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He shrugged and took her suitcase from her hand. “Maybe. I will do the heavy lifting around here…”
She was too tired to argue. Her heart felt warm after seeing how Alex had treated the Peruvian boy with respect and kindness. And he was a generous person, no doubt. It made her feel good about him. She’d badly misjudged Alex. She’d thought he was a traitor who couldn’t be trusted. But she had heard only part of the story. Now… well, now, she saw Alex in a completely different light. A better one.
Unsure if she wanted to follow him into the only bedroom of the small apartment, Lauren lingered at the door. The bed was queen-sized, the room fairly large, with a green jungle plant in a ceramic pot on the mahogany dresser at the foot of it. She watched him pick up the suitcases with ease, place them on the white chenille bedspread, and open them up. He dug around in his own for a moment and then offered her a dark-blue washcloth. She pushed off of the door frame where she had lingered, and took it. Their fingers met.
Alex straightened up. “You get the bedroom,” he told her, making it clear he wasn’t going to argue with her about it. “I will sleep in the living room, on the couch.”
She stood aside as he eased out past her through the door. He had to duck because he was too tall for its frame. “But,” she began lamely, “that rattan couch isn’t long enough for you.”
Alex halted and partially turned in the hall. He gave her a crooked grin. “That floor looks comfortable. I was used to sleeping out in the jungle, which is much worse. I will be fine. Do not look so concerned. All right?” Because he saw she was worried about HIM. Despite Lauren’s wounds from the past, she was unselfish, thinking about her partner. That was a good sign to Alex.
Shrugging, she murmured, “Okay. I see what I have to look forward to out there in the jungle,” and she took the washcloth and disappeared down the hall to the bathroom to take that hot shower.
Alex returned twohours later with the two huge, dark-green canvas bags, one over each shoulder. He unlocked the door and quietly stepped in. Earlier, he’d took a run down to the local grocery store in the plaza and bought enough food and supplies. He’d made Lauren some fragrant hot coffee, scrambled up some eggs with some tasty purple and yellow Peruvian potatoes, and onions, and they’d eaten ravenously, like wolves. She’d then gone to bed.
He quietly closed the door, setting the weapons bags on the couch. He’d changed into jeans, put on a black polo shirt and his hiking boots. Alex knew how to prowl the backstreets and alleyways to reach the makeshift airport. It wasn’t much more than a grass strip, usually muddy and wet because it rained here in the jungle every day. There was an old Russian helicopter, a couple of modern civilian planes, and the man whose job it was to keep track of boxes and other gear coming into the town. He had led Alex to the locker where the bags had been stowed beneath a hefty padlock.
Going to the sink, he quickly washed his hands. Drying them on a towel, he didn’t hear even a peep from Lauren. She had to be asleep. At least, he hoped so. Moving silently down the hall, he saw that the bedroom door was ajar. Through the gap, he saw Lauren curled into a nearly fetal position, the bright-red wool blanket around her shoulders, sleeping deeply. She had released her hair and it flowed like a crimson river around her face and shoulders. His heart lurched and he ached to walk into that room, lay down beside her and love her. Worse still, he was getting an erection. With a grimace, Alex turned away, quietly closed the door and walked to the living room. The weapons would need to be checked out, each of them well oiled, cleaned, and their jungle hunting gear gone through carefully and prepared for eventual use.
Lauren felt druggedwhen she woke up. The sun had been in the east, toward Machu Picchu, when she’d dropped off to sleep. Now, the bedroom was grayer, the light low. What time was it? She sat up with a groan, her hair falling around her face as she looked blearily at her watch. It was 1700! Five p.m.! Scrambling, she got off the bed, barefoot, and hurried out of the bedroom.
Lauren halted at the entrance to the living room. Alex had a cleaning cloth laid out on the floor, field-stripping her sniper rifle. There were all kinds of weapons, two dragon vests, rucksacks, two harness vests, ammo and other jungle gear spread neatly around him.
He looked up. “Feel better? You slept a good six hours.” She looked delicious. Damn, all he had to do was be around Lauren and he went into an instant ache, his mind spiraling into heat, arousal and wanting her. He continued to rub the barrel down with the light oil to protect it from the high humidity and constant rain.
“Yeah,” she muttered, wiping her eyes. “I can do that…”
“I want you to rest,” he told her. “I like cleaning rifles.” Because it would keep his hands off her. Keep him focused on their mission.Not her.Alex saw how drowsy Lauren looked, her eyes heavy-lidded, their irises that soft dove-gray which he was finding meant she was calm and at peace. Her eyes turned nearly colorless when she got focused, angry or defensive. He wondered how her eyes would look if he kissed her.Whoa.Alex gave himself a severe, internal shake. That wasn’t ever going to become a reality because Lauren would never permit it, role-playing or not.
“I need to wake up,” Lauren muttered, stumbling toward the kitchen.
“I just made a fresh pot of coffee,” he called over his shoulder. Alex heard a muffled sound. Clearly, Lauren was endearing when waking up. She was mussed, drowsy and vulnerable. Gone were her walls. He felt such a burning sensation move through his heart. He knew he could make Lauren happy. He knew it in his soul. Frowning, Alex continued to lightly oil all the metal parts to protect them from the constant rain they’d endure every day in the jungle. He heard a cupboard door open and shut. The clink of glass against ceramic. Smiling to himself, he could just picture Lauren sleepily fumbling around to find a mug and bring the coffee pot to its rim.
“Do you want some?” Lauren called from the door of the kitchen.
“Yes. Thank you.” Alex warmed to her. She was thoughtful. Lauren cared. That wasn’t role-playing. That was her. Despite her harsh life, she was a person who cared for others. He’d seen her worry about the boys crossing that river with their assigned luggage. Real concern, not play acting. In a way, this op was going to test him in ways he didn’t want. In another, more positive way, he was getting to see the real Lauren, the woman who he had known all along was much softer than those hard walls she hid behind. Now, he was privileged to see her open up.Bloom. Like that orchid.She’d thoughtfully placed the orchid he’d given her earlier in the small bowl of water he’d found sitting on the counter upon arriving back with the weapons bags. He felt hope. Realistically, Alex told himself his dream of someday loving Lauren was exactly that. Yet… he was seeing cracks in her defenses. Maybe even a little trust extended toward him. Or maybe it was because she was so sleep deprived and was struggling to wake up?
Alex set the cloth aside and took the mug of coffee Lauren handed him. She looked like a little girl, with her feet bare as they were, and he smiled.
“I wonder, did you run through the grass barefoot when you were a little girl?”
“Never,” she said, her voice a husky whisper. Lauren took a seat on one of the rattan chairs, curling her legs beneath her. She pushed her thick, long hair off her shoulder, cupping the mug and gratefully sipping the steaming, dark, rich coffee. Watching Alex sit on the floor, his masculinity right in her face, that polo shirt showing off his upper body, Lauren felt her own lower body flex, as if hungry. That same gnawing sensation returned as she skimmed his shoulders, chest, and those long, muscular, arms with her gaze. He had stubble now, and it accented the angular lines of his square face and that rock-hard chin of his. Her gaze drifted back to his nose. It had been broken by Vlad. Because Alex had sacrificed himself, turned decoy, and that had allowed Sky and Cal to get away. To stay alive. Her heart turned and Lauren felt warmth spilling through her chest once again. Alex was focused on his work, his profile rugged and sharp. There wasn’t anything else a woman could want from a man. Alex was the complete package.
“Do you have a relationship with someone?” she wondered, sipping her coffee, watching him over the rim of her cup.
“No. I have been busy since returning to your country. My sister, Kira, is my focus. She was a registered nurse in Ukraine, and now she is living in the state of California. She is working to fill the requirements that will allow her to work at a hospital once more, and that is a good sign. She loves the ocean, and walking the beach, too.” He frowned. “She is three years younger than me.”
“I can hear the love in your voice for her.”
Startled by her insight, Alex reminded himself that Lauren was a sniper. They, spotters and trackers; enemies called them predators because, when it came to noticing details, their intuition honed to an almost mystical level, any slight change, even hearing or sensing emotions in a person’s voice, was picked up and noticed. He cocked his head in her direction. Lauren was relaxed. And she looked like dessert to him, her bare feet tucked up beneath her body, her hair loose and free, as it should always be. It was the tender look in her gray eyes that told him she was sincere. There was that care of hers again. He’d been wrong to judge too soon on her ability to be a team player and a partner on this op. He finished oiling the rifle and started piecing it back together. “When I was nineteen, our farm was overrun by Russian separatists,” he told her gravely, not looking at her, focused on the rifle because it was easier to talk about all this that way. “My parents, my grandparents, and two of my aunts and uncles were murdered that night.”
“Oh, no…,” Lauren choked, sitting up, stunned. She saw the sadness in Alex’s face as he turned toward her. His eyes were filled with anguish. “H-how did you and Kira escape being killed, too?”
“I was in Spetsnaz training, and had come home on leave, and Kira was needed at a neighbor’s farm, ten miles away. The wife was birthing and Kira went over to help. I had driven her over there.” Alex frowned. “No one knew anything about the attack until we drove back the next morning.” His mouth tightened. “It was carnage.” And he would never forget seeing the photos that had been taken of his parents’ farmhouse and of them murdered in their kitchen. A police officer had turned swiftly, kept Kira out the station’s briefing room, told her to not come in. At least that man had spared her those haunting dark images that were always with Alex. She never saw the photos of their slain family.
“Alex, I’m so sorry.” And Lauren was. Life had not treated him well, either, she realized. “So, Kira is all the family you have left?”
“Yes. And you can understand that my heart, my focus, is on her right now. I have no room, no extra place in my heart for a relationship with a woman.”Except for you. And I can’t have you. You will never trust me enough because I am a man….
