Let It Ride (6 page)

As he asked her more, she told him about how she'd researched the market before deciding on a career field and how a few years ago the number of IT companies in Vegas had increased. But now, she might have to look in other cities. The subject changed to the once booming housing market in the suburbs, and how it seemed to have dropped off in the past couple of years, forcing many military families out of rentals that were being foreclosed.

Every few moments she'd sneak a peek at Cole. Watching him eat was torturous. His mouth closing around the sandwich, his jaw muscles tightening as he chewed. She shouldn't be this captivated. But his firm thighs covered by tight jeans were right in front of her and she found it impossible to stop her gaze from straying to the significant bulge between them.

He cleared his throat and she glanced up into his eyes. He knew she'd been staring at his crotch. Her cheeks burned.
Oh, please let the earth swallow me up now
.

“Did you want to play, too?” her mom asked.

Jordan blinked. “I'm sorry. What were we talking about?”

“Tammy and I are going to play some Gin,” Cole answered.

“Oh.” Jordan checked the time. “I'm sure Cole has other things to do.” If she weren't such an idiot she'd have gone back to the bedroom and studied instead of wasting time drooling over some smooth operator. “But you and I can play, Mom.” With a longing glance at her class notes, she stood and stacked the plates. “As soon as I do these dishes, okay?”

Cole jumped off the counter as she rose. “I've got these.” He took the plates from her and grabbed the silverware with his other hand. “Why don't you go study?” The unwavering look in his eyes softened as he flashed that devilish smile at her mother and took two strides to the sink. “I'll wash if you dry, Tammy.”

Her mother simpered as she got to her feet, picking up napkins and tea glasses. She turned a wondrous look to Jordan. “He's such a hunk,” she whispered like a schoolgirl as she followed him.

Jordan's face flamed. She couldn't let him bring lunch and wash the dishes. She opened her mouth and then closed it. Her mother had thrown a fit earlier when Jordan had made him leave. Resentment flared. Why did she have to be the bad guy and Cole got to be Mr. Charming Hunk making nice with her mom? Playing the role of hero, stepping in to save the day. She didn't need rescuing. They were just fine without him.

She watched her mom smiling and laughing with Cole. Having fun for the first time in a long time.

And the truth was, she did need some quiet time to
study. Would it hurt to accept help just this once? It wasn't as if she was depending on him for any kind of long-term commitment.

Spine stiffening, she gathered up her notebooks and textbooks. Cole looked up from washing a plate and stared at her. She met his dark gaze and the back of her neck tingled. The room felt hot, suffocating. She knew—she just knew—he was remembering that night on his motorcycle. His hands on her body, his mouth buried between her thighs. Him, inside her.

At the memory, her cotton panties were wet. Before he could read the need on her face, she ducked her head and strode into the bedroom.

“Y
OU GOT
a personal problem, Jackson?” Lieutenant Colonel Ethan Grady barked the question like the drill sergeant he used to be as he straddled the stool next to Cole's. Even if Grady hadn't approached him on his good side, Cole would have heard him.

Cole swigged the last of his Cuervo and let the final strains of George Jones's “I'll Always Get Lucky With You” end before he acknowledged him. “Besides you?”

“You were supposed to meet us at that yoga lady's shop after lunch.” Grady waved the bartender over. “Soda water. No ice.”

“Oh.” Cole signaled for another shot of Cuervo.

“‘Oh'? That's it? You risked your uncle's fifty-year-old Scotch to make me get a herbal treatment and then you don't even show?”

“So, did the lady help you find your chi?” Cole sucked down the next shot of Cuervo.

Grady took a sip of his water. “Nope. We'll have to reschedule. Figured you needed to be there since you won the bet.” He set down his drink and turned to face Cole. “Where you been the last twelve hours?”

Where had he been? Some alternate universe, maybe? That was the only explanation for why he'd knocked on Jordan's door intent on seduction and then settled for domestic duties. He'd played Gin all afternoon with a poor lady who was losing her mind. And left without making a move on Jordan. Not even a kiss on the cheek as she'd shown him to the door. Maybe he was losing his mind, too.

Grady's hand clamped on his shoulder. “You okay?”

Cole noted Grady's worried gaze. He was sick of people looking at him like that. “I'm good.”

Trying to clear his mind, he'd ridden out to Hoover Dam after leaving Jordan's and watched some guys kayaking down Black Canyon. He'd shot those rapids before. But never again. The knowledge burned a hole only tequila could fill. Or Jordan.

No. He had to shake the whole Jordan thing off. She was just a Keno girl he'd had a good time with. There'd been plenty before her. And there'd be plenty after. So she'd treated him as if they were nothing more than polite strangers when he'd left this afternoon. He'd never wanted to get involved with the woman anyway. Relationships tied a man down. Just ask his dad.

What he needed was to get his head straight. Get back in the saddle, as his grandfather would have said. He'd apologized to Jordan, right?

He gulped his Cuervo, slammed the tumbler on the bar, and stood. “I only got a few days left. Let's go find some women.”

Grady's brows shot up, but he finished his water and then followed Cole upstairs to Studio 54.

Even on a Tuesday night at one in the morning, The Grand's largest nightclub buzzed with energy. The throbbing bass vibrated in Cole's chest, half-naked go-go girls danced in cages, strobe lights flickered on the dance floor crowded with women. The thunderous music rendered him deaf to human voices, but then probably everyone in here was.

Forgetting Grady, he shouldered his way to the dance floor where half a dozen women were gyrating to the pounding rhythm. Their arms raised, they bumped against each other, but smiled as he joined them.

He smiled back.

One of them moved in front of him and slid her palm down his shirt front. Another came from behind and grabbed his butt. Oh, yeah. This is what he needed. He leaned down to ask the one in front her name and she stabbed her nails into his hair and bit his earlobe.

He jerked away.

A woman behind him grabbed his arm and he turned to find a curvy redhead. He slid his hand down her spine to the top of her sweet round bottom, intent on kissing her. But her makeup seemed packed on and her perfume was too sharp, too spicy.

He turned to a dark-skinned beauty. Ahh, yes. A fiery
señorita
was just what he needed. She smiled at him, but he closed his eyes and let his other senses take over. The heat of her soft body crushed against him. The feel of her hands slipping under his jacket and running over
his shoulders. He tried to conjure images of the
señorita
in his bed. But all he could picture were long blond curls spread over his pillow.

What was wrong with him?

He spun on his heel and pushed past the dancing women, his throat tight. His temples pounding in frustration, he headed for the exit.

Grady stood close to the door, his arms folded, and his face expressionless. Suddenly, Grady's unfailing composure infuriated Cole. The man never drank. Never swore. Never lost control, while Cole's life had been in a crazy tailspin ever since he'd crashed in the Iraqi desert.

Damn it. He had no say over his life anymore. His career was in the hands of his commanders. How long was it going to take for them to write him off as officially useless? Waiting for the verdict was like sitting on death row. Before, he could have channeled this restless energy into any one of a dozen adrenaline-pumping activities, all denied him now that he'd lost his equilibrium. All but one.

And now it seemed he couldn't even do that.

“Where are you going?” Grady asked as Cole strode by him.

“What are you, my fucking nursemaid?” Cole kept walking, picking up speed as he cleared the doors.

Grady kept pace with him. “If it's your career you're worried about, Jackson, don't. Even if you did break formation out there, you saved lives. The Air Force will take that into consideration. New orders will come through. You're too valuable an asset for them to—”

“Valuable?” Cole stopped and rounded on him, getting in his face. “As what? They need me to sit behind a desk and push papers? I'd rather take a discharge and sell pencils on a street corner.”

“You have twelve years of outstanding service, Major,” Grady barked. “You want to throw away a good career feeling sorry for yourself, or are you going to suck it up and do whatever it takes to retire with honor?”

Cole drew in a deep breath. Grady was right. He was losing it. He'd wanted to spend a week partying hard to forget everything for a while. But instead of sin city, this town, surrounded by nothing but desert, seemed like some Twilight Zone limbo land. A kind of weird purgatory where he could only wait around for someone else to decide his future.

With a quick nod, he met Grady's gaze. “I'm going to sleep it off.”

“You do that. Come out to the base tomorrow. Hughes has cooked up something brutal to pay McCabe back for her birthday stripper. You gotta see it.”

Hughes and McCabe and their practical jokes brought back memories of good times. Cole tried to smile. “I'll be there.” He shook hands with Grady and headed up to his room.

Sleep was out, so he showered, and then sat leaning against the headboard and stared at the silent images on the TV, his mind haunted with thoughts of driving out to Nellis tomorrow.

Like a coward, he'd been avoiding the base. Avoiding
the smell of jet fuel, the sleek fuselage of an F-22, the beauty of a Raptor taking off into the blue. All the things that reminded him he'd never fly again. Never feel the thrill of a rocket firing at his back and the pull of G-forces on his body. Of flying faster than the speed of sound and taking his jet so high he could almost see outer space.

But Grady was right. He needed to suck it up and get over it. As his eyes closed, his last thought was of Jordan, how she'd looked when she emerged from the bedroom and seen him playing Gin with her mom. Something in that look had nagged at him.

In the middle of the night, Cole awoke with a painful hard-on and the remnants of an X-rated dream swirling around in his mind. He'd been dreaming of Jordan, clasped tight in his arms in this bed, the sheets rumpled around him as he pumped into her. How was he going to get over this fixation he had for her?

He shoved out of bed, took an ice-cold shower and then shaved. As he stared at the scars on his lower jaw and neck, the first part of his dream clicked into his memory. The part before it turned sexual.

He'd been in Jordan's apartment, cooking for her. She'd been sitting on the counter beside him, more rested than he'd last seen her. And he'd felt…good being able to help. He'd told her he admired her strength to endure her mom's illness, and her determination to better her situation.

And she'd smiled and cupped his face and kissed down his scarred neck.

It hit him all of a sudden: last night was the first night in months that he hadn't woken in a cold sweat from his usual nightmare.

 

A
N HOUR LATER
,
Cole rolled to a stop at the gate to Nellis and showed the guard his ID. He noticed a red convertible with two women pull up behind him. Dark curls blowing behind the wheel and silky blond hair as long as your arm blowing on the other side. The guard saluted and waved Cole through.

As he watched in his rearview mirror, a female officer stepped out of the guardhouse and spoke with the ladies in the convertible, pointing in the direction of the air combat command buildings. What was that all about?

Shrugging it off, Cole drove around base housing, past the commissary and officers' quarters out to the aircraft hangars. Nellis Air Force Base. Home of the Thunderbirds and the Air Base Defense School. They'd had some good times in Vegas on the weekends back then, and Cole suddenly longed for those uncomplicated days when he'd believed a world of thrills and adventure awaited him after graduation.

With the exception of the newer F-22, everything looked the same as when he'd trained here. C-17s and C-130s sat next to Raptors on the airstrip, and a couple of F-15s screamed overhead as he parked in front of the instructors' buildings.

Hard to believe McCabe and Hughes were air combat instructors here.

Would he have been happy instructing rookie pilots
in air combat? He'd never know. Instructors had to be able to fly.

As he kicked the bike stand down and swung his leg over, Colonel Hogue, 99th Air Base Wing Vice Commander, stepped over to greet him.

Cole stood at attention and saluted.

The colonel returned the salute. “Good morning, Major.”

“Good morning, sir.” He hadn't expected to be met by the commander. Maybe he should have worn his uniform.

Assessing eyes searched Cole's. “How have you been feeling, Major?”

“Good. Thank you, sir.” Was this an official meeting? “I'm more than ready to return to duty, sir.”

Just as the colonel nodded, the convertible with the two knockouts pulled up behind Cole's bike, and one lady passenger called out, “Which way to Captain McCabe's office please?”

The colonel scowled, and Cole raised his brows. He was beginning to have an idea about Hughes's prank.

Colonel Hogue answered, “The next building over, down the hall, third door on the right.”

“Okay, thanks.” The women smiled and blew kisses as they pulled away and parked their car in front of the next building.

“I'd like to know what the hell is going on around here,” the colonel grumbled.

Cole kept his mouth strategically shut.

“Well, as you were, Major.”

They saluted and Cole strode to the next building and
followed the women to McCabe's office. Both were long-legged beauties, the blonde in tight jeans and a cropped shirt with a tattoo on the small of her back. The brunette wore a miniskirt and a halter top with no bra. And those tanned legs didn't stop. Oh, this was going to be fun to watch.

At McCabe's door, a tall, sleek redhead was just leaving as the other two went in. She eyed Cole up and down with a Mona Lisa smile as she sauntered past him.

McCabe's door was open, so Cole stayed in the doorway, leaned against the frame and folded his arms. Then he grinned.

The two women stood on either side of McCabe, who sat in his chair behind his desk. Pinned in. The poor guy wore a strained smile, his gaze locked on the leggy brunette. The other lady—the one in the miniskirt—hopped up onto the desk next to him, crossed her legs and leaned sideways until her chest was at McCabe's eye level. His gaze shifted to the magnificent cleavage in front of him. His mouth tightened and he swallowed.

“But Mitch,” miniskirt said. “I brought Meagan all the way out here to meet you. I was hoping you two might hit it off. Maybe we'd make it a threesome tonight.”

A low groan sounded from Mitch's throat. “Baby, make that offer again in a few weeks.”

Cole jumped at a hard slap to his back. “How's it going, Jackson?” Hughes stood behind his right shoulder, a wide grin on her face and a sparkle of mischief in her eyes as she stared at McCabe.

McCabe looked up and caught sight of Cole and Hughes. Immediately the misery in his expression changed to wicked amusement. “Ladies, here's someone who's available and looking for companionship. Major Colton Jackson, war hero, just back from Iraq.”

 

T
HE LADIES
turned to look at Cole, their makeup flawless, their lips pouty. Captain Alexandria Hughes had never figured out that whole pout-and-sulk thing that most women used to wrap a man around their finger. It always seemed so artificial. But guys fell for it every time. Most guys anyway. It never seemed to faze Mitch McCabe. But this prank had him on edge. Satisfaction welled in her chest.