Mackenzie's Pleasure (18 page)

Mackenzie's Mountain, just outside Ruth, Wyoming. The view was breathtaking, an endless

vista of majestic mountains and green valleys. Everything here was as familiar to him as his

own hands. Saddles, boots, some cattle but mostly horses. Books in every room of the

sprawling house, cats prowling through the barns and stables, his mother's sweet, bossy

coddling, his father's concern and understanding.

He'd been shot before; he'd been sliced up in a knife fight. He'd had his collarbone

broken, ribs cracked, a lung punctured. He had been seriously injured before, but this was the

closest he'd ever come to dying. He'd been bleeding to death, lying there in the bottom of

the raft with Barrie crouched over him, pressing the chador over the wound with every ounce of

her weight. Her quickness, her determination, had made the difference. Santos squeezing the

plasma from the bags into his veins had made the difference. He had been so close that he could

pick out a dozen details that had made the difference; if any one of them hadn't happened, he

would have died.

He'd been unusually quiet since leaving the naval hospital and returning home for

convalescence. It wasn't that he was in low spirits, but rather that he had a lot of thinking to

do, something that hadn't been easy when practically the entire family had felt compelled to visit

and reassure themselves of his relative well-being. Joe had flown in from Washington for a

quick check on his baby brother; Michael and Shea had visited several times, bringing their

two rapscallion sons with them; Josh and Loren and their three had descended for a weekend

visit, which was all the time Loren's job at the hospital in Seattle had allowed. Mans had

driven all night to be there when he was brought home. At least he'd been able to walk on his

own by then, even if very slowly, or likely she would still be here. She had pulled up a chair

directly in front of him and sat for hours, her black eyes locked on his face as if she was

willing vitality from her body into his. Maybe she had been. His little sister was fey, magical;

she operated on a different level than other people did.

Hell, even Chance had shown up. He'd done so warily, eyeing their mother and sister as

if they were bombs that might go off in his face, but he was here, sitting beside Zane on the

porch.

"You're thinking of resigning."

Zane didn't have to wonder how Chance had known what was on his mind. After nearly

battering each other to death when they were fourteen, they had reached an unusual

communion. Maybe it was because they'd shared so much, from classes to girls to military

training. Even after all this time, Chance was as wary as a wounded wolf and didn't like people to

get close to him, but even though he resisted, he was helpless against family. Chance had never in

his life been loved until Mary had brought him home with her and the sprawling, brawling

Mackenzies had knocked him flat. It was fun to watch him still struggle against the family

intimacy each time he was drawn into the circle, because within an hour he always surrendered.

Mary wouldn't let him do anything else; nor would Maris. After accepting him as a brother,

Zane had never even acknowledged Chance's wariness. Only Wolf was willing to give his

adopted son time to adjust—but there was still a limit on how much time he would allow.

"Yeah," he finally said.

"Because you nearly bought it this time?"

Zane snorted. "When has that ever made any difference to either of us?" He alone of

the family knew the exact details of Chance's work. It was a toss-up which of them was in the

most danger.

"Then it's this last promotion that did it."

"It took me out of the field," Zane said quietly. Carefully he leaned back in the chair

and propped his booted feet on the porch railing. Though he was a fast healer, two and a half weeks

wasn't quite long enough to let him ignore the wound. "If two of my men hadn't been wounded in that

screwup on the
Montgomery,
I wouldn't have been able to go on this last mission."

Chance knew about the screwup. Zane had told him about it, and screwup was the most

polite description he'd used. As soon as he'd regained consciousness in the naval hospital,

he'd been on the phone, starting and directing the investigation. Though Odessa would fully recover,

it was likely Higgins would have to retire on disability. The guards who had shot the two

SEALs might escape court-martial if their counsel was really slick, but at the very least they would

be cashiered out of the service. The extent of the damage to the careers of Captain Udaka and

Executive Officer Boyd remained to be seen; Zane had targeted the shooters, but the ripple effect

would go all the way up to the captain.

"I'm thirty-one," Zane said. "That's just about the upper limit for active missions. I'm too

damn good at my job, too. The Navy keeps promoting me for it, then they say I'm too highly

ranked to go on missions."

"You want to throw in with me?" Chance asked casually.

He'd considered it. Very seriously. But something kept nagging at him, something he

couldn't quite bring into focus.

"I want to. If things were different, I would, but..."

"What things?"

Zane shrugged. At least part of his uneasy feeling could be nailed down. "A woman,"

he said.

"Oh, hell." Chance kicked back and surveyed the world over the toes of his boots. "If it's

a woman, you won't be able to concentrate on anything until you've gotten her out of your

system. Damn their sweet little hides," he said fondly. Chance generally had women crawling all

over him. It didn't hurt that he was drop-dead handsome, but he had a raffish, daredevil quality to

him that brought them out of the woodwork.

Zane wasn't certain he could get Barrie out of his system. He wasn't certain he wanted to.

He didn't wonder why she had disappeared without even saying goodbye, hope you're feeling better.

Bunny and Spook had told him how she'd been dragged, kicking and yelling and swearing, aboard a

plane and taken back to Athens. He figured her father, combined with the Navy's policy of

secrecy concerning the SEALs, had prevented her from finding out to which hospital they'd

taken him.

He missed her. He missed her courage, her sturdy willingness to do whatever needed

doing. He missed the serenity of her expression, and the heat of her lovemaking.

God, yes.

The one memory, more than any of the others, that was branded in his brain was the

moment when she had reached for his belt and said in that fierce whisper, "I'll do it!"

He'd understood. Not just why she needed to be in control, but the courage it took her to

wipe out the bad memories and replace them with good ones. She'd been a virgin; she had

told the truth about that. She hadn't known what to do, and she hadn't expected the pain. But she

had taken him anyway, sweetly, hotly, sliding her tight little body down on him and shattering his

control the way no other woman had ever done.

She could have been a spoiled, helpless little socialite; she
should
have been exactly

that. Instead she had made the best of a tense, dangerous situation, done what she could to help

and hadn't voiced a single complaint.

He liked being with her, Weed talking to her. He was too much of a loner to easily accept the

word love in connection with anyone other than family, but with Bar-rie...maybe. He wanted

to spend more time with her, get to know her better, let whatever would develop get to developing.

He wanted her.

First things first, though. He had to get his strength back; right now he could walk

from room to room without aid, but he would think twice about heading down to the stables

by himself. He had to decide whether or not he was going to stay in the Navy; it felt like time to be

moving on, since the reason he'd joined in the first place was being taken away from him as he

moved up the ranks. If he wasn't going to remain a SEAL, then what would he do for a living? He

had to decide, had to get his life settled.

Barrie might not be interested in any kind of relationship with him, though from the way

Spook and Bunny had described her departure, he didn't think that was the case. The day of

lovemaking they had shared had been more than propinquity for both of them.

Getting in touch with her could take some doing, though. That morning he had placed

a call to the embassy in Athens. He'd given his name and asked to speak to Barrie Lovejoy. It had

been Ambassador William Lovejoy who had come on the line, however, and the

conversation hadn't been cordial.

"It isn't that Barrie doesn't appreciate what you did, but I'm sure you understand that she

wants to put all of that behind her. Talking with you would bring it all back and needlessly upset

her," the ambassador bad said in a cool, well-bred voice, his diction the best money could buy.

"Is that her opinion, or yours?" Zane had asked, his tone arctic.

"I don't see that it matters," the ambassador had replied, and hung up.

Zane decided he would let it rest for now. He wasn't in any shape to do much about it, so

he would wait. When he had his mind made up about what he was going to do, there would

be plenty of time to get in touch with Barrie, and now that he knew the ambassador had given

orders for his calls not to be routed to her, the next time he would be prepared to do an end run around

her father.

"Zane," his mother called from inside the house, pulling his thoughts to the present.

"Are you getting tired?"

"I feel fine," he called back. It was an exaggeration, but he wasn't unduly tired. He glanced

at Chance and saw the smirk on his brother's face.

"With all the worry about you, she forgot about my cracked ribs," Chance whispered.

"Glad to be of service," Zane drawled. "Just don't expect me to get shot every time you

bang yourself up a little." The entire family thought it was hilarious the way Chance reacted to

Mary's coddling and fussing, as if the attention terrified him, even though he was never able to

resist her. Chance was putty in Mary's hands, but then, they all were. They'd grown up with the

fine example of their father to emulate, and Wolf Mackenzie might growl and stomp, but

Mary usually got her way.

"Chance?"

Zane controlled a grin as Chance stiffened, the smirk disappearing from his face as if it

had never been.

"Ma'am?" he answered cautiously.

"Are you still keeping a pressure wrap on your ribs?"

That familiar panicked expression was in his eyes now. "Ah...no, ma'am." He could

have lied; Mary would have believed him. But none of them ever lied to her, even when it was in

their best interests. It would hurt the little tyrant s feelings too much if she ever discovered

any of her kids had lied to her.

"You know you're supposed to wrap them for another week," said the voice from

inside the house. It was almost like hearing God speak, except this voice was light and

sweet and liquidly Southern.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Come inside and let me take care of that.'

"Yes, ma'am," Chance said again, resignation in his voice. He got up from his rocking

chair and went into the house. As he passed Zane, he muttered, "Getting shot didn't work.

Try something else."

Two months later, Sheriff Zane Mackenzie stood naked at the window of the pleasant

two-bedroom Spanish-style house he had bought in southern Arizona. He was staring out

over the moonlit desert, something wild and hot running through him at the sight. His SEAL

training had taught him how to adapt to any environment, and the hot, dry climate didn't bother

him.

Once he'd made up his mind to resign his commission, things had rapidly fallen into

place. Upon hearing that he was leaving the Navy, a former SEAL team member who was now

on the governor's staff in Phoenix had called and asked if he would be interested in serving the

remaining two years of the term of a sheriff who had died in office.

At first Zane had been taken aback; he'd never considered going into law enforcement.

Moreover, he didn't know anything about Arizona state laws.

"Don't worry about it," his friend had said breezily. "Sheriff is a political position, and

most of the time it's more administrative than anything else. The situation you'd be going

into is more hands-on, though. A couple of the deputies have quit, so you'd be shorthanded

until some more can be hired, and the ones still there will resent the hell out of you because

one of them wasn't appointed to finish out the sheriff's term."

"Why not?" Zane asked bluntly. "What's wrong with the chief deputy?"

"She's one of the ones who quit. She left a couple of months before the sheriff died,

took a job on the force in Prescott."

"None of the others are qualified?"

"I wouldn't say that."

"Then what would you say?"

"You gotta understand, there's not a lot of selection here. A couple of the young deputies

are good, real good, but they're
too
young, not enough experience. The one twenty-year guy

isn't interested. A fifteen-year guy is a jerk, and the rest of the deputies hate his guts."