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“Is it? You haven’t had your coffee yet, Major Houston, so I know better than to engage you in polite social conversation.”
His boyish grin broadened in embarrassment. He saw Morgan frown and look first at Ann and then at him.
Houston nodded. “Yeah, you’re right, Doc. I’m just an old, snarly jaguar before I get my espresso. I’ll be in shortly. A good fairy all but made my java for me and it’ll be ready pronto.” He winked at her. “I owe you, Ann….”
“Take your time, Mike,” Morgan murmured with a forgiving look. He lifted a heavy white mug from the coffee table and took a sip. “Today we’re not in a hurry.”
Mike saw Ann’s eyes sparkle mischievously even though her face had a deadpan expression. As he stepped back into the kitchen, he remembered the blush that had spread across her long, sloping cheekbones when he’d winked at her. She always reacted to his playful charm with some discomfort. He wondered why and lamented once more that Ann had never opened up to him about her past or why she couldn’t fully embrace him now. Her kisses said one thing, the fear he saw in her eyes quite another.
Damn, but the woman was pretty. Did she realize she held his heart in her hands? Did she want today to be goodbye? He’d dreamed torrid dreams of loving her completely. The closest they had come to that was the day they had shared a picnic down at the creek. He’d accurately read her desire that time, and when he’d kissed her, she’d asked him to touch her intimately, to explore her with his hands.
In the molten heat of the moment, as he’d stretched out on the blanket beside her, she’d frozen. Mike had sat up, for he had no desire to push himself on her. She had apologized and quickly pulled her blouse back over her shoulders, before getting up and hurrying away. Her face had been flushed and he could tell she was embarrassed by her behavior.
It was so frustrating! Everything about their relationship was on again, off again. She wanted him. She was afraid of him. Or maybe she was afraid of herself? Mike pondered that angle as he waited for his espresso to brew.
Ann was a type A personality who didn’t know how to rest or relax. She had to be doing something every single minute of her day. In his book, people like that were running away from something. So what was Ann running from? Sighing audibly, Mike scowled. If only she’d lower those walls she held around herself and talk to him. If only…
The aromatic odor of the espresso drifted toward him as he stood expectantly over the machine. Ann had often made a wry face at his need to drink only black, thick espresso, but hell, in South America it was the drink of choice, besides maté, Argentina’s national drink. He’d been raised on espresso since he was a small kid, following his mother into the kitchen as she made her own cup each morning.
Picking up the note with his scarred fingers, he shook his head. He couldn’t figure Ann out. Most of the time around the ranch she pointedly ignored him. His job was to run patrols and keep Morgan and Laura safe from possible drug-cartel attacks while they holed up and tried to heal from the kidnapping ordeal that had torn their lives apart, quite literally, at the seams. Ann had come because she was a qualified psychiatrist and Laura’s state had been rocky and unstable at first.
Mike ran his fingers across the ink on the note. Since she’d been staying at the hideaway cabin on Oak Creek with her husband, Laura spent an hour in therapy every day with Dr. Parsons, and Mike wasn’t surprised that Ann had helped Laura Trayhern tremendously. God knew, he wanted to feel the effects of Ann’s undivided attention on him. Grinning darkly, he told himself that he’d change, too, if given the chance to be the center of her focus. But thus far, Ann evaded him whenever possible. So why did she obviously enjoy his kisses so much when he eased her into his arms? He could feel all her walls melt away as they kissed.
Was Ann prejudiced against his skin color—the fact that he wasn’t a pure white, Anglo male with all the trimmings? Perhaps she couldn’t bring herself to admit it to herself, much less him? Questions, so many damn, unanswered questions. And today was the last day he’d ever see Ann. His heart squeezed with pain. With need.
As he poured the espresso into a small, delicate white cup with his large hands, he sighed in frustration, mentally preparing himself to shift gears and talk business with Morgan Trayhern. At least Ann would be in the same room with him and he’d get one last moment with her. He felt like a man being sent to the gallows and having his last wish fulfilled, but hell, there was no love life for him where he was heading. None at all. The only thing waiting for him was a bullet or a machete with his name on it. No, Peru was his hell. Whatever small piece of heaven he’d been afforded had died years earlier, and Houston knew that with his karmic track record—the many men he’d killed over the years—heaven wasn’t about to grant him a second chance at anything. With a careless grin, he shrugged his shoulders as if throwing off the grief and chains of the past, and headed toward the living room.
Chapter 2
Mike sauntered into the living room after taking his first, rejuvenating sip of the dark, fragrant liquid. He chose a leather wing chair opposite Morgan, in front of a coffee table littered with magazines. Ann was holding her own cup of coffee between her hands, standing with her back to the snapping, roaring fire. She refused to look him in the eye, some of the flush still lingering on her cheeks.
“I overslept,” Mike growled in Morgan’s direction, studying his boss’s somber features. The man who had hired him was internationally famous. Morgan headed up Perseus, a high-tech mercenary operation consisting of men and women, mostly from the military, who were hired to perform dangerous missions around the world. Though Perseus was privately owned by Morgan, there wasn’t a government in the democratic world that didn’t hire his renowned services. Like Morgan, whose honesty and strong military background kept this clandestine ship of state running smoothly, his people were the best at what they did. Most people, when they heard the word mercenary, thought of a turncoat bastard who had no allegiance except to the bottom line: money. Not so at Perseus. Trayhern’s reputation for integrity was well-known by almost every government in the world. He and his team were revered for coming to the aid of those who were in trouble and, for whatever reason, were without their country’s legal or political protection.
Because Trayhern had been wronged by his own country, had been labeled a traitor and been in hiding for nearly half his life before his name was cleared with the help of his wife, he knew the disastrous results of not being able to reach out to some powerful entity for help.
As Mike leaned back and relished each sip of his espresso, he noticed once again the white scar that ran from Morgan’s left temple all the way down his recently shaved cheek to his jaw, a mute testimony of his surviving on a hill in the closing days of the Vietnam War. There, he’d been a captain in the Marine Corps, and responsible for a company of men that had been wiped out and overrun by the enemy. Only he and one other man had survived. And then his troubles had really begun. Now that he was nearing fifty, Morgan’s black hair was peppered at the temples with silver though his square face was still hard, shouting of the rigid discipline of his military background. Because he was a hero in Houston’s eyes, Mike had agreed to act as Morgan and Laura’s bodyguard during this rather bland two-month stay in rural Arizona.
“You ready to talk?” Morgan asked him with a slight grin. “Ann’s been warning me about you being snarly without your espresso.”
“Yeah,” Mike rumbled, “she might as well have set up an IV and poured it directly into my veins this morning. Sorry I overslept.” He glanced at Ann, who refused to meet his gaze. Mike was too much of a gentleman to say why he’d lost so much sleep last night. The reason was that he’d cornered Ann and asked her why she was evading him. It had turned into a frustrating, angry confrontation and he’d ended up silencing her with a kiss—a kiss that had nearly been both their undoing. Ann had almost lost control of herself. He had felt her unraveling in his arms. And that’s when she’d pushed him away. It had been a miserable night for them, he acknowledged. She’d cried and he’d held her. Yet as he rocked her in his arms, she’d still refused to give in to him and talk about why she kept him at arm’s length. One thing he knew for sure, she didn’t trust him. That hurt Mike deeply and his heart ached with sadness.
Cocking his head in Ann’s direction, he saw a slight, strained smile cross her full lips as she lifted the cup and took a sip of her coffee. Her eyes were still puffy looking this morning. He wondered if she’d cried more after tearing out of his embrace and fleeing to her room last night.
Morgan nodded. “It was a good day to sleep in.” He picked up a file and handed it across the pine coffee table to Mike. “Here’s your pay and a little extra bonus for taking this mission on. I know you didn’t have to.”
As the manila file slid into his fingers, Mike placed his cup on the table. Opening the folder, he saw a check for thirty thousand dollars, plus papers detailing all his duties over the last two months.
His brows raised. “This is a little much, boss.”
Morgan grinned and crossed his legs. “I know soldiers like you don’t enjoy babysitting jobs like this one. But you knew the drug lords involved, and you knew their habits and techniques. I know you’d rather be down in the Peruvian jungles chasing them than sitting up here for two months playing watchdog.” He motioned with his finger toward the check Houston was holding. “I’m grateful you took the mission, pabulum or not, Mike. That’s our way of thanking you.”
Houston had heard several times from Ann how generous Trayhern was with his employees, as well as the charities they supported. Now Mike was getting a firsthand taste of it. “Hell,” he muttered, “this is almost a year’s army pay for me.”
Chuckling, Morgan nodded. “It probably is. There’s a first-class airline ticket there also, reserved under your assumed identity of Peter Quinn. You’ve got a flight out of Phoenix at 1500 hours today aboard Veracruz Airlines. They make a fueling stop in Mexico City and then you fly directly into Lima.”
The man was excessively generous, Mike decided as he found the airline ticket. He frowned as he saw another check beneath the ticket. Setting the folder down in his lap, he muttered, “What’s this?” His eyes widened considerably. It was a check for a hundred thousand dollars, made out to the Sisters of Guadalupe Clinic in Lima, Peru.
“Laura was telling me how, in your spare time, you work with two old French nuns down in the barrio, the poor section of Lima, using your paramedic skills alongside the nuns’ homeopathic treatments. She said you’d established the medical clinic eight years ago to help Indian children who couldn’t afford medical help.” He waved his hand toward the check Mike was holding. “That’s a donation to your clinic, Houston. Laura hinted that the clinic was usually running on hope and faith, and that you could use a lot more supplies.” His eyes grew thoughtful. “Maybe this will keep the wolf…or jaguar…from your clinic’s door for a while.”
Mike swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he held the check. The paper felt as if it were burning his fingers. “This…”
“Speechless for once?” Ann teased with a soft laugh.
Mike twisted his head to look up at her. That unreadable doctor’s facade generally in place on her oval face was gone. He waited for such moments because her openness gave her unusual features a warm attractiveness. Her nose was long and thin and had obviously been broken at one time because there was a slight bump on it. She was narrow all over—narrow oval face, narrow hands and skinny but shapely legs. Her eyes were one of her finest features: large, intelligent and widely set. Her mouth, which was now curved gently, hinted powerfully to him of her soft, vulnerable side. Mike hungrily absorbed her countenance, and he managed a slight grin. Ann was trying desperately to be civil to him.
He saw the darkness in her eyes and could feel her fear. Was she as sad over their parting as he was? His heart said yes. Although his intuition didn’t make sense at all to him, now was not the place or time to pursue it. He was sure Morgan didn’t know about Ann’s on-and-off relationship with him over the past two months, and he’d keep it that way—for her sake.
“Yeah, you’re right—I usually have a comeback for almost everything, don’t I?”
Ann nodded. “Without fail, Major Houston. One of your most reliable traits.”
“I’ll take that as praise, not an insult, Dr. Parsons.” A little of her old, teasing self was resurfacing, and Mike was glad. The last thing he wanted was to make Ann feel bad, and he sure as hell had managed to do that last night. Before he left, he knew he’d have to draw her aside, privately, and apologize. He didn’t want their friendship to end on a bitter note. Ann deserved better than that and so did he.
She shrugged her shoulders delicately. “Take it any way you want, Major. I’m always open to options.”
How he wished she really were! Laughing deeply, Mike returned his attention to Morgan. “This is unexpected.”
The warmth in Morgan’s eyes belied the expressionless mask he usually wore over his features. “Needed, according to Laura,” he said. “I like to help out the less fortunate. God knows, I was one for long enough, Mike.” He scowled at the memory of the atrocities he’d suffered.
Mike stared at the check. “Thank you. You have no idea how much this is going to help. I was trying to figure out a way to keep the clinic open. I’m afraid our little charity isn’t seen as very worthy by the rich and powerful in Lima. The children are dark-skinned Indians, not poor little Anglos in need. Believe me—” his voice shook with sudden emotion “—this is going to help more than you’ll ever know.” Mike vaguely recalled talking to Laura about his clinic once, a fleeting conversation he’d completely forgotten about. The woman didn’t forget anything! And she was just as generous and giving as her very wealthy husband.
“We’re glad to do what we can, Mike. From now on, your clinic is on our donation list. The sum might go up or down a little, but at least you’ll know that every January, you’ll be receiving enough money, I hope, to keep those doors open to the Indian children and their families.” Leaning forward, Morgan took a second manila file from the coffee table and handed it to Ann. “Here are your marching orders, Ann. You were asking me where I was sending you next. Well, take a look. I think you’ll be pleased.”
Ann smiled warmly at Morgan as she took the file. “Thanks. I love new missions.”
Mike saw how comfortable Ann and Morgan were with one another and realized they almost had an older brother–younger sister relationship. It was obvious Ann loved Morgan and respected him. Hell, who wouldn’t? Still, Mike felt a twinge of longing because he wished Ann would bestow such a warm, trusting look in his direction. But he knew that would never happen after today, and he found himself lamenting that fact far more sharply than he should. Such was the effect the good doctor had on him, although she pretended to be oblivious of the way he mooned over her like a jaguar did over a lost mate. Mike suspected Ann really missed nothing. She was a trained therapist. She was taught to observe nuances of body language, tone of voice and subtle expressions. No, she knew he was powerfully drawn to her, but she wasn’t interested, that was all. And although that left him confused and frustrated, he realized it was for the best. He wasn’t exactly the kind of man who could give her what she needed, in light of his own past.
Sighing, Mike leaned back in the chair, stealing a moment to watch Ann unobtrusively. He rarely got such a chance, and since they were parting today and he’d never see her again, he wanted to take this opportunity to absorb her into his heart one last time. In some ways, he was like a greedy thief, and he felt a little guilty about it.
Ann chuckled as she placed the coffee cup on the dark wood mantel above the fireplace. “I hope it’s a warm place, Morgan! I’m freezing here.” She opened the file in her hands. “Hawaii or Australia would sure be nice,” she hinted with a smile.
“Oh,” Morgan murmured, “you’re going someplace warm, all right, but neither of those countries.”
Ann picked up the airline ticket and opened it.
Mike saw her broad brow wrinkle instantly. And then she snapped an unsettled look in his direction. He almost asked why, but then she pursed her lips and began sifting through the rest of the papers, reading intently.
“Morgan,” she protested in a strangled tone, “what’s going on here? This isn’t an assignment for another mission.” Ann stared accusingly at Houston again. “These are orders to go down to his clinic in Lima and help him out for six weeks.”
“Yes,” Morgan murmured, sipping his coffee contentedly, “it is.”
Stunned, Houston looked at Ann’s upset features and then at Morgan. “What?” He couldn’t have been hearing right. His heart pounded briefly in his chest as he sat up at full attention. Ann was coming to Lima with him? The news staggered him. Elated him. Worried him. He saw the undiluted fear in Ann’s eyes as never before. His hands wrapped around the arms of the chair. What was going on here?
Waving her thin hand across the file, Ann sputtered, “Morgan, this isn’t a mission assignment. This—this is—charity work!”
“It’s a mission,” Morgan soothed. “A very important one. Laura and I think you’re the perfect person to help Mike get this little clinic up and running.” He smiled slightly, satisfied with his plans. “As a matter of fact—” he glanced down at the gold Rolex watch on his wrist “—there’s a load of medical supplies being trucked from Mesa, Arizona, over to Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix right now. Ann, you will be responsible for over fifty thousand dollars’ worth of medical supplies once you two land in Lima. And then I expect you, with your usual precision and organizational skills, to take the six weeks and get Mike’s clinic up to full speed like it should be.”
Gasping, Ann shut the folder with finality. Her eyes flashed. “You planned this, Major Houston.”
Mike’s mouth dropped open and he quickly snapped it shut. “Now, just a minute, Ann,” he muttered as he unwound from the chair and stood up, “I didn’t know anything about this.” And he hadn’t. But he felt her anger directly. Those gray-blue eyes of hers turned icy cold when she was upset. Disliking the fact that he was being accused of something he was innocent of, he looked at Morgan. “Tell her, will you?”
“Mike knew nothing about this, Ann. It was actually Laura’s idea. We spent several evenings planning it out, making the necessary phone calls and getting everything lined up.”
Glaring at Houston, Ann closed her fingers tightly over the folder. “Morgan, one thing I learned about this Peruvian cowboy in the last two months I’ve spent here is that he’s a master of manipulation.”
“Oww, that hurts,” Mike protested. Not that it wasn’t true. “Sure, I rob Peter to pay Paul, so to speak, in order to get the money I need to finance our military efforts down in Peru, but—”
“You’ve got a mind like a steel trap,” Ann accused in a low voice. “You probably purposely dropped the information about your clinic to Laura because you know she has such a soft heart for people who are in trouble or need help.”
Anger stirred in Houston. One thing he didn’t like was being wrongly accused. He saw the desperation in Ann’s eyes and heard the raw pain in her voice. He was receiving so many confused emotional signals from her that he didn’t have time to sort them all out. Keeping his voice soothing, he rasped, “Look, Ann, I had no idea when Laura buttonholed me about a month ago, and nosed around about what I did down in Lima, that she’d take the information and do something like this with it.”
“Ann, calm down,” Morgan said in his deep voice. “This isn’t a prison sentence.”
“Really?” Ann glared steadily in Houston’s direction.
“Really,” Morgan repeated. He sat up and placed his cup on the coffee table in front of him. “Why be so upset? It’s spring in Peru. It’s warm. It’s a beautiful country and Lima is one of the most sophisticated and affluent cities in South America. I’ve arranged everything for you. There’ll be a van waiting at the Lima airport. The medical supplies will be loaded into it and Mike can drive you to the clinic. There’s another car there waiting for you. It was bought earlier and registered in the clinic’s name, since the clinic’s got a nonprofit status. You can use it to drive back and forth to the nice apartment we’ve rented for you.” He smiled at her. “For once you aren’t going to be flying around in a helicopter with a flak jacket and helmet on, wondering if you’re landing in a hot fire zone. This is a pretty safe assignment. Quiet. Probably pretty boring, but I’m sure it will be immensely satisfying to you emotionally. It isn’t that you don’t like children. I know different.”
Houston prowled restlessly around the perimeter of the living room. He watched Ann give him livid, stabbing looks of raw accusation every now and again, despite the fact that Morgan had an incredibly soothing effect on her—any woman, in fact. Mike wished he had the skill, but didn’t. “Look,” he protested in frustration, “if Ann doesn’t want to go, there’s nothing I can do about that. But maybe I can take the edge off things a little bit for her.” He leaned down and picked up the thirty-thousand-dollar check.
“Here, put this with the rest, since you’re going to have to put up with me six weeks longer than you thought.” He handed Ann the donation and the personal check Morgan had written out to him. He could see the fear deep in her eyes. Anger warred with sadness and heartbreak within him. Trying his best to gather his strewn emotions, he rasped, “You want to run a clinic, it takes money. So here it is. And if you’re pissed off and distrusting of me and my intentions, well, that’s okay. I know the truth—I had nothing to do with this assignment of yours. I won’t be around the clinic that much to be a pain in the ass to you, anyway. Fair enough?” He put both checks in her hands. Her gaze wavered as she met his hard, angry eyes.
Houston turned, shook Morgan’s hand, thanked him and left. He needed to get out of the house and calm down. As he went out the front door, the coolness of the Arizona morning hit him. Throwing back his shoulders, he descended the wooden steps quickly and headed toward the corral. Damn! Everything’s screwed up. Everything! As he took long, steady strides, Mike rubbed his aching chest.
But although this wasn’t how he’d planned things to go with Ann, a tiny part of him was euphoric that she would be coming to Lima with him. He would have more time with her, even if the opportunities to see her would be severely limited down there. As he halted at the corral, where twenty Arabians were feeding, he placed his elbows on the uppermost rung of the pipe fence. The metal felt cooling to him, to his smarting anger and frustration.
Closing his eyes, Houston tried to wrestle with all his emotions. Ann thought he’d set this whole thing up. It was obvious she hadn’t believed Morgan when he’d explained that Mike had nothing to do with it. Her anger was real. And so was that terror banked in her eyes. Closing his fists, Mike took a deep, unsettled breath of air into his chest. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t erase the sweet power of Ann’s mouth upon his, her incredible, hungry response to him. But although her mouth, her body signaled one thing, her mind held sway over her actions. What a helluva fix he was in now! More than anything, Mike wanted to somehow convince Ann that he was innocent of dragging her on this assignment. Judging from her anger, she probably wasn’t going to give him an opening very soon to explain. Maybe, on the flight down to Lima, she’d cool off and he could reason with her. He hoped so. Or maybe Morgan could soothe her because Mike certainly couldn’t!
“Morgan, I don’t want to go down there,” Ann declared.
He shrugged and sipped his coffee. “Calm down, Ann. This is an excellent assignment.” He smiled up at her drawn features. She looked cornered but Morgan didn’t really want to let her out of this one. Worried that Escovar, one of the most powerful of all the drug dealers in South America, was going to go after Mike Houston in earnest once Mike was back in Peru, Morgan wanted a backup. He didn’t want to tell Houston of his concerns for his life, but if Mike got into trouble, Morgan wanted someone with the best medical skills on the planet nearby. And even though Ann was only in her early thirties, she was a top professional in the field.
Ann didn’t know why he was sending her to Peru to be near Houston. Morgan didn’t want to put that kind of pressure on her. Besides, from everything he and his wife could see, there was a mutual attraction between the by-the-book doctor and the hotheaded, passionate major whose Indian blood kept him running headlong into dangerous scrapes with Escovar. Yes, Ann’s cool, calm and collected personality would be a good match for Houston, whose zealous attempts to destroy every drug dealer he could find in Peru could be his undoing.
Morgan admired Houston tremendously, and he’d just gotten information from the highest government sources that Escovar had recently renewed his efforts to take revenge on Houston. In fact, Escovar had just doubled the price on his head. Morgan had no doubt Mike had his own network of spies to warn him of Escovar’s movements, but Morgan wanted a safety net for him. And Ann, who was all science and facts, was a good chess piece to put into play down there. She could keep tabs on the footloose major and save his neck, if necessary. No, it was best that Ann go there thinking she would be slaving away in a small clinic. Morgan didn’t want her flying in those drug-raid copters and getting shot at. He knew that Houston’s network of helicopters could ensure that he was within an hour’s ride of Lima should anything terrible happen to him. And Ann would be there waiting, ready with her surgical skills to save his sorry life.
Smiling to himself, Morgan sipped more of his coffee. There was no one better than Houston to go up against Eduardo Escovar. But Morgan wanted insurance for him of a different sort. He felt intuitively that Houston liked Ann—a whole lot. And maybe, just maybe, the hotshot jungle fighter would ease off on the throttles just a little bit, take a few less risks if he knew he had someone to return to in Lima after one of his bloody raids deep in the mountains. Maybe… Morgan admitted his plan was risky in itself. It was obvious Ann thought Houston had maneuvered things to get her on this assignment. And in Houston, she had more than met her match. Chuckling to himself, Morgan marveled over the attraction he saw between the cool, level-headed scientist and the passionate jaguar god of Peru. It was the molten steel being thrust into a bucket of icy water. What a combination! Morgan knew the sparks would fly. Secretly, his money was on Houston to endure her scalpel-like reactions and slowly but surely wear her down. Beneath Ann’s genius mind, beneath that cold, scientific rationale that fed her intellect, was a hot-blooded woman who was afraid to step out of her ivory tower and experience being wild and free in a man’s arms. And these weren’t just any man’s arms Morgan was pushing her toward…. He was betting that Houston could handle her. Time would tell, though.
“The flight to Peru will be a good shakedown cruise for both of you,” he told Ann in his rumbling voice. “A nice chance to talk over how you want to run the clinic for Houston.”
Ann glared at Morgan. “I’m not happy about this assignment. At all.”
He lifted his hand. “Just be patient,” he urged gently. “Mike isn’t the monster you make him out to be. He’s all-heart if you give him a chance.”
That was exactly what Ann was afraid of—Mike Houston’s passionate, wild heart. He frightened her. More so than any other man. And in less than three hours, she’d be forced to sit beside him on that airplane. How was she going to deal with her fearful emotions?
Ann tried to contain her feelings as she sat in the first-class section of the Veracruz flight. Mike Houston, dressed in a pair of dark brown slacks, a short-sleeved, white silk shirt and camel hair sport coat, sat across the aisle. She studied his rugged profile. It reminded her of the harsh granite of the Andes beneath them. They’d been in the air for hours since picking up fuel in Mexico City for the long flight to Lima.
Her conscience prickled. She knew she was being grumpy about this assignment and she didn’t like herself for it. Generally, she was unflappable in every situation. Nothing ever caused her to swerve from her focus on saving lives, not even bullets flying around her. This man, this army major, had really unsettled her in ways she’d never thought possible. How could she be so drawn to Mike? How? It scared her to even think of him in that way. Ann thought herself incapable of ever falling in love again since— She slammed the lid shut on her memories before she felt the pain of them. Somehow being around Mike made her feel vulnerable once more. He was mysterious; there was something about him she couldn’t put her finger on and it bothered her immensely. He was unlike any man she’d ever met—or had been attracted to. Her gut told her that dealing with him would be like handling nitroglycerine—one false move and the attraction between them would explode into something more.
She was a coward, she admitted to herself. A certifiable coward. Mike had been honest and aboveboard in his genuine interest in her. He hadn’t manipulated her in this regard. After all, she’d enjoyed his kisses, his incredibly tender explorations, as much as he obviously had. There was no fault in this, really. She was an adult. She had willingly kissed him and wanted his continued caresses. Even now, she felt her lower body tighten with such need of him that she wanted to cry. The past was too strong for her to overcome, though. If she knew Mike for a longer time, those walls might dissolve. And that’s what Ann was really afraid of. Six weeks in Lima with him around on a daily basis would surely unlatch a door in her heart that she’d thought would remain closed forever.
Anxiety raced through Ann. She felt bad and wanted to apologize to Mike for accusing him, though she wasn’t so sure he was completely innocent of getting her assigned to Lima. She watched out of the corner of her eye as he sipped some amber-colored whiskey. He’d barely spoken a word to her for hours now and he only communicated when she asked him a question. He was still angry with her, despite the fact that he seemed to have cooled down considerably after his outburst in front of Morgan. He’d even apologized to her later as they were packing to leave the ranch. She’d stiffly accepted his apology, but she’d seen the sadness in his eyes, and had fought the tears in her own.
Ann didn’t want to hurt Mike, but she knew she had. She could barely stand herself as a result. He was a man of incredible courage, an officer and a gentleman. The kind of man she could fall in love with, if she allowed herself. That’s why going to a foreign country and being under Houston’s protection was unnerving. She would have to rely on him because she was unfamiliar with Peruvian culture. Her rational mind didn’t like being out of control like that. Ann had always relied upon herself, all her life. If she got into a scrape, she managed to get herself out—alone, without help.
Yes, she’d dreamed of Mike, of their kisses, of being with him completely. Her emotions unraveled when she was around him, and she felt needy, hungry in a way that she’d never felt before. The thought of six more weeks in his powerful and persuasive presence scared her more than bullets or bombs exploding around her.
Manipulation was something Ann despised. It brought out every conceivable dark emotion within her. But then, she’d been manipulated once, by a master similar to Houston, so why shouldn’t she be wary of him? She’d fallen for an Air Force pilot after the one love of her life had died in a plane crash. Robert Crane had said every word, given her every look and done everything she’d ever dreamed that a man might do for the woman he was falling in love with—and she’d fallen hopelessly for him. Now she knew that what she felt for Robert had not grown out of love, but out of the grief and loss of her one true love. At the time, Ann hadn’t realized that, of course.
The realization came soon after Crane had lured her into bed. Once he’d “caught” her, he’d up and left. When Ann confronted him about it a week later, he’d laughed at her and told her the awful truth: he was a hunter, she was the hunted. His quarry. She’d been prey to be taken, used and then thrown away. The humiliation and shame of that disastrous time in her life had branded her forever. Never did Ann want to be manipulated like that again. Yet somehow Houston had gotten beneath her considerable armor. It must be his South American blood, his passion for life, that had breathed hot, molten desire into her heart. Daily, she fought her feelings for him. Daily, she tried to shrug off his heated looks, his gentle teasing, and yes, those wonderful kisses that opened her up inside and made her bare her vulnerability.
Ann closed her eyes and sighed raggedly. What was Houston’s real intent? At thirty-two years old, she wasn’t stupid or naive. She’d seen the looks he’d given her. She wasn’t a young thing who didn’t recognize in his dark blue, assessing eyes the smoldering hunger of a man who wanted a woman. He wanted her. She felt his longing for her, his unqualified interest. The raw, painful truth was Ann wanted Mike as much as he wanted her. And she was too much of a coward to even try to disentangle herself from the past and reach out to him. She was simply too scarred and too scared. What little emotion she had left was deeply hidden and protected within her. She just didn’t have what it took to freely love Houston.
Sighing, Ann wrapped her arms across her chest, closed her eyes and tried to sleep. It was gloomy in the plane now, the lights very low. Most of the people around them in the first-class cabin were already asleep—except for her and Houston. Part of her just couldn’t believe that he hadn’t dropped several hints to Laura about his struggling clinic to get Ann down here in Lima with him. She knew enough about his dangerous job as an army liaison between the U.S. and Peruvian military resources to realize he had learned how to be very adroit in touchy political situations. She knew Houston had hobnobbed with the rich and powerful at fashionable dinners and society events in Lima. He was a smooth talker. Too smooth, she decided with a frown. Like Robert Crane, a little voice warned her stridently.
As an advisor and the commanding officer representing the U.S. Army, Houston had to have a lot of skills in place. He had to have the ability to employ U.S. policy and get it to jibe with Peru’s political philosophy at the same time. While working out in the field, which was obviously what he loved the most, he coordinated well-planned attacks against the cocaine lords in the jungle highlands. After a successful battle or raid, he’d work his way through the chain of command all the way up to the president of Peru, letting the government know what went down and how many millions of dollars of cocaine wouldn’t flow north as a result. Houston handled a big budget and was responsible for keeping ten helicopters flying around the clock, chopping away at the cocaine warlords’ domain.
Exhaling forcefully, Ann wondered why a man with such skills would have to manipulate her into coming down to his clinic. The thought made her open her eyes and sit up. She moved across the aisle to the empty seat next to him. Houston lifted his massive head, his dark blue gaze settling warily on hers.
“I just want to know one thing,” Ann whispered fiercely. “Why the hell didn’t you ask me, face-to-face, for my help? If you wanted me to come down here and help out, why didn’t you come to me instead of pulling strings with Laura and Morgan to maneuver me into this corner?”
She saw the hand lying on the armrest slowly flex. She studied the many scars across it and knew every one was a story in itself. The scars were like mini badges of courage in her mind. Then she saw a flinty, cold look come in to his eyes. She felt iciness around him, aimed directly at her.
“Don’t you think,” Houston growled, leaning forward and nailing her with a glare, “that I would have if I thought you might do it? Sure, the thought crossed my mind, but that was after I’d told Laura a little about the clinic.”
Ann gripped the seat, her fingers digging into the fabric. “You’re saying you’re innocent?” She tried to contain the hysteria she was feeling. Mike was so close, so very, very male, and her heart cried out for him, for his embrace. She hated herself for attacking him. He looked completely stunned by the force of her verbal assault. Once again she was hurting him. But she had to protect herself from Mike somehow, keep him from melting her down, little by little. Especially now that they would be working together at the clinic. He’d broken her resistance at the ranch. He would do so again down there, and Ann felt trapped and desperate. She just couldn’t give in to her heart. If she did… No, it was too scary to even contemplate.
“For once,” Houston rasped, “I am innocent.” Reeling from her unexpected attack, he felt his anger explode. “Don’t you think I know you don’t trust me? You’ve made that pretty damn obvious, Ann.” He set his empty glass down on the table in front of him and leaned slowly toward her, his eyes becoming slits. “Have you ever asked yourself why in the hell I would want to drag someone unwilling down to Lima and spend six weeks with her? That’s kinda like throwing two male jaguars into the same pen. You sure as hell know they’re territorial—that a male jaguar won’t put up with another being in his territory. And they’re sure as hell gonna fight each other to the death because each one can’t stand the fact that the other is invading his turf.”
He exhaled and growled, “One thing I’m not, Ann, is a victim. If you think for one second that I’m looking forward to your sulking, pouting demeanor while I’m working with those two little nuns, whom I love like grandmothers, you’re very mistaken. As far as I’m concerned, you can get off this plane at the airport, execute an about face and climb right back on for a return flight to the States.”
Stung, Ann glared at him, her heart beating hard in her breast. She saw the raw hurt in Mike’s eyes, heard it in the rasp of his voice. Oh, why was she doing this? It was as if all the desperation she felt was being fueled by her underlying fear and turning her into this woman she’d never met before. Helpless to stop her response to him, she whispered harshly, “You’re very good at twisting words, Major. But then, that’s your job, isn’t it? Get the dishonest politicians to play ball with you, fund you and your men, your activities. Cross lines in the sand and get both bullies to play the same game together?”
His lips curled away from his teeth. “Dammit, Ann, you’re stepping way out of line now. I don’t mind if you attack me personally or question my ethics, which you seem to think are very badly flawed, but when you go after my men, who put their lives on the line every day, that’s where I draw my line in the sand.” His gaze drilled into her shadowed, frightened eyes. “Those men have wives and kids and extended families, yet they get paid a pittance to leap out of those choppers and face well-armed cocaine soldiers in the highlands. It’s not fair and it’s not right. But I’ll be damned if some Harvard-graduate medical doctor is going to look down at them. My men are some of the bravest soldiers in the world. Their families are in jeopardy because of what they do, so they’re risking more than their lives, they’re risking the lives of their loved ones, too.”
Gasping, Ann straightened. The air was tense and she felt his low growl move through her like a tremor from an earthquake. His demeanor had changed to one of controlled violence—aimed at her. She saw the spark in his eyes, like the gleam of a predator stalking her. Fumbling internally, Ann knew she had started this attack. She deserved his reaction. The wounded and vulnerable part of her would rather deal with a man’s anger than a man’s love. And right now, her heart was hurting so much in her breast she wanted to cry out, throw her arms around Mike and just hold him as she knew he would hold her. If only she wasn’t so frightened. Smoothing her gray, light wool slacks against her thighs, she took several breaths before speaking. The danger emanating from Houston shook her. He’d pulled out all his guns, probably hoping she’d back down.
“Okay,” she whispered, holding his glare, “I’ll apologize for the remarks I just made about your men. They grew out of my anger. I own it and I’ll admit it.”
