Troublemaker

CHAPTER 20

BEFORE BO COULD ANSWER, TRICKS REALIZED SHE’D left her ball in the water and went charging back into the lake. Bo started after her, taking two steps into the water-damn, it was cold!-but Morgan put his hand on her arm. “She looks okay. If she gets tired, I’ll go get her.”

Bo stepped back out of the water but kept her gaze on Tricks. Morgan stood beside her, keeping watch too. He said, “Has she done that before?”

She nodded. “The first time I swam with her. She got such a look of horror on her face when she saw me in the water. She was only about four or five months old, but she swam like a champ. Thank goodness I wasn’t very far out, because she was still just a puppy. I don’t know if her strength would have held out.”

“Don’t you know she was thinking, ‘Oh shit, Mom’s in the water and if she sinks I’m screwed.’”

Startled, Bo laughed out loud. “She doesn’t know swear words.”

“Betcha.”

The idea of puppy Tricks swearing to herself was priceless. Bo was still chuckling as together they watched Tricks retrieve her ball and turn, swimming for the bank. She wasn’t going as fast as she normally did, but neither did she seem to be in any distress. Now that she had Morgan safely on land, she wore her normal jaunty, happy expression. It was amazing how a dog could smile with a ball in its mouth.

“The guys would rag my ass forever if this got out,” Morgan observed.

“Oh, good, I have something I can blackmail you with.” Tricks was touching the bottom now and bounding out, sending water flying everywhere, so Bo backed up out of the spray area. Morgan stayed where he was because he couldn’t get any wetter. Tricks gave him a quick look of disdain-evidently for being so foolish as to go swimming-and took the ball to Bo.

Morgan scratched his jaw. “I think I’ve been dissed.”

“Most definitely.” Bo didn’t take the offered ball, instead saying, “You need to rest a few minutes, princess, that was a long swim. Just a few minutes, okay? Nose around and see what you can smell.” After a few seconds Tricks dropped the ball and trotted off to sniff out something interesting.

Morgan had turned back and was looking out over the lake. Bo could feel him wanting to get back in the water, but he waited, not knowing how Tricks would react. For Bo’s part, she was content for him to stand there, because just looking at him made her hormones whisper, “Oh man, he’s fine.” As good as he looked now, with water dripping off his lean, muscled body, she could only imagine what he was like at full strength. For him, “weak” was most people’s normal.

The scar on his chest wasn’t the only scar he bore; there was a white slash across his right triceps, a dark discoloring along his left thigh that looked like road rash, a jagged scar under his left shoulder blade, even a raised white slash of scar tissue on top of his left foot. She wondered if all the injuries on his left side had occurred at the same time. And all she could see right now were those on his back; she hadn’t noticed any on his front last night, but then she’d been preoccupied with other things-plus the light had been off.

Her gaze lingered on the way his wet boxers were hanging low on his hips and clinging to his ass. The muscle definition in his legs was mouthwatering. Come to think of it, there wasn’t anything about him that wasn’t mouthwatering, but those legs looked as strong as trees. Thick pads of muscle lined the indentation of his spine, laced along his ribs. She remembered that when he’d arrived his arms had looked thin; they certainly didn’t now. She didn’t know what he’d been doing while she was at the police station, but she suspected he hadn’t rested much, not to fight his way back this far.

He had the body of a warrior. She didn’t try to forget what he was, but in the day-to-day normality of the routine they’d established, one reality would sink out of sight below the other reality. Yet every time she’d almost forgotten, something would happen to remind her. Yesterday it had been that moment when he’d taken Kyle down, the savagery in his gaze, the almost absent way he’d slammed Kyle’s head into the pavement to knock him out. Today it was seeing the scars he bore. Since the moment when he’d choked her, he’d been careful to keep himself under control and on low intensity, but by then it was too late. The people in town might have bought it, but she knew the truth.

“You’ve been really careful since you’ve been here, haven’t you?” she asked as she bent down to retrieve her jeans. “Simmer instead of boil. You walk a tightrope when you’re stateside, don’t you?”

He didn’t have to ask what she meant and he didn’t deny it. He shrugged and said, “For the most part I don’t have to because I’m with other men who are the same. That’s my job. But when I’m in the real world, I can ratchet it down with no problem-except for the minor slip when you shook me awake.”

“Minor.” She made a scoffing noise as she shimmied into her jeans. He’d scared the crap out of her, and he could so easily have crushed her throat. “You could have killed me.”

“Could have. But I didn’t, and I didn’t hurt you, so that makes it minor. Scared you, though. I’m sorry about that.”

His tone was absent. She looked up from zipping her jeans to see that his attention was riveted on what she was doing. His expression was so hungry that her heart skipped a beat and she froze, trying to get a handle on her immediate response to nothing more than that, just an expression. She felt breathless and turned on; a minute ago her wet feet had been cold from the lake water, but one look from him was all it took for heat to wash over her from her toes to her head.

Her cheeks were hot as she got her shoes. She wasn’t shy but she’d never been a flirt, never wanted to flirt. Why not just be up front and save everyone time and trouble? But now she wanted to tease him and get him as revved up as she felt, though if she went by his actions last night he didn’t need much revving.

She took a deep breath and composed herself, remembering that he’d wanted a long swim. “If you want to go back in the water, I can hold Tricks to keep her from saving you again. For all I know, if you go back in the water, she might write you off as wasted effort.”

“She would, too,” he muttered. “But, yeah, I’d like a longer swim. I’m way out of shape.”

“How long could you swim before?”

“Fifteen miles or so. Like I said, we trained our asses off.”

Fifteen… miles? He could swim farther than it was from her house to Hamrickville? She said faintly, “Yeah, I can see how just swimming a couple of miles would be disappointing.”

“The first couple of miles is just fun. After ten miles, it stops being fun and starts being work.”

She called Tricks to her and held her firmly while Morgan waded back into the lake, made a shallow dive, and began crossing the lake with strong, smooth strokes of his arms. Tricks strained against her hold, whining low in her throat with her dark gaze fixed on Morgan’s disappearing form, but Bo reassured her that he was all right and after a minute she took her cue from Bo’s attitude.

While keeping a weather eye on Morgan for the raised fist that would signal distress-and, oh shit, she hoped she didn’t have to go into that cold water, though she would if she had to-she began throwing the ball into the lake for Tricks to retrieve, combining her two favorite things, retrieving and swimming. After a while the sun got too hot on her face and arms and she called Tricks out, let her shake, then toweled her off and spread a dry towel next to the quilt for Tricks to lie down on. Morgan had stopped swimming up and down the lake and was gliding toward them, his arms moving steadily, so she guessed the aquatics were at an end for the day.

He was breathing fast as he waded out. She met him at the edge of the water with a towel. “Thanks,” he said, rubbing it roughly over his head, then swiping at his chest and arms and legs. Going to where he’d dropped his clothes, he stepped out of his wet boxers and pulled on his jeans commando. His movements were economical, not giving her much time to enjoy the view, but she took what she could get and what she got was an eyeful. Boy parts weren’t pretty but good God almighty, Morgan’s were impressive. She felt breathless remembering lying pinned beneath him while he stroked in and out of her body. What was she supposed to do with this feeling? They’d had sex; neither of them had made any promises, however vague, to each other.

He dropped down on the quilt and lay spread-eagled, his chest rising and falling with his deep breaths. “God, that felt good.”

She supposed some things just needed to be, without any great introspection or examination, so she knelt beside the cooler, opened it, and pulled out a couple of Naked Pigs. “Here, you can celebrate with a beer. Ready for a sandwich?”

“Or two,” he said, sitting up to take the beers from her and open them while she got out the sandwiches. He turned up his bottle and drank deep. He’d been out long enough that the sun had brought deeper color to the tops of his shoulders and his arms. He sat with his legs drawn up and his arms draped over his spread knees, looking out over the lake with his gaze narrowed against the sunlight glinting on the water, the neck of the beer bottle hooked between two fingers. His posture couldn’t have gotten any more “guy,” and it was startlingly attractive.

She sat tailor-fashion at an angle to him, getting the food out of the cooler and dividing it between them. She poured Tricks’s food into a bowl, and the sound brought Tricks jumping up from her towel, tail wagging. For a couple of minutes there was silence except for the sounds of man, woman, and dog paying attention to their food.

Food always tasted better on a picnic, Bo thought, even when the food was just a sandwich and a cold beer. Whether it was the sun, the fresh air, or the peace and quiet, her taste buds were either more sensitive, or more easily satisfied. And she had Morgan, and Tricks-for now, for today.

Tricks was too tired to try to guilt them out of their food, so she returned to her towel and curled up for a doggy nap, completely satisfied with her day so far. Morgan wolfed down his first sandwich but took his time on the second one. Bo was comfortable with the silence; she finished most of her sandwich, ate a cookie, then stretched out on the quilt with a sigh of contentment. She could take a nap, she thought drowsily, rolling over to pillow her head on her crossed arms.

“Did I take advantage last night?” Morgan asked, his deep voice taking command and snapping her out of her soporific mood. She opened one eye to study him, found him watching her with that piercing, intent look of his.

She considered that, rejected the idea that she hadn’t been capable of knowing her own mind. “I could have said no if I’d wanted to. I didn’t want to.” She yawned.

“That’s kind of how I was looking at it, too, but I wanted to make sure.”

“I won’t lie; yesterday was a nightmare. I was upset, I was grieving-”

“Grieving?” He looked surprised at the word.

She waved it away. She didn’t want to explain that she’d been grieving the loss of her blinders, that now she saw how she’d deluded herself into thinking she could keep her heart and Tricks safe, that every day they were perched precariously on the cliff of chance, and chance could send them toppling over. Instead she said, “In my mind, she was dead. Even when I knew she wasn’t, getting over it wasn’t easy. For a minute… for a minute I was in hell. But-” Her tone got stronger. “But crying didn’t turn me into a weakling. I was crying, that’s all.”

He reached out and wrapped his big rough hand around her ankle. “I never thought of you as a weakling. But I’ve never said I understand how women think, and I had to allow for the possibility that you thought… shit, I’m confusing myself. If you’re okay with last night, then that’s good.”

“I’m okay with it.” Because she could, she laid her hand on his bare shoulder, then rubbed it down his back. “More than okay.” She paused, then said, “So… why are you blowing sunshine up my skirt? If I were wearing one, that is.”

He released her ankle and in silence finished his sandwich, then lay back on the quilt beside her and rested his beer bottle on his bare stomach. “What makes you think I’m blowing sunshine?” he asked as he got comfortable, just when she’d thought he wasn’t going to answer.

“Please. When was the last time you were uncertain about anything, especially a woman? You think I haven’t been paying attention to how you operate since you’ve been here?”

He patted her thigh. “Can’t put anything over on you, can I?” He didn’t sound worried about it; in fact, there was a definite note of satisfaction there.

“So what was the point?”

“Just trying to make you think you had a little bit of control,” he said, then burst out laughing when she swiftly pinched him. “Ow!”

“You deserved it.” She gave a contented sigh and closed her eyes again, basking in the peace, the light breeze rustling through the tree limbs overhead and changing the dapple pattern of the sunshine. Tricks was sound asleep, resting after her exertions. Morgan was stretched out just inches away, and his presence let something relax deep inside her, as if she knew he was on guard and she was safe. She moved her hand so she was touching his side and went to sleep.

Morgan didn’t want to move and maybe wake up Bo, but he still managed to lift his head enough to take the occasional sip of beer. No way was he letting the Naked Pig get warm on him. It felt nice to just lie there, pleasantly tired from the three times he’d made love to Bo last night as well as the strenuous swim he’d taken. He’d definitely been pushing himself, but he was still happy with the distance considering how long it had been since he’d done any training.

When he was on the job, the physical and skill training was almost nonstop. You didn’t learn how to shoot and keep the same level of skill without constant practice. You didn’t swim fifteen miles, not get in the water for three months, and assume you could still swim the same distance. Staying on top in skill and condition required constant training. Now that he knew about the lake, he intended to be in it almost every day, preferably with Bo here to keep an eye out because even expert swimmers could get in trouble. On the job, he didn’t bat an eye at always having a teammate to back him up, but part of him rebelled at the idea of Bo possibly putting herself at risk to help him if he cramped up or something like that.

His reluctance to endanger her, even in theory, said something. He’d worked with women before and not once worried about them because they were women; he worried about the welfare of his team in general. Of course, they’d been professionals who knew the possibilities and odds. Bo wasn’t in his line of work; she was one of the ones he served to protect.

He turned his head to look at her, sleeping by his side with her hand just touching him. That light touch made his chest feel too full to hold his heart; the realization was startling, and a little bit panic-making. Damn. Maybe he’d been telling the truth when he’d told Kyle he was in love with her, though he wasn’t sure he knew exactly what love was or what it felt like. He liked her; he liked her probably more-no, definitely more-than he’d ever liked any other woman. He’d been hot for a particular woman, sure, but hot for and liking were two different things and the way they combined now knocked him for a loop.

He’d been engaged, but he hadn’t been in love. He’d even been vaguely relieved when things had gone off the rails, which said a lot. Still, he wasn’t a navel-gazer and he’d never spent a lot of time thinking about what had gone wrong or what he wanted in a woman, or if he would ever truly want to spend the rest of his life with one particular woman. He had the GO-Teams for money and excitement and purpose, he had female companionship when he wanted it, and sex when that was all he wanted. If anyone had asked, he’d have said that wasn’t a bad way for a man to live.

Except-now there was Bo, and it mattered. All of it. If he wanted sex-hell to the yeah-he wanted it to be with her. If he wanted companionship, he wanted it with her. He liked the routine of her orderly house, the lack of fussiness with which she met life. She didn’t do dramatics, she held it together, she coped. That was why her devastation at almost losing Tricks had hit him so hard. He’d have done anything to take that look out of her eyes. He hadn’t been certain she wouldn’t kick his ass out of her bed, considering how hard she’d been working to keep him at a distance, but instead she had turned to him so… well, hell, sweetly was the only word he could come up with to describe it. The woman was turning him into a fucking poet.

Okay, he could deal with that-as long as he got her again.

Today… something was different today. She was softer, more relaxed, more content. If last night had been the cause, then he’d have a great time keeping that look of contentment there, but his ego wasn’t big enough for him to assume his dick was a magic cure-all. Whatever was going on with her, it was something she’d worked out for herself, and whether or not she’d ever tell him about that “something” was up in the air.

That was another thing: she hadn’t wanted to rehash what had happened last night, hadn’t gone over every detail fretting about what meant what. In his experience, women did, and it drove him nuts. Fucking meant fucking. End of story. But not Bo; she hadn’t brought it up at all, which had forced him to do it.

Maybe it all meant something.

He wasn’t worried about figuring things out; he had time. Correction: He hoped he had time. He hadn’t heard from Axel except that one letter, but truthfully that had been one letter more than he’d expected. He had no way of pointing Axel in any direction, so they had to wait for the bad actors to make a move-and so far they were sitting tight. Why wouldn’t they? Unless they knew he’d remembered whatever it was he didn’t remember, they had nothing to lose by waiting. They wouldn’t move until they had to move, which left him and Axel sitting on their thumbs.

What if he got a call from Axel tomorrow that the trap had been sprung, the assholes caught, and he should report back to the teams ASAP? For the first time ever, he didn’t want to go. He wanted to have more time with Bo.

If Axel knew, he’d shit bricks. Despite some logical reasons for sending Morgan to recuperate at Bo’s, mostly he’d done it out of spite, and Morgan knew it. That was Axel. He was mean and immature and vindictive to everyone he perceived as being against him, which was balanced by being very good at his job and almost pathologically loyal to “his” men. He would never have sent Morgan here if he’d had any inkling that it might cost him one of his team leaders.

His own thought startled Morgan. Would he leave the GO-Teams to be with Bo? Would he have to? Some of the team members were married, and they made it work. Some of them got married and then divorced, but didn’t that happen to people no matter what kind of job they had?

Okay, double fuck, was he really thinking what he was thinking?

He looked at her sleeping face, the wide mouth relaxed and soft, her dark lashes fans beneath those big dark eyes that were closed now, but he wouldn’t be a bit surprised if she opened them and smiled at him. And if she did, he knew what his reaction would be. He’d have her naked in no time, and Tricks would probably be giving them that reproachful look again.

Triple fuck, since he was thinking what he was thinking, he had a big decision to make: did he come clean about Axel’s plan to set up him as bait that could backfire and draw some real danger here, or did he hope it never came to that? The last option was the easiest, but it was probably the stupidest.

It was his call, and he had to make it.