AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He grabbed her foot in a firm hold before she could damage a kidney. “You have the prettiest feet.”
She snorted.
Still, he couldn’t unwrap his brain from the notion that his job bothered her, a problem he should have considered before. The stresses of military life had broken up plenty of marriages in the squadron.
Whoa. Marriage?
Wasn’t he just considering the dating thing as grown-ups? Not that they’d ever really dated in the first place, just shot straight from pals to making love, all those teenage hormones taking over. Now, though, the next logical step included taking things slow, spending time together, healing old wounds and progressing from there.
But he couldn’t stop thinking about her old engagement ring in his flight suit pocket, his permanent reminder not to repeat past mistakes. Couldn’t stop remembering what it had once looked like planted on Mary Elise’s finger.
She scrunched her toes, drawing him from his haze. “Ouch,” she squawked.
His hand jerked away from her foot. “Oh, man, ’Lise, I’m sorry.”
“Gotcha!” She toed him in the side again, her gaze unrelenting. “I told you already. I’m not going to break.”
He smiled. He loved her spunk, her steely will. This woman was far from breakable.
Memories bombarded him of their hours together, re-discovering each other on the water bed. The floor. The sofa. “I figured that out.”
“I’m stronger out of bed, too. I realize there are things about your job you can’t tell me. But don’t hold back on what youcanshare because you’re worried I’ll turn all Victorian on you and you’ll need smelling salts. Got it?”
He forestalled her lethal toe. “Yes, ma’am.”
The ring in his pocket seemed to scorch a brand through the fabric and into his skin. If he even intended to consider those thoughts, then she needed to know more about him before they both landed in way over their heads. “About connections, let’s just say once you get a high-security clearance for one mission they tend to tap you for other missions since you’re already in the loop.”
“And you enjoy that,” she answered with understanding and no censure.
“Oh, yeah.”
Her fingers trekked inside the leg of his flight suit, scratched along his calf. “And you enjoy that?”
“Oh, yeah,” he repeated. “I think I could really get into this shared control gig.”
Next thing he knew, he had the ring out of his pocket and wasn’t sure who was more shocked, him or Mary Elise.
Her hand flew out of his pants leg. “You kept it.”
He worked the solitaire between two fingers until the diamond caught the fading sunlight, casting multifaceted sparks. “So I wouldn’t forget what a relationship screw-up I am like my father.”
“Danny,” her fingers slid to his knee, “you made a single mistake at twenty-one. For God’s sake, that doesn’t make you like your father.”
“I don’t do relationships well, never have. There are plenty of women besides you who can attest to that. And just look at the mess with my dad.”
“He was proud of you.”
Daniel jammed the ring back in his pocket where it could brand a reminder he needed before he ended up doing something totally illogical like asking this woman to marry him. “So much he didn’t trust me enough to tell me when you came to Rubistan.”
“I told him not to.”
“So?” If that sounded arrogant, big deal. His father should have called him, anyway.
“I wasn’t in a good place right then.” She plucked a leaf from a low-hanging branch, crumpled it in her hand.
“I can understand having someone try to kill you must have been rattling. All the more reason extra support and protection should have been a good thing.”
“Not just that.” She studied him for four lazy swishes of the hammock, her fist further mangling the leaf. “How much did you learn about endometriosis on the Internet while I was sleeping?”
