Gone Too Far (23 page)

He also knew that the dead last thing he should do was kiss her back. But then again, the dead last thing he should’ve done in the first place was come to Tampa.

She was sweet and hot and her kiss was twice as mind-blowing as he’d ever imagined, with her fingers in his hair, against his neck and face and God, God,
God
this was exactly what he swore he’d never do.

But her lips were so soft and she kissed him deeper, and he’d wanted this for
so
long, and suddenly he wasn’t just getting kissed, he was kissing her.

And, Christ, it was probably the most selfish moment in his life, which was really saying something since he knew he was a selfish bastard, but he couldn’t stop, couldn’t stop, couldn’t . . .

He had to stop. He was definitely going to stop now.

But, God damn it, he could taste the salt of her tears and that should’ve made him want to stop even more, but selfish, twisted son of a bitch that he was, it was actually a turn-on knowing that the mere sight of him made her cry.

She still thought that she wanted him. It had been over a year since he’d last talked to her on the phone, longer than that since he’d seen her. And nothing had changed.

But, God damn it, did that mean that she still had the nightmares, too? Did she still flinch when strangers came too close? Did she still get that distant look in her eyes, remembering what she’d endured at the hands of her captors—a terrorism survivor’s version of the battle-weary soldier’s thousand-mile stare?

He’d purposely stayed away so that she could heal.

Except he hadn’t stayed away, had he? Here he was. In Tampa. With his tongue in Gina’s mouth. Screwing up her life even more than it had already been screwed up by the bad guys.

Max Bhagat, emotional terrorist.

He pushed himself away from her.

She was breathing as hard as he was, and the look in her eyes promised paradise. If they hadn’t been in the middle of the road, in the heart of downtown Tampa, she would’ve had her clothes off by now. And wouldn’t
that
have been hard to walk away from.

She opened her mouth to tell him God knows what, but he stopped her. He didn’t want to hear it.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen,” he said, his voice too harsh even to his own ears.

Her face was so expressive, with her wide eyes and generous mouth, and he could read her like a book. Confusion. Amused disbelief. He had to be kidding, right?

Max clarified. “I shouldn’t have let you kiss me, Gina.”

She laughed. Stopped. “But . . .”

Now the confusion was mixed with disbelief and a glimmer of hurt. God
damn
it. But what did he expect? He’d purposely worded it so that the responsibility for what had just happened fell squarely onto her.

“It was the heat of the moment,” he told her, hating himself. “It wasn’t real.”

Hurt morphed rapidly to anger in her incredible eyes. “You kiss me back like
that
and . . . that wasn’t
real
?” She laughed. “Maybe you better say it again, Max, because I don’t think you’ve even convinced your
self
that that wasn’t
real
.”

“I’m sorry,” he said forcing his face and his voice to be distant. “But it wasn’t—”

Her voice shook as she cut him off. “There was more truth in that one kiss than in all the hours and
hours
of conversation we’ve ever had!”

“I can’t be more than your friend,” he told her, hearing tinges of desperation in his voice. He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself, realizing as he backed even farther away that the rain had almost completely stopped. “I’ve made that very clear.”

“Yeah,” Gina mocked. “You’re a good friend. You don’t visit, you don’t call, you don’t even write. You know, I’ve considered taking hostages simply to get a chance to talk to you. Although knowing you, you’d send a different negotiator.”

Max didn’t say anything. There were times when it was best not to speak at all.

Several police cars had pulled up, and one of the uniformed officers was heading toward them.

“She okay?” the man called.

“She seems to be,” Max responded. He handed the man his ID. “I still want her taken to the hospital, get her checked out.”

The cop nodded, standing straighter, shoulders back as he realized who Max was. “Yes, sir. An ambulance is on its way, sir.”

“I don’t need to go to the hospital,” Gina said, unbuckling her seat belt and climbing out of the car. Jesus H. Christ, she’d actually gotten a belly button ring. “I’m fine.”

All of the other drivers seemed fine, too. Thank God for airbags—or cars the size of Texas. The little old man in the 1975 Lincoln Town Car was more worried about his groceries melting in the backseat than any potential damage to his person.

But, “That’s what Princess Grace thought, too,” Max said to her.

“Who?”

Yes, Gina was young. “Princess Grace of Monaco,” he explained. “Grace Kelly. She died before you were born so you probably don’t—”

“The actress from
Rear Window
,” Gina said. “Who died of internal injuries after a car accident, in 1982, and I was, too, born. If you’d said Grace Kelly right away, I would have known who you meant. You know, being born in 1980 doesn’t automatically make me an idiot, Max.”

But it
did
make him old enough to be her father. In 1980, he was finishing up—two years early—his undergraduate degree at Princeton. Twenty years old, he was already being wooed by the Bureau and was negotiating for a chance to attend the Air Force’s legendary Indoc, aka Superman School, without the four-year commitment to the military.

His intention was to go through the Air Force’s pararescue jumpers’ pipeline—a succession of intensely rigorous training schools—before heading to the relative tameness of the FBI Academy at Quantico.

But the FBI said no can do, so he’d politely thanked them for their time. Instead, he dove into an accelerated master’s program at NYU where he took a class given by Professor Glenn Nelson, who was a former FBI negotiator and a lifelong friend of the then-head of the Bureau.

With a little pressure from Nelson, no can do became please, please do, and a year and a half later, when Gina was still practicing walking, Max was finishing up Indoc—earning both a reputation as an unstoppable son of a bitch, and his right to wear that big S on his chest.

He’d slid on down the pipeline as Gina had begun potty training.

By the time she started first grade, he was well on his way to his current position as head of the Bureau’s top counterterrorist group.

“So why are you here?” Gina asked. “No, don’t tell me. You just happened to be out for a stroll in the pouring rain and recognized me sitting in my car—through a blurry windshield . . .?”

She was going to figure it out anyway, so he might as well tell her. “I was in town on other business,” Max said. It was not quite a total lie. “I knew you were here, too, because . . . I make a point to know everything about everyone. I was just . . . checking up on you.”

She was staring at him.

He cleared his throat. “I should probably move my car.” His rental was right where he’d left it, two cars behind Gina’s, the driver’s side door standing open.

Realization was dawning in Gina’s eyes as she looked from him to his car and back. “You were checking up on me, as in watching me to see if I’m okay, as in
stalking
me—” Her voice got louder with incredulity. “—with no intention of letting me know you’re in town?”

Crap.
“Look,” he said. “I happen to care about you. I know these past few years have been tough—”

“It didn’t occur to you that I ‘happen to care’ about you, too?” she said hotly. “You didn’t even once think, ‘Gee, I bet Gina would like a chance to check up on me, too’?”

“What’s to check? I’m not the one who spent four days at the mercy of terrorists. I’m not the one who was—”
Gang raped.
He stopped himself from saying it. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Talk about nightmares. He still sometimes woke up sweating and practically gagging, the sound of Gina’s cries ringing in his head, echoes of her cries when those bastards hurt her, when he’d sat in the Kazabek airport terminal room that the FBI-SEAL task force was using as a surveillance center and listened to her being attacked in the cockpit of that airliner, powerless to stop them, unable to do a goddamned thing to save her.

“Gee, Max,” Gina said. “You sound as if you still have a great deal of unresolved anger.”

Max had met Dr. Elizabeth Dannowitz, Gina’s therapist, a handful of times, so he knew that she was doing a very decent imitation of the woman.

But he answered her as if she were serious. “Yes, I do.”

She was quiet then, hardly saying much of anything as the police officer approached to check her license and the car rental agreement, as she filled out the accident report, as the paramedics came and checked her blood pressure, as she took her things out of the car so it could be towed away, as Max made arrangements with the local police for them to drive her back to her hotel after taking her to the hospital for a more complete examination.

And then, that was it. She was saying good-bye, still so preoccupied, her dark eyes subdued, and he was standing on the steaming sidewalk, watching the ambulance drive away. The sun broke through the last of the clouds as he climbed into his car and headed south, for Sarasota.

Tom Paoletti’s Navy SEALs had a name for a day like today, the kind of day that started with Sam Starrett escaping from Alyssa Locke and ended with that troubled look in Gina Vitagliano’s eyes. A day that had Max’s tongue in her mouth somewhere there in the middle.

Clusterfuck. Today was, indeed, a grade A clusterfuck, no doubt about it. And it wasn’t even over yet.

But the marble-tiled, two-story foyer seemed cold and lifeless.

She hadn’t realized what a huge presence King Frank could be. And the fact that he’d spent quite a bit of time in his shooting range or walking around the house packing this rifle or that revolver had actually made her feel quite safe.

Mary Lou made sure that the door was locked and hurried back toward the wing of the house that held the au pair quarters and Whitney’s room.

Haley and Amanda were still napping, so she went into her living room, put the keys down on her kitchenette counter, and picked up the phone.

“You
do
know that all calls into and out of this house are screened.”

Whitney was leaning in the doorway that led to Mary Lou’s bedroom.

No matter what Mary Lou said or did, that girl was constantly going through her things.

Mary Lou sighed. “Whitney, I asked you, just yesterday as a matter of fact, to please respect my privacy.”

“I was putting back something that I borrowed.”

Stolen was more like it. But okay. This new semi-friendship they were developing was a good thing. “Thank you,” Mary Lou said.

“If you really want to call someone without Daddy finding out about it,” Whitney told her, “you need to call from a pay phone downtown. That’s what I do.”

Mary Lou finished dialing. “I’m just calling the front gate.”

The younger of the two weekday guards picked up. “Potter.”

“Yes, this is Connie from up at the house,” Mary Lou said. “I’m a little nervous with both Mr. Turlington and Mrs. Downs out of town for the next week or so. Please don’t let anyone through the gate without calling me first.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Will you let the other guards know, too?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Thank you,” Mary Lou said, and hung up the phone. Already, she was starting to feel better. There were guards at the gate and no reason on the planet that anyone at all would be able to find her here.

“Was that Jim Potter?” Whitney asked. “Was he, like, all ‘Yes, ma’am, yes, ma’am’?”

Mary Lou had to smile. “He was exactly like that.”

“He’s a dork.” Whitney sat down on one of the stools at the kitchen counter. “But he’s an honest dork. I once snuck in late when I was supposed to be grounded and he caught me. I told him I’d give him a BJ if he didn’t tell my father, and he actually said no.”

Oh, Lord.

“You should tell him about your husband,” Whitney said, sliding off the stool. “At least give him Sam’s description. It might make you feel a little less tense.”

Mary Lou doubted it.