THREE
Rome stepped out of the bathroom and stopped at Stina’s bedroom door.
He hadn’t heard a peep from the woman all night, which shocked the hell out of him.
As he listened, he tried to make out the squeak of the mattress as she climbed out of bed or muttered complaints about it squeaking.
For a woman who seemed genetically incapable of keeping her thoughts to herself, she was too quiet.
He started to move toward his own door but got pulled right back, even though he hadn’t heard any noise to keep him there. He told himself he was checking her because she was under his protection, that he was just doing his job.
That he wasn’t standing outside the room in a pair of jeans and no shirt because he was a creep.
The silence on the other side of Stina’s bedroom door wasn’t helping him feel less like a creeper.
He stood in the hallway for another second before common sense kicked him in the ass. She had to be exhausted. After all, she’d spent the last twenty-four hours finding new and inventive ways to ignore danger.
He backed away from the door before he could irritate himself further and headed for his room. Since he joined Sierra team, he’d gotten spoiled by the base having a gym with the best equipment. But he got his start as a Navy recruit running calisthenics drills at dawn.
The floor and his own body were enough. He dropped into push-ups and counting reps. Ten. Twenty. Thirty.
His shoulder muscles warmed and his breathing deepened.
Forty. Sixty.
Typically, physical exertion solved most of his problems. It burned off excess energy and gave his brain something to do besides wander into places it didn’t belong.
Like Stina’s bedroom.
Today wasn’t one of those days.
By eighty, he was still thinking about the fact that he’d spent two straight minutes standing outside his charge’s door.
By ninety, he was more annoyed with himself for it.
Rome finished the set at an even hundred, rolled onto his back and started sit-ups.
The woman had somehow managed to turn protective custody into a full-time headache.
Every conversation with her felt like stepping into a fight he hadn’t agreed to participate in.
She questioned everything. Commented on everything.
Ignored danger with a level of confidence that would have had his very first drill sergeant handing her ass to her.
Feeling a reluctant smile tug at his mouth, he flattened it into a hard line. Smiling about her irritational behavior was just as irrational.
By the time he finished a second circuit and made up his mind to call Cannon, sweat coated his skin and his pulse dropped into a steady rhythm.
He scrolled to Cannon’s number, but before he could hit the button, his phone buzzed with an incoming call from Cannon.
“Listen up. We’re moving you. Be ready to move in three-zero mikes. You’ll have escort to the Naval base. Military transport will handle the rest.”
“Copy.” He heard the hesitation in his own voice.
Cannon heard it too. “Do you have something else to say?”
“Remember when I said I could do anything?”
Silence followed. Then Cannon sighed.
“I already don’t like where this is going.”
“I was wrong. I can’t do this.”
A bark of laughter filled his ear, but Rome was certain this wasn’t funny.
“I’m serious.”
“You’re the guy who swam two miles through freezing water to rescue a hostage.”
“One point eight miles. And the water wasn’t freezing.”
“Rivers said differently when he treated you for hypothermia.”
Rome rolled his eyes. “Rivers is dramatic.”
“You finished an extraction with a fractured leg because you didn’t think it was broken.”
“Also different.”
“You’ve been shot.”
He pushed out air through his nose, fighting for patience with his CO. “Give me any other op. But I can’t do field work.”
Cannon chuckled. “You getting soft on me, Romey? Actually, maybe the whole team’s getting soft. We might be living at a resort, but we can’t act like we’re on vacation.”
“Having a base under a ski resort isn’t exactly a picnic.
None of the other Blackout teams deal with Youtubers who come to make videos about nostalgic locations, or people who show up to explore mine tunnels.
” He grabbed the towel from the quick shower he took last night and scrubbed it over the back of his neck.
Through his cracked door, he heard Stina’s open.
She pushed open his door without knocking, looking totally disheveled in a sexy, just-crawled-out-of-his-bed way.
She stopped at the sight of him, her gold and green gaze dropping to his chest and the towel slung around his neck for one beat longer than his libido could handle.
Fuck.
He held the phone away from his ear. “Can I help you with something?”
She pushed her weight to one leg, giving him an eyeful of long, tanned limbs and the reason he’d spent the morning doing push-ups instead of thinking.
“Do you have my panties?” she asked.
Cannon barked, “Hell no.”
Snapping the phone back to his ear, Rome closed his eyes. “It’s not like that. Nothing happened.”
Stina folded her arms, which bunched her T-shirt and made it ride higher up her thighs.
He held up a finger to her, indicating he needed to finish his call. Then he handed her his go-bag and shooed her back out.
Cannon’s growl filled his ear. “I’m choosing to ignore everything I just heard.”
Rome wasn’t touching that one. “Good choice.” The line went dead in his ear, and he pocketed his phone, tossed the towel into the corner and grabbed his T-shirt. After dragging it over his head and shoving his feet into his boots, he headed for the kitchen and the coffeemaker.
No damn way was he surviving another minute with Stina without caffeine.
He stuffed a coffee pod into the machine, aware of the minutes ticking by before they moved.
At the sound of a footstep, he looked up and froze, hand still on the machine.
Stina walked in. Wearing his shirt. And no pants.
“Oh good. You’re making coffee. I’m dying for a cup.” She twisted toward a shelf and went on tiptoe.
He damn near swallowed his tongue as the round curves of her ass—her bare ass—popped out from under the hem of his shirt.
That was enough to make him forget that coherent thought existed, but it was the shadow between those round cheeks that had his cock stiffening to hard steel.
With a growl, he turned away.
“What?” The question sounded innocent, but after only a few hours with the woman, he knew she wasn’t.
“Nothing,” he gritted out.
“You growled.”
“Get dressed.” He closed his eyes before his gaze could drift back to places it had no business being.
When he opened them again, his gaze landed right on Stina. She was staring at him like he’d finally lost what little mind he’d started the day with.
“You know I don’t have any clothes.”
“Put on what you were wearing last night.”
“There’s another problem.” She lifted her hand to her hair and pinched a curl. “The shampoo and conditioner in this place aren’t going to work for my type of hair. If I use the stuff, my hair is going to get so big and frizzy I won’t fit in the room with you.”
His brain should have stayed focused on the hair on her head. Instead, it supplied an image of her standing in the shower.
Naked.
Wet.
Covered in bubbles.
Apparently some higher power had decided to test him today.
“You won’t be here long enough to shower. We’re leaving in twenty minutes. Get dressed.”
Her eyes widened. “I’m going home?”
He was sure this woman was far from stupid or na?ve. So why was she continuing to purposely ignore the threat against her?
The little he knew about psychology suggested people processed fear in different ways. Stina seemed determined to pretend she didn’t have any.
“Go.” The order came out rougher than it would have if he wasn’t aching and hard and the woman wasn’t standing inches away wearing nothing but his damn shirt. His jaw popped from clenching it.
She spun, and the shirt swirled around her thighs. Before he could shut his eyes again, he caught another glimpse of those cheeks and the shadow between them, and suddenly every thought in his head took a sharp turn toward depravity.
While she got dressed, he fixed them each a travel cup of coffee. By the time she walked out again—still wearing his shirt, but her black jeans from the night before underneath it—they had only minutes before their escort arrived.
She dropped his go-bag on the floor. “You carry some weird things in there.”
He inflated his lungs to bursting and let his breath trickle out slowly. “It’s got anything I need.”
“A flashlight?”
“Never know when there’s a power outage.”
“Duct tape?”
For taping her mouth shut.
“Useful.”
“Zip ties?”
“Also useful.”
“Energy bars. Water purification tablets. A first-aid kit. Two knives. A sewing kit. Why do you have a sewing kit?”
“It’s got a needle. Never know when you need to stitch a cut.”
“Condoms?”
Of course she’d found those too.
“Planning for a very specific emergency, Rome?”
He shouldn’t be staring at her mouth when she said that. He shoved the coffee at her and picked up the bag. Taking two steps, he peered out the window facing the street.
“Let’s go.”
As they headed away from the safehouse, the escort SUV followed close behind them as they headed to the Naval base.
Close enough to help if things went sideways.
Far enough back to give him a few seconds’ warning if they did.
With Stina involved, he’d take all the warning he could get.
* * * * *
Stina watched the Chicago neighborhood slide past her window and tried not to think about how bizarre her life had become.
Just hours ago, she’d been worrying about tips and bills and whether her manager was going to schedule her for a double shift after he let her go early. She’d been planning her parents’ visit for weeks, and now that probably wouldn’t happen.
Now she was riding next to a man who looked perpetually annoyed by her existence.
Normal. Completely normal.