Chapter Five

8:50 p.m.

Carmen couldn’t believe how fast John dropped off to sleep. Seconds. The man had been pushing himself too hard for too long. Then again, that shouldn’t be a surprise—he’d done the same thing in Afghanistan.

He looked almost exactly the same as the first time she’d laid eyes on him. Tall, broad-shouldered, with dark brown hair cut short. Muscles had strained his uniform sleeves back then. He was leaner now, more defined, she realized, letting her gaze take him in. Asleep, he seemed so ordinary, and yet, when he entered a room, he took up space, took it over.

She’d fallen in love with him in less than a day nine years ago.

It had taken only one lie to destroy it.

She hadn’t wanted to believe he’d lied, hadn’t wanted to leave without hearing the truth from him, but it was either leave then or stay embedded with the unit for several more weeks. If she couldn’t trust him, she couldn’t trust anyone in the unit, so she allowed her fear to make the decision and left.

Forgetting him wasn’t so easy. He appeared in her thoughts whenever things were stressful or dangerous, and she’d ask herself how John would handle it. She’d modeled her responses after his calm, confident competence until they were her own.

When he’d walked into her office eight months ago, she thought she was seeing a ghost. She hadn’t wanted to deal with her feelings or his, so she hadn’t. Again.

Every day it got harder and harder to ignore the pull toward him. He’d made promises to her, damn it. Pleasurable ones.

If he died… It hadn’t occurred to her that he could die. Until the explosion a few weeks ago. And the shooting. And the two separate hospital attacks.

How badly did she want him? Enough to risk having her heart broken a second time? Because John was doing what he always did. Shouldering all of the risk himself and painting a target on his back.

Well, that wasn’t going to fly this time. She was going to carry her share of the threat, and if he didn’t like it, he could kiss her ass.

Literally.

She drove like she normally would. Sticking to the speed limit and changing lanes well in advance of any turn. She’d taken an offensive driving course a year ago, and the instructor told her she telegraphed her intentions to turn by lane changing too early.

It worked great if you wanted to look like you were driving normally, though.

She kept tabs on the traffic behind her but didn’t see a vehicle that stood out. Damn it. She wanted these guys caught and locked up before they started a fight no one could finish.

Or win.

That was the problem with terrorism and terrorists. They didn’t care who won, as long as everyone suffered.

She stopped at the CDC headquarters’ main building security checkpoint and nodded at the guard, a man she’d known for two years. A minute later, she pulled in and parked in her designated space in the underground parking garage.

“That guard didn’t even look at your ID card,” John growled.

She glanced over. His eyes were still closed. “I’ve known him for two years. He knows me by sight.”

John turned his head and looked at her. “Sight isn’t good enough. It’s not that hard to pass as someone else with the right clothes, hair, and makeup.”

“You’ve been reading too many thriller novels.”

“What the hell are we in but a fucking thriller novel?” He kept his volume low, but his tone was tight. “We’re switching cars in the dark and hiding in an apartment under someone else’s name.” Frustration and pain swam under his words, pummeling them, telling her he was in no way as calm as he wanted to appear.

Patience. “That has to be the most cynical thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

He shifted on the seat but didn’t sit up or lift his head. “Making the top of a terrorist organization’s hit list does that to a person.”

“That’s not why you’re so cranky. You’re in a bad mood because you can’t go back to work until your doctor says it’s okay.”

“I’m fine.”

She almost laughed, but it wasn’t actually funny. “I’m going to check your gunshot wound, your ribs, and your head when we finally stop running around. Want to bet something isn’t so fine?”

“There’s a portable X-ray machine at this apartment?” he asked with mock surprise and more than a healthy dose of sarcasm.

“No, it’s where I keep my Superman cape.”

“I’m amazed you have time to give me a scan. Shouldn’t you be working in an X-ray lab or trauma unit?”

“I love my job at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Please note the word disease.”

“Is this your way of threatening me? Be nice or I’ll sic my pet bacteria and viruses after you?”

“Will it turn off the ridiculous crap coming out of your mouth?”

“Your safety is not ridiculous,” he said sharply.

She closed her mouth with a snap, so angry she was surprised smoke wasn’t coming out of her nose. “Get out of the car.” She smiled at him, showing her teeth. “We’re switching vehicles.”

“Yeah, like no one in the history of sneaking around has ever used that ploy,” he said, rolling his eyes as he got out of the vehicle.

“You’re making it very hard to be nice to you,” she bit out as she grabbed his duffel from the trunk.

“What are you talking about? This is me flirting,” he said perfectly deadpan.

He did not just say that crap to her. “Keep this up and recovering from your injuries will be the least of your problems. I’ll shoot you myself.”

After switching vehicles and thirty minutes of circuitous driving, they arrived at the apartment building.

“This is Henry Lee’s vehicle,” she explained. “He lives across the hall from the apartment we’re staying in.”

They went inside, Dozer taking a good look around before going through the front doors.

The apartment was on the third floor, halfway down the hallway. She put the key in the lock and let John go in first. When she would have followed him, he put out a hand to stop her.

Right, how silly of her to expect to just walk in. Her unarmed, injured employee…partner…whatever had to make sure no one was waiting in the shadows to kill them.

She waited a few seconds, then heard a quiet “Clear.”

A single lamp shrouded the living area in a pale yellow light. It was enough to see and engage the three sets of locks on the door.

Someone knocked.

Since she was standing right there, she looked through the peephole. “Henry,” she reported to John, who was watching her intently. “Is it okay to see what he wants?”

“He’s your employee.”

“But I haven’t made him show me his ID.”

John rolled his eyes at her.

“See how ridiculous that is?” She unlocked all those locks, opened the door, and held out the keys to the SUV to Henry.

“Any problems?” he asked, pocketing his keys.

“How would I know?” Carmen asked, pouring sickeningly sweet syrup all over the words. “I’m just a figurehead who doesn’t know the first thing about safety, security, or how to look after my people.”

Henry stared at her for a moment, then said over her shoulder to John, “Have a nice night.” He went inside his own apartment and shut the door.

Men. Are. Assholes.

She closed and locked the door again, then turned and looked at Dozer.

He put up his hands in a classic surrender. “What?”

She pointed at the partially open bedroom door. “Take your shirt off and get on the bed.”

She wanted to order him to take all his clothes off. Make sure he was uninjured beyond the mottled marks on his skin. Take away his pain by kissing each bruise until all he knew was pleasure.

Anger and desire rode her hard. That fury should have soured her need, but it just added to it. And that pissed her off even more.

Heat suffused his face, adding color to his cheeks and turning his gaze predatory. He opened his mouth.

“If you say whatever just went through your mind,” she said, not hiding a damn thing from him, “you will regret it.”

He closed his mouth, then, with a meek expression she didn’t trust in any way, he preceded her into the bedroom.

He took off the long-sleeved Henley shirt he wore and waited with his arms held away from his sides.

There was one fresh bruise the size of a man’s fist on his back. It was still red, but in a day or two it would be black, blue, and purple. Carmen took hold of his left wrist and raised his arm until it was over his head.

His ribs were outlined in mottled bruises of varying shades of dark colors. Those were the older bruises. On top of those were a couple of new ones—the brighter red of fresh bleeding under the skin.

She ran her hands over the evidence of his most recent fight, easily feeling lumps of collected blood that had pooled under the skin where the damage was the worst.

Dozer sucked in a breath at her gentle probing. “Sorry,” he said when she jerked back reflexively. “Ticklish.”

Liar.

She put her hand over one of the worst bruises on his side. Just rested her palm and fingers on his skin without pressure or prodding.

The muscles of his jaw clenched.

“I call bullshit.” She slid around until she could look into his eyes. “Stop it.”

“Stop what?” he asked, his tone that of a mystified man.

“Stop trying to manage me. Stop putting yourself at risk to protect me.” Her voice rose until she was all but shouting. “Stop lying to me.”

It was a repeating pattern of behavior. He’d assess a situation, decide on a course of action, and ensure everyone involved did what he wanted by saying whatever he thought they needed to hear. If the truth didn’t fit into his plans, he misrepresented, skirted, or hid it.

“Manage you?” he asked, incredulous. “You’re the one in charge and giving the orders, not me. As for my protection methods, yeah, they need some work, hence the situation we’re in right now, but there’s no way I can stop doing it. It’s not in me to stand by and watch you get hurt.”

So, he thought the ends justified the means? “And the lying? Got an answer, argument, or apology for that?”

“I have to admit I’m stumped,” he said, his gaze wary. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. What lie?”

“Just now.” Was his concussion still impairing his ability to think, or was he truly oblivious to his own behavior? “My touch hurt you.”

“What point is there in complaining about it?” he demanded. “You weren’t going to let it go until you checked out my ribs for yourself. What am I supposed to do? Whine and snivel every time someone bumps into me?”

“How about a genuine, honest response? Pain is an indicator of the level of damage, a warning sign. How on Earth can I, or anyone else, know what you’re capable of physically if you aren’t honest in your responses and answers?”

“Honesty? You want honesty? Okay, deal. From here on out, we’ll be one hundred percent honest with each other. Let’s start with the charade we’ve been maintaining. The one where we’d never met each other before I was assigned to be your Homeland liaison eight months ago.”

He went there. He actually went there.

“That isn’t a lie. It’s keeping our past personal…connection…separate from our current professional one.”

He took a step forward into her personal space, their bodies almost touching. “I call bullshit.”

“We’re both adults, and it isn’t relevant to our lives today. Talking about it isn’t necessary.”

“Now who’s the liar?” he whispered.

He was staring at her mouth, his gaze hot enough to melt steel. That heat was quickly melting the ice she’d used as a wall between them. If she didn’t build it back up, it was going to melt entirely.

He wanted to talk? Fine. She had a few things to say to him on the subject of lying.

“Are you sure you want to discuss what happened in Afghanistan?” she asked sweetly. “Because you’re not going to like what I have to say.”

“Discussion is the last thing on my mind.” He swooped down and took her mouth. One hand cupped the back of her head, threading its way through her hair and hanging on so tight that she couldn’t move.

His other hand slid around her waist and pulled her into his body.

She raised her hands to push him away but stopped. His various injuries and bruises meant she might hurt him.

His tongue teased and touched her bottom lip, and her breath caught. He slid inside, and his taste exploded across her tongue. Need wound its way through her as she kissed him back. His hair was soft under her fingers, his skin hot.

He urged her closer with his hand in the small of her back, and the long, hard bar of his erection pressed into her belly.

It had been so long since she’d allowed desire in her life. So long. She wanted to immerse them both in it until they drowned, but the last time she trusted him, he’d broken her heart, taken her belief in the power of love, and stomped the life out of it.

The memory of the humiliation, horror, and agony she’d endured as a result of his lies swept over her. One of her own team members had had to fill her in on the fact that the man she’d just slept with, had fallen in love with, was married and going home to his wife in less than a week.

She didn’t even realize she was crying until John pulled back, confusion and concern cooling the heat of his need. He wiped tears from her cheeks.

“What’s wrong? Did I hurt you?” He scrutinized her, as if searching for a visible injury.

Her wounds were all on the inside, with not even a bruise to give away their presence.

“Lying is second nature to you, isn’t it?” The tears wouldn’t stop. “You lied to me in Afghanistan, and you’re doing it again. Whatever it takes to get what you want.”

“What are you talking about?” He stared at her with a level of astonishment that couldn’t be feigned.

“You made promises to me that night. Promises you had no intention of keeping.”

She let the words sit between them, an earthquake that spawned a tsunami capable of destroying entire cultures.

He jerked her closer to him. “I planned to keep every promise I made. I would have if you hadn’t run away.”

The assault of his answer tore a jagged hole across her chest, but this pain fed her anger, her indignation. “Oh, really?” she asked, her words torn out of her. “Martin was only too helpful in telling me about some of your other promises to other women.”

“What other women?” He paused. “Wait…Martin? The same Martin who served a couple of years in the stockade for embezzlement and then was tossed out of the military? That Martin?”

“Yes, him.” She stretched up on her tiptoes so she could get in his face. “That slimeball had been trying to get into my pants for weeks and laughed—laughed—when he realized you’d managed it. He figured since I gave it up to you, I should give it up to him.”

Dozer grabbed her by the shoulders and stared into her eyes. “Did he…assault you?”

Carmen’s jaw fell open.

Gone was the confused man. In his place was a menacing, avenging angel.

“Did he?”