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She turned away, not wanting him to see the pain in her eyes. Steeling herself against the feelings he stirred in her, she said, “You’ll have to forgive me, if I find your claim about missing me somewhat convenient.”
“Convenient?” he repeated, genuine puzzlement in his voice. “Just what is it you’re accusing me of?”
Having regained some measure of control over her emotions, Rachel turned around to face him again. “I’m not accusing you of anything,” she told him evenly. “I’m simply saying that after all this time without a word from you, you find yourself back in New Orleans and decide to look me up and tell me how much you’ve missed me.”
“It’s true.”
“Is it? Or maybe you thought it was a good line and you’d use it to talk your way back into my bed. After all, I was pretty accommodating the last time you were in town,” she said, unable to keep the bitterness from her voice. “So I guess I can understand why you might think I’d be interested in picking up things where we left off. And maybe I would be if—”
“Don’t,” he said the word softly, but there was no mistaking the steel behind the warning. She caught the icy glint of anger in those blue eyes. “I never used you, Rachel. Don’t cheapen yourself or me by pretending that I did.”
The truth of his statement shamed her. “You’re right, of course. You never used me, Mac. You didn’t have to. I allowed myself to be used.”
“Rachel.”
He reached for her, but Rachel stepped away. She turned her back to him, not wanting him to witness her shame. “You’ll have to forgive me. Having your lover tell you to forget him…to go find yourself a nice guy with a safe, nine-to-five job to fall in love with has a way of making a woman feel particularly stupid.” Hiking up her chin, she turned around to face him again. “But I’m a lot smarter than I used to be, Mac. Which brings us back to my question. Why are you here?”
“Because I didn’t follow my own advice.”
Rachel frowned. “What do you mean?”
He pinned her with hard blue eyes. “I mean I didn’t forget you. I haven’t been able to forget you—no matter how hard I’ve tried.”
Rachel blinked, caught off guard as much by his reply as by the dark heat behind it. Emotions surged through her like a storm. Pleasure. Hope. Fear. But it was the fear and the memory of all those long and lonely months when she’d prayed for Mac to contact her, to tell her he wanted to give their love a chance that kept her anchored now. She was no longer a naive woman who could be easily swept off her feet by the handsome Navy SEAL. She was a single mother with responsibilities. And she couldn’t afford to play emotional games with the likes of Mac McKenna.
“It’s true. There hasn’t been a single day in the past two years that I haven’t thought about you.”
Shaken, Rachel clutched the clipboard to her like a shield. “Why are you doing this?” she demanded, wanting to believe him, afraid to believe him. “What do you want?”
“You,” he said evenly. “I want you, Rachel.”
The breath stalled in her lungs. Rachel squeezed her eyes shut, striving to keep her emotions in check.
As the code came across the loudspeaker for her to report to the E.R., Rachel snapped her eyes open. “I have to go,” she told him, and started for the door suddenly glad for an excuse to escape. She needed time to think, time to figure out what she was going to do. The last thing she wanted was to read more into Mac’s words than he meant.
“What time do you get off?” he asked, following on her heels as she exited the employees’ lounge.
“Not until four o’clock.” She started toward the elevators with Mac matching her steps.
“I’ll pick you up.”
“No!” Rachel swallowed and, lowering her voice, said, “I…I have plans.”
He didn’t like it. She could see it in the set of his jaw, the way his eyes narrowed. “All right. When?”
“Tonight,” she said, praying Chloe would be able to watch P.J. for a few extra hours that evening. Mac followed her into the elevator and the doors slid shut, locking them in the confined space alone.
“What time?” he asked, looming over her so tall, so strong, so fierce. She’d almost forgotten how devastating Mac McKenna could be. No, that wasn’t true. She hadn’t forgotten. She’d simply tried her best to forget.
“Rach, what time?”
“Seven o’clock. Irene’s in the French Quarter?” she suggested and immediately kicked herself mentally for choosing the restaurant they had frequented as a couple.
“Irene’s is fine. I’ll pick you up at say six-thirty?”
The doors of the elevator slid open. “I’ll meet you there,” Rachel told him, and hurried out before he could object.
She wasn’t going to show, Mac conceded at half past eight that evening. He tossed back the last of his wine and motioned for the waiter.
“Another glass of merlot while you wait for your lady, Commander?”
“No thanks, Sergio,” Mac replied, still amazed that the man who’d been a fixture at the Italian eatery two years ago, when he and Rachel had frequented the place, actually remembered him.
“Then perhaps you will allow Sergio to bring you a small appetizer, just a little something to tide you over until the lady arrives.”
“Thanks. I appreciate the offer, but I’ll just take the check.”
“But your plans for dinner…” he objected.
“Are off. It doesn’t look like the lady’s going to make it.”
“Ah, a pity,” the older man said with a frown that formed a crease between his brows that extended to his receding hairline. He placed the black leather folio with the bill on top of the table. “I am sorry.”
“Yeah, me, too.” After a quick glance at the check, Mac dropped a twenty inside—enough to cover the cost of the two glasses of wine he’d nursed while waiting for Rachel and a generous tip for the disappointed Sergio.
“Thank you, Commander,” Sergio murmured as he picked up the folio. “You and your lady will come to Irene’s again soon and ask for Sergio, yes?”
“Sure,” Mac replied.
But don’t count on it, Mac added silently because he didn’t hold out a lot of hope that he would be dining with Rachel at Irene’s or anywhere else in the near future. Picking up his hat, Mac headed for the exit. Even if he hadn’t completely blown things by showing up out of the blue at the hospital today, the chances of Rachel wanting to share so much as a cup of coffee with him were slim at best. While she hadn’t thrown him out, she hadn’t exactly welcomed him with open arms, either. Her crack about his reasons for coming to see her had gnawed at him all day. Was that how she remembered him? As some sort of stud who had used and discarded her? The idea that she might believe such a thing filled him with self-disgust. If she did believe him so callous, she’d probably only agreed to meet him in the first place in order to get rid of him.
Not that he blamed her, Mac conceded as he stepped outside into the chilled night air. If whatever she’d once felt for him had been replaced with resentment, he supposed he deserved it. And probably a lot more. To say he’d handled things badly two years ago when he’d left was an understatement. He’d flat-out bungled it, he admitted. The truth was he hadn’t wanted to leave her, and that fact alone had left him scared spitless.
Lost in thought, he scarcely registered that the weather, unpredictable as always, had gone from a balmy breeze to a brisk November wind. Unfazed by the sharp bite of cold air that met him when he turned the corner, Mac walked down the dimly lit street. As a SEAL, he’d been trained to master his body’s reaction to swift temperature changes, be it Arctic winds or desert heat. What he hadn’t been trained for was this sense of…uselessness.
Picking up his pace, Mac continued determinedly, striding headfirst into the cold gusts that swept through the narrow French Quarter streets. He walked faster, needing to burn up some of the restlessness churning inside him—a restlessness that had begun long before the minefield explosion that had damaged his hearing and had only worsened since he’d been placed on medical leave. But as he walked the historic streets of the city, Mac’s thoughts kept turning to the last time he’d walked these same streets. It had been hot then. Hot and humid as only New Orleans in September could be. And he’d been with Rachel.
He cringed at the memory of her face when he’d told her he was leaving and that she should forget him. As long as he lived, he’d never be able to erase the image of her brave but tremulous smile, of seeing the light go out of her eyes. He’d handled the situation with all the finesse of a bull in a china shop. The fact that he’d been in over his head and had been shaken by how important she had become to him, to where those feelings for her would lead him, didn’t excuse his actions.
Nor did it excuse the fact that he’d hurt her. Deeply, he suspected—despite the fact that there had been no tears, no accusations, no pleas for him to change his mind. But he’d known he had hurt her just the same. He’d seen the hurt in those sad gray eyes when he’d told her a clean break was best. He’d heard the hurt in her voice when she’d told him that she understood. And he’d tasted the hurt when she’d kissed him goodbye and wished him well.
And now here he was more than two years later showing up to ask her…
To ask her what, McKenna? To give you a second chance?
Hell, he didn’t know what he wanted to ask her or even how much he wanted to tell her. Maybe it was just as well that she had stood him up tonight. He would have probably made a fool of himself if she had come. His thoughts turned inward, Mac barely noticed the sidewalk musicians as he crossed the street and continued down to the next block. As a SEAL he hadn’t been able to offer Rachel any future. No way would he have asked her to commit herself to him knowing that the very nature of his job meant he might not make it back from one mission to the next. He’d learned firsthand the damage that kind of selfishness could cause. But now…
Now what, McKenna? What kind of future could he offer her now? Why should Rachel settle for a man who was damaged goods. Not even the SEALs wanted him anymore.
Anger and frustration stormed inside him as he recalled the conversation with his captain three days ago….
“Damn it, Mac, this sucks. But you know as well as I do that a SEAL’s got to be physically 100 percent. Loss of hearing, even in just one ear…” Captain Mike Rossi rammed a fist through his hair. He looked Mac square in the eye. “I’m sorry, kid. I really am. But I can’t risk the safety of the rest of the team.”
Standing at attention, his back ramrod straight, Mac felt as though he’d just been plowed down by a tank. It didn’t matter that he’d known it was coming. He’d expected to be cut loose from the team for nearly two months now, ever since the explosion in the raid on that embassy had left the hearing in his right ear diminished. Yet even anticipating the inevitable didn’t lessen the impact of the blow when it came. “I understand, Captain.”
“You’ve got a lot of leave coming. Take it, Mac. Go to New Orleans. Talk to the specialists at the base hospital there. I understand they’re doing some great things. Find out all you can about that new surgical procedure and then decide if it’s worth the risk or not.”
“I’ve already decided to have the surgery, sir.”
The captain frowned. “You should check it out first. Weigh all the risks before you make any decision. Forty percent hearing is better than none.”
“Forty percent isn’t good enough to be a SEAL, sir.”
“Being a SEAL isn’t everything.”
“It is for me, sir.” Which was the truth. For him being a SEAL wasn’t just what he was or did, it was who he was. And if he could no longer be a SEAL, he was…he was no one.
The captain’s frown deepened. “This isn’t something you should make a snap decision about, Mac.”
“I know. And I’ve given it a lot of thought, Captain. I want to have the surgery.”
“Check it out first, SEAL. That’s an order. Afterward if you still want to go through with it, it’s your choice. But if I were you, I’d think long and hard before I make any decision. And while you’re thinking, it wouldn’t hurt to look up that lady friend of yours who lives there and maybe see how she feels about it.”
Mac had hoped that the captain’s failure to comment on him getting dog-faced when he’d broken things off with Rachel two years ago and his lack of interest in any woman since had gone unnoticed. He should have realized that Eagle Eye Mike Rossi never missed a thing when it came to the members of his SEAL team. “I…we ended things the last time I was in New Orleans. Things weren’t that serious between us.” Or rather Mac had decided to end things because they were getting too serious, he admitted in silence.
Rossi gave him a knowing look. “Too bad. It might make a difference in your decision if she were still in the picture.”
Rachel wasn’t in the picture anymore, Mac reminded himself. Yet, here he was anyway because he hadn’t been able to stay away from her. Just as he hadn’t been able to forget her, regardless of how many missions he went on or how many willing women he could have had in his bed since he’d left her.
And now that he’d seen her again, he was no closer to banishing Rachel from his thoughts than he had been when he’d walked out of her life two years ago. If anything, he wanted her even more.
So what are you going to do about it?
Dammit, he was still a SEAL, Mac reminded himself. A member of the U.S. military’s fiercest, bravest and smartest band of warriors. A SEAL didn’t walk away from a battle because the odds were stacked against him. A SEAL found a way to even the odds and win.
“Hey, sailor,” a sidewalk barker standing outside one of the nightclubs called out in that unmistakable drawl that marked him as a New Orleanian. Opening the door a fraction, the giant of a man offered Mac a glimpse of a long-limbed woman dancing onstage to the seductive wail of a sax. “Why don’t you come on in out of the cold, my man? Lovely Lola’s next show is about to start any minute. You have my word,” he said with a smile that glinted with gold. “Lola’s act will warm you right up and make you glad you’re a man.”
“Thanks, pal,” Mac said with an answering grin. “But there’s another lady I’ve got to see.”
Rachel didn’t see him at first—not until after she had climbed the stairs and deactivated the alarm to the house. Bone tired from a day that had started with the shock of Mac showing up at the hospital and ended with her pulling an extra stint in the E.R., she’d driven home on automatic pilot. Tomorrow she would worry about Mac, she promised herself. Tomorrow she would sort out how she felt about the things he’d said to her, and she would figure out how to break the news to him about P.J.
But right now…right now all she wanted to do was crawl into her bed and sleep. Stifling a yawn, she reached into her purse for the house key when a movement from the far end of the veranda caught her eye.
Rachel froze. The weariness of a moment ago dissolved in a heartbeat. Fear-induced adrenaline took its place. Suddenly she realized how vulnerable she was, standing alone in the darkness, illuminated by the glow of the porch lamp Chloe had left on for her. Since it was long past midnight, the street was quiet save for the wind whistling through the oaks. No lights burned in her neighbor’s homes. No cars made their way down the silent street. She was alone and even if she screamed for help, no one was likely to come to her aid in time.
Quickly she gauged her chances of getting the door unlocked and safely inside before he realized she’d spotted him. She couldn’t risk it, she decided. Not with P.J. asleep in the house. Seconds ticked by in which fear knotted like an icy fist in her stomach. She tried to recall the techniques she’d learned in that self-defense class and drew a blank.
She had to do something! Beads of perspiration dampened her brow despite the cold temperatures. Fighting back the panic that threatened, she told herself to think. Then she remembered—the mace! She had a can of mace in her purse. Her heart thundering in her ears, Rachel closed her fingers around the metal cylinder. “Who’s there?” she demanded in a voice that sounded surprisingly strong given the fact that her legs felt like jelly.
Keeping her eyes trained on the corner where she’d detected the movement, Rachel lifted the can like a gun and aimed. “I know you’re there. So you might as well come out.”
Suddenly a hand shot out from behind her, disarming her so quickly that her finger was still poised to shoot. At the same time another hand clamped over her mouth midscream, and she felt herself being pulled back against a very hard, very strong, very male body.
“Rach, it’s me.”
With the metallic taste of fear in her mouth and her heart beating frantically, his words failed to register. She kicked at his legs. She jabbed her elbow into his midsection. Panicked, she wished for a pair of killer stilettos as she lifted her foot and did a karate-style back kick to his shin. She barely heard her captor’s grunt as stars exploded in front of her eyes and pain ricocheted up her leg.
“Rach, cut it out! It’s me,” he repeated. “It’s Mac.”
Rachel stilled. “Mac?” she mumbled the name against the hand covering her mouth.
“Yeah,” he told her as he removed his hand from over her mouth.
Suddenly weak with relief, Rachel whooshed out a breath. It was Mac. Not a mugger. Not a burglar. It was Mac. And, she realized in the next breath, it was Mac who had just scared her silly.
Slowly he loosened the arm anchored around her waist. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
Relief swiftly gave way to anger, and Rachel whirled around to face him. “Frighten me? You scared me half to death,” she accused, her voice shaking with fury. “What are you doing here slinking around in the dark? And how did you find out where I live?”
“I wasn’t slinking around. I was waiting for you. Since you never made it to the restaurant, I came by hoping we could talk. And as for finding out where you live, I’m a SEAL, Rach,” he said crisply. “Finding you wasn’t hard.”
Her breath was still coming fast, but already the edge of her anger was cooling. “I-I’m sorry about dinner. But you still should have said something. You should have at least let me know you were there.”
“I started to, but when I saw how tired you looked, I decided tonight wasn’t a good time. I was waiting to make sure you got inside safely before I left. Then I was going to call you in the morning and see about rescheduling our date.”
“It wasn’t a date,” Rachel corrected. “It was dinner between…between acquaintances.”
Mac snorted. “We were a bit more than acquaintances.”
Deciding it best to ignore that remark, Rachel explained, “I got tied up at the hospital. That’s why I didn’t meet you at the restaurant. There was an accident. A bus filled with high school kids on their way to a football game was rear-ended by an eighteen-wheeler.”
“I heard. Was it bad?”
“Not really. Mostly bumps and bruises. A few stitches, a couple of sprains and one broken ankle.” Suddenly, standing alone in the dim porch light with Mac felt too intimate. It reminded Rachel of other nights when they had stood in the moonlight and she’d recounted the events of her day for him. Slamming the door shut on her memories, she tucked her hands into the pockets of her coat. “Anyway, by the time I got a break and was able to call the restaurant, you’d already left. I didn’t know how else to contact you.”
“It’s all right,” Mac told her, the ghost of a smile on his lips. He ran his thumb along her jaw in a gesture that was tender, loving…like the look in his eyes.
No, she wouldn’t do that to herself again, Rachel vowed, and turned her face away from his touch. But not before she caught the flare of emotion in his eyes. For a second she almost believed that she had hurt Mac. Just as quickly, Rachel dismissed the notion. More likely she’d been right earlier today, and she had simply dashed Mac’s hopes for a quick reunion while he was in town. Swallowing hard, she reminded herself of what a mistake their relationship had been the first time. It was a mistake she had no intention of repeating. “All the same I’m sorry about standing you up.”
“Quit apologizing, Rachel. Your roommate already explained about the flu hitting the hospital’s staff and how you had to pull an extra shift in the E.R.”
“My roommate?”
“Chloe.”
Rachel sucked in a breath. “You talked to Chloe?”
“Yeah. When I came over to find out why you didn’t show up at the restaurant, she answered the door and told me what happened.”
