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Kaiya had picked up Kodiak,the team, Anna, and Dodger in the motor pool van and drove them to one of her favorite restaurants for dinner. If she couldn’t have dinner with her family, at least she was going to enjoy the food. She had to park the large vehicle across the street, and Kaiya was visibly shivering as the chill of the Australian spring blew in behind them. She was stylishly dressed in a pretty, soft-looking hoodie sweater in wide alternating cream, pink, and gray stripes under a denim jacket, snug jeans outlining her tight, rounded ass.
The minute she walked in, the bartender called out, “Kaiya, girl. You’ve finally come to agree to be my wife?”
She shook her head and leaned against the bar. The humorous glimmer in her eyes and the teasing smile curving her lips opened her up. Some of that steely armor disappeared.
“Yeah, nah. You’re much too good for me, Liam. But we’ll take your best table for our out-of-town guests.”
He threw his head back and laughed, his eyes twinkling. “You have too much cheek,” he said, then gestured toward a waitress. She led them to a big round table almost smack in the middle of the place. Eyes followed her—admiring eyes.
“Judging by the enthusiastic…ah…proposal, you must come here a lot,” Hazard said.
Shrugging lightly, she sat down at the table. “This place is close to work, and when I don’t feel like cooking after a long day, I get takeaway to eat at home.” She went to shrug out of her jacket, and Kodiak automatically helped her without thinking. His fingers brushed against the side of her neck. Her skin was incredibly soft to the touch, and he detected the inhalation of her startled breath at his accidental caress.
Dropping his hand to his side, he pulled out her chair to show their brief contact hadn’t affected him. Hazard’s shrewd eyes trained on him, then traveled to Kaiya. He gave Kodiak a wry lift of his lips to show he’d seen everything. Observant bastard.
But an inadvertent touch was far and away from deliberate touches, even though she smelled like heaven. She took the chair to comply with the illusion she was on board with them being here. He took the chair next to her, one that faced the door out of habit.
It was clear Kaiya not only didn’t want them here, but she was also hiding some deep-seated…resentment? Anger? Other emotions that he picked up on but couldn’t quite place in her…guilt, some shame…at least as to why she was feeling this myriad of emotions in direct stimulation to their arrival. There were subtle nuances in her body language that gave her away. She was pretending to like them, but the truth was she was tolerating them.
What he wanted to know—was suddenly dying to know—was who she was and what she’d be like on a regular, everyday level. Then he laughed at himself. What was a regular, everyday level?
They might have tracking down terrorists in common for this moment in time, but other than their shared Indian heritage, everything else was diametrically opposed. He was an American, she was Australian, his job took him all over the world, she was ensconced here in Sydney, and they might speak the same understandable language—for the most part—but their culture was totally different.
Yet his body warmed with an interest he’d been fighting since the moment he’d met her, followed closely by annoyance. He didn’t want to feel that way for someone who was going to be nothing but complicated if he let it proceed from interest into something else.
It didn’t help that she was one of the most stunning women he’d ever seen. With her straight black hair wound into a messy braid and almost reaching her waist and her gorgeous sepia-toned skin with undertones of copper, he couldn’t keep his eyes off her. But even with those attributes, her eyes were inexplicable, blue and brown around the pupil spreading out to the distinctive ring of teal around the iris. Their lightness, mixed with her rich, deep skin took his breath away.
He only realized he was staring when her brows arched like small raven wings. He wasn’t the only man or woman in this place who was checking her out. But she seemed oblivious to the rest of the patrons, focusing her laser attention on him.
“Did you grow up in Sydney?” he asked and there was a blank look on her face before she replied. “No, I was born in Queensland, where my dad was an intern.”
“Intern?”
“Medical intern at Toowoomba Hospital. It’s where he met my mum.” She delivered the information with reluctance, and he had to wonder why she wouldn’t want to share that.
There was an interesting lilt to her voice when she said, “Toowoomba.” He wondered what it was, surely not part of her Australian accent…but something more.
“How long did you live there before you moved to Sydney?” Breakneck asked, leaning forward.
“About five years, before I went to kindy…uh…kindergarten.”
Kodiak leaned over because she drew him with her scent and the electricity that arced between them. “You’re probably going to have to explain some words to us.”
Boomer rolled his eyes and said, “A-mericans…right?”
Normally, he wouldn’t have indulged in a dinner out with a liaison he planned to work with; they were all about mission first. But Kodiak thought it would be prudent to try to put Kaiya at ease. Break the ice, so to speak.
“I expect that will work both ways,” she said with a tight smile. Turning to him, she asked, “Where are you from?”
It was an open-ended question, and she was quite interested in his answer. Her pupils dilated, and she leaned toward him with a heedless intent.
“Alaska, Kodiak,” he said with a soft smile.
“Right, explains the call name. It’s quite cold in Alaska, yes?”
“Very.”
