THE GUARDIAN (Taskforce Series) (30 page)

In the blink of an eye,
Jackson
was leaning over his colleague and breathing fire. “Don’t even think about it,” he warned.

Toby’s dark blue eyes mocked him. “Relax, man, I would never trespass on your territory. But seriously, I’ll watch the kid for you so you can give it your best shot.”

“Don’t be crass,”
Jackson
said, striding out of the office and across the hall to his room
.

A minute later, they bumped into each other out in the hallway, Toby in his Hawaiian shirt and cut-off jeans,
Jackson
in his swim trunks. Toby raised an inquiring eyebrow, and
Jackson
felt his face heat. “I accept your offer,” he said, shortly. “Give me half an hour.”

“Half an hour?” Toby rolled his eyes. “A body like that should be hammered for at least an hour str--”

Jackson
stuck a warning finger in his face. “Don’t say it.” Disgusted by how easily his colleague pushed his buttons, he stalked toward the sliding glass doors, ignoring Toby’s wicked snicker
.

“My mom was always sad,” Naomi divulged, her shovel sliding into the sand as she carved out a castle moat
.

Lena
tore her gaze from the dancing water to the profile of the girl sitting next to her, head bowed in concentration. She had promised herself she wouldn’t exploit the child by asking questions, but, as it turned out, Naomi didn’t need any prompting. Her words suggested all kinds of tragic situations.

Maybe
Lena
could allow herself one
tiny
question. “Why was she sad?”   

Naomi shrugged. “She missed my dad, I guess, ’cause he was in
Iraq
. But whenever he did come home, my mom got mad and sometimes she’d cry or go for walks by herself.”

Oh, dear.

“He thinks you’re hot, you know,” the girl volunteered, squinting against the sun to smile up at her knowingly.

Pleasure tingled to the ends of
Lena
’s extremities only to fade away with a throb of regret. Whether
Jackson
could forgive her now depended, in large part, on what happened with his investigation. She had her own concerns to fret about—her interview with
Davis
, whether Peter would blow
Jackson
’s cover, whether she and Jackson would ever have the chance to reconcile.

It seemed ludicrous to hope for any kind of a relationship between them now, sexual or otherwise.

“I think I’m ready to wade,”
Lena
decided, hoping to raise her flagging spirits.

Naomi scrambled to her feet. “I promise it’s not muddy at all unless you go out deep,” she encouraged, running into the shallows and diving under the surface
.

Lena
took off her tulle blouse and draped it over a chair. Wearing just her royal blue tank top and jeans rolled to her knees, she waded cautiously into the water which closed with welcoming coolness about her calves. “Wow, this feels great,” she admitted, wondering if she’d done the right thing to turn down the offer of Silvia’s swimsuit.

Movement up at the house had her glancing up. Her heart leapt to see
Jackson
, bearing an armload of towels on his way down. Toby followed him carrying a cooler, but Lena only had eyes for
Jackson
, whose smooth bare torso made her heart race
.

As Abdul Ibn Wasi, he had appealed to her in a powerful, but illicit way. As Jackson Maddox, there wasn’t any dimension of his being that didn’t strum a chord of admiration and desire.

“You’re staring,” Naomi taunted
.

“Am not.”
Lena
turned and splashed her. Naomi splashed her back then gasped in remorse when she realized she had soaked
Lena
’s tank top. “It’s okay. I can get this shirt wet.” She looked back up at the stairs
.

The memory of
Jackson
’s skilled tongue
turned her bones to Jello as she watched him come closer. To think that just the other night she had gripped the table and begged for his possession. A shiver of longing rippled through her, pearling her nipples and heating her face
.

There was no hiding her response from
Jackson
’s sharp gaze as he stepped off the last set of stairs. Blocking Toby’s view of her, he deposited their towels on one of the folding chairs and strode into the water toward them.

“You two having fun?” he asked, his gaze dipping toward her sodden top
.

“Yes,” they chorused
.

Compunction at not accepting
Jackson
’s ultimatum wrung
Lena
’s womanly parts.
Say it’s not too late,
she begged silently. Seeing him like this, in his off-duty life, interacting with his daughter, he appealed to her so powerfully, she simply had to have him, had to learn all there was about him, to feel him possessing her utterly and completely.

“Swim with us, Dad,” Naomi ordered, tossing water on him.

With a mock roar of outrage, he charged his daughter, tackling her into the shallows. They fell together with a splash, and the displaced water billowed toward
Lena
, soaking her jeans to her thighs
.

Shocked, she returned Toby’s mocking gaze as he settled into a chair to salute her with his beer.
Oh, what the hell.
She was probably going to get a lot wetter before she got dry again.

She dove in after them.

Chapter Fifteen

“FYI, it’s 3 P.M.,” Toby called, having glanced at his phone.

Lena
, sitting in the lounge chair next to him, looked down at her clothing, which had repeatedly been soaked and dried in the scorching sun, over the course of the day. Now, she was wet again. Thanks to the cold beer she’d sucked down, she felt both wonderfully content and sensually stimulated as she watched
Jackson
draw Naomi about on her float.

She could not remember a single day in the past ten years that she had enjoyed more. Having frolicked for hours in the river with the two of them, sharing comfortable conversation and a picnic of chicken salad sandwiches and strawberries, the last thing she wanted was to return to the reality she’d created for herself these last two weeks.

At Toby’s remark,
Jackson
looked over at her, his expression conveying reluctance. “You should probably head out,” he commented. Leaving Naomi to sunbathe on her float, he waded out of the water. Sunlight glimmered on the droplets snaking down his powerful chest, making him look like a dark-skinned Poseidon.

Lena
’s heart expanded. Was it possible for him to appeal to her any more than he did? Everything he had said and done today had an immediate, corollary effect on her pulse and her emotions.

Naomi’s head popped up. “Oh, man! Can’t she stay a little longer?” 

Can’t I?
asked a plaintiff voice in
Lena
’s head.

“We both have to get ready for work, sweetheart.”
Jackson
’s firm yet gentle tone made arguing pointless.

Lena
admired his assertiveness, while his words elicited a pang of compunction
.

“Plus, your grandmother will be here within the hour,” he added, unwittingly providing her the impetus to leave. “Stay here with Mr. Burke while I find
Lena
something to wear and see her on her way.”

“But there’s nothing to do,” Naomi protested, flopping back on her float.

Toby stood up unexpectedly, whipped off his sunglasses, tossed aside his straw hat, and started tackling the buttons on his colorful shirt. “I’ll tow you to the other side,” he offered.

Naomi squinted at the opposite shore. “You can’t swim that far.”

But one glimpse at Toby’s broad bare back, and
Lena
was pretty certain that he could.

“Let’s go,”
Jackson
urged as Toby dived into the water and seized Naomi’s raft
.

“Daddy,” she shrieked with mixed delight and terror. “He’s kidnapping me!”

“You’ll be safe,”
Jackson
called with confidence. “Say good-bye to
Lena
.”

Good-bye as in they’d never see each other again?

“Bye!” Naomi called out.

With a poignant farewell,
Lena
recalled how she’d never gotten to say good-bye to Alexa. “Good-bye, Naomi. I had a great time today.”

As
Jackson
draped a towel over her shoulders, he sent her a searching look. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” She dredged up a smile. “Naomi’s great. I like her a lot.”

He cut a glance at his daughter, who lay back, smiling up at the sun as her float moved farther into the slow-moving river. “I missed too much of her childhood,” she heard him say in a gruff voice. “But that’s going to change.”

Regarding his pained expression,
Lena
realized she was seeing his vulnerable side. Her heart seemed to crack in half. “Do you miss your wife?” she blurted.

His startled gaze made her curse her inquisitive nature, but then his words reached her ears and she was glad to have asked.

“Honestly, since we met, you’re the only woman I think about.”

The sand burning the soles of
Lena
’s feet was the only indication that she wasn’t floating inches off the ground. The time had come to bury her pride, once and for all
.
“Can we start over again,
Jackson
?” she pleaded
.
    

A slow smile drew back his lips and carved dimples into his cheeks that turned her giddy. “I’d like that,” he agreed
.

In the next instant, he caught her hand in his and tugged her toward the stairs. Feeling like a teenager,
Lena
hurried up the zigzag staircase at his side, wondering with a pounding heart, what starting over would look like.

He led her into the cool hallway at the back of the house. “Come on in,” he said, waving her into a tidy bedroom with a queen-sized bed. She knew it was his by scent alone. “You need to get out of those wet clothes. I’ll find you something to wear home.”

He started sifting through his drawers then froze as the door clicked shut and
Lena
dragged her tank top off over her head. Fire leapt in his gaze as it jumped to hers, then dropped to her naked breasts, following the path of her jeans as she peeled them deliberately over her hips and down her legs, dragging her underwear off with them. “I need you to finish what you started the other night,”
Lena
requested, in a voice thick with longing. Something about
Jackson
brought out the tigress in her, and she could care less about modesty at the moment.