t have to be the end.

All she could do was stare at him, silently begging him not to do this.

But it was like looking into a wall of granite. Eventually she lowered her gaze. “All right.”

But it wasn’t all right at all.

He must have heard the disappointment in her voice and reacted. “What the fuck else do you want from me, Annie? I told you how it had to be.”

She suspected it was defensiveness rather than anger, but that didn’t make his crude retort sting any less. He had told her, but that was before this . . . before them. Didn’t he feel what was happening here?

“I know what you said, but are you so sure that is how it has to be? I know you are hiding from something, and I know it’s serious, but there must be a way to help. My stepfather is an important man with all kinds of connections—maybe he can do something. If you just tell me what kind of trouble you are in—”

He didn’t let her finish. He took her by the arm and forced her to meet his angry gaze. “There is nothing you can do, and there is nothing your stepfather can do—no matter who he is or who he knows.”

“You don’t know that. I know you aren’t a criminal. The best I can figure is that you are either CIA or—” She stopped and looked at him. “You aren’t former military, are you?” Her heart fell. Oh God. He was still in the military. “That’s it, isn’t it? You are on some kind of covert op and I got in the middle of it, didn’t I?”

His expression was almost too still. He released her arm. “You read too many spy novels. You are way off base.”

“No, I suspect you are the one off base—the base.”

She knew enough about Special Operations to know that men didn’t typically work on their own. Was he some kind of black ops?

It didn’t feel right with what she knew of him. But despite his stoic facade and refusal to address her suspicions, she suspected she was on the right track.

“Think what you want,” he said with too much indifference. “It doesn’t change the fact that I have to go, and you have to forget about me.”

If what she suspected was true, and he was still a SEAL, he was right. She should be the one running for the door.

But she couldn’t do that. Instead she took a few steps toward him. He might be everything she thought she didn’t want, but apparently her heart hadn’t gotten the message. Somewhere along the line Mr. Not Going to Happen had become Mr. Feels Really Right. She couldn’t lose him—not without a fight.

He was still standing only partially in the room, almost as if he didn’t want to come too close. She could see his muscles draw tight and rigid as she neared. His hands were balled into fists at his side; his nostrils flared as he probably caught a whiff of the lotion she’d doused herself with. His eyes burned hot as he watched her. With anger, but with something else also.

Lust. Desire. Electricity. Whatever that powerful connection was burning between them, it was flaring in full force.

He was trying to fight it, trying to ignore what was between them, but she wasn’t going to let him off that easily. If he was going to walk away, she was going to make damned sure he understood exactly what he was walking away from.

“What if I can’t do that?” she asked softly. She took a deep, nervous breath, her heart beating tightly in her chest. “What if I think I’m falling in love with you?”

There. She’d said it. She’d put words to the feelings that neither of them wanted to acknowledge.

The silence was deafening, his utter lack of reaction stinging.

Her cheeks were on fire, but she wouldn’t let herself feel humiliated. She wasn’t going to let him walk away and wonder “what if?” She was going to put it out there. Put herself out there.

“What happened to casual?” he snapped angrily.

Her heart flinched. But anger was good, right? If he didn’t care, he wouldn’t be mad. He’d be uncomfortable. Embarrassed. Feel sorry for her. But not angry.

She was standing under him now. Close enough to put her hand on the flat of his chest and look up at the day-old gold-flecked dark stubble on his chin. Would she ever get used to the power and size of him? “It has never been casual for me. From the first time you touched me, I knew you were different. And I don’t think it’s ever been casual for you, either. Can you honestly say that you don’t feel anything for me?” His lack of response coupled with the frantic beat of his heart under her hand emboldened her. “I think you care about me, too. I think you want this just as much as I do.”

He gritted his teeth, wrapped his hand around her wrist, and pulled it from his chest to her side. It was harsh but not hurtful. He knew his strength. He was in control even when furious. Even when she was forcing him to acknowledge something he didn’t want to acknowledge. Something he might not be able to walk away from so easily.

“I think you’ve confused good sex with something else. We barely know each other. You’re a nice girl, Annie, but . . .”

Ouch. She stepped back. If he was trying to push her away, he was doing a fantastic job. She felt skewered. Her already shaky confidence faltered.

But he was lying—purposefully downplaying his feelings—to make a clean break of it . . . wasn’t he? Or had she been wrong? Had she imbued him with feelings that were only one-sided?

She lifted her chin to meet his gaze. She would know from looking into his eyes, right? “So that’s it? After everything we’ve been through, you are just going to walk away? Leave and never look back? It was nice knowing you—is that it?”

She’d never seen his face look so dark. He was almost shaking as he yelled at her. “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m going to do, damn it.”

He meant it. She could see the truth in his gaze, and she felt a stab of finality plunge through her heart.

Her eyes were hot, her throat burning and tight as she turned around. “Okay. If that’s what you have to do, go—” Her voice broke. “Please just go.”

She’d done everything she could do, but she couldn’t fight for them both. He had to want to make it work, too. She’d told him her feelings, and it hadn’t changed anything. He was determined to go through with this, whether he cared for her or not.

She hoped it wasn’t not, but it certainly felt that way right now.

What had she expected? Him to pull her in his arms, and tell her he was falling in love with her, too, and they would find a way to work it out together?

She bit her lip. Maybe a little.

Okay, maybe a lot. No matter how unrealistic that might have been.

She’d tried, but he’d shot her down.

She just wished it didn’t have to hurt so much.

She steeled herself for the slam of the door that would bring an end to it. Whatever “it” might have been.