Guarding the Soldier's Secret (20 page)

“Yankee,” he whispered, wondering if she was asleep, “are you happy?”

She lifted her head and rested her chin on his chest. “Happy?”

“Yeah. Living here, I mean.”

She turned her head to lay her cheek once more on his chest, and it seemed a long time before she replied so softly he had to strain to hear her. “It’s where I have to be, right now.”

“I know. But are you
happy
?”

Thunder rumbled, louder and closer now. Her hand moved on his chest, fingers stroking through the hair, then following it downward over his belly. His body stirred.

“Have you been happy,” he insisted, “working in the newsroom, away from the action?” Her hand continued its journey, and he laughed a little, then growled, “Tell me the truth. And, dammit, quit trying to distract me.”

She laughed a little, too, then drew a shuddering breath. “It’s hard to admit it, you know. I love Laila more than life, but—” Her voice thickened, then became a whisper. “If you knew how guilty I feel. That it’s not enough, I mean. That she’s not enough. But—oh, God, Hunt, I miss it so much. I do. I can’t help it. But I know—”

He caught her hand and rolled her under him, pressing her wrist to the cloth covering the grass while he cut off the words with his mouth. The anguish in her voice was an ache in his own throat, a tightness in his chest. There was no gentleness in him this time as he kissed her, plunging his tongue hungrily into her mouth. And the thunder boomed and crashed around them as if the heavens understood his need to obliterate thought.

She answered his need the way she always had, wrapping her arms and legs around him, lifting her head to meet the demands of his tongue, angling her body to fit his so that their joining was quick and sharp and deep. She gave a shuddering gasp that might have stopped him, or at least returned him to a measure of control, if he hadn’t felt her nails raking his back and buttocks, if her body hadn’t met the urgency in his with a wantonness of its own. If the violence of the storm hadn’t fed the passion in his soul and drowned out all voices of reason.

It was over quickly, as a storm of such intensity must be. She arched and cried out even as his own climax took him to the edges of sanity, then brought him back exhausted, drained and awash in remorse. He felt her body quaking beneath him and was certain he must have hurt her, something he’d never done and would never forgive himself for if he had. It was all he could do to bring himself to open his eyes and look down into her face.

And she was laughing. Breathless with laughter, the aftermath of passion, with sheer joy. He began to laugh, too, with relief, with thanksgiving. And yes, with joy.

At that moment the heavens opened up and the rain came down in sheets. In a moment water was cascading from his forehead, from the end of his nose, onto her face. He tried to wipe it away, but it was futile.

“Let’s get out of this before we drown!” he shouted, and she nodded. But it was a moment longer before he could bring himself to withdraw from her, first kissing her again, slowly and deeply, lingering there as long as he could because separating from her felt so much like pain. As if she’d become a part of him he was having to tear away.

But, of course, he had to end it even though he felt that hollowness in his chest he couldn’t put a name to.

They were on their hands and knees, scrambling to find their clothing, their shoes, gathering everything into the car cover, into one big awkward bundle. Dashing blindly through the rain, making it through the barbed-wire fence without serious injury, splashing through puddles in the packed sand and gravel driveway, to take shelter at last in the garage. Laughing and gasping while they sorted sodden clothes and tried without much success to dry themselves with the equally sopping-wet car cover, shivering and talking in breathless bursts.

“Oh, my God, I can’t believe we did that!”

“I know—what are we,
twelve
?”

“I don’t think I was this crazy when I was twelve...”

“I know I wasn’t. I’d have been in so much trouble...”

“Aren’t we now?”

“I don’t know—what time is it? They get up really early—”

“Oh, hell, we can’t go in the front—”

“Looking like—”

“Drowned cats!”

It was the laughing and shivering and craziness, Yancy thought, that got her through the aftermath of what had just happened. For a while, at least, she didn’t have to face the realization that those moments with Hunt, making love on a makeshift bed beneath a stormy sky, were probably all they would ever have. Later she’d wonder how she was going to find the strength to say goodbye to him and mean it, when every part of her was aching with wanting him, needing him.

Loving him.

“You’re shivering,” Hunt said, and for a few more moments she allowed herself to be wrapped in his arms and to soak in the warmth and comfort and strength of his body.

Later she’d wonder how she was going to find the strength to hide her own grief when the time came to help Laila deal with hers. Later she’d find a way to ignore the voices in her head that even now were urging, begging, pleading with her reasoning self to find a way, somehow, to let Hunt be a part of their lives, for however long or for as much as he was able. Because it was what
she
wanted.

Later, much later, she would find a quiet place and maybe, just maybe, allow herself to cry.

For now, she would laugh in spite of the pain in her heart, and if there were tears...well, they’d just seem to be a few more raindrops, and no one—certainly not Hunt—would notice.

“Seriously,” Hunt said, resting his chin on her head as he took a settling breath, “any bright ideas how we handle this? I think the rain has slowed down, but no matter how you slice it, we are busted.”

“Hmm. Maybe not.” She pulled away, wiping her cheeks with her hands, and turned before she could give in to the yearning to kiss him one more time.
Just once more. But it would only make it hurt worse, wouldn’t it?
“There’s an outside door to the chapel—a big heavy one like the front door. It’s probably not locked.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Hunt said. “Help me spread this cover out so it’ll dry. Then let’s make a run for it.”

With some streaks of pink-tinged sky showing off to the southeast, it was light enough to see their way when they left the garage. A light mist speckled their faces as they dashed from under the dripping trees that lined the drive and across thick grass to the chapel. The flagstone circle drive that was the approach to the villa’s front door didn’t extend to the chapel doors, which weren’t used very often. Here, a single flagstone and concrete step surrounded by lawn approached the massive double doors, and sprigs of Bermuda grass had found their way between the pavers. The doors weren’t locked, but creaked and groaned when Hunt pulled them open, like a grumpy giant awakened from a long nap. As they stood on the step peering into the chapel, the rising sun found an opening in the clouds, making the darkness inside seem almost impenetrable.

“Close your eyes for a few seconds,” Hunt said. “It’ll help your night vision.”

Yancy followed his suggestion and when she opened her eyes was able to make out shapes well enough to guide him to the side aisle and, from there, feeling their way along the wall, to the door that led to the courtyard. With her hand on the latch, she let out a breath of relief at having avoided the humiliation of getting caught sneaking into the house half-dressed, like a couple of delinquent teenagers.

She started violently, her heart jumping half out of her chest as a cracked and rusty voice came from the deep shadows only a few feet away.

“Kind of early for a walk in the rain, ain’t it?”

Chapter 15

H
unt’s conditioning kept him from jumping out of his skin, but he felt Yancy’s violent start. “Sam Malone, I presume?” he said as he squeezed her hand in reassurance.

From the shadows came a scratchy sound he was pretty sure was laughter. “You got good nerves, son—I’ll say that for you. You can let go of my granddaughter’s hand now. She needs to get some dry clothes on before she catches her death. And the little girl’s gonna be waking up pretty soon. Best she doesn’t find her mama gone.”

“Couldn’t agree more,” Hunt said and was turning once again for the door, Yancy tucked into the curve of his arm. He could feel her body quivering.

“Not you, son,” the old man said. “You can stay awhile. Got some things to say to you.”

Uh-oh. Seriously?
Hunt thought. He felt Yancy’s hesitation and murmured, “It’s okay. You go on.”

He stayed where he was until he heard the door latch behind her. His night vision was excellent, and he could see Sam Malone sitting in a pew on the side aisle near the door. He went to lean against the wall beside him and folded his arms on his chest. “Okay, sir, I’m listening.”

Sam gave his scratchy laugh. “No need to ‘sir’ me, son. I’m not your CO and this ain’t the army.” There was a long pause, which Hunt patiently waited out. Then the old man gave a gusty sigh. “Ah, hell, I never was one for words.”

“Not true,” Hunt said. “I read that letter you sent to Yancy. Seems to me like you do a pretty good job of saying what you need to.”

Sam snorted. “That’s writing. You can think on what you want to write. Change it if it doesn’t sound right. Speaking’s different. Never could figure out how to tell a woman how I felt about her. Maybe why I couldn’t make any of my marriages work—well, one reason, anyway.” There was another pause. Sam shifted restlessly on the hard pew. “You say you read my letter, so you know how I ruined things with all three of my wives and my children, too. That’s the thing I regret the most in my life, you know, and it’s been a long life and I’ve done a whole lot to regret. But that’s the biggest. That I never knew my kids. Oh, yeah, I did see my son grow up—that’s Yancy’s daddy, you know—but I wasn’t home enough for him to know who I was, hardly. And then he was gone, and it was too late. Too damn late.” His voice cracked and faded away. He cleared his throat and went on.

“Oh, I thought what I was doing was important, making a lot of money. Money I didn’t need, since I already had more’n I knew what to do with. What it mostly was, though, was I had this... I guess they call it the wanderlust. It was what made me hop on that freight train way back when I wasn’t much more than a fool kid, though I told myself it was because I was hungry and needed a job. It was the Great Depression, you know. No, I just never took well to stayin’ in one place, doin’ the same things over and over. Thought I needed adventuring to be happy, and maybe I did, back then. Took me a while longer to learn what was important and what wasn’t.”

This time the pause was so long Hunt thought maybe he was through. But then the old voice took on strength. “You understand what I’m sayin’ to you, son?”

Hunt straightened up and cleared his throat. “Yes, I believe I do,” he said. He wanted to say more, but it seemed he wasn’t any better than Sam Malone when it came to talking about what he was feeling.

Maybe because he wasn’t sure himself what that was. Which was something that seemed to be happening to him a lot lately. He frowned into the shadows, trying to home in on just what he was feeling at the moment.

Scared. Again.

Surprisingly, not resentful.

He felt chilled, and not because of his wet clothes. This cold was deep down inside.

“She’s like you,” he surprised himself by saying.

The old man’s head moved, nodding in agreement. “She is. But she’ll do what she thinks needs to be done—for the little girl, you know.” He gave a gusty sigh. “Women are better at making those kinds of sacrifices than we are. Shamed to say it, but it’s true.”

He shifted around, going about the task of getting to his feet. Hunt thought better of trying to help him.

“Well, you go on now. I expect you’re just as wet as she was. Sage’ll be by here shortly to get me...take me down and get me up in the saddle. I like to be ready for the kid, you know, when she comes down for her ride.”

Once again, Hunt surprised himself by holding out his hand. The old man’s was large and callused, his grip strong. “Thank you,” he said and just did manage to stop himself from adding
sir
.

He left the chapel and was halfway across the courtyard before he realized his heart was pounding and his body vibrating with unspent adrenaline, his mind racing, replaying the words and scenes and thoughts of the past day. And he realized it was the way he’d often felt right before a mission when he was preparing himself mentally and physically for events that might change his life forever.

* * *

Yancy had always done some of her best thinking in the shower. This morning, though, all the cascade of warm water drumming on her head did was foster a ridiculous urge to cry. She couldn’t seem to find a way to get her mind past the pain. Pain that was everywhere—in her throat and her chest. Even the muscles in her face hurt. Her stomach was in knots. All she wanted to do was find a corner somewhere, curl up in it and weep.

But she wasn’t a crier, never had been. And Laila was an uncommonly perceptive child and would be sure to notice.

And how would I explain?

How do I explain this to myself? How do I explain that, even though I love Hunt and even though I think he loves me and I
know
he loves Laila, and even though he is her father, in spite of all those things, I have to tell him...

Tell him...what? Oh, God, what do I tell him?

When Yancy finally emerged from the bathroom in a cloud of steam, dressed in shorts and T-shirt, hair towel-dried and finger-combed, she found Laila up and chipper as a sparrow, all but dancing in her eagerness to see Akaa Hunt.

“Do you think Akaa Hunt will come riding with me and Sam—”

“Sam and
me
,” Yancy corrected automatically.

“—and I want to show him my goats and how I’m not afraid of horses anymore—well, not as much as I used to be. Do you think Akaa Hunt knows how to ride a horse? Because if he doesn’t, I could teach him. Or Sam could. Mom, I can’t find my shoes! Do you think Akaa Hunt is awake yet? Can I go and see? If I knock really quietly—”

“No, you absolutely may not wake him up,” Yancy said firmly, while her insides fluttered and her head grew light at the thought of facing him again. So soon after...
Oh, God, not yet. I’m not ready!
“He’s probably tired after such a long trip yesterday. Go on out to the kitchen and eat your breakfast. When Akaa Hunt wakes up, and
after
he has his breakfast, I’m sure he’ll want to see your goats, and maybe he’ll go for a ride with you, too.”

Oh, yes, please, let him go for a ride with her. Please let me have more time.

“O-kaay,” Laila said with a heartrending sigh. “But you better tell him to come with me, Mom.” Having retrieved her shoes from underneath the bed, she shoved her feet into them and clumped her way to the door.
“Promise,”
she threw over her shoulder as she opened the door and went out.

Yancy winced as the door slammed behind her daughter.

She couldn’t bear the thought of breakfast, or even coffee, but crawling into bed and pulling the covers over her head seemed like a cowardly option. Feeling as if she was moving through molasses, she tugged the bedclothes into some sort of order, then went out to the veranda. Though it was already warm and muggy, the sun hadn’t yet reached that side of the courtyard, so she settled onto a chaise longue and lay back with a sigh.
I’ll only close my eyes for a few minutes
, she told herself.

Just a few minutes.

* * *

Hunt emerged from his room, having showered and put on dry clothes, feeling cloaked in the same mantle of calm with which he usually faced a difficult mission. He felt focused. He felt ready.

He stood for a few minutes on the veranda, thinking about his next move. Coffee first? Breakfast? He didn’t feel like eating. He usually didn’t, before a mission, but normally forced himself to eat anyway, knowing he would need the energy. But this being more of an emotional battle than a physical one, that probably didn’t apply.

The sun was hot already, and he was about to retreat into the cool of the house, when he saw Yancy. She was lying on a chaise longue on the veranda. His heart gave an odd little kick, then settled down to a slow, heavy beat as he crossed the courtyard, moving as silently as he knew how.

When he got closer to her, he saw that her eyes were closed. Sleeping? Not too surprising, he thought, considering the night just past. Instead of moving on, he stood for a few minutes, just looking at her.

She was incredibly beautiful.

Well, hell, he’d always thought she was. But it occurred to him now that it had been a long time since he’d thought about that at all. When had she become just...Yankee? Not a pair of brown eyes that inexplicably matched almost exactly hair that was indisputably auburn. Not a wide and generous mouth that curved upward at the corners, or a pair of legs that were long and slender, and a body that...well. At some point she’d stopped being any of those things. Now to him she was simply
Yancy
.

He drew a long breath, disconcerted to find that it wasn’t quite steady, and went to join her, intentionally making his footsteps audible.

She stirred and opened her eyes. Looked up at him, not smiling. “Hi,” she said, her voice husky.

“We need to talk,” he said.

We need to talk? You just orchestrated a complex treaty among factions that had been killing each other for hundreds of years, and that’s the best you could come up with?

“Yes,” she said.

She took the hand he offered to help her up, but when he would have brought her on into his arms, she slipped past him and stepped off the veranda, into the courtyard. He followed her, though every nerve and muscle in his body screamed in protest at not being able to hold her. It would have been so much better, he thought, if he could just hold her.

“Yancy,” he said. She stopped, her back still turned to him. He took in a breath. “I think we should get married.” Then he counted her silence in his own heartbeats.

She turned with a soft gust of laughter. “What did Sam say to you? Tell you to do right by me? Threaten you with a shotgun?”

He tried his best to smile back at her. “Nothing like that. No, he...just talked about his own life. His regrets...” He drew a breath, and the tightness in his chest made it painful. “Uh...and priorities.
You
know. And I think—” She was shaking her head. He put up a hand to stop whatever it was she wanted to say. “No—let me say this. I think— Dammit.” He thrust his fingers through his hair and tried to laugh. “He told me he—Sam did—that he never could tell the women in his life how he felt about them. I get that. I really do. But I’m trying to—I
need
to do better than that. So... I’m just gonna say it. Yankee, I think— No, I
know
. I love you. I really do. I think I always have. And—” She made a small wounded sound and whispered something he couldn’t quite hear and chose to ignore. “And maybe you love me, too? And there’s Laila. So... I think we should just...get married. Don’t you?”

* * *

Laila had finished feeding and brushing Mor and Jasmine and Belle, and Akaa Hunt still hadn’t come. Sam was already on his horse, Old Paint, and he was waiting for Laila to finish her chores so they could go for their ride. Sweet Pea, Laila’s horse, was all saddled up and ready to go, too.

But Laila was disappointed that Akaa Hunt hadn’t come. She had really wanted him to come and ride with her, and every minute that went by and he still hadn’t come made her feel sadder and grouchier. And maybe a little bit scared, too.

She didn’t
think
Akaa Hunt would leave without saying goodbye. But...what if he had?

“I don’t want to go riding today,” she told Sam. “I’m going to go and see Akaa Hunt.”

She ran almost all the way back to the villa. When she saw that Akaa Hunt’s car was still there in the driveway, she stopped beside the fountain to catch her breath. Happiness flooded back into her chest, making her feel warm inside. He hadn’t left after all! He was probably eating breakfast. So maybe there was still time for him to come for a ride with her and Sam.

Smiling, she skipped around to the side gate and scampered up the steps and across the patio to the kitchen. Nobody was there, not even Josie. Laila could hear her singing and the vacuum cleaner going in a different room somewhere. Akaa Hunt must be in his room, she thought. Surely it wasn’t too early
now
to wake him up.

She ran through the dining room, across the entryway and then the living room, pausing only long enough there to call out “hi” to Josie. In the corridor, she stopped running. She walked sedately to the door of Akaa Hunt’s room and knocked. Quietly. She waited. Then she knocked again, loudly this time.

No one answered. She thought about opening the door and just walking in, but she knew that wouldn’t be polite. Anyway, Mom would probably know where Akaa Hunt was.

So back through the house she went, around to the other corridor and down to the door to the room she and Mom shared. This time she didn’t have to knock. She opened the door and went in. Across the room, through the closed French doors, she could see Mom and Akaa Hunt. They were in the courtyard, talking.

No. They were arguing.

Laila’s heart began to beat very fast. Her stomach felt cold inside. She crept across the room, right up to the glass door, and now she could see Mom’s face. She looked almost like she was crying.

She knew she shouldn’t. But she had to hear what Mom and Akaa Hunt were saying to each other.
She had to.
So, very, very quietly she pushed on the handle and opened the door. Just a little bit.