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What was up with the awkward tone in his voice? “Could you, uh, ask him to step in please?”
She needed to see Max, reassure herself he was alive. Then she would face the fury and hurt crowding her brain.
“I already planned to.” All fatherly concern slid away, the General back. “Given what happened out there today, there are a few things you need to know.”
Her father jerked open the door and called into the corridor, “Keagan, could you step in here? It’s time for that chat.”
She tensed. All the memories of their encounter on the beach and their fight afterward marched over her. What would they say to each other once her father left?
Max stepped into the open doorway. Backlit, he filled the frame with his broad shoulders and magnetism. Darcy’s mouth dried. Man, she could use that cup of crushed ice perched on the sink corner right about now.
Then Max stepped into the light.
Her tongue turned to pure cotton.
He stood in the harsh glow of the fluorescent hospital lights, familiar and so very different at the same time. She recognized the outward man in his boat shoes, flowered dive shorts and raspberry-red T-shirt. Hacked-off sleeves showcased his diver-down tattoo with that hint of a scar tracing from his shoulder.
The set of his face, the glint in his eyes, however, was completely new. All the events of the past weeks gelled together…his undeclared Glock, his odd dive patterns, why his dolphins still hadn’t been released even with so many trips out…
Why they’d been attacked.
Darcy reevaluated that new glint in this man she suddenly realized she didn’t know at all. The mindset, however, she recognized well since she’d seen it stamped on so many before him—her father, her crew, every one of those countless faces populating her world since childhood.
She’d wanted Max because he represented something so very different from her father, her co-workers and yes, even herself—government protectors by training, trade and blood. Looking into his eyes, she knew. He wasn’t so different at all.
Max Keagan was one of them.
CHAPTERELEVEN
Max schooledhis features to stay blank, tough to do even after eight years of CIA undercover work. Darcy’s look of comprehension—followed by disillusionment—stabbed clean through him. She was a smart woman. No doubt, she’d put enough pieces together to realize he wasn’t simply Dr. Max Keagan. Now necessity, not to mention safety, dictated she learn the rest.
Or at least enough to keep her safe.
Stepping farther into the room, he resisted the urge to wince at the ache to his joints from the rapid rise to the surface. He’d suffered worse on dives in the past. Luckily the fight had ended quickly. Any more dive time would have added a trip to the decompression chamber. One small thing to be grateful for in an awful day.
Okay, two things. Seeing Darcy awake and ready to spit nails shot a bolt of relief through him that threatened to down him faster than their underwater attackers.
The General’s eyes landed square on him, quietly measuring. The old guy still hadn’t decided what to think of him. He’d expressed gratitude for the phone call. Protectiveness had come later, seconds after his military transport plane landed. Why was his daughter tangled up in some covert flight with dolphins, for heaven’s sake?
What was she doing with Max?
He hadn’t missed the General’s assessing frown. No doubt Darcy’s dad hoped the flowered dive shorts were only a part of the cover.
Footsteps sounded behind him as Daniel Baker followed into the room, sweeping around to the side to lounge against the wall and finish off a candy bar. His third since they’d staked out Darcy’s door two hours ago.
Darcy’s gaze flickered from Max over to Crusty. Shock rippled from her for a split second before her face blanked. Yeah, very smart woman. Keep quiet until her suspicions were confirmed. She looked away and concentrated on raising the head of her bed.
When she looked back, her composure was solidly in place. “Apparently there’s something more going on here than I thought.”
Max studied the bandage on her arm and reminded himself of his vow to do anything to keep her safe. Her ego would heal a lot faster than another stab from their attackers.
General Renshaw stood sentinel by his daughter’s bed. “Keagan is a CIA Officer.”
The stark statement hung in the air like a toxic cloud. Max waited for the fallout. Silence echoed, cut only by the rattle of passing carts and the hum from the nurses’ station.
Finally a smile tugged at the corner of Darcy’s full lips but never made it to her eyes. “That’s a mighty good cover act you’ve got going there, Doc.
Accepting the jab as the least he deserved, Max strode deeper into the room. He took up residence by the window so he could monitor the parking lot while talking. “My superiors have sent the okay to tell you some of the background, given what happened. But even with your level of military clearance, you have to realize that we can’t tell you everything.”
