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Max eased his boat into the bay. The sight of Darcy waiting for him had become familiar over the past two weeks, since he’d issued the initial invitation to join him. An invitation to keep her safe had somehow turned into something else.
Today she’d chosen the dock rather than a sandbar, sitting on the edge with her feet dangling in the surf. Her black suit clung to her honey-tanned body, dog tags dangling from her neck. He forced his hungry eyes up. Her welcoming smile blazed brighter than the tropical sun toasting his back.
A rare thing for him, a welcome-home scenario, and yet he’d become too accustomed to it in a few short weeks. Darcy waited while he moored the boat. Sometimes she met Perry and him at the dolphin pen. Other times she waited at the boat launch. Just for him.
He’d always been a loner. His animals made more loyal companions than people, anyway. They also had fewer expectations, a corner of his brain taunted. Yet Darcy never asked anything of him. Just that he hang out with her. No great hardship, hanging with Darcy Renshaw in her bathing suit.
Sometime during the past days things had gone from professional to personal. He and Darcy had scoured nearly every inch of the island together. Whatever ghosts waited for her there, she faced them, shadows lurking in her eyes.
He knew the basics about her kidnapping from her file, not that she’d ever confided in him. At least the “critter coincidences” had stopped, but he couldn’t convince himself to back away.
And in another few days she would be returning home. His stint as her unknown guardian would be over and he could forge ahead with finishing his mission. And that sandbar and dock would be empty. More so than before.
He would miss talking to her. Miss that he’d never had the chance to peel her suit off.
He would missher.
“Hey there, Keagan,” his personal siren called, waving as she pulled her feet from the water. “About time you showed up.”
How long did it take to draw a pair of never-ending legs from the water? Finally she stood and swiped beads of water from her tanned skin.
Max swallowed and concentrated on docking the boat rather than parking himself in Darcy. “Busy day.”
One that left him itching. He was so close to locating that tap. He could feel the logic pattern of which cable contained it gel in his mind. He knew. But until he had solid proof, the knowledge was useless to his superiors. He’d run Lucy and Ethel up and down the cable four times with no luck. What was he missing?
He couldn’t afford wasted time with operatives in the field and crews flying missions over Cantou. Darcy’s words on the roof after the snake attack came back to haunt him. How she wanted to be in the action in Cantou. The edge of urgency to plug that leak upped tenfold.
Soon, he reassured himself. Soon. Then the real maneuvering would begin in the dance of filtered misinformation to flush out the traitor. He counted the hours until Darcy’s departure took her away and safe. Took her away. Period.
But he couldn’t afford to regret her leaving.
The tide drew the boat closer, engine in idle gurgling water behind. With a familiarity two weeks in the making, he pitched her the line to tie off the boat.
She looped it around her hand but didn’t move to secure the craft. “Get your party Tevas on, Doc. We crewdogs are throwing a farewell luau on the base beach. It’s sure to be hokey and full of food, just like the ‘Brady Bunch Goes to Hawaii’ episode.”
He wanted to go with her. Too much. “Thanks, but I’ll have to pass. Stacks of paperwork.”
She perched a hand on her hip. “So don’t sleep tonight. Time’s a-wasting, and I’ll be leaving soon. There’ll be ukulele solos by torchlight. More shish kebabs than you can eat in two lifetimes. You don’t even have to talk to us humans if you don’t want. Heaven knows, no one can get a word in edgewise around Bronco and Crusty, anyway.”
Or around her, either. She was mesmerizing to listen to and watch.
Darcy inched closer. “At least give me a ride over. I’m still too exhausted from yesterday’s flight to hike back to base,” she groused, her body screaming a vitality that mocked her claims of weakness.
He hesitated.
She scrunched her nose. “If you don’t come, Bronco’s going to pair me up with that new copilot. The big lug is so happily married he thinks everyone should invest in a ring and make a slew of picture-worthy memories. Pretend to be my date and protect me from that overgrown Cupid.”
Protect.The single word reminded him of his need to keep her clear of alot more than that. “When you put it that way, how can I say no to you?”
“You can’t.”
No kidding.
Darcy stepped out onto the nose of the boat and tossed the line back to him. Her water shoes slid along the slick deck. Max steadied her. Hands to her waist, careful to keep a safe distance, he lifted her into the boat, steeling himself to keep his distance. As if the tempting give of womanly flesh under his hands wasn’t already tempting him to throw away rational thoughts.
A traitorous wave slapped the boat. Darcy pitched into his arms. Warm, wet Darcy molded to him, every inch of him. Every throbbing, too-long-denied, starving inch of him that was fed up with keeping her at arm’s length.
His hands tightened around her waist, the feel of her too enticing against his skin. Branding him. Her generous lips parted, lips as generous as the woman. It would be so easy to take from her.
