Oath Of Honor

Chapter Nine

Cam leaned against the doorway to Blair’s studio in the house they’d purchased not far from Tanner and Adrienne’s on Whitley Point. In the middle of winter this far north, sunset came early, and the late-day sun slanted low on the horizon. Diffuse golden light cast a halo around Blair’s face as she concentrated on the canvas propped up on the easel in front of her. Her paint-spattered jeans rode low on her hips, and her faded black T-shirt with a silk-screened Andy Warhol slid up and down over the hollow of her spine as she captured the colors of the sea in gray, and green, and blue. A strip of skin two inches wide just above the waistband of her Luckys winked into view and disappeared to the rhythm of her brushstrokes in a hypnotic cadence that captured Cam’s attention and made her throat go dry. She knew that spot—the sweet softness of the skin, the delicate ripple of bone beneath supple muscle, the breathy moans when her fingers dipped and stroked. She’d rested her hand in just that spot while they’d danced at their wedding.

She smiled. They hadn’t really celebrated privately yet. By the time they’d said good-bye to the last of their guests, thanked Tanner and Adrienne for opening their home and putting up with the weeks of heightened security, and made it back to their place down island, they’d fallen into bed exhausted. After sleeping far later than usual, they’d both needed to unwind. Blair wanted to paint. Cam needed to move. Now she wanted nothing more than to be right where she was, looking at her wife.

“Have a good run?” Blair asked, touching a dab of purple to the swell of a wave.

“The beach is a bitch. I’d forgotten how much harder it is to run on sand.”

“Tire you out?” Blair wiped her brush on a cloth and set it in a tray next to the easel and turned, her gaze slowly sliding from Cam’s face down her body.

“Just getting started.”

Blair smiled slowly. “You’re all sweaty.”

“Sorry about that.” Cam fanned her fingers over the center of her chest, and Blair’s eyes flared with heat, making her nipples tighten and pressure surge in her groin. “Stark made me promise I’d let her join me when her leg healed.”

“Oh, I can just see that—I know she hates to run. You’ve been torturing her again by playing to her need to best the boss.”

“Ex-boss. And all Secret Service agents are competitive by nature. I didn’t have to play her at all.”

Laughing, Blair crossed the room with the easy grace of a trained martial artist. She gripped the bottom of Cam’s T-shirt and jerked it up and over Cam’s head, tossing it onto the floor behind them. She leaned against Cam’s body, pinning her against the doorjamb. “Well, I like you sweaty and you’re going to need a shower anyhow—I’m going to get paint all over you.”

Cam circled Blair’s waist and gripped her ass, snugging Blair’s hips into the vee of her pelvis. “Is it washable paint?”

“I might have to work on it.” Blair nipped at Cam’s chin and kissed her, molding her mouth to Cam’s, teasing the seam of her lips with the tip of her tongue. “Rub a little here and there.”

“Make sure you get a lot on me, then.” Cam pulled her closer, enjoying the heat spreading through her belly, the rising beat of arousal, the anticipation of the pleasure to come. Blair’s hands covered her breasts, thumbs lightly brushing her nipples, and she tilted her head back, giving Blair room to scrape her teeth down her throat. “Your mouth is so hot—God, Blair.”

“You taste so good,” Blair mumbled as she nipped and kissed her way to the hollow of Cam’s throat. She licked the salty skin there and moaned softly.

Cam pulled the tie holding Blair’s hair back, letting her thick waves fall free. She tangled her fingers in them, cupping the back of Blair’s head, guiding Blair’s mouth lower, to the curve of her breast. Blair’s teeth closed over her nipple and Cam jerked. They were alone in that part of the house, but several of Blair’s security agents were in the kitchen—and she was losing her grip more with every stroke of Blair’s tongue. “Shower soon?”

“Mmm, in a minute,” Blair whispered, licking a warm path down the underside of Cam’s breast.

“Blair,” Cam warned, her thighs starting to shake.

Blair laughed, pressing the flat of her hand to the center of Cam’s belly, making slow, tight circles, knowing the motion would work Cam up even faster.

“You looked beautiful,” Cam whispered, “standing over there in the sunlight.”

Blair stilled, then raised her head, her blue eyes dark and questioning. “You always catch me off guard, Cam. You mean that, don’t you.”

“Every time I see you, I fall in love again.”

“I believe you when you say those things. You make my heart melt.”

Cam framed Blair’s face and kissed her softly. Her body demanded Blair’s hands, Blair’s mouth, Blair’s fingers, but her heart wanted nothing more than to hold Blair close with her last breath. “I love you. You’re all I want.”

“Cam.” Blair’s fingers trembled against Cam’s skin. “I never thought I’d have this. You undo me.”

The tears shimmering on Blair’s lashes were Cam’s undoing. She only wanted her love to make Blair smile. “Don’t worry—I’ll never tell.”

Laughing, the hint of vulnerability erased by joy, Blair closed her eyes and rested her cheek against Cam’s shoulder. “Good. I’d hate for my badass reputation to suffer.”

Cam skimmed her hand under Blair’s T-shirt and stroked her back. “Want to take that shower with me?”

Blair fingers skated lower, brushing softly between Cam’s thighs. “Want me to finish what I started?”

“Oh yeah. Several times.”

Laughing, Blair took Cam’s hand and dragged her down the hall. “I’ll see what I can do.”

*

“Five Guys?” Wes said when Evyn stopped in front of the red-and-white checkered burger joint.

“What? You don’t like burgers? Are you a vegetarian?”

“No.” Wes shook her head. “I think my coronaries can take it. A burger would be great.”

“Well, these are great burgers.” Evyn reached for the door but Wes was there first, pushing it open and waiting for her to pass. “You know that’s very retro, right?”

“What?” Wes let the door close behind them and followed Evyn to the counter.

“Holding the door for a woman.”

“Does it bother you?”

“Do you always do it?”

“If I don’t have to knock someone down to get there first.”

Evyn laughed. “Chivalry just comes naturally to you?”

“I don’t know. Is that what you call it?”

Evyn almost said I call it sexy, but caught herself just in time. Wes really didn’t know her actions were both charming and unusual, and that made what might have been annoying in someone else just plain attractive. “I guess you take the officer-and-a-gentleman thing seriously.”

“I do.”

“So you don’t just rely on the uniform to turn heads?”

“Never did, really,” Wes answered easily. The glint in Evyn’s eyes made it hard to resist her good-natured teasing. “I’m not the head-turning type.”

“Come again?” Evyn stared. Did the woman really not know how hot she was?

“What?”

“Never mind.” Evyn took a mental step back. Fifteen minutes alone with Wes and they were already dancing around personal issues again. Maybe even flirting. Without her even realizing it. Without meaning to. Wes slid right through her usual barriers, and she couldn’t have that. Especially not here, on the job, and especially not with Wes. “We don’t have much time, so if you know what you want…”

“I’m good to order,” Wes said, visibly drawing back.

Evyn supposed she’d been rude, but better that than familiar. So what if the cool curtain that fell between them chilled her more than the miserable weather outside.

They ordered, grabbed a table by the window, and waited for their number to be called. She started to rise when the server called their order, but Wes got to her feet.

“I’ll get it. Ketchup on your fries?”

“What else?”

“Vinegar,” Wes said.

“Blasphemy.”

“You should try it.”

Evyn leaned back in her chair and stared up at Wes, who stood looking down, amusement dancing in her eyes. Every single thing about her was attractive—the sharp profile, the long tight body, the devastating mouth. And she was close enough to being on the job to know what it meant to have no life to speak of—a schedule that changed at a moment’s notice, travel plans she couldn’t share, colleagues who knew her better than family. Or maybe who were her family. Wes Masters might just be the most interesting woman she’d ever met, and that was a big, big problem. She’d had a very brief and very ill-advised affair with another agent right after she’d been assigned to DC. They’d split up when her ex’s ex returned from an assignment overseas and wasn’t so ex any longer. Unfortunately, Evyn kept running into said ex on the job. That was painful at first and then just embarrassing. Then and there she’d decided to keep life simple—a total separation of work and play. Wes was upsetting her game plan. Add to that the whole breach in security issue, and the inadvisable became the impossible.

“I’ll stick to the sure thing,” Evyn said. “Ketchup, that is.”

“Okay.” Wes looked at her a second longer before disappearing to retrieve their food.

“Smooth—really smooth, Daniels.” Evyn shredded her paper napkin and wondered what the hell Wes had just seen in her eyes.

“This is kind of scary,” Wes said, pointing to the grease-stained brown paper bag filled with french fries as she sat down a minute later.

“Never took you for a coward.” Evyn grabbed her double burger with cheese and bag of fries.

Wes just laughed and carefully tore the bag open. Fat golden fries spilled out. She plucked one up, dipped it in a little plastic container of vinegar, and ate it. “Good.”

“Told you,” Evyn said as she plowed through her food. “After this I’ll take you over to the clinic—it’s in the OEOB.” At Wes’s raised eyebrow she added, “Old Executive Office Building. You can sort out your schedule and whatnot today in terms of coverage. Tomorrow, you’ll report to me at zero eight hundred.”

“All right,” Wes said, carefully rolling up the remains of the paper bag that had held her fries. “I need to take shifts in the clinic as soon as possible. I want to see how things work—how the team meshes.”

“I understand. We’ll have at least one away exercise. The rest of the sims we should be able to do at Beltsville.”

“Come again?”

“Our training center.”

“Gotcha. Assuming the polygraph results are okay.”

Evyn lifted a shoulder. “I doubt there’ll be any problem there. It had to be done, but you wouldn’t have gotten this far if there was a question.” She hesitated. “Those things are always tough.”

“It’s okay—I expected it to be intrusive. So I have no secrets left—I never really had many to begin with.” Wes smiled but there was a hint of bitterness in her eyes.

Evyn wished Tom hadn’t wanted her there—she didn’t want to learn about Wes’s life in a windowless room while she was hooked up to a machine that was set to gauge whether she was lying. She wanted to hear about Wes’s family and her aspirations and the places she’d been over dinner and a bottle of wine. She wanted to know more about her, and there was that big, big problem staring her in the face again.

“Have you been assigned permanent quarters?” Evyn asked, steering the conversation onto safer ground.

“I don’t know.” Wes flicked the temporary ID she’d gotten at the gate that morning. “I’m not exactly official yet.”

“We’ll take care of that this afternoon.”

“Thanks. I appreciate—”

“The sooner we get you settled,” Evyn said, gathering up her trash and standing, “the sooner we can see how you’ll do in the field.”

“Sure.”

“Let’s get back.”

Evyn turned away from the intensity of Wes’s gaze. She’d have to learn to look at Wes without wanting to fall into those damn gorgeous green eyes.