Tender Stranger

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“You’re very honest, aren’t you?” he remarked for the second time that day. “It’s vaguely disconcerting. No, I don’t mind if you look at me. Except that it—”

“It…?” she persisted.

“Arouses me,” he said frankly.

“Just to be looked at?” she asked, fascinated.

He smiled a little. “Maybe it’s my age,” he said with a shrug. “You have very expressive eyes, did you know? They tell me everything you’re thinking.”

“Do they really?” She laughed, looking up at him. “What am I thinking now?” she asked, her mind carefully blank.

He pursed his lips and smiled slowly, and she felt a deep, slow ache in her body that was intensified when she looked at the broad sweep of his chest.

“That you’d like to have dinner with me,” he hedged. “How about it?”

“Yes. I’d like to. If you won’t seduce me for dessert,” she added.

He sighed softly. “I’d like to have you,” he confessed. “But I couldn’t quite take you in my stride, either. A virgin would be something of a rarity for me. Most of my one-night stands have been the exact opposite of virgins.”

She tried not to blush, but her cheeks betrayed her.

He searched her eyes. “I wouldn’t hurt you,” he said suddenly. “And with you, it would have to be lovemaking, not sex.”

Her body felt boneless as he searched her eyes, and there was a flash of something like tenderness in the look he gave her. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“Why?”

She dropped her eyes to his chest. “Because I think…I’d have liked you…for a lover.”

“Yes, I think I’d have liked you for one,” he agreed softly. He tilted her face back to his and searched her eyes. “Wrong time, wrong place. We should have met ten years ago.”

She smiled ruefully. “You wouldn’t have liked me at sixteen,” she said. “I really was twenty pounds overweight.”

He drew in a slow breath. “And I was in the early days of some pretty raw living,” he agreed. “What a pity.” He lifted her hand and kissed the soft palm, watching her face color with pleasure. “How long will you be here?”

“Four days,” she said miserably.

His teeth bit into the soft flesh. “Make some memories with me,” he whispered.

“That will only make it worse…” she began.

“We’ll keep it light,” he said. “I won’t seduce you.”

“By tomorrow I’ll probably beg you to,” she said unhappily, studying him with helpless longing. “I’m frighteningly vulnerable with you.”

His eyes went along her body and he felt himself going rigid with desire. “Yes. I’m pretty vulnerable myself.”

She had to force her eyes to stay on his face, and he smiled wickedly, knowing exactly what she was thinking.

He laughed and she rolled over onto her stomach again.

“Don’t worry,” he murmured as he stretched out beside her. “I’ll take care of you. Don’t sweat it.”

She turned her eyes toward his and searched them, and then she smiled. “You’re so handsome,” she whispered helplessly.

“You’re a knockout yourself,” he said. “Flat-chested, hell.” He laughed. “You’re dynamite!”

“Thank you.”

He searched her face appreciatively. “So innocent. J.D. would laugh himself sick at me.”

“J.D.?” she asked curiously.

“An old friend.” He grinned. “Close your eyes and let’s soak up some sun. Later, I’ll take you sight-seeing.” His eyes closed and then opened. “Not to the docks,” he added, and closed them again.

She closed her own eyes with a smile. Miracles, she thought wistfully, did occasionally happen to lonely spinsters. These were going to be the four most beautiful days of her entire life. She wouldn’t take a second of them for granted, starting now.

Chapter Three

Dani was glad she’d stopped by the little boutique in the basement of the hotel on her way up to change for dinner. She’d bought a white Mexican dress with an elastic neckline and lots of ruffles, and when she put it on she looked slightly mysterious, with her brown hair and gray eyes and creamy complexion. Her wire-rimmed glasses weren’t so spiffy, she admitted, but they did make her eyes look bigger than they were. And she wasn’t really fat, she told herself, smiling at her reflection. It was mostly what was on top, and the dress even minimized that. She got her small evening bag and went downstairs to meet Dutch in the lobby.

He was wearing white slacks with a white shirt and blue blazer, and he rose lazily to his feet from a plush sofa, leaving his evening paper there as he joined her.

“Nice,” he said, taking her arm. “What do you fancy? Mexican, Chinese, Italian, or a steak?”

“I like steak,” she murmured.

“So do I.” He guided her along the hall past the family restaurant and into the very exclusive Captain’s Quarters next door. White-coated waiters in white gloves were everywhere, and Dani glanced up at Dutch apprehensively as he gave the hostess his name.

“What is it?” he asked softly, guiding her along behind the well-dressed young woman with the menus.

“It’s so expensive,” she began, worried.

His face brightened, and he smiled. “Do you mind washing dishes afterward?” he whispered mischievously.

She laughed up at him. “Not if you’ll dry,” she promised.

He slid an arm around her waist and pulled her close. “You’re a nice girl.”

“Just the kind your mother warned you about, so look out,” she told him.

He glanced down at her. “No. My mother would have liked you. She was spirited, too.”

She smiled shyly, aware of envious eyes following them along the way. He was so handsome, she thought, peeking up at him. Muscular, graceful, and with the face of a Greek statue, male perfection in the finest sense. An artist would have been enchanted with him as a subject.

The hostess left them at their table, near the window, and Dutch seated Dani with a curious frown.

“What were you thinking about so solemnly just now?” he asked as he eased his tall form into the chair across from her.

“That you’d delight an artist,” she said simply. “You’re very elegant.”

He took a slow breath. “Lady, you’re bad for my ego.”

“Surely you look in the mirror from time to time?” she asked. “I don’t mean to stare, but I can’t help it.”

“Yes, I have the same problem,” he murmured, and his eyes were fixed on her.

She was glad she hadn’t yielded to the temptation to pull the elastic neck of her dress down around her shoulders. It was hard enough to bear that dark stare as it was.

“Shall I order for you, or are you liberated?” he asked after she’d studied the menu.

“I kind of like it the old-fashioned way, if you don’t mind,” she confessed. “I’m liberated enough to know I look better in a skirt than in a pair of pants.”

He chuckled. “Do you?”

“Well, you’d look pretty silly in a dress,” she came back.

“What do you want to eat?” he asked.

“Steak and a salad, and coffee to drink.”

He looked at her with a dry smile, and when the waiter came, he gave a double order.

“Yes,” he told her, “I like coffee, too.”

“You seem very traveled,” she remarked, pleating her napkin.

“I am.” He leaned back in his chair to study her. “And you’ve never been out of the States.”

“I’ve been nowhere—until now.” She smiled at the napkin. “Done nothing except work. I thought about changing, but I never had the courage to do it.”

“It takes courage, to break out of a mold,” he said. He pulled the ashtray toward him and lit a cigarette. “I hope you don’t mind, but I’m doing it anyway. This is one habit I don’t intend to break.”

“‘I’ll die of something someday,’” she quoted. “There are lots of other clichés, but I think that one’s dandy.”

He only laughed. “Smoking is the least dangerous thing I do.”

“What do you do?” she asked, curious.

He thought about that for a moment, and pursed his lips as he wondered what she’d say if he told her the truth. She’d probably be out of that chair and out of his life so fast…He frowned. He didn’t like that idea.

“I’m in the military,” he said finally. “In a sense.”

“Oh. On active duty?” she continued, feeling her way because he seemed reluctant to elaborate.

“No. Inactive, at the moment.” He watched her through a veil of smoke from his cigarette.

“Is it dangerous, what you do?”

“Yes.”

“I feel like a panelist on ‘What’s My Line?’” she said unexpectedly, and grinned when he burst out laughing.

“Maybe you’re a double agent,” she supposed. “A spy.”

“I’m too tall,” he returned. “Agents are supposed to be under five feet tall so that they can hide in shrubbery.”

She stared at him until she realized he was joking, and she laughed.

“Your eyes laugh when you do,” he said absently. “Are you always this sunny?”

“Most of the time,” she confessed. She pushed her glasses back as they threatened to slide down her nose. “I have my bad days, too, like everyone else, but I try to leave them at home.”

“You could get contact lenses,” he remarked as he noticed her efforts to keep her glasses on her nose.