By Break of Day (The Night Stalkers) (19 page)

“Where in the hell, Cowboy? What part of the planet are we on.”

“Don’t rightly know,” he drawled at her. Then he pointed to a small sign set into a stone pillar where the cab was turning in: Garret Mountain Equestrian Center. “But it’s the right sorta place.”

“Equestrian? Horses? Hell no, Cowboy.”

“They aren’t real cowboy boots if you haven’t ridden in them.”

“But I don’t want to muss them up.”

“They aren’t just for show, Kara. Like the salesgirl said, they’re for using. A couple scuffs gives them character, makes them something a real person wears, not some barhopping, line-dancing cowboy.” He made little quote signs around the last word.

Hadn’t she thought that’s what he was at first? Showed how much she knew. His boots were well used and his hat worn proudly. The goddamn man radiated who he was—unadulterated Texas male.

“You trying to reshape me in your image?”

At least he had the decency to look surprised and then confused.

“Cowboy boots. Now riding lessons. Next thing you know, it will be a hat like yours—and you can just forget all about any such stupidity.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied with deadpan seriousness. “It would look darned cute on you though.”

She sent a sharp jab into his ribs, but he’d anticipated her and her fingers bounced off hard muscle.

* * *

The horse looked at her—looked down at her—and Kara wasn’t the least bit pleased about the whole idea. Justin had done his sweet-talk thing, and they now had the only two Western saddle-trained horses in the whole place. Her horse, Ivory, was mostly white with gray spots on her rump, dark legs, and a dark mane.

“Dapple gray,” Justin had informed her.

Her head was about the size of Kara’s torso. And the beast just knew that she had beautiful, dark eyelashes and wide, warm hazel-brown eyes.

“You probably have a stone-cold heart, are known for bucking rookies into blackberry bushes, and will try to bite my ass when I’m not looking.”

“Aww, don’t hurt her feelings.” Justin brushed his hand over the horse’s nose. “She a total sweetheart; you can see it in her. And on a horse it’s a greenhorn, not a rookie.” Then he waggled a warning finger at the horse. “But if you do any messing with Kara’s behind, I’m gonna get jealous. That’s my turf.”

The horse looked at him blandly.

“You know how a dog likes to be rubbed behind the ears?”

“Sure.” Could she reach Ivory’s ears?

“Horses like this.” He reached out and scrubbed Ivory’s cheeks hard with his fingertips. The horse leaned into it like a giant puppy. “You try.”

Kara was surprised at how coarse the fur or hair or whatever was. But again, the massive head leaned into it with as much unconscious strength as Justin had. Kara hadn’t even thought about throwing herself at Justin in the store; she simply had, knowing she’d be caught.

Where was the cautious Kara she knew so well who gave herself to no man? Had sex with, sure. But around Justin she simply gave without thought, not a familiar place to go.

“Horses are suckers for treats.” He pulled out a pocketknife and an apple, splitting it into quarters. “Make your palm flat, fingertips together and straight, and keep your thumb tucked safe to the side.” He dropped a quarter apple on her palm and guided it forward. “She won’t bite you on purpose, but she can’t exactly look down at what she’s eating.”

Ivory snapped it out of her hand with a muzzle just as soft as her cheek had been coarse and crunched happily. Justin gave Kara another piece, checking her hand position.

Then he moved over to feed his horse, an imposing red—more a brown than a red, but Justin insisted on the designation and she wasn’t about to argue with a cowboy. If Ivory was big, Red was ginormous.

“Sixteen hands high if he’s an inch,” Justin had said admiringly when they’d first brought out the horse, as if that meant something. He looked noble and lively, and even with her new boots, Kara couldn’t see over his back because he was so tall.

“Time to saddle up, sweetheart.” Justin showed her how to hold the reins and the pommel. “Always climb aboard from the left side. Way to remember it is which side you would wear a sword on.”

“How should I know. I’m not a lousy jarhead Marine.” Though she’d dated one for a while and he’d let her wear his sword once. It was easy to imagine it on her left side.

“You don’t want your sword interfering with how you mount. So left foot in the left stirrup, grab the horn and the cantle, push off with the right, and up you go. Don’t kick Ivory’s behind as you swing your leg over or she’s likely to try running off with you.”

Before Kara could protest that she wasn’t ready, Justin’s strong hands wrapped about her waist and let her float up into position. He made a few adjustments to the saddle before shifting over to his own horse.

It was as if she could see the whole world from up here. She looked down at Justin’s hat, which was a new perspective on him. Though the ground looked pretty far away seeing as she was sitting atop a very large animal. As Ivory shifted her stance to accommodate Kara’s weight, the saddle seemed to shift and ripple beneath her. Kara resisted the urge to grab on to the horn with both hands; cowboys never did that in the movies, but lame girls always did. She wasn’t a lame girl and kept her hands calm, one holding both reins, the other resting on her thigh—ready to grab the horn if need be.

She admired how effortless Justin made it look to mount. This was clearly as natural to him as riding the subway was to her. He stepped his horse sideways until their knees brushed and he leaned in to kiss her.

“Kara Moretti astride a horse wearing Lucchese boots. Who would have thought you could get even more beautiful than you already are.”

Kara was not going to swoon at a compliment. She was far too nervous to swoon. But her nervous system considered it.

One look at Justin astride the tall red and the concept of swooning took on a whole new meaning. It was as if she’d never seen him clearly before. This was where he belonged—in the saddle, out in nature on a sun-dappled morning, ready to ride off among the oak and maple.

Then he led them forward and all thoughts of anything beyond survival were swept away.

* * *

Justin had helped train hundreds at the Roberts Quarter Horse Ranch. The young ones generally did better because they weren’t set in their ways yet. Most adults were stiff, awkward, thought they were driving a car, or just couldn’t relax in the saddle which always made a horse twitchy.

But every now and then an adult student simply had the intuitive feel for what was right. What happened then was always a wonder to watch. With a confident hand, a horse behaved, which increased the new rider’s confidence in a feedback loop.

Perhaps it was all those hours Kara spent dodging through harsh air currents, perhaps it was just in her nature, but Justin never had a student go so easily from walk to trot to cantering down a trail. Ivory had a smooth-footed pace, but that wasn’t even half of it. Kara simply let herself ride. She looked so natural that he was half tempted to try a gallop, but decided not to push her on her first time astride a horse.

As in so many things, Kara was a natural. With her hair banner-flown behind her, she moved with the saddle as easily as she moved in his arms.

And with an equal impact on his libido.

They’d only hired the horses for an hour because more than that would be cruel to a new rider’s legs. And that was a good thing. If he didn’t get her alone in short order, he was going to be one deeply frustrated cowboy.

* * *

Justin wasn’t more than two steps into the hotel room when he was attacked by a short, Italian whirlwind who smelled of heaven and tasted of pure sin. Keeping his hands off Kara Moretti for three days in a row had been torture and he never wanted to do it again.

She pinned him against the window with a twenty-story drop just a thin sheet of glass away. But she’d been very strategic in her attack. His T-shirt was gone and his jeans were around his ankles, held there by his cowboy boots. She was fully dressed, and he was naked and couldn’t even walk.

But his hands were free and he didn’t resist the enticement to run them up her still fully clothed body as she slid down his unclothed one. Womanly hips, a waist that he tried to trap because it felt so wonderful against his palms, but still she continued down. Generous breasts filled his palms but still she slid down until all he could manage was to dig his hands into her hair.

That’s how she took him. Pressed against the glass with his back and butt exposed to lower Manhattan, his hands lost in a tangle of hair so thick that they could get lost there and decide to never leave, and his heart completely gone into the morning sky.

His pent-up need for her exploded from him as she hummed happily, sending vibrations racing up his nervous system.

When his knees finally let go, he slid down to the carpet, taking her with him. He managed to free his hands from the luxurious fall of brunette and gold, but all he could manage was to shift her so that he could lie with his ear resting on the center of her chest.

Her happy hum continued as she wound a leg and her arms around him. They lay unmoving long enough for the sunlight streaming in the window to warm them.

“Justin?” His name blended with the quick double beat of her heart through her soft blouse.

“What does it feel like?”

He opened his mouth and then closed it. How could he describe what it felt like to have her teeth lightly scrape him, the soft, moist heat of…

No. She wasn’t asking about the sex.

He opened his mouth a second time, with little better luck because now he knew exactly what she was asking.

Kara had gone still with waiting for his answer. Wanting to know.

“I think of you all the time.”

“I do that too. Give me more.”

He went to prop himself up on his elbows.

But she’d wrapped her arms around his head upon her breast and kept him anchored there.

“When I make love to you, or you make love to me…” He broke off when he felt her hesitation. “Because trust me, girl, what you just did wasn’t merely sex.”

“No. It was toast.”

“What?”

“Doesn’t matter. What does it feel like?”

She still didn’t say the word. This time he forced his head up to look down at her.

Her dark eyes were wide, tracking back and forth across the ceiling as if searching for an answer that she couldn’t find. Finally her gaze settled on his face.

“It feels like flying. When you’re riding the curve of a storm or a battle and you know you’ve got it licked. No way it can buck you off. You’ve got it so clean because you’re in that perfect flow and synchronicity no matter how wild the ride. I’ve watched you fly, Kara. It doesn’t matter if you do it from a chair or in the sky; you know exactly what I mean.”

Her expression shifted again, every emotion clear. Uncertainty, doubt, then fear. That was one expression he’d never expected to see on her face.

“What are you afraid of, Kara Moretti?”

She rolled her head back and forth against the carpet. “I don’t know.” It was barely a whisper. Then her eyes focused on him once more. “But I do know one thing.”

“What’s that?”

Kara didn’t answer, but instead closed her eyes and pressed up where his one hand had come to rest on her hip.

He began tracing over her clothes, under her clothes, working her body with his free hand and his mouth until she lay naked and shuddering on his other arm. He had replaced the boots after helping her shed her pants; it was a wonderful combination—soft leather and soft woman.

“What one thing do you know, Kara?” He stopped, held her on the edge of a cascade reaction that he could never tire of evoking from her limitless responses to his attention.

“Kara?” He nibbled an ear.

She forced her eyes open, though it clearly took effort to come back from the place he had her teetering.

“What one thing do you know?” he prompted her again.

She rested a hand on his cheek even as she shuddered with the effort. “I may be the AMC.” Her breath came shorter and shorter. “But on the ground, I’m going to do my best to follow your lead. I’m afraid of several things, Cowboy. But you aren’t one of them.”

Justin brushed his lips over hers in a sweet kiss as he slipped into her and offered her the release her whole being was begging for.

It was almost dinnertime before Justin checked out of the hotel and they headed back toward the Moretti home.

Kara was sore in a dozen places, every one of them wonderful. Justin had a cat-ate-the-canary grin that shone brighter than the Manhattan skyline on Christmas Eve.

They walked hand in hand, and she ignored the grumble of the early commuters today just as she had three days before.

“Three days.” She spoke in surprise.

“I was just thinking that myself.”

“How come shit happens so fast?” She didn’t even recognize herself. Holding hands with a cowboy—while wearing totally awesome cowboy boots—and totally happy to be doing it. Far past the
toast
stage and headed well into four-letter land.

“I suppose that we’re simply two right fortunate folk.”

She squeezed his hand in agreement and did her best to erase her smile when some street punk sneered at her expression. Kara gave it up as a lost cause and left the goofy smile in place even though it was making her cheeks hurt.

“There is one other thing it feels like, Kara.”

“What’s that?” Oh, being in love. Rather, him being in love with her.
Being in love
—that still only applied to him, right?

He stopped her in the middle of the sidewalk, ignored the surge of commuters as only a Special Operations cowboy pilot could, and kissed her. Kissed her until her toes curled inside the soft Lucchese leather. Until she wanted to drag him down on the sidewalk and to hell with the street punk’s sneer and the crowds threatening to trample them.

Justin released the kiss, but not his one-armed hold that held her so tightly against him.

“It feels like a kiss?”

“What? No. I did that simply because I wanted to.”

Kara could feel the goofy smile go right over the top.

He started them walking again before he continued. “Being in love feels like you’d rather die than ever have the feeling stop.”

Kara caught her boot heel and stumbled on a crack in the sidewalk, might have fallen if not for their interlaced fingers. Though when she glanced back she couldn’t see the break.

If that was being in love, then she was way past “toast” and right on over into “totally screwed.”

* * *

Justin’s phone rang as they approached the Morettis’ front door. By chance, Al Junior and Senior, along with black sheep Rudi, were approaching from the other direction at close to the same moment.

Justin pulled out the phone but didn’t recognize the number.

“Roberts.”

He heard a sound that had always reminded him of a chicken the moment its neck was wrung. He tapped in the current encryption code to unscramble the signal and tried again. “Roberts.”

Kara hadn’t missed what was happening and moved in closer to listen. It was against protocol, but he leaned down and tipped the phone out so that she could hear.

“Your present location, Brooklyn, New York.” The operator’s all-business tone didn’t make it a question. “Report Fort Belvoir, Virginia, Pence Gate at precisely 2315 hours tonight. You will be directed from there. A rental car will be reserved and waiting for you six blocks due east of your current position. GPS locator on Captain Kara Moretti’s cell says that you are in probable contact. Is this correct?”

“Yes.”

“She is also required. This is a secure message. Need-to-know only. Acknowledge.”

“Acknowledged.”

And the line went dead.

He barely had time to exchange a glance with Kara before her father and brothers reached them.

“So, you come to stay with us now?” Rudi addressed him, but didn’t wait for an answer before turning to tease his sister. “You gonna make him stay in the guest room again?”

His father smacked Rudi on the back of the head, which only made him grin.

“I was hoping to stay. However, that is no longer possible.” He held up the phone still clutched in his hand before tucking it away. “I apologize, but I’m afraid that I’ve been called back to service and have to leave immediately.”

Mr. Moretti looked genuinely disappointed. He reached out and took Justin’s hand, but offered no bone crusher this time, instead a single firm shake.

“We will miss you. You are welcome back for as long as my daughter will allow it.”

“Thank you, sir. You’re most kind. And I regret that Kara is also called back. We just need to pick up her belongings.”

“Hey, that’s not right. Sis was supposed to be here a whole week, not three days.” Rudi sounded genuinely upset.

“Get a grip, Rudi.” Kara punched her brother’s arm, hard. “It’s not his doing. I’m the one who got a new job title last month; I’m important now. And I can still beat the shit out of you.” Then she kissed him on each cheek before turning to face Justin. “Give me two minutes.”

* * *

Kara scrambled up the two flights to her room and began jamming the stuff she’d scattered all over the room into her duffel. She looked longingly at the comfortable single bed. She’d hoped to have Justin in here with her tonight.

It wasn’t about making love here, for she could no longer deny that’s what they were doing. It was about holding and being held. Almost as if at twenty-seven, taking Justin into her childhood bed would be when she finally became a woman.

She paused at the window as she picked up a bra and a blouse that had landed there rather than going into the wash as they should have. No time now.

Down on the street below, the groups had shifted. Mama and Joe were home from the shop. Marta arrived from a rehearsal in a short yellow dress that offset her flash of red hair. It was a regular Moretti convention down there on the sidewalk. They had all gathered and were obviously waiting for her and Justin’s departure. But he and Papa stood off to the side, apparently having a serious conversation.

“They’re talking about you,
bambina
.” Nonna had arrived at Kara’s elbow without making a sound. Kara slid her arm around her grandmother’s waist.

“You’ll have to tell me how you sneak up like that someday, Nonna.”

“When you need to know, dear, you’ll know how. So why should I waste good teaching on you now?”

“I have a grandmother with stealth technology in her bones. Be careful the government doesn’t label you top secret. What do you think they’re saying?”

Nonna pulled Kara close and kissed her cheek. “You don’t have to reach my age to figure out that one, Kara.”

“‘I’m aware’”—Kara tried to lower her voice like Justin’s—“‘that we haven’t known each other long. And while Kara and I are not yet ready, I hope that someday I may have your permission to ask for…’” Kara sighed.

“You always were smart…when you let yourself think about it.”

“I’m going to have to kill him, Nonna. It’s the only solution.”

“Either that or say ‘Yes’ when he asks you his question.”

Kara finished packing, shouldered her duffel, and kissed Nonna good-bye.

Killing him sounded easier.