Night Call

“I guess she’s not one of those women who gets teary-eyed at the sight of a baby,” Honor said.

“Honey, she looks like Quinn has a contagious disease.”

“Quinn looks unbelievably hot holding that baby.”

“Well, it’s a good thing you think so, since she’s probably going to be doing that a lot for the next couple of years.”

“Look,” Honor said, “Mandy is practically running away.”

“I think Jack has finally accomplished what even the wedding ring couldn’t do. Mandy acts like Jack is a no-trespassing sign hanging around Quinn’s neck. Hands off. Private property of Honor Blake.”

“Good. I trust Quinn.” Honor eased back down into the chair. “That still doesn’t mean I like some harlot looking at her like she’s a

side of beef.”

“Harlot?” Linda lowered her voice when several people looked in their direction. “Harlot?”

Honor shrugged. “That seemed more polite than some of the other things I was thinking.”

“Well, I’d say your beefcake is safe now.” Linda followed Mandy’s retreat, then muttered again. “Uh-oh.”

“What now?”

“I think Mandy’s just found fresh meat.”

Honor turned to look. “Isn’t that your pilot?”

Linda nodded as Mandy honed in on Jett, who leaned against one of the big oak trees, nursing a beer. “I hope Chief McNally can maneuver as well on the ground as she does in the air.”

“You promised you’d call me,” Mandy said, tapping Jett in the center of her chest with a perfectly sculpted nail.

“Did I?” Jett shook her head, smiling slightly. “Then I should apologize for being so forgetful.”

“You can make it up to me.” Mandy draped both arms on Jett’s shoulders and leaned against her, nestling her pelvis in Jett’s crotch.

Her breasts were heavy and warm against Jett’s chest. Jett wasn’t used to public displays of affection and glanced quickly around. No one was paying any attention to them, and more than one couple had cozied up on a lounge chair or sprawled on a blanket. Apparently everyone with children had taken them inside or gone home.

“I think you’d be disappointed.” Jett palmed Mandy’s hip and tried to put some space between them. Instead, Mandy rocked between Jett’s legs.

“You don’t know what I want.” Mandy ran her tongue along the edge of Jett’s jaw.

“More than I’ve got to offer.”

Mandy’s breath was hot against Jett’s neck as she undulated against her. “I want you to make me feel good. Really good. And I know you know how.”

Jett had been aroused since Tristan had touched her, and her body had been simmering for weeks with dream memories and daytime fantasies. Having Mandy climbing all over her was like tossing a match on gasoline. She kissed Mandy’s neck.

“I just might.”

“Show me,” Mandy whispered hotly in her ear.

Jett looped an arm around Mandy’s waist and pulled her around the other side of the tree into the shadows. Then she pushed her against the rough bark, wedged her thigh between her legs, and kissed her.

Mandy moaned low in her throat and grabbed Jett’s ass, grinding into her. Every single thought, image, memory fled from Jett’s mind and all she felt were hot ripples of pleasure and merciful oblivion. She wanted more. She needed to find the knife edge of pleasure and slice through the hard heart of her pain until she bled to empty.

“Let’s get out of here,” Jett rasped, dragging her mouth over Mandy’s neck.

“Mmm, yeah,” Mandy moaned.

Jett opened her eyes and through the haze saw Tristan staring at her from across the yard. She couldn’t read what was in Tristan’s face, and she didn’t want to know what was in her mind. What she wanted was right in her hands. She grabbed Mandy’s arm and dragged her away.

Chapter Twelve

“Look, Rick,” Tristan snapped, “if you want the patient to wake up as soon as you finish the case, you need to start estimating your time better. Don’t tell me it’s going to take three hours and then decide to quit after two.”

“If you were watching the case instead of reading the newspaper,” the trauma fellow shouted, his face contorted with contempt, “you’d know when we were finishing up. I don’t have time to do my job and yours too.”

Tristan yanked off her surgical mask, not even bothering to untie it, and threw it into the trash can outside the surgical intensive care unit where they had just delivered a forty-nine-year-old construction worker who’d fallen off a scaffold and broken his back. He’d probably never walk again. It wasn’t the kind of case that made anyone feel good, and Tristan wasn’t in the mood to take any crap from a resident. She got up in his face, and a look of surprise flashed across his as he backed up.

When she had him up against the wall, she said tightly, “I’m not a mind reader, even if that is irrelevant in your case, you brainless dipshit—”

“Your job is to make mine easier.” Rick’s chin shot out. “You’re nothing more than a glorified technician, and not a very good one at tha—”

“You’re a good one to talk. If you actually had a clue what you were doing—”

“Fuck you, you—”

Quinn barreled around the corner and headed for them. “Whoa. Whoa. Cool off, you two, I can hear you all the way down the hall.”

She surveyed first Tristan, then her trauma fellow, and finally fixed on Tristan. “What’s going on?”

“We just spent an extra thirty-five minutes with the patient on the table because your trauma fellow forgot to tell me he wasn’t doing the feeding tubes today and ended the case early.”

Quinn gave Rick a questioning look. He glanced away, his jaw muscles working silently. Finally, he said, “Ortho wants to bring him back in three days for a washout of his tibia, so I figured we could do it then if he needs it.”

“Sounds reasonable. Did you tell Tris?”

“Well, I, uh—”

Quinn blew out a breath. “Okay. Rick, I’ll meet you for rounds in thirty. We’ll start in the SICU.”

“Right,” Rick mumbled, and hurried into the surgical intensive care unit.

“Jerk,” Tristan muttered.

“I’ll teach him the error of his ways later. So, what’s going on with you?” Quinn slung an arm around Tristan’s shoulders and walked her down the hall away from the surgical waiting room filled with families and visitors huddled in uneasy knots, alternately terrified and anxious.

They stopped at the far end of the corridor where a bank of windows overlooked the expressway and the river beyond. “Rick fucked up, but it wasn’t that big of a deal. I’ve never seen you go off like that before.”

“He’s a pain in the ass. He thinks he’s a goddamned king and treats everyone else like peasants.”

“Sure he does,” Quinn said easily. “He’s a surgeon, after all.”

“Bunch of assholes, all of you.”

“But we’re so good, you have to love us.”

Tristan laughed despite the press of anger in her chest. She wanted to lash out at someone, for something, even now. She braced both hands on the windowsill, her forehead nearly touching the glass. Outside the sun shone brightly beneath a crystal clear blue sky dabbed with white clouds. It was so beautiful, it was painful. “Sorry. Bad day.”

“You sick?”

“No. I’m fine.”

“Family?” Quinn asked gently.

Tristan shook her head. “It’s nothing.”

“Something’s got you twisted around.”

“Nah. I’m okay.” Tristan lied because she had no explanation that made sense. Even to her. She’d been twisted around for two weeks, ever since the party. She’d made good on her promise to Darla and given her the semipublic thrill she’d wanted, fucking her in the bathroom next to the kitchen while a dozen people talked and laughed a few feet away.

She’d even managed to keep her head in the game and not think about Jett while she’d been inside Darla, but she’d lost the battle after that.

Darla had wanted to go down on her in the tiny, cramped room, and she’d resisted at first. But making Darla come hadn’t blunted her arousal the way it usually did, and Darla kept teasing her, sucking her tongue while she squeezed her crotch, promising to do all kinds of things to her clit. Finally, when Tristan couldn’t take it anymore, she’d ripped open her fly, shoved her pants halfway down her thighs, and pushed Darla down to her knees. Darla moved in, and she kept her promises. Tristan lasted twenty seconds before she’d flashed on the fierce expression on Jett’s face when she plunged her tongue into Mandy’s mouth, and she exploded into Darla’s, barely managing not to shout, she came so hard.

Darla loved it, laughing as they pulled their clothes on. Tristan had been confused and humiliated and embarrassed, even though she was willing to bet Darla wouldn’t care who she was thinking about while she was coming. But Tristan cared. She didn’t think about one woman while she was coming with another, but she couldn’t keep Jett out of her head.

And she still couldn’t.

Morning, noon, and night, waking or sleeping, she kept seeing Jett drag Mandy behind the tree in a move so explosive Tristan was breathless just remembering. She could only imagine how it would feel to have Jett take her that way. She was certain no one ever had, and she wanted it. Wanted Jett to be the one making her explode. God damn it, this didn’t happen to her.

“Tris.”

The kindness in Quinn’s voice broke her. She leaned her forehead against the window and closed her eyes. “I’m sort of fucked up over a woman.”

“Well, that could definitely make it easy to lose your cool.”

Tristan grimaced. “I’ll say. In more ways than one.”

“Anything you want to talk about?”

“Not really.” Tristan spun around and tilted her head back, staring at the ceiling. “I don’t usually get into women enough to get fucked up. Not since I was too young to know better.”

“But now you have?”

Tristan shrugged. “Not exactly. I’m not sure what’s going on, really. Nothing, actually.”

“But you want there to be something.”

Tristan thought about that, trying to sort through her tangled emotions. She went out with women all the time who were smart and capable and interesting and sexy, all the things she sensed Jett was.

But Jett was something else too. She held herself back, away from other people. Tristan had watched Jett talk to Quinn at the party, seen her acknowledge people as she moved through the crowd, had caught glimpses of her chatting with Linda. Despite the interactions, Jett still seemed alone—until she’d kissed Mandy with such force and fury Tristan had felt the passion yards away. She could only imagine what might follow a kiss like that, and that was her problem. Imagining wasn’t enough. She hungered to be the one who held the key to all that restless, seething energy, and the need went beyond simple desire. She wanted to know Jett’s secrets.

“Fuck,” Tristan muttered. “I don’t know what I want. You know that old saying ‘be careful what you wish for’?”

Quinn nodded.

“I think I should listen to that.”

“Are you going to?”

“I don’t think so.”

Jett cradled the delicate inner workings of the hundred-year-old timepiece in the palm of her hand and studied the mainspring through her loupes. At some point someone had replaced the original mainspring with the current one, which was slightly wider and thicker. As a result, the barrel cap would not seat evenly and the watch could not function properly. Finding the appropriate mainspring might be a challenge, but she was patient.

She set the watch aside and straightened, grimacing at the cramps in her shoulders and lower back. When she glanced at the wall clock, she realized she’d been working for four hours. Four hours when she’d thought of nothing at all. She closed her eyes and sighed. Two more days until the next rotation would start. A little more than forty-eight hours to fill.

For the last four days she’d read and worked on her timepieces and taken long walks at night. Sometimes she’d slept. On one late-night stroll in a fine misty rain, with all the houses along her way dark for the night, she’d walked down Tristan’s street, her hands in the pocket of her jeans, her head bare and water streaming down her face. She’d stopped for a few seconds across the street and glanced up. Tristan’s apartment was dark like all the others. When she started to wonder if Tristan was alone, possibly awake like she was, she walked on, faster, until thoughts of Tristan fled.

When her doorbell buzzed, she almost didn’t recognize the sound.

It was the first time anyone had come to her door, at least while she was home. The apartment complex was equipped with an intercom system, and she flipped the switch on the speaker next to her door. “Yes?”

“Jett? It’s Mandy.”

Mandy. Forty-eight hours to fill and Mandy at her door. Jett glanced around her apartment—at the smooth white paper spread out on the table in the center of the room, covered with tiny watch workings, her screwdrivers and pin pusher and polishing bits arranged in a precise row. Her life was neat and orderly and controlled. Mandy was not.

Jett grabbed her keys off the small table by the door and punched the intercom button. “I’ll be right there.”

When she got downstairs, Jett opened the inside door and stepped into the foyer where Mandy waited by the rows of mailboxes. The overhead light was out and the small space was dense with shadows.

“Hi.”

“Hi.” Mandy smiled and looked her over in a way that told Jett she was thinking of them in bed. “Would you believe I was in the neighborhood?”

“No.”

“Okay.” Mandy hooked a finger over the waistband of Jett’s jeans and pulled her close. “Would you believe I’ve been thinking about you and I’m horny?”

Jett laughed. “Yes.”

“Do you have any suggestions?” Mandy tugged Jett’s T-shirt from her jeans and slid her hand underneath, swirling her fingertips over Jett’s stomach in slow circles. When Jett’s muscles tightened, she said, “Mmm. Nice.”

Jett’s clitoris grew stiffer by the second as Mandy toyed with her, but she had a firm rein on her body. Unlike the last time Mandy had taken her by surprise. That time she’d been primed—halfway there from Tristan’s touch. Now she was prepared. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Why not?” Mandy sounded unperturbed. She popped the snap on Jett’s fly with a practiced flick of her wrist and eased the zipper down. “I seem to remember there were a few things I wanted to do we never managed.”

“We managed fine.” Jett trapped Mandy’s hand flat against her stomach. “Sometimes one night is perfect. Let’s leave it that way.”

Mandy studied Jett for a long moment. “I’m not looking for a girlfriend.”

“Neither am I.”

“Then we’re perfect for one another. You’re great in bed and I like sex.” Mandy kissed her lightly. “You seriously fuck like a dream.”

“Thank you.”

“And you don’t quit.” Mandy laughed. “Most girls back off when it gets that intense. You don’t.”

Jett had lost it a little bit Saturday night. That hadn’t happened since Gail. Fortunately Mandy had driven to the party Saturday night, because Jett wouldn’t have been able to wait if they’d had to walk all the way to her apartment. She would have pulled Mandy into some dark alley before they’d gone six blocks. She often went months without sex and then spent two or three days doing nothing but exorcising the images of too much human misery with wild, relentless, continuous sex. She’d felt that way Saturday night, and Mandy had been the perfect partner, urging Jett to take her harder, harder, harder until both of them were too exhausted to move. In the morning, Jett had awakened in a tangle of sheets surrounded by the smell of sex and sweat and desperation, and when Mandy wanted more, again, baby, come on, she’d put Mandy off by saying she had to go to work. Then she’d walked Mandy down to her car and avoided promising to call. Because she knew she wasn’t going to.

“You were amazing,” Jett said, because it was true and she was going to disappoint her. “But you’re not going to fuck me again, are you?” Before Jett could answer, Mandy pressed her fingers to Jett’s mouth. “No, don’t answer that. Then you won’t have to take it back when you get hungry again. Because you will. You can’t keep that inside of you forever.” She slid her fingers deeper into Jett’s jeans until she brushed the base of Jett’s clitoris. “Say no now.”

“No.”

Mandy laughed easily and removed her hand. “God, I really hope I’m around when you get the urge next time.” She kissed Jett and backed away. “Still remember my number?”

Jett nodded.

“Use it when you can’t wait any more. ’Night.”

“Good night,” Jett said softly as Mandy let herself out. She waited a minute or two for her breathing to settle, wondering why she hadn’t just taken Mandy to bed. Mandy understood her in a lot of ways—and wasn’t frightened or put off by her needs.

Jett slowly climbed the stairs to her apartment. She returned alone because it wasn’t about what she needed, it was about what she wanted.

And she didn’t want Mandy.

She hadn’t wanted anyone, in any way, for a long time. She stood in her quiet apartment and refused to lie to herself. She had wanted to kiss Tristan. She’d wanted a lot more than that.

When the phone rang, she almost didn’t answer, thinking it might be Mandy. Then she realized it wouldn’t be. Mandy would wait for her to call, because if Jett gave in and called, Mandy would be calling all the rest of the shots. Jett grabbed the phone on the fifth ring.

“McNally.”

“Oh good,” Linda said. “I was afraid for a minute you weren’t there. Mike just went home sick with some kind of stomach bug. Can you take his shif—”

“I’ll be there. Give me twenty minutes.”

Jett hung up and hurried to shower. Twelve hours of work ahead. Then there would only be thirty-six until she was up again. As she stepped under the hot spray, she wondered who else might be on call tonight.

Chapter Thirteen

The first person Jett saw when she walked into the flight crew lounge was Tristan, leaning against the counter next to the refrigerator, laughing at something Linda had just said. She had a cup of coffee in her hand, and her maroon scrubs signaled she was on call.

To a casual observer Tristan probably appeared totally relaxed, but Jett picked up the wariness in her gaze when their eyes met.

“Hi,” Jett said.

“How you doing.” Tristan’s eyes drifted down the length of Jett’s body and back again.

“Hey, Chief,” Linda said. “I’m glad you could come in. Without a pilot we’d all be sitting here listening to Tristan’s bad jokes for hours.”

“No problem. Anything happening?” Jett walked to the rack against the far wall and grabbed one of the clipboards holding the preflight checklists. She was probably imagining that Tristan watched her as she moved. Probably. She’d worn black cargo pants and a dark gray T-shirt, and the way Tristan looked at her wasn’t all that much different from the way Mandy had earlier—like she was sizing her up for bed. But this time, heat skittered along her skin. Of course, she probably imagined that look too.

“We were just about to go out on a call to pick up a preemie from Atlantic City Hospital. Necrotizing enterocolitis.” Linda dropped into one of the seventies-style blocky tan vinyl-covered chairs, kicked off her clogs, and curled her legs under her. “The baby’s pretty rocky and they requested a physician on board, which is how we lucked out and got Tristan. Then Mike got sick and we’ve been holding for you.”

“Let me take a look at the aircraft,” Jett said. “You can put us back on active status now.”

“Okay.”

“Mind if I tag along?” Tristan fell into step with Jett as she headed for the stairwell to the roof.

“No. Come on up.”

Once outside, Jett walked to the waist-high concrete wall on the far side of the aircraft and breathed in the night. The air lay motionless, a heavy blanket of deep August heat beneath thick, unbroken clouds.

“Feels like a swamp out here,” Tristan said from beside her.

“Rain’s coming.”

“You can tell?”

Jett hunched a shoulder. “You get a feel for it after a while.”

“No wind.” Tristan braced her arms on the wall and leaned out, craning her neck to see the river and the ribbon of cars that flowed along beside it like pearls on a string. “Funny how everything looks so much more beautiful at night.”

Not everything, Jett thought to herself, studying Tristan’s profile in the muted moonlight. Her dark hair blended with the sky, the slivers of pale light etching her features against the black backdrop in delicate relief. She was beautiful, hauntingly so. But Jett had seen her in bright sunlight too, and knew the shades of blue that swirled in her eyes. Just remembering, she experienced the same dizzying sensation as flying above crystal-clear water, drowning in the splendor.

“What are you thinking about?” Tristan murmured, aware that Jett had drifted away.

“The ocean,” Jett answered as truthfully as she could.

“No, you weren’t.” Tristan leaned closer. “You were thinking about flying, weren’t you?”

Tristan was inches away. Jett tried not to look at her mouth, and failed. The last time they’d been this close, they’d nearly kissed. Two weeks and an exhausting night with another woman hadn’t diminished the memory. Or the desire. “How could you tell?”

“Because you looked happy.” Tristan remained completely still, afraid to break their tenuous connection. She doubted that Jett had any idea how revealing her expression was when she wasn’t carefully guarding her feelings. Right now, her lips were parted slightly, her lids heavy and shuttered. She looked completely desirable and completely unaware of the naked need in her eyes. Tristan sensed that if Jett realized how much she was revealing, she would instantly retreat. Tristan wanted to kiss her and knew that she couldn’t. Because if she kissed her, Jett would know what Tristan had seen in her face. That need was part of Jett’s secret, and one did not steal secrets from a woman like Jett. “Am I right?”

“About what?” Jett asked, sounding confused.

Tristan laughed. “About flying.”

“No. Well, partly.” Jett wanted to tell her, because Tristan so carefully hadn’t asked. Unlike the last time they’d been together, when Tristan had pushed and needled her into nearly succumbing to Tristan’s charm and her own hungers, tonight Tristan held back. Waiting, maybe.

Waiting for Jett to own what pulsed and breathed between them. Jett never shied away from taking calculated risks when she was flying, but she’d learned her lesson with Gail. She couldn’t trust herself with women. If she’d been thinking, if she’d been in control of herself, she never would have touched her. Next to her, Tristan waited. Maybe, maybe she could risk a little of the truth. “I was thinking that your eyes are the color of the Mediterranean at dawn.”

“Jesus,” Tristan whispered, completely blindsided. She was instantly, totally, mind-dazzlingly turned on. “This is the first time in a couple of weeks I haven’t felt completely nuts. It would be good if you don’t make me crazy now. Not when we’re standing on a rooftop, and any moment we have to go to work.”

“Bad week?” Jett eased back, giving herself space. Giving Tristan space. She needed it, and she had a feeling Tristan did too. Desire she understood. Sex she understood. These tentative touches to places far deeper she didn’t, and wasn’t at all sure she wanted to. When she was in control, she was safe.

“You could say that.”

“Work?” Jett asked.

“Partly. The governor’s son is understandably upset about his wife. Unfortunately, he’s also a Class-A asshole.”

Jett frowned. “He’s still making trouble about the loose tooth in the airway?”

“Maybe not lawsuit kind of trouble, but he’s been vocal about his unhappiness. She’s out of the ICU but still on a respirator.” Tristan turned her back to the sky and canted her hips against the wall. “The people in risk management don’t think anything is going to come of it, because the media fallout would be bad. The governor isn’t going to want an immediate family member suing one of the state medical school hospitals. But the son has everyone walking on eggshells just the same.”

“Sorry. You don’t deserve to be in the middle of that.”

“Ah, hell,” Tristan sighed. “It comes with the territory.”

“It shouldn’t,” Jett said vehemently. “You do a job that not many can, and you deserve to be supported for doing it.”

“Sounds like you have some experience with that.”

“No system is perfect,” Jett said evasively. “I should check out the aircraft.”

“You never answered my question,” Tristan called as Jett started away.

Jett looked back. “What question?”

“About women. Do you date women?”

“No. Not really.” Jett grinned ruefully. “The military wasn’t exactly a great place for it.”

“I’ll bet.” Tristan stayed where she was because Jett looked like she was about to flee. Just like she always did when the conversation veered into the personal. Trying to get close to her was like trying to sneak up on a wild animal. Jett’s senses were sharp and completely honed to guard against being taken by surprise. She expected Tristan to put some kind of move on her. To kiss her maybe, the way Tristan almost had at the party when she’d stopped thinking and given in to the crushing urge to touch her. But Tristan was thinking now, and she had a good hard hold on the desire that had her aching inside. She wasn’t making any kind of move, sudden or otherwise, because she’d decided the only way she was ever going to get close to Jett was to keep surprising her. “You’re not in the military now. So what do you say we get out of the city on Saturday. Take a ride up into the mountains. Hike a little bit.”

“And that would be a date?” Jett bounced the clipboard against her thigh.

“Well, I figured we’ve already done the dinner date routine. Twice.” When Jett frowned, Tristan added, “Hospital cafeteria.”

Jett laughed. “Sorry. And they were memorable moments too.” She was suddenly serious. “What about the redhead?”

Tristan tried not to let her discomfort show. She hadn’t been certain if Jett had seen Darla move in on her, but now she knew. She wasn’t about to apologize for something there was no need to apologize for, but she also wanted Jett to know…what? That her interest in Jett wasn’t the same as it was with Darla? Was that really the truth? She’d been fascinated by Jett from the moment she’d seen her, even though Jett was nothing like the women she usually went out with. She thought about her. Dreamed about her. Christ, she fantasized about her. Fantasized about her taking her the way women never did, hard and fast and in charge. Okay, so that was different. But it wasn’t like she was looking for a relationship with anyone. Still, it felt important to clear the record.

“Darla is a friend.”

“No promises there?”

Tristan shook her head.

“All right. Saturday.” Jett nodded, turning the idea around in her mind. “Let’s do that.”

“Yeah,” Tristan said, letting out a sigh and trying to ignore the way her heart jumped around in her chest. “Let’s.”

When they arrived at Atlantic City Medical Center to pick up the baby, the neonatal intensivists informed them that the surgeons had gone back in to stop some unexpected bleeding. The last update from the OR nurses was that the surgeons were closing. Linda checked with PMC for clearance to wait. With luck, they’d be airborne within the hour.

In the meantime, the flight team hung out in the lounge, picking at food left on a tray from someone’s abandoned dinner, watching an old Vincent Price movie on the TV affixed high in one corner, and leafing through three-month-old magazines. It was Tristan, Linda, and Jett, and the conversation ranged from hospital gossip to politics and back to the casually personal.

“So, Jett,” Linda said, “what made you decide to leave the military?”

Tristan stiffened and glanced quickly at Jett, who slouched on a sofa. Tristan didn’t think this was a casual question for Jett. Seeing Jett’s expression shutter closed, Tristan had a completely foreign urge to protect her, to prevent whatever bad memories the question stirred from hurting her.

“Probably the same reason you left the ER,” Jett said smoothly. “It was time. I liked the Army. I always liked it. But…” She shrugged. “I wanted something else. Different experiences, I guess.”

“Makes sense,” Linda said, appearing not to have noticed the cool, detached tone of Jett’s voice.

But Tristan noticed. Before she could change the subject, Linda continued on in her usual indomitable fashion.

“It must have been hard having a personal life. Did you worry much about it—you know, the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ thing?”

Tristan’s insides quivered, and she wanted to jump up and wave her arms, as if warding off a freight train barreling down on a car stuck on the tracks at a railroad crossing. She felt about as helpless to stop the conversation as she would have been to divert the locomotive.

Jett rose suddenly and walked to the soda machine. As she dropped change into the slot, she said with her back to the room, “I didn’t have much reason to worry about it. A lot of other people did.” She popped the top on the soda as she turned, the fine lines around her eyes deeper than they had been. “They had reason to worry. Even over there, where everybody was needed and people tended to look the other way when rules got broken, that one could still take you down.” She lifted the can and sipped, then headed toward the door. “It’s hot in here. I think I’ll be hot outside where there might be a breeze. Page me when I need to warm up the bird.”

In the next instant she was gone. Linda stared after her. “Uh-oh. I stepped in something, didn’t I?”

“I don’t know. She doesn’t say much about over there.”

Linda rested her head on her hand and regarded Tristan contemplatively. “She is interesting. I like women with a lot of passion.”

“Is that what you think it is?” Tristan asked, drumming her fingers on the tabletop.

“What do you think it is?”

“Pain. I think it’s pain.” Tristan stood abruptly and went after her.

The landing pad at ACMC was not on the roof, like at PMC, but adjacent to the emergency room. Several emergency vehicles, angled to disgorge passengers, crowded around the emergency bay on the far side of Jett’s chopper. Otherwise, the area was deserted. At three in the morning, only the dead and the dying and those who stood as the last barrier to inevitable fate moved through the silent hallways inside. Jett leaned against a pole beneath the short overhang in front of the ER entrance and smoked a cigarette she’d scored from a police officer as he’d been climbing into his patrol car.

“Got another one of those?” Tristan asked as she crossed the silent lot toward her.

“No, sorry,” Jett said, holding it out to her. “Be my guest.”

Tristan carefully took the half-smoked cigarette and drew deeply before handing it back. She coughed and shook her head. “I smoked for a year in college and then quit. Every time I bum a smoke, I remember why.”

Jett smiled, took one last drag, and stubbed the butt out against the concrete pillar. Then she slid it into the outside pocket of her cargo pants. “I won’t contribute to your delinquency.”

“I didn’t see you smoke at the party,” Tristan said. “Most smokers do when they’re drinking.”

“I’m lucky. I can smoke or not smoke. I don’t crave it.”

Tristan thought about cravings. She liked women and she liked sex, but she rarely craved either. She wanted the pleasure sometimes, replayed moments with a woman she’d enjoyed on occasion, but only recently had being with a woman begun to feel like an obsession. Since Jett. “So you’re basically a nonsmoker who indulges occasionally.”

“Pretty much.” Jett bent one leg and braced her foot against the pillar. “There’s not much to do in the desert except smoke, toss a football if it’s not too hot, and write letters home or wait for letters to come.”

“I’d be thinking about sex a lot,” Tristan said lightly.

Jett smiled a crooked smile. “Yeah, that too, I guess.”

“Maybe it’s that old adage about needing to feel alive when you’re surrounded by death.” Tristan spoke quietly, carefully, uncertain of her ground. But Jett had opened the door ever so slightly by mentioning her service, and Tristan desperately wanted to walk through. She wanted to be on the other side of the wall Jett erected between herself and everyone else.

“You must feel the same way,” Jett said, neatly turning the tables. “You’ve probably seen more deaths than me.”

“I don’t think it’s the same. I see violent death. I see senseless death.” Tristan watched Jett’s face in the slanting red light cast by the emergency sign over the double doors behind them, searching for guideposts. She couldn’t find any so she followed her instincts. “I haven’t watched my friends die—maybe for no reason that made sense to me. I don’t think I could take that for very long.”

“You lose your sense of time,” Jett said as if talking to herself. “One day, two days, ten. Three months, six months, it all becomes just one long endless day and night, always the same.” She looked at Tristan, her expression confused. “If you really think about it, really let yourself think about what’s happening, you’d go crazy.”

“I’m sorry.” Tristan didn’t want to say the wrong thing, do the wrong thing, but she ached for her. Gently, she cupped Jett’s jaw, tracing her thumb along the sharp angle.

For a few seconds, Jett leaned into Tristan’s hand, then slowly drew away. “Not your fault. Besides, I signed up for it, right?”

“I don’t think anyone signs up for that kind of madness, do you?”

Jett shoved her balled hands into the pockets of her pants. “Some do, I think. The engagement is what it’s all about for them. Others just love the service, being part of something bigger, grander than themselves. Gail was…”

The sudden silence in the hot still night was nearly suffocating.

Tristan took a deep breath and still felt as if she were drowning. “Gail. A…friend?”

“Not exactly.” Jett pulled her beeper off her waistband and peered at the readout. “They should be ready for us pretty soon, don’t you think?”

“Babies are tricky,” Tristan said, taking her cue from Jett and letting the subject drop. Part of her wanted the story on this woman who was obviously more than a friend, but part of her didn’t want to hear there was someone special somewhere. That was different for her too. Very different. “None of their systems are mature, so they don’t quite respond to anything the way you expect.”

“Sounds like a real challenge.” Jett strode toward the emergency room doors, all business again.

Tristan kept pace with her. “I don’t mind. I thrive on challenges.”

Chapter Fourteen

“What’s our ETA?” Linda shouted, leaning around the Plexiglas shield that separated Jett from the treatment bay in the helicopter. She clamped a hand on Jett’s shoulder to get her attention.

Jett pulled her headset away from her ear so she could hear and checked beside her. Linda, Tristan, and the patient were crowded into the space just to her right and behind her. When she was transporting an adult, usually all she could see were their legs. “About fifteen minutes. Problem?”

“The baby’s looking bad. Bleeding again, Tris thinks.”

“Roger. Tell her to hold on. I’ll push it.”

Linda nodded and scrambled back to inform Tristan. “Another fifteen minutes max. How’s it going?”

Tristan knelt on the deck next to the incubator, sweating under the heat lamps that kept the 2800-gram preemie warm. She shook her head grimly. “O2 SATs are falling and her pressure’s bottoming out. God damn it, they never should have transferred her when she was this unstable.”

“Is it her lungs?” Linda squatted next to Tristan and rehooked her safety harness. The ride was smooth—it always was with Jett flying—but she didn’t want to get tossed around if they hit unexpected turbulence.

“I don’t think so. She’s either septic or bleeding again.” Tristan raced through a mental checklist of therapies she needed to institute and the signs and symptoms of further decomposition she couldn’t afford to miss. Linda was experienced and a great medic, but Tristan alone could make the decisions that might mean life or death for the neonate.

“I think they’ll need to go back in to be sure.”

“I’ll radio ahead to tell them we have a full alert.”

“Better give the OR a heads-up too.”

“Will do.”

“How much blood did they send with us?” Tristan asked, watching the BP tail downward. Either the baby was bleeding or her heart was quitting on them.

“Just the one unit.”

“Is it all in?”

Linda tilted the small plastic bag and squinted at it. “Just about. Do you want me to start some saline?”

“Yes, but keep it slow. We don’t need to add fluid overload to her problems.” Tristan gently probed the abdomen. “Tight as a drum. There’s so much pressure below the diaphragm, I’m having trouble ventilating. Another couple of minutes and I’m going to have to open that incision. Jesus. Call the surgeons again and see what they say.”

A minute later, Linda pulled off her headset. “I talked to Quinn. She says if we release the sutures, the sudden drop in intra-abdominal pressure will probably make her blood pressure fall too. She might arrest. Last resort only, she said.”

“She’s going to arrest if I can’t get some oxygen into her.” Tristan checked all the monitors again. “Tell Jett to find someplace closer. We’re not going to make it like this.”

“All right.” Linda scooted forward and got Jett’s attention. “We’re in trouble back here. Is there anyplace else?”

Jett shook her head. “It’s too late to turn back to Atlantic City, we’re more than halfway to PMC. We might try Cooper in Jersey, if they can take us. Hold on, I’ll get them for you.”

When Linda got one of the ER nurses on the Technisonic radio, she quickly relayed the situation. After listening for a few seconds, she disconnected. “They just closed to emergencies. Their OR is backed up with victims from a five-car crash on the New Jersey Turnpike.”

“Then we head for PMC. Tell Tristan I’ll have her down in five minutes.” Jett spared a quick glance behind her and saw Tristan working feverishly over the tiny form that was nearly invisible beneath the array of tubes, wires, monitors, and IV bags. It was always a shock to look back and not see the deck awash in blood or to hear the screams of the wounded.

Jett pushed the throttle to the max and as they streaked above the expressway, the flashing headlights below them came at her in the dark like tracer fire. The first time she’d taken a helicopter up after coming home, she’d seen the lights and thought she was under attack. Even now when caught unawares, she braced for bullets to pierce the cockpit and hit her. Tonight the enemy was time. She tried not to think about Tristan and the war she waged behind her, but she couldn’t help it. She wanted to help her. So often she’d felt helpless to help, to stop the waste. Now as then, her impotence fueled her anger. Quickly, she shook her head to clear her mind of the past and the things she could not change. She pushed her aircraft, because that was all she could do. It didn’t feel like enough, but then it rarely had.

“How long?” Tristan shouted. She hand-bagged the baby, hoping to get enough oxygen into her to keep her heart and brain working.

Every breath was harder to deliver than the last. The infant’s lungs just didn’t have enough room to inflate with her intestines pushing up against her diaphragm.

“Three, four minutes.” Linda took in the numbers on the portable O2 monitor. “God, Tristan, this is bad…”

“I can’t push in any more air. If I increase the inspiratory pressure much more, I’m going to blow a lung.” Tristan flicked the thin blanket away and exposed the distended abdomen. So much blood had accumulated beneath the surface, the thin skin appeared purple. “Give me a pair of scissors.”

Without hesitation, Linda handed the instruments to Tristan. “I’ll get wet packing ready.”

Tristan clipped the first few sutures holding the abdominal incision together and loops of small intestine and bloody fluid immediately poured out. She caught the thin, delicate ribbons of bowel in her palm and protected them until Linda could wrap them in sterile saline-soaked gauze. Immediately, she was able to ventilate more easily. And just as quickly, the blood pressure fell. Sixty. Forty. Twenty. Nothing.

“She’s arresting!” As Tristan began closed cardiac compression, she realized the engine sounds were fading. They’d landed.

The doors flew open and Quinn jumped in. “What have you got?”

“Twenty-nine-week-old preemie,” Linda announced. “Dead bowel resected at ACMC, prolonged intra-abdominal bleeding. We think she’s still bleeding.”

“I had to open the incision,” Tristan told Quinn as the rest of the OR team sorted the monitors and lines to offload the patient to the waiting gurney. She jumped out and grabbed the stretcher across from Quinn. “I lost her pressure right away.”

“Are we ventilating now?” Quinn asked tersely as they raced across the rooftop toward the elevators.

“Better. O2 SATs are coming up.”

“Good.” Quinn pressed a finger to the baby’s groin. “I’ve got a pulse. Linda, can you run downstairs to the blood bank and get two units. I don’t want to wait for a courier to bring it up. And call and see if the peds surgeon is here yet.”

“You got it.”

Linda disappeared down the stairs while everyone crowded into the elevator. The doors closed, and silence descended on the rooftop, broken only by the faint ping of the cooling helicopter engine and Jett’s quiet footsteps as she secured her aircraft.

Gail pushed Jett toward the cockpit after they lifted the injured soldier inside. “We have to go! There’s too many of them.”

“Not yet!” Jett ran a few steps back toward the bodies still lying in the smoldering, twisted wreckage amidst mounds of rubble thrown up from the roadway when the transport vehicle had run over the IED.

“They’re dead,” Gail shouted.

Jett kept going until a hail of bullets stopped her. They’d just begun the evacuation when insurgents had poured out of several nearby buildings, opening fire on them. One of their medics had been hit, and for a heart-stopping moment she’d thought it had been Gail. They’d managed to get most of the wounded into the aircraft, but steady small arms fire made it impossible for them to get to the last few casualties.

“Jett,” Gail screamed. “Go. We’ve got wounded on board. Go. Go.”

Still, Jett hesitated. Her aircraft was filled with badly injured men and women, but leaving anyone behind, even the dead, violated everything she believed in. A bullet pinged off a nearby rock, and a shard of stone tore a hole in the shoulder of Jett’s flight jacket. Another few inches and it would have hit her in the neck. The sharp pain and warm gush of blood down her arm sharpened her focus. She twisted and dove into the pilot’s seat. Then she took the Black Hawk up and out of harm’s way.

When Jett landed at the field hospital, Gail disappeared with the wounded and Jett staggered wearily to the showers. Almost too tired to think, she stripped and examined the gash in her shoulder in the wavy metal mirror above the sinks. It was long, but not deep. A little blood seeped from under the edges of the dark crust that had formed over it already. She turned the shower on as hot as it would go and stood under the water, her arms braced against the wall, her head down. She didn’t know how long she’d been there, but the water had begun to cool when she heard movement behind her. Then a hand grasped her uninjured shoulder and spun her around.

“What the hell were you doing out there?” Gail shouted. She seemed oblivious to the fact that she was standing under the spray, still in her uniform, or that Jett was naked. “Were you trying to get killed?”

“I didn’t want to leave them,” Jett yelled back.

“Do you think I did?” Gail grabbed Jett’s shoulders and shook her. “Do you think I wanted to see you blown apart?”

Jett winced and blood trickled down her shoulder.

Gail’s eyes widened. “Oh my God. You’re hurt. Why didn’t you say something?”

“I’m all right.”

“No, you’re not.” Gail’s voice was tight. “I have to be able to trust you out there. I can’t worry about you when I’m—”

Jett jerked away, heedless of the blood still seeping down her chest and over her breast. “Just worry about the wounded. I don’t need you to worry about me.”

“I worry!” Gail skimmed her fingers over Jett’s chest and stared at the drops of blood on her fingers. “Don’t you understand?” She cradled the back of Jett’s neck with her other hand. “I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you.”

Gail hadn’t touched her since the night of the aborted massage.

Her fingers trembled over Jett’s skin, softly caressing her. The pain from Jett’s injury and the agony of leaving the wounded behind and the adrenaline coursing through her blood from the near-death experience stripped away the last of Jett’s restraint. With a groan, she grasped Gail’s arms and pushed her against the shower wall. Then she pinned her there with her body while she drove her hands into Gail’s hair and her tongue into her mouth.

For an instant, Gail’s arms came around her and her tongue swept over hers, hot and demanding.

A wave of hunger rose from Jett’s depths, so primal, so powerful, all she knew was need. Gail was warm and alive and hers.

Jett came out of her half-doze with a start and looked around the lounge. Six forty-five a.m. She was alone, but the day shift would show up at any moment. She rubbed her face, stood, and shook the stiffness out of her shoulders. She hadn’t really been asleep, just drifting in that disengaged state where she was aware of her surroundings but her mind was free to wander. Unlike so many other times before when she’d traveled back to her time with Gail, she came back to herself neither aroused nor angry. If she had to put her finger on exactly what she was feeling, she would have named it resigned.

She wandered over to the coffeepot, sniffed the few inches of black liquid in the pot, and grimaced. Then she emptied the dregs into the sink, rinsed the carafe, and poured a fresh pot of water into the coffeemaker. While she was digging around in the drawer for a packet of coffee, she heard footsteps behind her.

“If you’re making coffee, I might have to marry you,” Linda said.

“Is that legal in this state?”

“What? Gay marriage?”

Jett hesitated for a second, then laughed. It was getting easier to talk about what had always been forbidden. “I meant polygamy.”

“No to both,” Linda sighed. “God, what a night.”

“Did you get any sleep?”

“No.” Linda searched through the cabinets above the sink and found a clean coffee cup that she didn’t think belonged to anyone. Even if it did, they probably wouldn’t mind if she used it. “I had my beeper, so I knew you could reach me if there was another flight request. I stayed in the OR with Tris and Quinn.”

Jett poured them both coffee. She didn’t really have an excuse to go to the operating room, but she’d wanted to. She wanted to find out what happened to the patient, and she wanted to see Tristan. While she was flying, she couldn’t pay much attention to what was going on with the patient, but enough had come through to her for her to understand how difficult the situation had been and how much pressure Tristan had been under. Since she couldn’t go searching for her, she’d waited in the lounge, hoping for word.

“How did it go?” Jett asked.

Linda stared into her coffee cup as if the answer were somehow written inside it. “Sometimes no matter what you do, it’s not enough, you know?”

Jett took a slow breath. “Yeah.”

“The mortality rate for preemies that size is five times higher than a full-term baby. Add to that the multiple surgeries and the dead bowel and the bleeding…” Linda shook her head. “Just too much.”

“I’m sorry.” Jett replayed the flight in her head. Maybe if she’d pushed harder, she could have bought a few more minutes. Given Tristan a few more minutes. “Do you think if we’d been able to divert to Cooper—”

“I asked the same thing. Quinn didn’t think so. Neither did Harry Noone, the pediatric surgeon.”

“I guess that’s something.”

“It helps a little.” Linda set her coffee aside. “Tristan doesn’t believe it, though.”

“Where is she?” Jett asked as casually as she could.

“I think she left. She was pretty strung out over the whole thing.”

“She blames herself?” Jett wasn’t surprised, not after listening to Tristan talk about the governor’s daughter-in-law and her feelings of responsibility. Tristan took a lot on herself.

“I don’t think anyone was able to convince her that opening up the abdominal incision isn’t what tipped things over the edge.” Linda smiled ruefully. “The good ones like Tristan and Honor and Quinn always blame themselves.”

“And like you,” Jett said gently. “But you shouldn’t. You and Tristan and the others—you’re good at your jobs, and you care. That’s what counts.”

Linda brushed her fingers over Jett’s arm. “Thanks.” She glanced toward the clock. “Hey. We’re off duty. I’m going to go home and seduce my wife into making mad passionate love to me. Then I’m going to sleep for ten hours—or at least until the kids get home from day camp.”

“I’ll see you this weekend.”

“Do you want to come over for breakfast?”

“Before or after you have sex?”

Linda gave her a little shove. “I could wait for that.”

Jett shook her head. “Thanks, but I think your first plan is probably a better one.”

“All right, but if you change your mind, you probably have a twenty-minute window of opportunity. Need a ride?”

“I’m good. I drove in.”

“I’m out of here, then.”

Linda disappeared into her on-call room and Jett headed for hers to collect her gear. When she pulled out of the hospital parking lot, she still hadn’t shed the sadness over the night’s events, and she could only imagine how Tristan must feel. Knowing Tristan hurt bothered her more than she wanted to admit.

Chapter Fifteen

Honor rolled over and listened for the sounds of her family.

Jack slept peacefully beside the bed in his bassinet, his breathing gentle and sweet. Arly’s laughter and Phyllis’s mellifluous tones floated up to her through her open bedroom door. The shower ran in the adjoining bathroom. Quinn was home.

She lay still for a few more moments, appreciating the joy in her life. Then, moving carefully so as not to wake the baby, she got out of bed, padded barefoot to the bedroom door, and closed and locked it. On her way to the bathroom, she lifted her nightgown over her head and draped it on a chair in passing. Through the steam and streaks of water on the glass shower door, she could make out Quinn’s form inside.

Even the distortion of the glass and pounding water could not disguise the tight muscular shape of her athletic body. Honor slid the door open and stepped under the spray.

“Welcome home.” Honor wrapped her arms around Quinn’s waist and kissed her between the shoulder blades.

“Did I wake you?” Quinn spoke without turning, her voice gruff, as if she’d been shouting for a long time and had gone hoarse.

“You didn’t, but I wouldn’t care if you did.” Honor rested her cheek against Quinn’s back, one arm still around her waist. She ran her other hand over Quinn’s chest between her breasts, tracing her fingertips over the scar below Quinn’s collarbone where her defibrillator had been. “I missed you.”

Quinn clasped Honor’s hand and leaned back against her. “Missed you too. Missed the kids. How are they?”

“Everyone’s fine. Phyllis helped Arly give Jack a bottle yesterday afternoon when I went in to the ER for a few hours to do some paperwork. Arly hasn’t stopped talking about it yet.”

“You didn’t work too hard, did you?”

“I couldn’t if I’d wanted to. Everyone treated me like spun glass.”

Honor shook her head, touched by everyone’s concern, but tired of being immobile and basically useless except for providing meals for Jack. As much as she loved everything about her children, she needed a little bit more than twenty-four-hours-a-day motherhood. She needed to work for her own sense of self, and she wanted the kids to grow up seeing that family meant helping everyone else realize their dreams.

Keeping one arm around Quinn, Honor reached for the soap and began lathering Quinn’s back. “I scheduled myself for half days starting next week.”

“You sure?”

“Really, I’ll just supervise. I already talked to Phyllis, and she’s good with taking care of both kids. I don’t want to go back full time until Jack’s a little older anyhow. But I need to get out of the house.”

She laughed and turned Quinn in the spray. “I need to remind the troops who’s in charge in the ER before certain surgeons I know take over.”

“Like we’d forget.” Quinn smoothed her hands over Honor’s shoulders, then cupped her chin, scrutinizing her face. She brushed her thumb along the ridge beneath Honor’s eyes. “You’re still really pale.”

Honor was about to dismiss Quinn’s concerns, but when she got a good look at Quinn’s face, she forgot all about the ER and working and what she needed. “God, baby, you look absolutely beat.” She brushed wet strands of hair back from Quinn’s forehead. “You didn’t get any sleep at all last night, did you?”

“Not much,” Quinn said nonchalantly, averting her gaze.

“Did you operate all night?”

“Most of it.” Quinn reached for the shampoo. “Turn around. I’ll wash your hair.”

Biding her time, waiting for Quinn to elaborate, Honor turned her back to Quinn and let the water soak her hair. “I’m getting spoiled with all this pampering.”

“If you’re just now getting spoiled, I’ve been falling down on the job,” Quinn murmured as she worked her fingers through Honor’s hair.

Honor moaned quietly with pleasure and settled her butt against Quinn’s crotch. “Believe me, you are doing just fine in the pampering department.”

“Good.” Quinn disconnected the handheld portion of the showerhead and used it to rinse Honor’s hair. When she was done, she finger-combed the thick silky strands, then lightly clasped Honor’s shoulders, pulled her around, and kissed her. “All done.”

Honor snaked her arms around Quinn’s waist. “Thank you. Now, tell me about last night.”

Quinn’s grip on Honor’s shoulders tightened. “Later. Let’s go to bed.”

There was something in the way Quinn looked, the way she sounded, as if she were keeping something painful at bay, that made Honor want to comfort her. Honor grasped Quinn’s hand, turned off the shower, and led her out. They quickly dried off, and after a few more seconds were on their way to bed.

Quinn stopped next to Jack and watched him sleep. “He looks good. He’s good, right?”

“He’s perfect.” Honor lifted the covers and slid under them, then held them up. “Come on. Come to bed, Quinn.”

Quinn stretched out next to Honor and sighed. When she reached for Honor, Honor propped herself up on one elbow and stroked Quinn’s face. Then she kissed her. “You’re trying to pretend you’re relaxed, but I can tell you’re not. Your body is tight as a drum.”

“Just tired.”

“That’s part of it.” Honor brushed her hand over Quinn’s breasts and Quinn jerked, vibrating at the touch. Her eyes were the deep, deep blue they became when she was troubled or aroused, or both. Quinn didn’t want to talk, Honor knew that, and she wouldn’t push her. Quinn would tell her what was troubling her when she was ready. In the meantime, Honor would give her what she could. “Close your eyes and let me put you to sleep.”

“Honor,” Quinn said, her voice dropping low. “It’s too soon.”

“Not for everything.” Honor kissed her. “Close your eyes.”

Quinn hesitated for a second longer, and then as if the decision had been made, she circled Honor’s shoulders with one arm and pulled her closer. She pressed her mouth to Honor’s ear. “I want you. I love you.”

“I love you, baby,” Honor whispered, cleaving to Quinn’s body as she caressed Quinn’s face, her neck, her chest, her abdomen. She kept stroking her as she followed the same path with her mouth, bestowing soft kisses across the hard muscles and silky skin. Even though Quinn’s breathing quickly grew shallow and uneven, Quinn held Honor ever so carefully, trying not to squeeze too tightly, not to move too much, not to do anything that might hurt her. Honor wanted to break that restraint, but she knew Quinn needed it. Quinn needed not to worry about her right now.

“I’m going to make you come,” Honor whispered, her mouth against Quinn’s neck. She slipped her fingers between Quinn’s legs and continued her caresses, slowly at first, increasing the pressure and speed until Quinn’s hips lifted beneath her hand and Quinn groaned, shuddering in her arms.

“That’s right, baby,” Honor whispered. “Everything is all right.”

When Quinn turned her face into Honor’s breasts, Honor cradled her head and smoothed her fingers through Quinn’s hair. Honor held her until her breathing gentled, easing into the same quiet rhythm as that of their baby sleeping nearby. When she was certain that Quinn was safe from whatever demons had followed her home, Honor closed her eyes and slept.

Tristan poured an inch of scotch into a glass tumbler and swirled the honey-colored liquid until small eddies climbed up the inside of the glass. It might be seven thirty in the morning, but she’d been working for the last twenty-four hours, and it had been a hell of a night. She walked to the door leading out to her small porch and thought about sitting outside, but she was too restless to sit. She sipped the scotch. The burn was familiar as it made its way down. Otherwise, it was tasteless.

A waste of good scotch, but safer than some of the other potential remedies for a hyped-up nervous system and the waking nightmares that were guaranteed to follow her into sleep. A morning, better yet, a day of sex might put her right, but she couldn’t keep dragging Darla away from work, and now that she thought of it, she hadn’t connected with any of her other usual dates for a few weeks. She could hardly invite them over out of the blue to service her needs. She poured another inch of scotch. Thinking about sex made her aware of the edgy energy that thrummed at her center. She remembered coming in Darla’s mouth, but as she looked down in her mind’s eye into Darla’s face, she saw Jett looking up at her. Her body twitched and the pressure between her legs surged.

“Jesus,” she muttered. When she lifted her glass, she was surprised to find it empty. With another soft curse, she set the glass aside and strode toward her door. Her head was fuzzy but she still wasn’t tired.

She needed to do something to unwind, and drinking wasn’t going to do it and there was no sex on the horizon. Walking. Maybe walking would wear her out enough so she could sleep without dreaming. She yanked open the door and stared. Maybe she’d had more scotch than she thought. The thrum low in her belly became a drum roll.

“Uh…” Tristan said.

“I owe you breakfast,” Jett said, indicating a Dunkin’ Donuts bag in her hand. “I wasn’t sure what you like. I’m a chocolate glazed myself.”

“Apple fritter, but I can do chocolate in a pinch,” Tristan said, feeling anything but tired now. Jett still wore her black cargo pants and charcoal T-shirt from the night before. Her sandy hair was darker at her temples, damp with sweat and a little bit mussed. Windblown, or maybe disheveled from the helmet she’d worn in the helicopter. Tristan didn’t want to think about the helicopter, or the hellacious ride back from Atlantic City, or her futile battle to save the infant. She’d much rather think of how good Jett looked right now, and of how glad she was to see her, and of how very much she’d like to finish their almost kiss.

God, the timing sucked. “I’m not very good company right now. In fact, I think I’m half drunk.”

“I didn’t come to be entertained.” Jett held out the bag. “There’s coffee in here too. You can take it and close the door. I won’t mind. I know what it’s like to need to be alone.”

“I don’t need to be alone,” Tristan said way too fast. “What I need could be a problem, though.”

“I don’t think so,” Jett said softly.

“You don’t have any idea what I—”

“Sure I do.” Jett stepped forward, forcing Tristan back inside the apartment. Jett caught the edge of the door on her way in and closed it behind her. Without taking her eyes off Tristan, she set the donuts and coffee down, then straightened and took another step. Only an inch or two separated her body from Tristan’s. “I know what you need, and it’s not a drink. It’s not talking about it. It’s not even sleep.” She slid her hand behind Tristan’s neck and gently gripped a fistful of her hair. She pulled Tristan’s head toward her until she could skim her lips over Tristan’s. It was barely a kiss but Tristan shuddered and grabbed Jett’s hips. “You need it now, but tonight or tomorrow you might think differently.”

Tristan pressed her forehead to Jett’s shoulder. “How do you…”

Jett didn’t ask what Tristan meant. She wrapped an arm around her shoulders and held her tightly, caressing the back of her head and massaging her neck. With her lips brushing Tristan’s ear, she murmured,

“Been there. Lots of times.”

“I won’t regret it. I’m not that drunk.” Tristan ran her hands up and down Jett’s back, squeezing the muscles in her shoulders and along her spine. She kissed her neck. “You feel so good.”

“So do you.” Jett wanted her. Tristan’s need was so naked, so raw, she couldn’t help but want her. Trouble was, she wanted a lot of things where Tristan was concerned, and not all of them made her happy.

She wanted to soothe and protect her, but she also hungered to claim her, hard and fast. She was pretty sure Tristan would let her, right this moment.

Maybe if she hadn’t been with Tristan in the helicopter, hadn’t seen her desperate fight, hadn’t witnessed her anguish, she might have been able to focus only on what they both wanted right now. But Tristan wasn’t some anonymous woman in a nameless bar in a soon-to-be forgotten town. And she wasn’t the woman she had been, mindlessly seeking solace in the arms of another. She wasn’t giving in to that need again.

Jett eased away, her hand in Tristan’s hair again, tugging Tristan’s head back. She kissed her, not fleetingly this time, but a deep, probing kiss to stamp the taste of her in her memory. To quench the thirst for just an instant, to savor later when she was alone and the need rode her hard.

“Let’s lie down on the couch. Let me hold you,” Jett said.

“I’m climbing out of my skin,” Tristan groaned. “Jesus, I don’t need you to hold me. I need you to fuck me.”

“Five minutes,” Jett said. “Five minutes, and I will.”

Tristan grabbed Jett’s hand and dragged Jett toward the couch.

When Tristan’s knees hit the edge, she kept going, falling back, pulling her legs up, and Jett stretched out beside her. Jett shifted until she was almost on her back and Tristan lay half on top of her, Tristan’s head nestled on her shoulder. Jett resumed massaging Tristan’s neck and shoulders, using both hands now. Tristan shivered, drawing one leg up until her thigh rode in the vee between Jett’s legs. The sudden pressure detonated a shock wave up Jett’s spine, but she concentrated on Tristan.

“Close your eyes.” Jett kneaded the knotted muscles at the base of Tristan’s skull.

“I think about you,” Tristan said, her voice soft and slow. “I think about you inside—”

“Shh,” Jett whispered. “Tell me later.”

After a long moment of silence, Tristan said, “What if there isn’t…any later.”

Jett remembered not being able to count on another day. When any day, every day, could be the last. How the fear became anger, and the anger need. She kissed Tristan’s forehead and continued to stroke her. She didn’t say, there will be time later, because she didn’t know if there would be another day for them. If there was nothing else between them, at least there would be truth.

When all Jett could hear in the quiet room was the steady tick of her watch and Tristan’s soft breathing, she gently slipped away.

Chapter Sixteen

Jett let herself out of Tristan’s apartment, half hoping as she made her way down the stairs that the apartment door behind her would open and Tristan would call her back. Leaving her had been hard, but not nearly as hard as not touching her. She wasn’t exactly sure why she had held back. Tristan had made it clear what she wanted, and Jett couldn’t deny she had too. She’d been drawn to Tristan from the start, and physical attraction she understood. Every time she saw her, the attraction grew. If she went back upstairs, she wouldn’t resist again. Which was why she kept walking until she was outside. Sex with Tristan wouldn’t be what she was used to—it couldn’t be anonymous, and she wasn’t even sure it could be casual. She knew Tristan. She liked her. She felt for her, watching her struggle with sadness and pain. She cared. Hell.

When Jett reached the street she found the air already oppressively heavy and hot despite the early hour, but the idea of returning to her apartment to toss and turn held no appeal. For a few seconds she thought about Linda’s invitation to breakfast, then dismissed the idea with a mental laugh. Linda was most likely in bed, either sleeping or making good on her earlier promise to seduce her girlfriend. Besides, Jett didn’t just drop in on people. Like she’d just dropped in on Tristan.

She wondered just exactly what was happening to her, because she was behaving less and less like herself every day.

Disturbed, aroused, she strode rapidly to her Jeep, and then simply walked past. If she got in she’d go home, and that seemed just a little bit like prison today. By the end of the block she was sweating, but she barely noticed the heat. Nothing would ever truly feel hot again after the desert, and working her body was what she needed. Usually she dispelled her mental anxiety and physical tension with aggressive sex, but the fast pace in the broiling sun was almost doing the job—almost.

She couldn’t quite shake the sensation of holding Tristan. And she couldn’t forget Tristan asking her, almost begging her, to take her. The encounter had her needing sex, more than she had in a long time. Sex and something more, and the more part scared her.

Jett’s stomach tightened at the thought of having Tristan beneath her, of making her writhe and cry out with pleasure, of letting go of everything except the sight and sound of Tristan. She couldn’t pretend it was just sex she wanted. She wanted Tristan. She picked up her pace, hardly registering the presence of anyone else until a woman called to her.

“Hey you,” a familiar voice said. “Hungry already?”

Jett slowed and noted exactly where she was for the first time in blocks. To her left lay the playing fields where Linda had brought her the night she’d driven her home from the hospital. And coming across the grass toward her was Mandy, a self-satisfied smile on her face. Jett wondered, as she watched Mandy’s breasts rise and fall beneath her tight white T-shirt, if she’d come here with the subconscious intention of finding what she needed. Mandy had said she’d come looking for her when she got needy, and here she was.

“I’ve got T-ball practice in a few minutes,” Mandy said, rising on her tiptoes to kiss Jett quickly. “But after that you could definitely talk me into leaving early.”

“Hi.” Jett stepped back a pace. “Would you believe I was in the neighborhood?”

“Sure I would. I’d also believe you’ve got an itch that I know just how to scratch.”

Jett laughed, because Mandy had her number—as far as Mandy knew. “Several of them, probably. But not today.”

“You’re kidding.”

Jett shook her head.

“You mean you actually are just in the neighborhood?”

Jett nodded.

“Well, all right.” Mandy traced her fingers down the center of Jett’s chest. “Since you’re here, we should still make the most of it.”

She studied Jett through narrowed eyes. “Let me guess. You haven’t had any recreation to speak of since the last time we were together.”

She ran her fingernail along the edge of Jett’s jaw and Jett jerked back.

Mandy chuckled. “Mmm, yeah, and you are very ready for some fun.”

Jett wasn’t going to deny it. The lie would show. “I’m still going to pass.”

“Why?” Mandy sounded genuinely confused. “You had a good time. I had a good time. We understand each other. That’s unusual and not something to just throw away.”

“I know.” Jett slid her hands into her pockets and watched the children run up and down the field shouting exuberantly. She tried to remember when her life had stopped being simple and spontaneous.

When she was their age, maybe, maybe younger. About the time she realized she was different, and others noticed too. “You make it sound simple. I’m not sure why it isn’t.”

“When sex stops being about sex, it gets complicated.” Mandy tapped Jett’s chin teasingly. “I’m not interested in complicated. I didn’t think you were, either.” She leaned close but didn’t touch Jett again.

“What I’m interested in is you doing what you did to me last time. More than once and in many different ways.”

Jett thought about Tristan, about her pain and how much she’d wanted to ease it. She thought about how much she’d wanted her, and she couldn’t tell if the two were connected. Gail had been one of the few women in her life who she’d had feelings for, and when her feelings got twisted up with her desires, she’d suffered for it. Maybe mixing sex with caring just didn’t work for her. Mandy was watching her, waiting.

Mandy wanted simple. That she could do.

“You’re right,” Jett said. “I’m not interested in complicated. I’m just not as ready as you think I am right now.”

“You’ll call me when you are.”

It wasn’t a question.

“Maybe. I’m not making any promises.”

Mandy smiled and kissed the tip of her finger, then pressed it to Jett’s mouth. “I wasn’t asking for any.”

Tristan sat on the edge of the couch trying to figure out what the hell had just happened. She was so used to being awakened during the night by a phone call informing her of some emergency, and needing to be instantly awake and alert, that even the alcohol she’d consumed couldn’t suppress her natural reflexes. The quiet click of her apartment door closing behind Jett had been enough to rouse her. Her first instinct had been to go after her, and then her rational mind caught up to her libido and some sanity returned. She was out of control where Jett was concerned. She needed to get a grip.

Head still fuzzy from lack of sleep and the scotch, Tristan stumbled into the bathroom, turned on the shower, and stepped in after leaving her clothes in a pile on the floor. She twisted the dial to cool and washed her hair and body, waking herself up and clearing the cobwebs from her mind. After briskly toweling off, brushing her teeth, and downing a glass of orange juice, she pulled on nearly threadbare jeans, deck shoes, and a light blue short-sleeved shirt. Feeling more human, if not quite herself, she stepped out onto the back porch and leaned against the railing. Finally, she let herself replay the few minutes with Jett.

She saw herself folding into Jett, letting herself be held, letting herself be soothed when what she wanted—at least, what she’d thought she’d wanted—was a different sort of comfort. From the signals her body was still sending, despite the shower, a big part of her had definitely wanted sex. She was still vibrating from the sexual charge of Jett’s hands on her neck, in her hair, coursing over her back. She smelled Jett’s skin, tangy and rich, and recalled the long, hard planes of her body and the surprising softness of her breasts when Jett had embraced her.

After the catastrophic night she’d had, her guard might have been down, but she hadn’t been lying when she’d said she wanted Jett to fuck her. That was exactly what she’d wanted then, and having a clearer head now didn’t change her mind. She couldn’t deny it any more than she could quite explain it.

Until the last few weeks, Tristan had been accustomed to being in charge when she was with a woman, and that’s how she liked it.

No surprises, no disappointments—for anyone. But Jett called to a completely new and different part of her, one she was only beginning to embrace. She craved Jett’s solid strength, thrilled to the hardness of her body, and hungered for that intense, dark gaze and all it promised.

She wanted, perhaps had always wanted, to be the singular focus of that kind of intense passion.

“Why not just admit it,” Tristan muttered to herself. “You want her to do to you what she was doing to Mandy.” She shook her head.

She couldn’t see herself as Mandy, but she could see herself opening to Jett, taking her in, taking her deep, and the idea downright terrified her as much as it turned her on.

One thing she was clear about. She needed to see her. Jett had come to her with the offer of friendship, and she’d been too fucked up to appreciate it, or to thank her. She needed to fix that right now.

Tristan was halfway down the stairs before she realized she didn’t know where Jett lived. God damn it. She stopped, considering her options. The hospital might page Jett for her, but they wouldn’t give Tristan her home number. Neither would the business office. And what

if Jett wasn’t wearing her beeper or had turned it off? Tristan didn’t want to wait. Couldn’t wait. She had to see her.

Linda. Linda must know how to reach her. Tristan took the rest of the stairs two at a time and shoved through her front door. She sprinted toward the sidewalk, then slowed when she saw Jett’s Jeep parked a few houses away. At least she thought it was Jett’s.

If Jett was still around, where was she? Who had she gone to see?

Mandy lived in the neighborhood somewhere. The thought of Jett with Mandy, holding her, caressing her, made Tristan’s head ache. The idea of Jett going to Mandy for what she hadn’t found with Tristan made her half crazy. Tristan forgot all about her destination while she tortured herself with images of Jett backing Mandy up against a tree, kissing her, dominating her, taking her the way Tristan had wanted to be taken.

She groaned aloud.

“Tristan?”

The picture of Jett and Mandy dissolved and the world snapped back into Technicolor focus. Tristan turned and Jett was there.

“Hi,” Tristan said.

“Hi.” Jett shot her a half grin. “Couldn’t sleep, huh?”

“I heard you leave.”

“Sorry.” Jett ran her hand through her hair and sighed. “I probably shouldn’t have come over. Company was probably the last thing you nee—”

“Wrong.” Tristan kissed her, then moved back quickly before Jett could touch her. She didn’t trust herself if Jett touched her. “That’s for the coffee and doughnuts. Thanks.”

Jett’s eyes were hungry as they swept over Tristan’s face. “Next time I’ll bring sandwiches.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” Tristan said, determined not to let her get away. She didn’t want her out of her sight. “Let’s get out of here.”

She pulled her keys from her pocket and gestured to her Saab, parked two cars behind Jett’s Jeep. “I’ve got a place an hour from here in the mountains. It will be at least ten degrees cooler up there.”

“I don’t think so,” Jett said, her voice low and gravelly.

“I’ve got to be back tomorrow for practice at two.”

“I’m flying tomorrow night,” Jett said.

“I’ll have you back by one at the latest.”

“I need to shower, change clothes.”

“No, you don’t. I woke up thinking about the way you smell. The way your skin tastes.” Tristan moved into Jett again, sliding her hand over Jett’s shoulder and down her arm. “You’re just fine the way you are.”

Jett grabbed Tristan’s hand. “What are you do—”

“Hey, Tristan!” Arly came racing up, nearly colliding with them as she skidded to a stop. “Quinn’s sleeping, but my mom is taking me to the park for practice. Are you coming?”

Tristan eased back from Jett and smiled at Arly. “Not today, sport. I’m the Saturday coach, remember?”

“I know,” Arly said, “but sometimes Quinn—”

Honor caught up to Arly and put her hand on top of her head.

“Honey, Tristan might have other plans for today. Hi, Tris.” She held out her hand to Jett. “I saw you at Linda’s party, but never got a chance to talk to you. I’m Honor Blake.”

“Jett McNally.”

“I know. Linda flies with you and can’t stop talking about how great it is.” Honor frowned. “I’d appreciate it if you stay away from the rest of the ER nurses.”

Jett was silent for a second and then laughed when Honor’s frown turned into a warm smile. “Quinn already warned me about that. I promise the ER is officially a no-fly zone.”

“Oh, I can see exactly why Linda left,” Honor said with a shake of her head. “You’re slick.”

“Yeah, she’s got a way about her,” Tristan said, grinning at Jett. “How are you feeling, Honor? And how is Jack?”

“He’s great. He’s with his grandmother right now.” Honor took Arly’s hand. “We are having a play date while Quinn sleeps in. I needed to get out for a while. If I walk slowly I don’t feel a day over eighty.”

“Can I drop you somewhere?” Tristan asked.

“You two look like you were headed out. And we’re doing fine,” Honor said.

“We’re headed up to the mountains,” Tristan said, casting a sideways glance at Jett.

“Nice. Have a great time.” Honor tugged on Arly’s hand. “Come on, honey. Let’s go to the park.”

Arly went with her mother, walking backward a few steps, her gaze riveted to Tristan. “What about Saturday’s practice? We have that big game next week and Quinn said she might have to work that day.”

“Got you covered, no problem,” Tristan called after her. “I’ll be there Saturday and I’ll give Robin a hand with the game next week too.”

Arly grinned back. “Okay. Have fun.”

Tristan laughed. “She’s got Honor’s looks, Quinn’s persistence, and probably both their smarts. She’s going to give some boy or girl a run for their money one day soon.”

“I think she’s got a crush on you,” Jett said.

“Girls always get crushes on their coaches. It’ll pass.”

“Not always.”

Tristan gave her a look. “You’re right.” She opened the Saab with the remote. “You ready to get out of here?”

Jett looked at the car, then back to Tristan. “This is crazy.”

“No,” Tristan said softly. “Pretending we don’t want to would be crazy.”

Jett didn’t say anything, she just got into the car. That was enough for Tristan, for now.

Chapter Seventeen

Tristan started the engine and powered down the convertible top. “No pets, right?”

“Pardon?” Jett still didn’t entirely believe she was about to go off who-knew-where with a woman who by turns pissed her off and turned her on and made her want things she’d never thought of having.

Like quiet moments in the sun and the sound of another heart beating in the dark. When she took in Tristan’s bold sharp profile, her dark hair still wet from the shower and gleaming in the sun, she didn’t feel as if she were with a stranger. Weathering a crisis together and struggling through the aftermath had a way of stripping away the veneer and letting you see people for who they really were. She’d seen Tristan under fire, more than once, and she knew her to be fearless and brave.

She’d seen Tristan blame herself for perceived failures that were not her responsibility, and witnessed her pain. Jett recognized a warrior with a tender heart.

“Dogs? Cats?” Tristan glanced over, blue eyes glittering. “Canary? Anything that needs food in the next twenty-four hours?”

“I’ve spent my whole life being sent around the world with a few hours’ notice. I don’t even keep plants.”

“Good.” Tristan pulled out and gunned the Saab down the street in the direction of the interstate. She didn’t plan on giving Jett any time to reconsider because she needed to get away, and she wanted Jett with her. She needed to leave the sadness behind and recharge where there were no schedules and no demands and no tragedies. Just the smell of the pines and the clean mountain air and a woman to share it with. Jett. Jett to share it with. Tristan hit the on-ramp and glanced at Jett. “Then we don’t have any reason to hang around here.”

“Guess we don’t.” Jett was used to being driven to unknown destinations, only usually she was crowded in the belly of a troop transport or bouncing around in the hold of a plane or the back of a Jeep. Speeding out of the city with Tristan at the wheel couldn’t have been more different. Or more exciting. She stretched out her legs and tilted her head back. She must have sighed, because Tristan reached across the space between them and rubbed her shoulder for a second.

“Tired? Feel free to take a nap.”

“I’m good just like this.” Jett rolled her head on the headrest and squinted in the bright sunlight. Tristan glowed, and Jett almost touched her just to be sure she was real. “How about you? I think your night was a lot rougher than mine.”

Tristan’s jaw tightened. “I’ll need a nap later. I’m all right to drive now.” She cut another quick look in Jett’s direction again before focusing on the road. “I didn’t have that much to drink.”

“I wasn’t worried about that.”

“I don’t make a habit of—”

“Tristan,” Jett said gently. “I get it. Remember? I’ve had my fair number of shots first thing in the morning. Morning is relative when you’ve been on duty for God knows how long.”

“I don’t know why last night got to me more than usual.” Tristan spoke slowly, as if the landscape of her own feelings were unfamiliar and dangerous territory. “I’ve had patients die before. Kids, pregnant mothers, twenty-five-year-old guys who should’ve lived to be eighty. I don’t know.” Her hands tightened on the wheel. “I just keep wondering if I did the right thing.”

“Was there something else you could have done? Something you missed?”

“Maybe.” Tristan laughed shortly. “Aren’t you supposed to assure me that of course I did the right thing?”

“I probably would, if I didn’t know you.” Jett gripped Tristan’s forearm, then brushed her fingers over the inside of Tristan’s arm below her sleeve, caressing her soft, warm skin. Then she pulled back. “If I didn’t like you, I wouldn’t mind blowing smoke at you.”

Tristan exhaled slowly, trying to dampen her edginess. The barest touch of Jett’s fingers had her insides quivering. Her clit strained against the inside of her jeans. She ought to be used to the constant arousal by now—every time she was with Jett her body went in one direction, no matter what her head was doing. She forced herself to think about what Jett was saying, despite the urgent throbbing between her legs. “I’m glad you like me.”

“So what do you think you should have done last night?”

“Jesus, don’t you ever give up?”

“Sometimes,” Jett said quietly. “We’re not talking about me.”

“We never do,” Tristan said mildly.

“There’s nothing to talk about. Quit stalling.”

Tristan crossed lanes onto the expressway heading north. “Quinn warned us if I opened the incision to relieve the pressure on the baby’s chest she’d probably arrest. I did it anyway, and she arrested just like Quinn said. Even though we got a heartbeat back, it was all downhill from there.”

“I was flying, but I could still hear what was going on. I’m not a medic, but it was pretty clear that baby was headed downhill a long time before you put her into my aircraft.”

“You’re right. She was in bad trouble,” Tristan said. “And maybe if I’d seen that earlier and refused to transfer her—”

“Oh, now you’re responsible for the judgment of the surgeons and neonatologists at the other hospital?” Jett shook her head. “You would have made a crappy soldier.”

Tristan glowered at her. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“You can’t accept that you are one link in a chain. You might be a vital link, but you’re still only responsible for part of what happened last night. Being part of that chain means you do your job and count on others to do theirs.”

“I suppose you never took anything extra on yourself, huh? Captain McNally.”

“Chief, and we’re not talking about me.”

“Cut that out,” Tristan griped. “Jesus, you sound like a therapist.”

“Hey,” Jett protested, “no need to get insulting.”

Tristan grinned. “Did I mention one of my sisters is a psychiatrist?”

“Sorry.”

“No need. She’s given up trying to analyze me. Finally.”

Jett heard the fondness in Tristan’s voice, but there was sadness there too. She suspected Tristan’s family had pressured her to change the way she felt about women. As if it was just a simple choice. “You did say your family didn’t always understand you.”

“They all have the same picture of life. One I never had.” Tristan sighed. “Last night I did what I did up there in the helicopter because I believed that infant didn’t have four more minutes. Or even two.”

“Then you made the right call,” Jett said.

“Why are you so sure?”

Tristan’s eyes were dark, pain-filled, when she searched Jett’s face. Jett leaned across the space between the seats and cupped the back of Tristan’s neck. She stroked her slowly, her fingers playing up and down the tight muscles. “I don’t have to be sure. You do.”

“Usually I am. It’s been a rough month.” Tristan relaxed against Jett’s hand. “Damn, that feels good.”

“I’ll finish when we get there.” Jett sifted Tristan’s hair through her fingers, then slid inside Tristan’s collar. She squeezed the ridge of muscle between Tristan’s neck and shoulder with deep, rhythmic compressions. “Your back could probably use some work.”

“That would be great.” Tristan tried to sound casual, but her head swam and she had to force herself to watch the road. She didn’t want Jett to know that every caress made her blood surge. Darla got a charge out of teasing her while she was driving, playing with her until Tristan couldn’t hold back and laughing when Tristan flamed out. But even while Darla was making her come she didn’t have this kind of trouble focusing, and Jett was only rubbing her shoulder. She hadn’t felt this dizzy with need since she’d first discovered the miracle of girls, and then it was touching them that got her off. She didn’t think she’d ever wanted anyone to touch her as much as she did Jett. She prayed Jett wouldn’t stop.

“There’s a lake,” Tristan blurted. “We can go swimming first.”

“I’d like that,” Jett said drowsily. She probably shouldn’t keep touching Tristan, but Tristan’s skin was so damn soft. She rested her cheek against the seat and watched Tristan’s face as the clouds rolled by overhead and the wind sang through the car. She thought of walking barefoot on dusty roads, of lazy summer afternoons and cool shady ponds. “I haven’t been swimming in a long time.”

“Then it’s about time.”

“Yeah. Maybe it is.”

Tristan drove on as Jett slept beside her, more settled than she had been in days, all from the simple touch of Jett’s fingers on her neck.

“We’re here,” Tristan said, gently shaking Jett’s shoulder.

Jett opened her eyes and sat up. “Sorry. I just got too comfortable.”

“I think that’s the idea.”

“I don’t fall asleep in front of people.”

“Never?”

Jett shook her head. “Not the way I just did. A catnap, maybe. You could’ve dumped me out by the side of the road and I wouldn’t have known it.”

Tristan laughed. “Believe me, getting rid of you was the last thing on my mind.”

“Oh yeah?” Jett braced an arm on the door and pushed up with her legs, then swiveled and dropped over onto the ground. She put her hands on her hips and grinned. “What was on your mind?”

“Oh, very smooth.” Tristan pocketed her keys and got out on the opposite side of the car. No way was she telling Jett she’d been fantasizing for the last twenty-five miles about lying next to Jett again, this time without clothes in the way. “I was thinking a swim, a bottle of wine, and some steaks.”

Jett turned in a slow circle, surveying their destination. A one-story wood cabin with a broad front porch stood in a half-acre clearing surrounded by pines. A grassy slope led from the small knoll where they’d parked down to a still mountain lake. A short dock extended into the water. A canvas-covered boat was tethered to the dock. She couldn’t see any houses on either side of the cabin, but there were a few on the far side of the lake. It was just about midday, and the surface of the clear water reflected the sunlight like glass.

“This is a great place.” Jett looked over her shoulder. Tristan was watching her intently. “Your family’s?”

“No. They have a big compound in the Poconos. My sisters have cabins—well, they’re not really cabins, more like houses—on the family land. I opted for something smaller.”

“And more private?”

Tristan nodded ruefully. “I enjoy socializing with my family, but—”

“Tough to bring dates?”

“Not that so much anymore.” Tristan walked around the car and joined Jett. She looked out over the water, her expression brooding. “I might bring a date to dinner at the country club, but extended weekends aren’t exactly my style.” She met Jett’s eyes. “I’ve never brought anyone here.”

“I’ve never been to a woman’s cabin before.” Jett shrugged, a dimple appearing to the right of her mouth. “I’ve never been to the country club, either.”

Tristan rested her hand in the middle of Jett’s back. Jett’s shirt was damp with sweat and she imagined how slick her skin would be underneath it. She could almost taste the salt and feel the heat against her lips. A heavy ache settled in her stomach and her legs trembled.

“Some night when you’re feeling masochistic, I’ll take you.”

“How could I refuse an invitation like that?” Jett brushed a lock of hair from Tristan’s forehead with her fingertips. “I didn’t bring a bathing suit.”

“Neither did I.”

“How private is private?”

“No motors of any kind on the lake. I suppose we might scare a canoer if one wanders by.”

Jett backed away a step and unbuttoned her shirt. She wore nothing underneath it. The dimple deepened as she watched Tristan’s eyes grow smoky. “You ready to go swimming?”

“More than ready,” Tristan said hoarsely. She started down the gentle slope toward the water, her gaze never leaving Jett as Jett walked beside her, shedding her shirt. Jett was lean, muscle and bone beneath smooth bronze skin. The vee between her breasts was darker than the surrounding skin, left over, Tristan imagined, from the months beneath the broiling sun. A thick pink scar, three or four inches long, stood out on her left shoulder. It was fresh and it wasn’t an incision. Her stomach plummeted. It could only be a wound of some kind. While she knew intellectually that Jett had been in combat, she hadn’t absorbed the true reality. She wondered if anyone who hadn’t been there really could. Jett had not only seen death, she had faced it.

“It wasn’t anything serious,” Jett said, knowing from Tristan’s expression that she had seen the scar. “A little bit of flying debris.”

“I’m sorry.” Tristan gently touched the scar. Jett’s breast, a slightly paler, perfect oval, lay just below her hand, but she didn’t stroke downward to caress it. Jett was baring far more than her body, and Tristan knew it. “Is this the only one?”

“Nothing else but bumps and bruises.” Jett caught Tristan’s hand and held it for a second. “Don’t feel bad. I’m one of the lucky ones.”

“Okay.” Tristan smiled shakily. “I just don’t like thinking about you being hurt.”

“It’s over now.” Jett rarely thought about the wound, because everything else about that night had been so much more critical. When Gail’s face flashed through her mind, she resolutely put the memory aside. Gail wasn’t here now. Gail wasn’t anywhere in her life. And

Tristan was. “Tristan…”

“What?” Tristan took off her shirt by the water’s edge, unzipped her jeans, and pushed them down. Then she kicked off her boat shoes and was naked.

Jett halted with her zipper halfway down, drinking in Tristan’s body. Shorter by an inch, Tristan was more muscular, her thighs and chest thicker. Tristan’s breasts were broader than hers and Jett imagined the weight of them in her hands. As if she had touched them, the dark nipples tightened and Tristan’s breasts rose.

Tristan shuddered in a breath. “I like the way you look at me.”

Jett’s control slipped a notch. They were already on dangerous ground. If she let go, if she touched her, one touch would never be enough. “I don’t know what you’re expecting—”

“Nothing,” Tristan said quickly. “Nothing. Just for us to be here for a while.”

“You’re sure.”

“Take your clothes off. Come in the water.” Tristan turned and dove. She was underwater for a long time, her path marked by faint ripples on the surface.

Jett shed her shoes and the rest of her clothes and waited until Tristan surfaced. Then, marking the spot, she took a breath and followed her. The cool water closed over her, and she swam with her eyes open.

After three strong strokes she saw the pale outline of Tristan’s body in the water. Tristan’s breasts swayed gently, beckoning to her. Jett stroked closer and then surfaced, her body brushing Tristan’s. She scissored her legs between Tristan’s, cupped the back of her neck, and covered Tristan’s mouth with hers. Tristan groaned and wrapped her arms around Jett’s shoulders, opening her mouth to draw her in.

The sun beat down on Jett’s shoulders, but it was nothing like the desert. Water lapped at her throat and cooled her feverish body. And Tristan was nothing like any woman she had ever touched. Her body was powerful and strong, made stronger by her yielding. Tristan broke the kiss and Jett felt teeth on her neck. She tilted her head back and let Tristan take more. When her control snapped and she was seconds from sliding her hand between Tristan’s legs, she grasped Tristan’s shoulders and pushed away from her. She kicked back, dunked her head, and came up flinging the hair from her eyes.

“It’s not physically possible to do what I want to do to you out here,” Jett said.

“How do you know?” Tristan swam toward her, her eyes on fire. “How many women have you fucked in a lake?”

“How do you know that’s what I had in mind?” Jett said.

“If it isn’t, I’m in trouble.” Tristan gripped Jett’s shoulder, kicking gently to stay upright in the water. “Are you going to make me beg you?”

“That’s not what I want. But you might not want what I—”

“Believe me, I do.” Tristan let go and drifted back away from Jett. “But I don’t want you thinking about what I want when you’re making love to me. I don’t want you thinking about anything.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“Then we should get our clothes on and I’ll make something to eat.” Tristan stroked swiftly to shore and climbed out of the water.

Jett, treading water slowly, watched her get dressed. Then she made her way in to shore as Tristan climbed the hill toward the cabin.

Pulling her clothes over her wet body, she told herself she’d held back because Tristan didn’t know what she was asking. But there’d been another reason too. Jett walked up the hill, thinking she’d already come too close to completely losing control, and all she’d done was kiss her.

Chapter Eighteen

Quinn parked the Volvo in the shade of the big maples bordering Whitman Park, three blocks from her house. She headed for the largest group of kids she could see, figuring Arly would be in the middle of the pack. A minute later she found Honor on a park bench watching an impromptu soccer game. She sat down next to her, slid an arm behind her shoulders, and kissed her.

“Phyllis told me you and Arly walked over here. How are you feeling?”

Honor sighed and leaned her cheek against Quinn’s shoulder. “Truth?”

Quinn brushed her lips over Honor’s temple. “No, I prefer you lie to me whenever possible.”

“If you didn’t bring the car, you’re going to have to carry me home.”

“Is your incision bothering you?”

“Not really. I’m mostly just out of gas.”

“I figured you might be tired. I drove over.” Quinn stroked Honor’s hair and watched Arly outrun a boy two years older than her, deftly dribbling the soccer ball between her knee and foot. “She’s really good.”

“Give her a ball and she’s in heaven.” Honor rested her hand on Quinn’s thigh. “What if she’s not tall enough for basketball? She’s going to be really upset.”

“She’ll be fine. She can play point guard. That suits her personality better, anyhow.”

“Are you any good at basketball?” Honor asked.

Grinning, Quinn shrugged. “I’m going to have to be.”

“Was Jack all right when Phyllis gave him the bottle?”

“I fed him.” She hugged Honor gently. “Not that I don’t think your breasts are a marvelous invention, but I don’t think he really cares where dinner comes from. He chowed down, no problems.”

Honor laughed. “Good. Because my breasts have other uses, and I’d like to get them back to that sooner rather than later.”

Quinn nuzzled Honor’s ear. “Oh yeah?”

“Children present,” Honor murmured, although she didn’t move away.

“They’re not watching.”

“Behave anyhow. If you tease me and I’m too tired to do anything, I’ll just get cranky.”

“You don’t have to do anything.” Quinn kissed Honor’s cheek and drew back before she wanted to do more than she could do outside. “I’ll do all the heavy lifting.”

“Somehow the idea of me lying there like a lump doesn’t strike me as sexy.”

“You’re sexy no matter what you’re doing.” Quinn held Honor’s hand. “Besides, I was pretty much a lump when I got home, and you didn’t seem to mind.”

“You were a gorgeous sexy lump. How are you feeling?”

“I got five hours of solid sleep. I’m good.”

Honor rubbed Quinn’s thigh. “I’m glad. Although that wasn’t exactly what I meant.”

“I’m okay,” Quinn said quietly. “Healthstar brought in a preemie with NEC. Things went south pretty fast and we lost her.”

“That’s rough. I’m sorry.” Honor rubbed Quinn’s hand against her cheek. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah.” Quinn sighed. “Better now. Thanks for this morning. It was just what I needed.”

“Baby,” Honor murmured, “that was for me too.”

“Good.”

“Was Linda on last night? She hates it when kids are involved.”

Quinn nodded. “Tristan and Linda did the transfer.”

“I’ll call Linda when we get home. Check in on her.” Honor paused to wave when Arly shouted across the field that she had just made a goal. “I saw Tristan on the way over here. She and Jett were headed off somewhere together.”

“Oh yeah?” Quinn gave Arly a thumbs-up. “Interesting.”

“Is it?” Honor studied Quinn’s grin. “Oh. Huh. Jett doesn’t look like Tristan’s usual.”

“That’s when you have to watch out,” Quinn said. “It’s the ones you don’t expect to get to you who always do.”

Honor laughed. “Well that was certainly true for me where you were concerned.”

“Really? I understood you went for the handsome, sexy types.”

Quinn made a move to nuzzle Honor’s neck again and Honor pushed her away.

“Oh, your nap definitely got your batteries recharged,” Honor said. “What is there about out of shape, recently pregnant women that you find so irresistible, Dr. Maguire?”

“I look at our amazing kids and realize they came from you,” Quinn said gently, “and it’s like witnessing a miracle. Plus, you’re the most exciting, beautiful woman I’ve ever known.”

Honor caught her breath. “You’d better take me home now. I think I’m ready for you to do that heavy lifting you promised.”

Quinn jumped up and waved her arms. “Yo, Arly. Wrap it up. Time to go!”

A minute later Arly came running over. “Did you see me score?”

“Sure did,” Quinn said. “Nice move getting around that guard too.”

Arly grinned. “Kevin is here. Can I stay just a little bit longer? He can walk me home.”

Quinn shook her head. “No go, sport. But I’ll make a deal with you. We’ll come back after supper, okay?”

“When will I be big enough to stay by myself?”

“Soon,” Quinn said, slinging an arm around Arly’s shoulders while thinking in five or six years she might feel comfortable not knowing where Arly was every minute of the day. Big maybe. “Right now Mom’s pretty tired.”

Arly grew serious. “Okay. We should take her home.”

Honor rose, hiding her stiffness and the brief twinge of pain, and took Arly’s hand. “I think if I take a nap this afternoon, I’ll be ready to come back over with the two of you tonight. Maybe we can bring Jack.

Sound like a plan?”

“Deal.”

Arly swung her parents’ hands as she walked between them toward the car. Honor smiled over at Quinn, and Quinn let the last remnants of sadness and regret drift away on the wings of children’s laughter.

Just as Jett reached the porch, Tristan came out of the cabin, jiggling her keys in her hand. Jett didn’t blame her for wanting to leave, but she didn’t expect the disappointment to be so sharp. She turned to go back down the steps to the car. Leaving was for the best, she knew that, but the prospect of spending the next day alone, when she’d be thinking of Tristan constantly, saddened her in a way that was completely foreign.

After Gail, she’d felt shell-shocked—part angry and part wounded— but the pain had been blunted by her own self-recriminations. This pain was razor-edged and nearly unbearable.

“There’s a mom-and-pop store a couple miles up the road,” Tristan called from behind her. “I’m heading out to get a few supplies. Unless you trust me to pick out steaks and wine, you’d better come along.”

Jett turned back. “You want to stay?”

Tristan came down the stairs and strode along the gravel path, slowing when she reached Jett. “Babe. One of these days you’re going to have to tell me why you think the only thing a woman would want from you is sex.”

“Maybe that’s all I want,” Jett said, although even as she spoke she wasn’t sure she believed it any longer.

“Things change,” Tristan said, almost to herself. She smiled ruefully. “Come on, let’s go shopping.”

Jett climbed back into the car, acutely aware of Tristan just inches away as they drove along a narrow, twisting dirt road dappled with sunlight filtered through overhanging trees. For moments at a time she felt completely disconnected from anything she’d ever known, her past heartaches and mistakes seeming to exist in another lifetime. The Army, the desert, even the city she’d just left faded away, until all that remained was Tristan and sunshine.

“Pull over for a second,” Jett said.

Wordlessly, Tristan eased the Saab onto the shoulder of the road, leaving just enough room for one vehicle to pass. She regarded Jett expectantly.

Jett leaned over, slid her hand behind Tristan’s neck, and tugged her close enough to kiss. She kissed her more slowly and more carefully than she’d ever kissed a woman in her life. She traced Tristan’s lips with the tip of her tongue, slipped inside to taste her heat, teased her by drawing back when Tristan would have probed more deeply.

“Jesus,” Tristan gasped. “What are you trying to do to me?”

“I just wanted to say thanks,” Jett said. “For bringing me up here. I thought if I kissed you out here, it wouldn’t be about sex.”

“Wrong. Very wrong.” Tristan’s chest heaved. “But you’re welcome just the same.”

Jett skimmed her fingertips over Tristan’s jaw. “I’ve never kissed a woman in the sunlight before.”

“Christ,” Tristan whispered. “You kill me, you know that?”

“Is that bad?” Jett asked.

Tristan shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. A dusty red pickup truck piled high with wooden crates filled with chickens rattled by, but Tristan never took her eyes off Jett’s face.

“I never kissed anyone until I’d been in the service a couple of years, and then, well…” Jett shrugged. “Everyone pretty much had to hide.”

“I hate myself for being a little bit glad that this was a first.” Tristan wanted to be Jett’s first, because she was coming to realize Jett was her first in all the ways that counted. She’d never wanted to give herself to another woman the way she did right now. She’d never hungered to know another woman, heart and soul, as much as she wanted to know Jett. And God help her, she just wanted her. She wanted to climb over the gear shift and into Jett’s arms. She wanted her out of those clothes so bad, she thought she might cry.

Jett frowned. “You’re shaking.”

“It’s nothing.”

Jett reached for her. “Don’t blow smoke at me. Something’s—”

Tristan jerked away. “Christ, Jett. I’m not made of stone. You’re driving me out of my mind.”

“Sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“Don’t be sorry. God damn it.” Tristan threw her head back against the seat and fisted her hands on her thighs. She squinted up at the sky and took a deep breath. “If it weren’t so fucking painful, it would be great.”

“What?”

Tristan turned her head and grinned at Jett. “Being this turned on.”

Jett laughed. “You’re a little bit crazy.”

“No, I’m a lot crazy.” Tristan held out her hand and Jett took it. Tristan rubbed her thumb over the darkly tanned, wind-roughened skin. “This is different, this thing between us.”

“Tristan, I don’t think—”

“Don’t,” Tristan said quickly. “Don’t tell me there’s nothing here, because I know differently.” She released Jett’s hand, straightened, and started the car. “At least for me.”

Jett didn’t contradict her, because she didn’t understand what was happening, and even more importantly, she had no idea what she wanted to happen. So she didn’t say anything, and she didn’t touch her again.

Tristan was careful not to push for the rest of the afternoon. She’d gone too far in the car earlier, moved too fast, and Jett had immediately withdrawn. Even so, Tristan had experienced a sense of giddy freedom, almost elation, when she’d voiced her feelings to Jett. Still—too much, too soon. Hell, even she didn’t know what it meant. All she knew was that she’d never enjoyed shopping for groceries and cooking a meal with anyone quite so much. Come to think of it, she’d never actually done those things with any of her dates. Her dates were just that, appointments for some social function with the unspoken understanding that sex would likely follow. One step up from a business arrangement.

The only thing that made those encounters anything more than cold, calculated exchanges was the fact that she and her companions genuinely enjoyed one another. But just the same, those dates were nowhere near as enjoyable as the afternoon she’d spent with Jett doing something as simple as barbecuing steaks. Part of the pleasure had come from Jett finally relaxing enough to tell her a few things about her life. They’d discovered a shared love for baseball. They were both Yankees fans.

When Tristan confessed to having a huge collection of classic sci-fi movies on tape, Jett was eager to see them.

And all the time they’d talked, moving around each other in the small kitchen, carrying plates of food back and forth, opening wine, refilling glasses, Tristan remembered the dark, dusky taste of Jett’s mouth and the strength in her hands. A few times, Tristan had had to walk out of the room on the pretext of checking the coals in the grill or opening another bottle of wine, because she couldn’t hide how much she wanted her. Because somehow, she had to convince Jett she wasn’t with her just for the sex.

Now Jett sat on the top step of the wide wooden front porch, her back braced against the rough-hewn post that supported the slanted metal roof above their heads. The sun rode low across the lake, gilding the treetops and painting long, wavering shadows on the opalescent surface of the water. Jett’s profile appeared carved in bronze, and Tristan ached to run her fingers over her cheekbones and along her jaw. She wanted to taste her and lose herself in the hot mystery of her mouth. Tristan shifted in her Adirondack deck chair, her legs tight and her stomach twisting. She needed to think about something else, and quickly, or else she was going to need to excuse herself for a few minutes.

Looking for a diversion, Tristan lifted the bottle of wine from the floor next to her and poured half a glass for herself. “More wine?”

“No. Thanks.” Jett indicated the nearly full glass beside her. “I’m good.”

“We could have gotten beer,” Tristan said.

Jett planted one foot on the porch and draped her arm over her bent knee. “I’ll admit, beer is a little more my style, but I enjoyed the wine.”

Tristan sat forward on the end of her chair. A foot of space separated them. “I’m really glad you came up here with me.”

“I’m glad you invited me.” Jett couldn’t miss what was so plainly written in Tristan’s eyes, and the look had been there all afternoon. She owed Tristan more than a safe, polite response. But she had no idea what to say, how to explain that she had no reference for the afternoon they’d shared. She’d spent all her life with men and women in close quarters—comrades—eating together, sleeping together, living and breathing and dying together. But she couldn’t remember a single day that she’d spent in the company of someone by choice, for the pleasure of it. She wanted to tell Tristan how special this day had been, even more because Tristan wasn’t asking.

“I don’t know how to do this,” Jett said.

“Do what?”

“Be with someone—a woman—like this.” Jett stood abruptly, frustrated by her inability to express what she felt, especially since she didn’t understand most of what was happening. With her back to Tristan, she braced her forearm against the post and leaned out over the railing, watching night fall and the moon ascend. “I’ve known women I would die for, and those same women I’ve never touched, never told a secret to. I’ve made love to women whose names I didn’t know, whose names I didn’t need to know.” She rapped her fist sharply on the post. “Nothing about being here fits, Tristan.”

Tristan rose. “Was there ever a woman to bridge that gap? A woman you knew, a woman you touched?”

“No.” Jett bit out the word, half turning. Tristan was right behind her. So close, so close. “No. There wasn’t. There was only my mistake.”

“Whatever happened, that doesn’t mean things couldn’t be different with someone else.”

“What if I don’t want things to be different?” Jett’s back was to the railing and Tristan was almost against her now. She kept her hands clenched at her sides. “I don’t like complications. I prefer sex to be simple.”

Tristan laughed abruptly and took another step. Jett only wanted what Tristan herself had always been satisfied with. The physical connection had always been enough. It could be enough again. “Hey, I think you know I’ve never been one to disagree with that. So why do you keep running?”

Jett couldn’t answer. Tristan was a breath away, so near Jett could make out flecks of moonlight dancing in her eyes. Her skin shimmered with silver highlights. Jett swore waves of heat swirled and danced around them. She was so beautiful. Still, Jett didn’t touch her, because she didn’t believe her. Someone would get hurt, and she didn’t want it to be Tristan. “Back off, Tristan.”

“No.”

“Tristan,” Jett warned, her voice low and tight.

“Simple.” Tristan began to unbutton her shirt. “We’ll keep it simple. Just the way you like it.”

The white shirt parted, exposing Tristan’s breasts. And just that fast, the distant croak of frogs, the mournful cry of a loon, the wind in the trees—all went completely silent. The stars winked out and the sky overhead became an endless void. The world receded until there was only Tristan, living, breathing, offering Jett a gift more precious than the promise of tomorrow.

“Take it,” Tristan whispered. “Please, Jett. Take it.”

Jett slipped her hands under the edges of the white cotton shirt, sliding her fingertips along Tristan’s collarbones until she gripped Tristan’s shoulders. She turned her suddenly, forcing Tristan’s back against the post, then leaned into her, her mouth against Tristan’s ear.

“Are you sure you know what you’re asking?” Jett pushed a leg between Tristan’s. “Because I’m not going to ask again.”

Tristan dug her fingers into Jett’s ass, forcing Jett’s leg more firmly into the cleft between her thighs. “The answer is yes.”

Chapter Nineteen

“Hold on to the railing behind you,” Jett said, keeping Tristan pinned to the post with both hands on Tristan’s shoulders and one leg between her thighs. She slid her teeth along the edge of Tristan’s jaw, then down the center of her throat. When she reached the hollow between Tristan’s collarbones she sucked the soft skin between her lips and tugged at it with her teeth.

“What?” Tristan muttered, struggling to find her mental balance.

She’d fantasized about Jett doing something just like this so many times that she was halfway to an orgasm already. She swept her hands up and down Jett’s back until Jett pushed her shirt down over her upper arms, tethering them close to her sides.

“If I wanted you to touch me I would have said so.” Jett worked Tristan’s left arm free of her shirt, leaving it dangling from her other arm. “Now grab the railing behind you.”

Tristan could barely think clearly enough to understand Jett’s words. Her body had been constantly stimulated for hours, and she’d been psychologically aroused for days on end. Every nerve in her body was firing erratically, and all she could think about was Jett touching her. But the second Jett did, she was going to lose it. “I need to slow down.”

“No, you don’t.” Jett angled her thigh higher between Tristan’s legs, crushing Tristan’s clitoris against her pubic bone. “I know what you need.”

Tristan groaned, the pressure nearly unbearable. She desperately needed to explode and she couldn’t with her clitoris so compressed.

Mindlessly, she clutched Jett’s hips and tried to push her away. If she could just catch her breath, just get a little control. But she didn’t want to be in control. She thrust down on Jett’s leg, poised on a precipice— her head insisting she take charge, her body screaming for her to let go.

“Please, I need to come and I—”

“You think I don’t know that? You think I couldn’t see what you wanted all afternoon?” Jett jammed her leg higher and tighter, and Tristan cried out, more from surprise than pain. “Did you get yourself off while I wasn’t looking this afternoon?”

“No,” Tristan gasped.

“But you wanted to, didn’t you?” Watching Tristan’s eyes lose focus, watching her slide toward the edge, Jett punctuated each word with a hard thrust of her leg. “Didn’t. You. Tristan.”

“Yes. Yes. Jesus. Yes.”

“Now you’ll come when I say you will.”

Tristan’s head was spinning. Spots danced in front of her eyes.

She was right there. Right there. “Jett, I don’t think I can hold—”

“When I say, Tristan.” Jett grabbed Tristan’s wrists and forced them behind her back. “Your hands. On the rail.”

When Tristan gripped the wooden banister, her fingernails digging into the unpainted surface, Jett lifted her breasts in the palms of her hands and squeezed them together until the nipples almost touched.

Whimpering, Tristan stared down at her stiff nipples as Jett sucked them both into her mouth. Jett’s face in the moonlight was stark and feral.

“Bite them,” Tristan mumbled feverishly. Almost. Almost there.

Jett sucked harder, working them in and out between her lips until Tristan was panting. Then she closed her teeth on one of the blood engorged tips, pinched the other, and tugged.

Tristan jerked and threw her head back, writhing in Jett’s grip.

Her legs trembled wildly and only the weight of Jett’s body kept her upright. She drove her fingers into Jett’s hair, forcing Jett’s mouth harder against her breast. “Please, I can’t take—”

Jett wrenched her face away. “You’ll take it. As long as I want you to take it. Now move your goddamn hand.”

Reaching blindly behind her, Tristan felt the post and wrapped one arm around it. Just as she did, Jett dropped to her knees between Tristan’s legs and ripped open her fly. Tristan braced her legs wide apart and watched as Jett yanked her jeans down to her ankles. Her clitoris, released from the agonizing compression, instantly became fully engorged. The cool air streamed between her legs and teased her fevered flesh, the breeze a tantalizing caress over her erect clitoris. She held her breath, the muscles in her stomach like a board as Jett kissed low on her belly, moving languidly toward the tops of her thighs. Jett’s lips were wet and hot and Tristan couldn’t help thrust her hips. She heard her voice begging, kiss it, please kiss it, please kiss it, over and over, but she wasn’t aware of speaking. She couldn’t make the connection any longer between her mind and her body. All she knew was need.

As if knowing Tristan couldn’t control her muscles any longer, Jett steadied Tristan’s hips against the railing with a hand on her hipbone and kissed her clitoris.

“Oh fuck, Jett.” Tristan lifted her pelvis and Jett sucked her. Watching Jett’s lips move on her, Tristan pushed and pulled in and out of Jett’s mouth. “Here it comes.”

Jett abruptly pressed one hand low on Tristan’s belly and grasped the base of her clitoris between her thumb and finger. She squeezed as hard as she could, preventing the nerves from discharging, blocking Tristan’s orgasm.

“Please,” Tristan whimpered, her belly convulsing futilely. “It hurts.”

“Breathe,” Jett said sharply, easing up with her fingers until Tristan’s clitoris surged outward even harder. Then she sucked the entire length into her mouth.

Tristan felt as if she were turning inside out. Her legs gave way but she didn’t fall. Somehow Jett had braced one shoulder beneath her thigh, keeping her standing. She started babbling. “Coming. Coming. Coming in your mouth.”

Jett squeezed, holding her off again. Tears ran down Tristan’s face and she clutched Jett’s head.

“Please.”

Jett replaced her fingers with her lips, sucking her while she wrapped both arms around Tristan’s hips. She kept up the on-again off again squeezing and sucking until Tristan doubled over.

“Can’t breathe,” Tristan gasped. “Need… need you.”

Jett held her tightly and finished her.

Tristan broke apart as a million volts of white-hot lightning erupted inside her, scorching her mind and soul. On some distant plane she was aware of her body writhing and jerking, of shouting incoherently, of collapsing into wordless sobbing. The last thing she registered was Jett gripping her fiercely in the curve of her body while the cataclysm raged on.

When Tristan came to, she was in bed and naked. And she was alone. She felt nearly bereft, as if her endless orgasm had hollowed her out and left her empty. The isolation was so devastating she literally sensed her heart about to stop.

“Jett,” Tristan whispered brokenly.

“I’m here, Tris,” Jett said out of the darkness.

The bed dipped and then Jett was beside her. Desperately, Tristan pressed her face against Jett’s neck. “I thought…”

“I know. I know what you thought,” Jett murmured, stroking Tristan’s hair. Despite Tristan’s half-conscious protests when they’d stumbled into the bedroom earlier, Jett wouldn’t lie down with Tristan after she’d gotten her undressed and into bed. She knew if she did she would want her again, and Tristan was in no shape for it. They’d both worked all night the night before, and Tristan had been through hell losing that baby. She didn’t need Jett making even more demands of her than she already had. But Jett hadn’t left her, and wouldn’t have, even if she had been able to find her way in the dark to some semblance of civilization. She’d left plenty of women in the middle of the night to awaken alone in the morning, but this was Tristan. No matter how Tristan might feel about her after what happened, Jett was going to stay and face her.

So she’d pulled a chair over to the window and watched the night sky. She’d forgotten how pure and unsullied it could be when it wasn’t lit up by fire and bombs. With Tristan’s soft breathing in the background, she felt unexpectedly content, not the cranked-up, agitated way she often felt when she’d had some sex, but not enough sex. The pulse of arousal was a low-level hum in the background of her body and mind, but she didn’t feel the usual frantic need for more. As long as she kept some distance between them, she’d be all right.

“Try to go back to sleep,” Jett said.

“What the fuck did you do?” Tristan groaned.

Jett felt just a little bit sick. “I’m sorry. I’m sorr—”

“Sorry?” Tristan laughed weakly. “Jesus. I think I might have crossed over into another dimension.”

Jett stilled. Tristan didn’t sound upset, but Jett was still prepared for the accusations. She hadn’t meant to take her so hard and for so long. She’d just wanted her so badly, she’d lost herself in the powerful currents of Tristan’s excitement. She should’ve known that would happen, because she’d been wanting her more and more every day. “I didn’t realize you believed in that out-of-body sort of thing.”

“I didn’t, before tonight. I didn’t even have a clue how much I wanted that.” Tristan tried to sit up but found that her arms and legs still weren’t working. She slowly began to sort out her surroundings as she got her mind and body back together again. “You still have your clothes on.”

“It’s cooler up here than in the city, and I couldn’t find any wood for the fire.”

“I take it I more or less conked out on you.”

“You were a little tired.”

Tristan snorted. “I can’t even remember getting in here, and it wasn’t because I was tired. I’ve never come like that before. I thought my flesh was going to peel off my bones.” She frowned. “Fuck. I left you hanging, didn’t I? Hell.”

Tristan started to sit up and Jett stopped her.

“Believe me,” Jett said, “if it was good for you, it was better for me. You didn’t leave me hanging.”

Tristan didn’t look convinced. “Did you…you know? Handle things?”

Jett smiled. Tristan talked so easily about things Jett had always kept secret. “Yeah. I did. It was about a five-second flash bang.”

“Then I owe you big.”

“No,” Jett said softly. “You don’t owe me anything at all.”

“Why didn’t you get under the covers with me?” After a moment of silence, Tristan asked, “Jett?”

“I wasn’t sure you’d want me to.”

“Turn on the light.”

“What?” Jett asked.

“Turn on the light next to you, because I can’t reach it. In fact, I still can’t move,” Tristan said.

Jett rolled over and fumbled on the bedside table until she found the pull chain for the old-fashioned brass lamp. The fabric shade with thin tassels along the edges cast a pale yellow glow over half the room and a portion of the bed. Cautiously, Jett eased back against the pillows, still mostly on top of the covers. She was barefoot but still wore her pants and shirt.

Tristan propped herself up and began to open the buttons on Jett’s shirt with one hand. “In case you’ve forgotten,” she said conversationally, “I told you I wanted you to make love to me. If you thought I meant I wanted you to service me and then be on your way, I’m sorry I gave you the wrong impression.”

“I didn’t think that.”

“Then I’m confused as to why you’re not in bed with me.” Tristan opened Jett’s shirt and felt suddenly dizzy again. “Jesus, you have an amazing body.” She kissed Jett swiftly, then watched Jett’s face as she caressed her breasts. She smiled when Jett trembled. “You like that?”

“Yes,” Jett whispered.

Tristan bent her head and licked a nipple. “Just yes?”

“Yes. A lot.”

Tristan cupped Jett’s breast but no longer caressed her. She searched Jett’s eyes. They were murky and dark, troubled. “What do you think you might have done that I wouldn’t have wanted?”

“You said I hurt you.”

“No. I don’t remember exactly what I said, considering that I was losing my mind. But I think I said it hurts. It did.” Tristan grinned crookedly. “It hurt so fucking good I about came all over your hand a dozen times. Tell me you didn’t know that.”

“I know what I made you do,” Jett said quietly. “That doesn’t mean you wanted it.”

“Of course I wanted it. Did you hear me say no? Jesus Christ. Who fucked with your head like this?”

Jett stiffened. “No one.”

“Bullshit. Bullshit.” Tristan shook her head vehemently. “One of these days, one of these days, you’ll tell me. But not tonight.” She smoothed her hand down the middle of Jett’s belly and opened her pants. “Lift up, take these off.”

Jett gripped Tristan’s wrist. “Tristan, it’s late. We should get some sleep.”

“You think I’m going to leave it like this?” Tristan said sharply. “Without touching you? Without tasting you? You think all I wanted was to get off?”

Jett knew once they started again she would need more, would end up taking more, and they wouldn’t sleep for the rest of the night. She was certain that Tristan would never let her own exhaustion prevent her from satisfying Jett, if she thought Jett needed it. “I’ve got to fly tomorrow night, Tristan.”

“Fuck,” Tristan muttered. “I’m not on call again until Monday. I can go the rest of the night without sleep.” She brushed her fingers through Jett’s hair. “But you can’t. You have to be safe.” She rested her forehead against Jett’s. “Ah but Jesus, I want you so much.”

Even in the soft light the deep circles beneath Tristan’s eyes were obvious, and despite her protests that she didn’t need sleep, her hands were shaking. Jett curled her arm around Tristan’s shoulder and pulled her down. “Would you mind if we just held each other?”

“If that’s what you need, you got it.” Tristan rested her hand on Jett’s stomach and settled her head on Jett’s shoulder. “Okay?”

“Yeah,” Jett said, amazed and perplexed because it was true.

“Absolutely okay.”

Chapter Twenty

Jett woke with the dawn, as she did every day. This morning was completely different from any she could ever remember, because this morning she held Tristan in her arms. She lay on her side with Tristan curled in the curve of her body, her arm around Tristan’s waist and Tristan’s ass nestled against her pelvis.

Tristan seemed so vulnerable in her sleep, and Jett wondered how she could be so trusting. She was humbled by Tristan’s trust, humbled and in awe. She didn’t think she could ever give up that much control, surrender so completely to the care of another. That Tristan did made Jett feel fiercely protective, and she held very still, not wanting to wake her. What she wanted was to absorb the feel of her, the scent of her, the taste of her. Carefully, she moved her lips to the back of Tristan’s neck and kissed the skin below her hairline, tasting salt and a surprising sweetness, like sun-warmed strawberries fresh off the vine.

When Tristan sighed and caught Jett’s hand, drawing it to her breast, a shaft of pleasure hit Jett so hard she groaned. Then Tristan’s breathing deepened again, and Jett realized she had made the movement in her sleep.

Nothing about being with Tristan was what she expected. She’d had women tease and taunt her until she made the first move, bearing responsibility for what they both wanted. She’d had women force her hands to the places that craved her touch and had women rake her flesh in the throes of orgasm until they drew blood, but she’d never had a woman reach for her in her sleep. Jett’s chest tightened as she softly, cautiously caressed Tristan’s breast, feeling Tristan’s nipple harden even as Tristan shifted restlessly and murmured under her breath. Jett abruptly stilled.

Tristan turned onto her back, her gaze already eclipsed by desire. She hooked an arm around Jett’s neck, pulling her down for a kiss.

“Why did you stop?”

“I didn’t want to wake you.”

Tristan raised an eyebrow. “Why not?”

“You were sleeping,” Jett replied.

“There’s a non sequitur in there,” Tristan muttered, rolling over onto Jett. She slid her leg between Jett’s and braced herself on her elbows, a hand on either side of Jett’s head. She combed her fingers through Jett’s hair. “But I don’t feel like figuring it out right now.” She kissed her again, longer this time, exploring in a way she hadn’t been able to the night before when Jett had taken her so completely. Jett tensed beneath her, hard muscles quivering, and Tristan feasted on the power of exciting her. “You’re so fucking sexy.”

“Tris,” Jett whispered, partly in wonder and partly in need. She’d slept, but restlessly, her body sending mixed signals of satisfaction and lingering arousal. Once she’d touched herself, squeezing her turgid clitoris, and cutting points of pleasure had shot through her. But she hadn’t wanted to finish, preferring instead to tease herself while remembering Tristan surrendering in her mouth. Recalling it now, she shuddered.

“Baby,” Tristan murmured. “Baby, what do you need?”

“Anything,” Jett whispered, reaching for Tristan’s hand.

Tristan laced her fingers through Jett’s, gripping her fingers tightly.

“Tell me what you don’t want me to do.”

“Nothing,” Jett said, arching into her. “There’s nothing I don’t want you to do.”

“That’s good.” Tristan eased to one side so she could run her fingers down the center of Jett’s stomach. “Because I want to do everything.”

Jett kept her eyes on Tristan’s as Tristan slid her fingers between her legs. Jett’s lips parted on a silent moan, and Tristan’s eyes shifted from blue to deep purple. Tristan’s satisfaction was Jett’s greatest pleasure, even now.

“You’re so hard,” Tristan murmured. “Have you been like this all night?”

“Yes,” Jett whispered.

“Baby.” Tristan kissed her, harder, catching Jett’s lip between her teeth, sucking as she gently rolled Jett’s clitoris between her fingers. “You should’ve let me do this last night.”

“You’re doing it now.” Jett panted, trying and failing to control herself as Tristan’s practiced strokes worked her closer and closer to coming. She grabbed Tristan’s hand.

“Too hard?”

“No,” Jett gasped. “You’re going to make me come.”

Tristan laughed, picking up speed. “And the problem is?”

Jett groaned, her hips lifting and circling of their own volition, chasing the sweet relief Tristan’s caresses promised. “Ruins…my reputation.”

“I’ll never tell.” Tristan watched Jett’s eyes roll back. Jett was right on the edge, and Tristan wanted to satisfy her. But she wanted so much more. She wanted to imprint her touch on Jett’s mind, on her body, on her soul, and the force of her desire frightened and confused her. She relaxed her grip and slowed her strokes.

“Oh God,” Jett moaned. “Tris…”

“I’m here,” Tristan whispered. “I want to be inside you. Can I?”

Jett covered Tristan’s hand with hers and pushed Tristan’s fingers lower, curling her own until Tristan glided inside her. The unfamiliar sensation was at once so exquisite and so intense her muscles spasmed and she had to bite her lip to keep from crying out. A small whimper escaped.

“It’s all right,” Tristan crooned, holding completely still until Jett relaxed enough for her to move her fingers. Then she thrust, slow and deep, using her thumb to massage Jett’s clitoris at the same time. Jett was swollen and hard and Tristan knew she could not hold her off much longer. Still, she wanted more, and she could think of only one thing that might prolong Jett’s pleasure. “Jett. Jett, baby, can you touch me?”

Jett traced Tristan’s forearm to the curve of her hip, over her thigh, and between her legs. She pressed against the base of Tristan’s clitoris, then circled.

Tristan sucked in a breath, instantly on the verge. “Oh yes.” She kissed Jett, starting to lose her grip, her mind completely unleashed. She pushed deeper, Jett manipulated her, and she had to pull away before she lost herself entirely. “Slow dow—”

“No,” Jett implored. “Come with me. Come with me, Tris, come with me.”

Somehow, Tristan sensed Jett waiting, holding back, and knew what Jett needed to trigger her. “Do me hard like you did last night.”

Jett’s hips jerked, and she squeezed Tristan tightly between her fingers. Squeeze, release, stroke. Squeeze, release, stroke. Once, twice, three times.

“Oh yeah,” Tristan cried, the first jolt racing through her. Instantly, Jett surged around her fingers, muscles clamping down, legs rigid as iron. Tristan felt teeth against her upper arm as Jett bit down, jaws working soundlessly as she exploded. Tristan rode the brief spike of pain to another peak, coming so hard she forgot to breathe until spots danced behind her eyelids.

“Tris, Tris,” Jett whispered, her face pressed to Tristan’s shoulder. “Oh, Jesus. Don’t stop.”

“Don’t worry, baby. I won’t. I won’t.”

Tristan was in trouble, because she never wanted to stop.

Tristan hadn’t meant to fall asleep again, but every time Jett made her come, the physical and emotional catharsis was so intense her body just shut down. This time when she woke she was immediately aware of bright sunshine and the utter stillness of being completely alone.

Abruptly, she sat up, scanning the room. Jett’s clothes were gone.

She leapt from bed, crossed the small room in three rapid strides, and yanked open the door to the main room of the cabin. Empty as well. A minute later, she jerked open the front door.

Jett turned at the sound of the door opening, and for a second or two, she thought she might still be in the midst of her daydream.

She’d been reliving the moments with Tristan—the heat of her body, the insistent press of her hands, her sharp cries of pleasure. She often replayed her sexual encounters, especially as the weeks between real life experiences stretched on. Faces and places would blur as she spliced highlights together, struggling to call up the perfect combination of sights and sounds to take her over the edge. As she gazed at Tristan’s naked body, she knew she would never need to imagine any other image to find satisfaction.

“I thought you were gone,” Tristan said, feeling a little foolish and a lot disoriented. She did not get bent out of shape over women.

She certainly didn’t panic if one of her dates left in the middle of the night. In fact, they often did. Then she realized what was different about Jett. She expected Jett to go because everything she knew about her indicated that Jett did not let people close, anywhere, even in bed.

That was nothing different than what Tristan was used to; in fact, it was exactly what she sought in the women she slept with. And while Jett might be behaving exactly as she usually did, Tristan definitely wasn’t.

Because she did not want Jett to go anywhere.

“I’m not exactly sure where we are,” Jett said. “I don’t have a car.” She eased her wallet from her back pocket and riffled through it. “And I don’t think seventeen bucks would get me too far.”

Jett replaced her wallet, opened the screen door, and wrapped both arms around Tristan’s waist. Then she backed her into the cabin, nudged the door closed, and turned Tristan against the door. She caught Tristan’s jaw in the palm of her hand, fingers spread on one side, thumb on the other, holding her head still as she scraped her teeth along the tight muscle in the side of Tristan’s neck. She leaned into Tristan, sucking on the buttery skin below Tristan’s earlobe, and eased her hand between Tristan’s legs. “And I had something else in mind.”

“Christ,” Tristan gasped, unable to believe she was ready again.

She couldn’t see Jett’s face because Jett kept her head turned away.

Jett’s shirt and pants felt like sandpaper against her sensitized skin. The metal grommet at the top of Jett’s pants was hot against her stomach.

Jett’s lips as they nibbled and tugged and sucked at her neck had the same effect as if Jett had her mouth between her legs, teasing her there.

And then Jett’s fingers were there, sliding and stroking and slipping into her. She grabbed Jett’s ass, digging her fingers into the hard muscles.

“Ah, Jesus, baby,” Tristan moaned. “You’re making me so hot.”

Jett rimmed Tristan’s ear, breathing hard as Tristan tilted her pelvis and invited her to take more. She had a hard time focusing on anything except the way Tristan grunted softly each time she touched her clit.

“I think you’re always hot.” She pinched Tristan’s clit, then rapidly circled it. Tristan’s knees buckled and she sagged. “You like that.”

“Yes.” Tristan closed her eyes. The pressure was building. She was close. “Yes. Yes.”

“Yes what?” Jett lifted her fingers away.

“Oh fuck,” Tristan groaned. “I want to come.”

“Do you?” Jett licked her way down to Tristan’s collarbone, reaching between them to open her own fly. She kept Tristan pinned to the door with her mouth against Tristan’s throat while she worked the hand she’d been using to immobilize Tristan’s head inside her pants.

Then she stroked them both at once.

Through her haze, Tristan heard Jett moan, felt her tremble, and tightened her grip on Jett’s hips. Knowing that Jett was getting off getting her off did it for her. “Feel me, baby? You’re making me come.”

As soon as Tristan started to climax, Jett barely had to touch herself to follow her over. Then they were both shivering and groaning and slowly sliding to the floor. Jett ended up on her knees, her forehead pressed to Tristan’s shoulder, Tristan’s hands rubbing her back and her neck while she whispered softly.

“So good, babe. So so good,” Tristan crooned.

“Needed you,” Jett gasped, “again. Sorry.”

Tristan laughed. “Oh, it was a hardship.” She sagged back against the door, stretching her legs out on either side of Jett. With an arm around Jett’s shoulders, she cupped Jett’s chin and lifted her head, studying her glazed eyes. The worried look was back again. So was the uncertainty. “I happen to like having you hungry for me.”

“Sometimes I forget to ask.”

“You don’t have to. I told you before what I wanted.” Tristan found Jett’s hand and pressed it between her legs. “And how I wanted it.”

Jett fondled her, and after a minute, Tristan moved Jett’s hand away and sighed. “We’re going to have to head back soon. Keep doing that and I’m going to want you to make me come.”

“You don’t really want me to stop.”

Tristan didn’t, but she felt the press of time at their backs, and she didn’t want this—whatever this was—to end right here, right now. She couldn’t think when she was this turned on. “I have to stop.”

Jett pulled away. She wanted Tristan again right now, would want her for hours, and the need frayed her temper. Her need, always too much. Jett managed to sit up and put some distance between them.

One of the nice things about not waking up with a woman was that she didn’t have to say good-bye, and neither of them had to pretend that they’d done anything other than use each other for a few hours.

“Wait.” Tristan grabbed Jett’s hand, not knowing quite what to say, because she didn’t have any practice at what they were doing. She didn’t even know exactly what she wanted. “Look, about last night…”

“There’s nothing to say, Tristan. Last night was what it was.” This was a talk Jett didn’t want to have, especially not with Tristan. She got to her knees, then unsteadily to her feet, and zipped up her pants. Her hands were shaking and she tried to hide it by jamming in her shirttails.

“We’ve both been here before. Let’s not complicate it, okay? I had a great time. I hope you did too.”

“You know I did.” Still sitting with her back to the door, Tristan studied Jett, trying to read below the surface of her cool, closed gaze. She couldn’t, but she sensed yet again that if she pushed, Jett would retreat. “I had a lot more than a good time.”

“Yeah.” Jett stepped back.

Tristan stood, conscious of being naked with Jett fully clothed.

She felt naked in a lot more ways than just being without clothes. Jett was much better at keeping what she was feeling, if she felt anything at all, hidden. Suddenly, Tristan didn’t like being the one completely exposed. She might like being controlled in bed, but she didn’t like being out of control in any other part of her life. She turned and walked toward the bedroom. “I’m going to grab a quick shower, and then it’s all yours if you want it. Then we should go.”

“Right,” Jett said. “We should go.”

“Quinn!” Honor called from the back porch.

“Watch your follow-through, Arly.” Quinn crouched to catch Arly’s pitch. When the softball landed in her glove with a resounding smack, she nodded in approval and stood, shading her eyes with her gloved hand. “Yeah?”

“Phone. It’s the hospital.”

“I’m not on call,” Quinn replied.

“It’s Dave Barnes from emergency management. He said he has to talk to you.”

“On my way.” Arly stood ten yards away, a worried look on her face, and Quinn walked over to her. “Shoulder feeling okay? You put a lot of speed on that ball, kiddo.”

“Feels great. Are you going to have to go to work?”

“I don’t know.” Quinn cupped the back of Arly’s head and stroked her hair. “Let me go find out.”

Honor met Quinn on the porch with the portable phone.

“Maguire.” Quinn listened for a minute or two, then responded. “Call the OR supervisor next and alert all the backup teams. Then have the head of nursing start calling in the evening shift. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

As soon as Quinn disconnected, Honor asked, “What is it?”

“A section of the I-95 overpass collapsed. All the hospitals are going to mass casualty alert.”

The phone rang again and Honor answered. “Dr. Blake. Yes, I just heard. Get me a status report from the blood bank and round up as many off-duty ER staff as you can. Also, call the chief of medicine and tell them we need to pull residents from the floors down to the ER. What? No, it’s covered under the mass casualty protocols. I’ll be there soon.”

“Honor,” Quinn said quietly. “You—”

“I’ll supervise. I won’t see patients.”

“Promise.”

“I do.” Honor took Arly’s hand and carefully bent over. “I’m sorry, honey. There’s been a big accident and there might be a lot of people who are hurt. We both need to go.”

“When will you be back?”

“Probably not until tomorrow. We’ll get Robin to take you to practice, and you and your brother will stay with your grandmom tonight.”

“Will you call me?”

Honor smiled and kissed Arly’s forehead. “I will.”

“Okay.”

“Good girl.” Honor headed into the house. “I’ll call Phyllis.”

Quinn wrapped her arm around Arly’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Arly. I wouldn’t miss practice if I didn’t absolutely have to. I know you’re disappointed. Me too.”

Arly shrugged and leaned her head against Quinn’s side. “I know you’d be there if you could.”

“You can count on that.” Quinn and Arly followed Honor into the house. Every chief of staff and on-call personnel would be getting the same phone call she just did. Quinn wasn’t happy about Honor going to work, but she knew there was no way she could stop her. They were all in for a very long weekend.

Chapter Twenty-one

“What’s the longest relationship you’ve ever had?” Tristan said out of the blue, while shifting into fifth to pass an eighteen-wheeler on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. She knew she was headed down a dangerous road, but since the very first instant she’d seen Jett, she hadn’t been able to take the safe or smart path. Somehow, she always veered into unknown territory, both in terms of how she felt and what she knew was likely to push Jett away. Just the same, she could tolerate anger a lot better than she could stand the silence. No, it wasn’t really the silence that bothered her. It was the distance that separated them at this moment. Even though she could have reached out and touched Jett, the chasm seemed insurmountable. And she knew if she did touch her, it would be like touching a marble statue, cold and unyielding. After the consuming heat of what they’d shared, she couldn’t bear the cold.

Jett watched the slower traffic flicker by as they flew past. She didn’t fear speed, and a big part of her wanted nothing more than to get back to the city so that she could get out of the car and away from Tristan. Tristan held the key to things she preferred to keep locked inside—her physical needs, her emotional uncertainty, her fear. Her fear that she would come to want what until this point in her life she had only needed. Needs were so much easier to control than wants. And when she looked at Tristan, when she thought of Tristan, she wanted.

She wanted with a hunger that hollowed her out and left her shaking.

She wanted to touch her, hold her, be held by her. She wanted to tell her the things she had never even dared to dream of. Wanting was dangerous and only led to disappointment.

“I’ve never had a relationship,” Jett finally said.

Tristan looked over at her, then back at the road. “Never had a girlfriend?”

“No.”

“Why not? Because of the military?”

“Mostly.” Jett had plenty of practice staying relaxed under fire, and she kept her body still and her voice even, despite the fact that her stomach was in knots. Tristan was upset and she hated that she had been the cause. The night before she had feared hurting her physically, or pushing her to do something she wouldn’t enjoy or would later regret.

Nothing had been further from the truth. Tristan had not only welcomed her, she’d read her body and mind so clearly she’d been able to give Jett exactly what she craved—passion without restraint. Jett had never once considered that Tristan might be wounded by the emotional gulf that Jett had no idea how to bridge.

“What was the other part of mostly?” Tristan gripped the wheel, not because the vehicle demanded it, but because she wanted to touch Jett so badly she could barely breathe. When they made love, and she realized that’s how she thought of it—not had sex, made love—nothing stood between them. She felt stripped bare, exposed to her core, adored and desired. She felt owned in the most fundamental of ways, and she was shocked to discover she liked it. The sense of belonging was more acute than anything she’d ever experienced, and now she felt adrift, disconnected, lost. The sensation was nearly unbearable.

“I never met anyone who I trusted enough, I guess.” Jett thought fleetingly of Gail. “Or who trusted me.”

Tristan knew she had to be thinking of a woman. “Who was she? What did she do?”

Jett clenched her jaws and turned to look out the open passenger side of the car. Tristan saw too much.

“Did she break your heart?”

“No,” Jett said sharply. “I never gave her my heart.”

“Why not?”

Jett whipped her head around. “Because she didn’t want it.”

The pain in Jett’s eyes hurt, because Tristan hated to see her hurting and because whoever this woman was, Jett had cared for her. Jett had cared in a way she didn’t for her. Even knowing that the answer was going to hurt even more, Tristan whispered, “But you wanted to give it to her, didn’t you.”

“Like I said,” Jett said flatly, her face expressionless again. “My mistake.”

“I’m sorry.”

Jett shook her head. “Nothing to be sorry about. What about you? You’ve got at least one girlfriend.”

Tristan’s heart leapt, then she chided herself for being foolish for the second time that morning. “You mean Darla?”

“That’s the redhead, right?”

“Darla is a friend.” Tristan laughed. “And before you ask me if I fuck all my friends, the answer’s no. She’s a special friend.”

Jett raised an eyebrow. “Do you have a lot of special friends?”

“Not a lot. Not currently.”

“So why friends and not…” Jett wasn’t even certain of the term, since such things were beyond her realm of experience.

“Lovers?” Tristan shrugged. “It’s weird. My parents love me—I know that in my head. But my sisters were always the perfect ones, and I never measured up. I never felt special. Hell, I never even felt adequate.”

“I don’t follow.”

Tristan grinned wryly. “I’m sure it would take years of intensive therapy to unravel it.” Jett laughed, and the sound of her laughter lightened Tristan’s heart even as the sadness washed through her. “Somewhere along the way I guess I stopped wanting to be special. To anyone.”

Jett couldn’t imagine anyone not thinking Tristan was special.

She was amazing—bold and brave and honest. Beautiful. Sexy.

Remembering the way Tristan felt in her arms that morning, in her mouth the night before, inside her a few hours ago, she was swamped with so many unfamiliar feelings. Tenderness, gratitude, wonder. Her heart ached. Her clit got hard and she wanted to touch Tristan again.

She looked out the windshield because she couldn’t keep looking at her, not and think. Not and keep her hands off her. “You’re special.”

“What?” Tristan asked, still thinking about what she’d just said. She’d given up. Given up hoping that she’d ever be more to anyone than a great fuck. Jett’s voice had dropped so low she could barely hear her. “What?”

Jett cleared her throat. “I’m sure your special friends think you’re special too.”

What about you, Tristan wanted to ask, but she’d been asking since the first day they’d met and she wasn’t about to beg. Darla thought she was pretty special in bed, she was sure of that. Until Jett, that had been enough. “You start your seven on tonight?”

“Yes,” Jett replied, happy to leave the topic of Tristan’s girlfriends behind. Then she wondered what Tristan would do with the rest of her weekend off. Saturday night. She probably went out on Saturday night.

Last night had been an exception, an anomaly. They’d both needed an escape, and they’d run from the death and destruction into twenty-four hours out of time. Now they were nearly back, and life would get back to normal as well. Jett would fly for her pleasure, and Tristan—Tristan would have her special friends.

“Jesus,” Tristan muttered. “Look at the traffic backed up heading east. Glad we’re not going that—” She grabbed at her waist as her beeper went off. She’d barely lifted it to eye level to read the number when Jett’s went off as well. She glanced at Jett. “Trouble.”

Tristan signaled and pulled off the turnpike an exit early so she could park and they both could return their calls. They sat with the engine idling, cell phones to their ears, while they waited to make their way through the labyrinth of hospital operators. Tristan turned slightly away to take her call. When she disconnected she stared at Jett.

“Jesus. They call you in?”

“Yes,” Jett said. “You?”

“Yep.” Tristan gunned the engine and pulled away from the curb. “We’ll take the back roads. I can get us there in ten minutes.”

The secondary roads leading to the hospital were crowded too, and it was closer to fifteen minutes before Tristan pulled into the doctors’ parking lot. She switched off the engine and turned in her seat, finally doing what she’d wanted to do for the last hour and a half. She slid her hand over Jett’s shoulder to the back of her neck and caressed her. “It’s going to be crazy. I don’t know when I’ll see you again.”

“Okay.” Jett tried to ignore the glide of Tristan’s fingers through her hair. She wished Tristan hadn’t touched her. She’d been keyed up in the car, and then the adrenaline spurt from hearing about the disaster had put her nerves on high alert. Now the physical stimulation was almost more than she could take. Still, she didn’t want to pull away.

“I can see it in your eyes,” Tristan whispered, circling her thumb over the base of Jett’s skull. God damn it, she wasn’t a quitter. “Last night isn’t over yet.”

“I have to go,” Jett said, her throat tight.

“I know. So do I.” Tristan yanked Jett toward her and covered her mouth with hers. She needed to be sure Jett didn’t forget her, and she needed part of Jett to take with her. Jett grabbed the front of her shirt and kissed her back, hard, their tongues seeking, searching. Tristan groaned. “Jesus. Jett.”

Jett pulled away and fumbled behind her for the door handle.

“I don’t want to go.” She pushed the door open and got out, her legs feeling too weak to hold her up. “Okay? I don’t want to go.”

“Yeah. Okay,” Tristan said, her chest heaving. “Be careful.”

“Always.”

“I mean it.”

Jett backed up, shaking her head. “Don’t worry. I’m always careful when I fly.”

“Remember what I said,” Tristan called after her. “Last night isn’t over.”

Jett turned and jogged away.

“You running the show?” Tristan asked when she saw Quinn changing in the surgical locker room. Quinn was chief of trauma, so the normal protocol would be for her to coordinate the hospital’s emergency surgical response.

“Yep. Honor’s downstairs in the ER. They’ll handle triage at that level.”

“Honor?” Tristan banged open her locker, kicked her shoes off, and unbuttoned her shirt. “She okay?”

Quinn shrugged her shoulders. “She’s Honor.”

“Yeah, I guess that’s true.” Tristan pulled off her shirt. “What’s the word?”

“Conflicting reports. A three-hundred-yard stretch of the overpass collapsed just north of the city. Most of it ended up in the Delaware.”

“Jesus. How many cars?”

Quinn shook her head and hooked the trauma and code beepers on the waistband of her scrub pants. “Nobody knows. I’ve heard anywhere from a dozen up to a couple hundred. There’s talk of mobilizing the National Guard.”

“How long before we can expect casualties?” Tristan pulled on scrub pants and reached for a shirt from the pile she kept on the top shelf of her locker.

“Anytime. The Coast Guard is working the waters. I just got a call for physicians and medics to triage on shore.” Quinn slammed her locker door. “Want to come?”

“Hell yeah.” Tristan kneed her locker closed. “I don’t want to stay here squeezing a bag all night. Can I take some respiratory techs with me? If many people went into the river, we’re going to have a lot of respiratory arrests.”

“Just make sure we don’t leave the intensive care units uncovered here. We’re hitching a ride on Healthstar, so limit it to two. Collect your people and meet me on the helipad. You’ve got five minutes.”

“Right,” Tristan called, already sprinting toward the hall and the intensive care units at the other end. Healthstar. Healthstar meant Jett. She was going to see her again a lot sooner than she’d thought.

She spared herself twenty seconds to enjoy the anticipation, then she focused all of her attention on what she needed to do.

Jett kept a change of clothes in the closet in her on-call room and had just pulled out a clean shirt when a knock sounded on the door. “Come in.”

When Linda entered and shut the door behind her, Jett turned her back and stripped. She hadn’t put on any underwear after showering at Tristan’s, but she figured Linda had seen more than her fair share of bare butts in her time. “What’s up?”

“There’s someone here to see you,” Linda said.

“If it’s another one of those jerks from risk management, tell them I don’t have anything else to say.”

“Even those anal idiots wouldn’t be trying to interview us in the middle of all this.” Linda laughed at the absurd image. “Well, maybe they would, but it isn’t them.”

“Who is it?” Jett zipped her fly and yanked a black T-shirt over her head. She found a pair of socks in the bottom of her flight bag and pulled them on along with her combat boots.

“I think it’s a personal visit.”

Frowning, Jett straightened. “Hell of a time for it. Tell them to go away.” She grabbed her helmet and started out into the hall. “See you upstairs.”

“Okay,” Linda called after her. “Be there in five.”

Jett took the stairs two at a time and pushed through the exit door onto the rooftop. Clear skies, bright midafternoon sunlight. Perfect day for flying. Her aircraft waited within the white lines delineating the landing pad. Just seeing it made her heart beat faster and her mind settle. This was where she belonged. This she understood.

“When I heard what was going on at the waterfront, I knew this was where I’d find you,” a voice said from behind her.

Jett stopped, almost believing she was daydreaming again. She pivoted and blinked as a shaft of sunlight struck her eyes. They watered and her vision wavered, and she still thought she might have conjured the slender figure walking toward her.

“I know you’ve only got a minute,” Gail said, and Jett’s heart stuttered in her chest.

She was in uniform, but not the desert camo Jett remembered.

She looked taut and trim in the crisp Army blue service uniform with navy trousers and gray shirt. The oak leaf insignia of the Nursing Corps shimmered on her shoulder, and Jett barely stopped herself from saluting.

“Major.”

Gail smiled faintly. “Chief Warrant Officer McNally.”

“I’ve got a flight check to do.”

“I know. Your flight nurse told me.” Gail stopped just inches away, her eyes searching Jett’s.

“What are you doing here?” Jett’s throat hurt. Her heart hurt.

“I came back on a patient transport from Ramstein. I’ve got two weeks’ leave.” Gail brushed the tips of her fingers through the hair at Jett’s temple. “It’s getting long.”

Jett forced herself not to flinch at the touch. Instead, she stepped carefully back. “I don’t have any time.”

“Not now. I know.” Gail’s hand fell slowly to her side. “But in a day or two. I’m at the Hilton at Thirty-sixth Street. I want to see you.”

“Gail…” Jett stopped when the doors bounced open on the far side of the roof and Linda and several others came out. “I don’t—”

“Please. Jett, please.” Gail’s voice broke.

“All right,” Jett said hoarsely.

Gail waited another heartbeat, then turned and walked away. Jett watched her for a few more seconds before climbing into the cockpit to prepare for the upcoming battle. She couldn’t think about Gail now.

Couldn’t think about what she saw in her eyes. Regret. Sadness. Desire.

She couldn’t think about what she’d felt when she’d first seen her face.

Recognition. Anticipation. Desire.

Chapter Twenty-two

The elevator doors opened and Tristan jumped out, nearly colliding with a good-looking brunette in a snappy uniform.

“Oh, sorry.” She grabbed the woman by the shoulders to steady her, surprised by the firm muscles in the lithe frame. “You okay?”

“Yes, fine. My fault. I was crowding the door.” She smiled at Tristan. “Bad habit I have, always being in a hurry.”

“I know what you mean.” Tristan stepped around her, then realized there was no parking on the roof. So if the soldier wasn’t up there parking a car, where did she come from, and what was she doing?

The only thing outside was the flight deck. Suddenly the pieces fell together. The only other soldier, well, ex-soldier but not ex by much, who was likely to be up on the roof was Jett. So this woman—this very attractive, actually pretty hot woman—was there to see Jett. Tristan was two seconds from demanding who she was and what she wanted with Jett before she mentally ordered herself to calm down. She was making some huge leaps of logic, and even if she was right and the brunette was there to see Jett, Jett probably had lots of friends from the Army, most of them women. Why shouldn’t she have a visitor. Perfectly natural.

Tristan narrowed her eyes. “You’re not lost by any chance, are you?”

The soldier turned back to Tristan, a curious question in her eyes, and the elevator doors opened and then closed, leaving her still standing in the small foyer. She pushed the down button again. “No.”

Well then, why are you here, Tristan wanted to ask, but it wasn’t any of her business, and she didn’t have any time left. “Enjoy the rest of the day.”

“You too, and stay alert out there,” the brunette said.

“Thanks,” Tristan said, and ran for the helicopter. Linda, with one hand on the handle of the large side sliding door, leaned out of the aircraft, whose rotors were already spinning. Tristan could make out the rest of the team inside. She ducked her head and vaulted into the cabin. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

Linda pulled the door closed and tapped Jett on the shoulder, saying at the same time, “All aboard, Chief.”

Tristan strapped in next to Linda and, keeping her transmitter turned off, leaned close. Under cover of the motor revving, she asked “Who was that?”

“Who?” Linda asked.

“The brunette. The soldier.”

“Oh. I don’t know. A friend of Jett’s, I guess. She showed up in the flight lounge a while ago, asking for Jett.”

Tristan frowned. “And Jett brought her up here?” To our favorite place, she almost said.

“I don’t think so. I think she came up on her own.”

“Pretty fucking good friend,” Tristan muttered, “or a pretty ballsy one.”

“What?” Linda yelled, signaling that she couldn’t hear.

Tristan shook her head. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”

Except it did. It mattered a hell of a lot. Because no matter how much Jett said whatever had happened between her and the mystery woman in the Army was over, her eyes said otherwise. Tristan didn’t believe in coincidences, not when they showed up out of the blue and acted like they owned the place. Following Jett to the flight deck. Hell.

She stared past Quinn into the cockpit. She couldn’t see Jett’s face, only her shoulder, one arm, and her hand. She watched Jett’s fingers cradle the stick, reading the aircraft through its vibration and pitch, just as she had read Tristan’s body as she’d clenched and tightened. Tristan had a quick flash of Jett grabbing Mandy, of her hands skimming Mandy’s breasts, and suddenly Mandy became the woman by the elevator. Only this time Jett wasn’t just touching the woman, the woman was touching Jett too. The idea made something inside Tristan coil so tightly she felt herself quiver.

A strong hand gripped her shoulder and broke her reverie.

“You okay?” Quinn yelled.

“Yeah. Fine.” Tristan tore her eyes away from Jett. “Couldn’t be better.”

“It’s going to get hairy down there,” Quinn said, peering into Tristan’s face. “Stay focused.”

“Always am.” Tristan closed her eyes so Quinn couldn’t read them, and blanked her mind. They’d be in the field in a few minutes and lives depended on her being sharp. She didn’t have time to think about Jett, or why the idea of Jett with any other woman made her furious. She wanted to hang a sign on Jett that said mine. What the hell was that about?

Jett studied her approach through the wide windows of the glassedin cockpit. Even from a few miles away, signs of the devastation were clearly evident. The air surrounding the site of the freeway collapse was cloudy with particulate matter, probably concrete dust, resembling what she’d seen in Baghdad after buildings had been reduced to rubble by missiles and bombs. She tensed, half expecting incoming fire, automatically preparing to begin evasive maneuvers. Despite the internal climate control on the aircraft, she was sweating. The closer she got, the more the ground action looked like a war zone. Huge slabs of concrete were standing on end, resembling a jumble of giant dominoes haphazardly tossed about. A section of the overpass had accordioned down onto the highway below. If the collapse had occurred even a half a mile in either direction, there would have been houses buried in the rubble rather than just vehicles.

“Oh my God,” Jett heard Linda say over the radio. “There are cars everywhere. In the water…oh my God.”

Cars floated upside down in the Delaware River, kept afloat by air pockets inside the vehicles. Jett figured there had to be dozens more beneath the surface. At one spot where two block-long sections of the highway formed a funnel, cars and trucks lay piled at the bottom of the vee. Coast Guard cruisers and smaller boats littered the waterways.

Emergency vehicles jammed the side streets in all directions. A news helicopter drifted into view. Jett disliked sharing her airspace with news choppers. Even experienced emergency helicopter pilots occasionally crossed paths midair, but the news pilots tended to be too busy jockeying for camera angles and exclusive shots to adhere to strict safety protocols. Risk takers. Jett might take chances, but she knew her limits. They didn’t.

“This is Healthstar 3, two nine nine PMC. Request LZ site.” The FAA would have set up a temporary flight restriction above and around the disaster area, so the TV and radio news choppers weren’t likely to come any closer. Just the same, Jett slowed and circled, keeping an eye on them while waiting for clearance to land on one of the designated landing zones. The firecrews on the ground would direct her to one.

“Roger Healthstar 3. Your LZ is the Marina parking lot. You have power lines at the southwest corner. Land between the trucks.”

“Roger.”

Jett set down in the parking lot on the river side of the destroyed highway, a few hundred yards from the center of the rescue activity.

She climbed down from the cockpit to help unload the emergency equipment.

“Try to work as a team,” Quinn instructed the medics. “If another crew requests assistance, go ahead, but let me know where you’re going. We don’t want to lose anyone out here, and these situations can be unstable. Don’t take any chances.”

Jett edged through the people toward Tristan, who was offloading equipment. She had been surprised to see Tristan climb aboard, but her overwhelming response had been pleasure. Pleasure and relief. Gail—Gail who was no longer part of her world—had just appeared out of

nowhere and then disappeared just as quickly, and Jett didn’t want to think about her, couldn’t think about her now. And when she’d seen Tristan, Gail’s face had faded. Instead she’d remembered waking up with Tristan in her arms and the feeling of peace like none she’d ever experienced. All the while she’d been in the air, she’d thought about Tristan. Tristan, who never seemed afraid to talk about anything, who could get Jett to talk, to feel, even when she didn’t want to. Tristan, who wasn’t afraid of Jett or what she wanted. Jett replayed how Tris’s hard, strong body had softened with desire and how her tight, powerful muscles had trembled on the brink of orgasm. Thinking about caressing Tristan, of making her cry out with pleasure and release, fueled the hunger that had never ebbed, and Jett had to fight not to touch her. Like an addict, she craved more.

“You doing search and rescue now?” Jett asked, cramming her hands in her pockets because she didn’t trust herself.

“Being out here beats sitting back at the shop waiting.” Tristan kept dragging equipment out of the cabin. She was still thinking about the brunette. About who she was and why she’d come looking for Jett.

It bugged her that she wanted to know so badly, and she didn’t know how to ask, and she didn’t know how to stop thinking about her with Jett.

“Look,” Jett said hurriedly. “I’m going to be transporting casualties to any available hospital, and from the looks of things, we’re going to be out here for a while.”

Tristan stopped what she was doing and finally looked at Jett.

“Yeah. A very long night. Be careful.”

Jett grinned. “I was just going to say the same thing to you.”

“I’m always careful.” Tristan went back to what she was doing, stiffening when she felt Jett’s hand close around her upper arm. Even that casual contact sent her pulse into overdrive. Then Jett moved closer and their legs touched. Tristan started shaking, and for a terrifying second, she thought she might actually fall. She locked her knees and gritted her teeth. She needed some control, and she needed it fast. This thing with Jett, whatever the hell it was, had her so completely turned around she didn’t recognize herself.

“I’m sorry about earlier,” Jett murmured.

Tristan shook her head. “There’s nothing to be sorry about. You’re right. I had a great time.” She lifted her shoulders and forced a casual tone. “You definitely know what you’re doing.”

Jett ran her fingers up and down the inside of Tristan’s arm, stroking the bare skin below her scrub shirt. “No, I don’t. Not where you’re concerned.”

“I gotta go,” Tristan said, aware of Quinn waiting for her nearby.

Jett was driving her crazy, not just from touching her, that was bad enough. The slightest caress got her so hot she couldn’t think. She was a little sore from all the sex, but she still wanted it. Wanted Jett. And that’s what was really driving her nuts. One minute Jett was there, touching her, taking her, pushing her to places she’d never been, and in the next minute she was gone, sequestered behind a wall of perfect indifference, leaving Tristan feeling gutted. Laid open and bleeding.

And all she could think was that she wanted more. “Fuck, I really gotta go.”

“Yeah. Go. I’ll catch you later.”

Tristan didn’t go. Instead she turned so her back was to Quinn and only Jett could see her face. “I want to kiss you right now. I want you to do to me what you did last night. How fucking crazy is that?”

“Pretty fucking crazy,” Jett agreed. She took a breath. “And about last night. When things settle down, we should do it again.”

“We should. I’ll call you.”

“Yeah, do that,” Jett called after her. She watched the team disappear, then headed toward the white van with the flag indicating it was the command post. She needed to let someone know she was available to transport. She rubbed her fingertips. They were warm, and she thought of Tristan’s skin. She thought of how easily Tristan had recognized what she needed, and how effortlessly she’d given it.

I know what you need, Gail had said. But maybe she’d been wrong.

Quinn squatted next to a fire rescue van, twisted off the top of a plastic bottle of water she’d snagged from a cooler filled with them, and punched in Honor’s cell phone number on hers. After three rings the call was picked up.

“Hello?” Honor said, sounding harried.

“Hi, love, it’s me,” Quinn said.

“Baby,” Honor replied softly. “How are you? How are things out there?”

“Pretty grim,” Quinn said. “They’ve been pulling cars out of the river for the last six hours, and it still looks like there’s more down there or under the rubble.”

“If we get many more, we’re going to have to close,” Honor said.

“We’ve converted half the fifth floor to an intermediate care unit, and all the intensive care units are full. We’re boarding patients in the ER. God only knows how much blood we have left.”

Quinn could hear the strain in her voice. “You need to go home, Honor. It’s been almost eight hours. It’s too soon for this.”

“I haven’t been walking around, I swear.”

Quinn said nothing.

“I promise I won’t stay any longer than two more hours. Then I’m gone.”

“Okay.”

“What about you? What’s it like out there?”

“Hot.” Quinn guzzled the rest of the water. She didn’t need to tell Honor about the casualties. Honor was getting them flown in to her. “A lot of cars are burning. If it wasn’t August, it would feel like it anyhow. The smoke makes it tough to see. I just talked to the OR. Every room is running. Things are slowing down a little out here. If there are people in those cars, well—there probably aren’t many more survivors, and it’s going to take a long time to get them out. Most of the acute surgical patients have been transported. I’m heading back to the OR now.”

“Are you going to be able to get any sleep before you start operating?”

“I’ll try.”

“Take care of yourself, baby. I love you.”

“I love you too. Tell Arly I said hi, and I’ll see her tomorrow sometime. Kiss Jack for me too.”

“I will. Miss you.”

“Me too.”

Quinn put her cell phone away and went to find Jett. She wanted to hitch a ride back to the hospital.

Tristan wrapped a thin strip of tape around the endotracheal tube she’d just placed and secured it to the cheek of a child who appeared to be no more than four. The Coast Guard had pulled her out of the water, just floating there. Tristan wondered where her family was and tried not to think about how long she might have been in the water, how long she’d gone without oxygen, how long her brain had suffered from hypoxia. If Tristan let the pictures of grief and loss into her head, she’d be useless. So she did her job and passed the child off to the next person to do theirs. Two medics strapped the child carefully to a gurney and trundled away. Still crouched down beside her equipment box, Tristan wiped the sweat off her forehead and was surprised to see streaks of blood on the back of her arm.

“Tris!” Jett dropped to the ground beside her and cradled her face. “You’re bleeding.”

“Can’t be much,” Tristan said wearily. “I don’t feel anything.”

“Let me look.” Jett rummaged in the open tackle box of equipment and found a penlight and some gauze. The sun had gone down an hour ago, and despite the emergency halogen lights strung around the perimeter, there were still pockets of darkness that swallowed up victims and rescuers alike. Here on the bank of the river, they were in shadow. “Hold still.”

“You give up your wings?” Tristan asked.

“Not likely.” Jett gently dabbed at Tristan’s forehead with the gauze. “You’ve got a pretty deep laceration. What did you do?”

Tristan started to shrug, then recalled reaching into a mangled automobile to help extract an elderly woman and cracking her forehead on a twisted portion of the frame that shouldn’t have been where it was.

“Hit my head.”

“No kidding.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I caught a five-minute break.” Jett turned away, searching in the box again. “Haven’t seen you in a couple of hours. Aren’t you about ready to head in?”

“Soon. What about you?” Tristan liked that Jett had come looking for her. She liked it very much.

“Soon.” Jett put on gloves, smeared antibiotic ointment over the laceration, and taped a square white bandage over it. “I think it needs stitches.”

“You any good at that?”

“I think someone in the ER should do it. I think you’re beautiful no matter how you look,” Jett said, “but it would be nice not to have too much of a scar.”

“Beautiful, huh?”

Jett rubbed a smudge of soot away from the corner of Tristan’s mouth. “Yeah. Very beautiful.”

Tristan closed her eyes, giving herself a second to absorb the contact. Jett’s touch helped mute the horrors of the last few hours. Then she sighed and looked around. “I feel like I’m in a war zone. Is this what it was like?”

“The destruction. The senseless death. Yeah.” Jett smiled bleakly. “But at least no one is trying to kill us.”

“I don’t think I would have lasted very long.”

“Sure you would have. You get used to it. And everyone else is going through it too.”

“That must have helped. Not being alone.”

Jett busied herself replacing equipment and didn’t answer.

“The soldier who visited today,” Tristan said. “Was she with you over there?”

“You saw her?” Jett thought Gail had left before Tristan showed up on the roof. She wondered what Tristan had seen. She wondered how much Tristan guessed.

“Talked to her for a few minutes. Who is she?”

“Just someone I knew.” Jett stood. “I’ve got to get back. I’ll be making another run soon.”

Tristan rose also, surprised when she felt dizzy. She ignored the spinning sensation. She didn’t want to ask, but she had to know. “Was she someone special?”

“Special?” Jett laughed, a short, bitter laugh. “Well, I guess you could say she was a special friend.”

“Oh. I see.” So they’d been lovers, Tristan thought. And now she’d come for a visit, or something more. Tristan had no reason to be jealous. In fact, what she felt wasn’t jealousy. It was something far, far more painful.

“I didn’t know she was coming,” Jett said, although Tristan hadn’t asked.

“And if you had, you probably wouldn’t have spent last night with me,” Tristan said lightly. “You would’ve had better places to be.”

Jett went completely still. “You’re wrong, Tristan. You couldn’t be more wrong.”

“I’m sorry.” Tristan knew she’d pushed too far one time too many, but she was exhausted and soul-weary and God damn it, she was jealous. She didn’t want to be just a body in Jett’s bed. Replaceable. Forgettable. “Jett—”

“I’ve got a run to make.”

And then Jett was gone. Tristan wanted to go after her, to explain, but she didn’t move. What could she say? She didn’t have any claim on Jett, even though she was coming to realize she wanted one. More, she wanted Jett to put a claim on her. It didn’t make any sense, but then, looking around her, the entire world had gone insane. Why should she be any different?

Chapter Twenty-three

“Everybody secure?” Jett called, her hand on the throttle.

Linda and Quinn had just loaded a middle-aged man with a broken leg, facial lacerations, and a concussion. He was stable, but the closed head injury combined with serious extremity fractures put him at risk for unseen internal injuries as well. Quinn wanted to get him to the ER faster than he would make it if he was added to the queue waiting for ambulance transport.

“We’re set,” Linda said.

“Where’s Tristan?” Jett didn’t like returning to base without all of her crew, especially without this particular crewmember. The disaster scene was even more treacherous now that night had fallen. Shifting blocks of concrete, uncertain tides, and the ever-present fires threatened more than the victims. The rescue crews were exhausted, their reflexes dulled, their judgment slowed. Tristan had been on the ground now for ten hours.

“Tris is staying to check out one of the engine crew,” Quinn said, reaching behind her for her shoulder strap. “Smoke inhalation, and the guy is having a fair amount of respiratory distress. She’s worried he may need to be intubated out here.”

“I should stay and help. Our patient’s stable.” Linda started to climb back out, but Quinn grabbed her arm.

“There are a couple of medics and a respiratory tech with her. She’s got enough help, and I told her to get her butt back to the hospital as soon as this is squared away. She’ll catch the next chopper back to PMC.”

“Okay,” Linda said, settling back down.

Jett scanned the area outside one more time, hoping to see Tristan emerge from the smoke and the dark, but she didn’t. After another minute, she took her aircraft up and left the chaos and Tristan behind.

“We have to move these boarders,” Honor said to Yale, her new head nurse and Linda’s replacement. “We don’t have any treatment rooms open for the incoming patients.”

“There’s nowhere to put them upstairs,” the burly redhead answered, frustration putting an edge in his voice. “All the beds are full.”

“I don’t care if they have to sleep two to a bed on the medical floors. If a patient doesn’t need immediate surgery or intensive care monitoring, they go to medicine. And I mean right now.”

Yale straightened. “Yes, ma’am. I’m on it.”

“Thank you.” Honor pressed both hands to the base of her spine and pushed in, trying to ease the stiffness in her sore muscles.

“Very impressive,” Quinn said, sidling around the doorway into Honor’s small, windowless box of an office. She closed the door behind her. “My residents never move that fast for me.”

“God, I love ex-military nurses. I never have to ask them twice. And they never give me any excuses.” Honor draped her arms around Quinn’s neck and rested her cheek against her shoulder. “You are the best-looking thing I’ve seen in many an hour.”

Quinn stroked Honor’s hair and kissed her forehead. “I’m very glad to see you too, even though you’re not supposed to be here.” She led Honor to the tiny, nearly threadbare couch pushed against one wall, sat down, and eased Honor down beside her. She held her, smoothing her hand up and down Honor’s arm. “How are you doing?”

Honor sighed and burrowed deeper into Quinn’s arms. “I feel like I used to during my residency. After a while you get so tired you forget that you’re tired. Or hungry. Or that there’s even a world outside these walls.”

“You need to go home,” Quinn murmured. She didn’t want to let her go. She wanted to hold her, soothe her. She wanted to carry her all the way home and put her to bed. She wanted to grab the kids and gather their family around them. She wanted the joy and comfort and sanity Honor had brought to her life. “If you wear yourself out, it’s only going to take you longer to get back to work full time.”

“Oh, Quinn Maguire, you are so slick.” Honor rolled her head back and smiled wearily at Quinn. “What were you going to try next if bringing work up didn’t motivate me sufficiently? The children need me at home?”

Quinn grinned. “Not a bad idea, but I was thinking I’d try sex next.”

“Oh really? If I could move, I might actually be interested.” Honor ran her fingers through Quinn’s hair. “What was the offer?”

“That you should get some rest so that when I got home, all worked up and not able to sleep, you could work your magic.”

Honor laughed. “Oh, that’s really bad.”

“How about, I’m worried about you.”

“I know, honey,” Honor murmured. “I’m sorry. I’m going, I really am. Tommy Henderson is on his way. I think he can handle things down here, especially with Yale helping.”

“Thanks.”

“What about you? Are you holding up okay?”

“I’m all right. I’m used to twenty-four-hour shifts.”

“Yes, but you were just on call—” Honor stopped at the sharp rap on the door and moved away from Quinn. “Yes?”

Yale burst through the door. “Sorry. I just heard a report over the radio. A couple of choppers collided and went down. They think one of them’s ours.”

“Oh no.” Honor started to rise. “Linda.”

“She’s all right,” Quinn said quickly, keeping Honor seated. “She came back with me. You stay here. I’ll find out what’s going on.” She pressed Honor back onto the couch and lifted her legs until she was lying down. “I mean it.” She looked over her shoulder. “Yale? If you see her walking around, I want you to escort her back to this sofa.”

“Yes, ma’am. Understood.”

Honor held Quinn’s hand tightly. “Let me know as soon as you hear anything.”

“I will.” Quinn didn’t want to tell her that Tristan was almost certainly on that second Healthstar helicopter.

Head back, eyes closed, Jett stood under the ice-cold spray as the sharp needles drove the fatigue and sadness away. Per regulations, if she slept for four hours she could fly again, and the way things were looking, she would need to. She and the other pilots had staggered their shifts so that only one of them would be down at a time. She might not sleep, but at least she could lie down and de-stress for an hour or two.

Then she’d be ready to go again.

She fumbled for the soap, found it, and rubbed it automatically over her body, her mind drifting back to the night before. She’d been making love to Tristan at just about this time last night. Just thinking about it caused her clitoris to rise. She’d come undone with women before, losing herself in sensation, driving them and herself to the limits of endurance until they both collapsed. Those times, she’d been nearly mindless, blind and deaf, propelled by some urgent primitive need to connect, to declare her presence in a world that ripped life away with heedless indifference. When she lost herself in a woman, she never felt more alive. All of that had been true for her the night before, but for the first time she could ever remember, she was completely present. She heard every one of Tristan’s soft moans, every plea and exhortation, every cry of pleasure and release. And because it was Tristan, Tristan, she had found something beyond passion. She’d found she wasn’t alone.

“Tris,” Jett murmured, replacing the soap and turning the water to hot. She brushed her fingers over her clitoris and her hips jerked beneath her hand. She leaned her shoulders against the shower wall, closed her eyes, and imagined Tristan kneeling between her legs. She—

“Jett!” Linda banged on the bathroom door. “Jett!”

Jett shut off the water, jumped out of the shower, and scanned for her weapon. It took her another second to realize she wasn’t under attack. She grabbed a towel, slung it around herself, and pulled open the door. Linda stood on the other side, wild-eyed and breathing as if she’d just finished a marathon.

“What?” Jett demanded.

“Two helicopters…” Linda gripped the doorjamb as if to steady herself. “Two helicopters collided—”

Jett grabbed Linda’s arm. “Ours?”

“We’re not sure. Everything’s so garbled. It’s crazy. God, Jett…”

“I’ll be right there. See if you can raise our aircraft.”

Linda nodded wordlessly and hurried away.

Jett tossed the towel aside and pulled on a shirt and pants over her still-wet skin. She kicked into her boots without bothering to put on socks. She was through her door and into the lounge in under twenty seconds. Linda, Juan, Mike, and two flight nurses were crowded around the radio. All Jett could hear were voices talking over one another, shouting names and call numbers of aircraft.

“Who do we have out?” Jett called loudly.

“Cindy and Jeremy,” Mike said, referring to two of the other pilots.

“Have we heard from either of them?”

“No, but there’s so much chatter, it’s hard for anyone to get through. And ground control has diverted a lot of aircraft to other hospitals because so many are full. We don’t know who’s going where.”

Jett gripped the back of one of the metal chairs that ringed the round Formica-topped table in the middle of the room. She’d been in this limbo a dozen times before. Wondering if her fellow pilots, her friends, were coming home again. If anyone had asked her a month before, she would have said she was prepared to lose anything. She’d been wrong.