Storm Front (2 page)

Get your head out of your pants, Blackhawk. She’s nowhere ready to hop into bed with your ass.

As tall as she was, she still had to angle her head to look him in the eye. “How in the heck am I supposed to clean and chop veggies for my western-style scrambled eggs if I can’t get my hand wet?”

“You don’t.” He swept a finger down her dainty, straight nose and tapped the tip. “I do.”

He took in her wide-eyed look of disbelief mingled with a goodly amount of annoyance and barely kept from laughing. His Tessa had a temper.
Good.
He liked women who gave as good as they got. A timid woman wouldn’t make it in his world.

“Sweetheart…” his lips quirked as she uttered a kittenish growl, “…back in Michigan, I run a diner and do most of the cooking in the off-season. I’ve been known to chop more than a few vegetables. You can watch me work. You’re so tired you might cut off a finger.”

“I’m fine,” she huffed. But she clearly wasn’t. She had lines of pain around her mouth, dark circles under her beautiful eyes, and the muscles in her neck were taut.

Earl couldn’t stand seeing her in pain, so he turned her around and massaged her neck and shoulders. She moaned. “God, that feels good.”

Her moan turned into a shriek when Earl let go of her shoulders and picked her up, cuddling her to his chest. He walked the few steps to the island and set her down on a stool.

“Stop touching me and carrying me and … um, just stop it.”

“For now.” Earl leaned over and touched his forehead to hers. “But I reserve the right to continue working the kinks out of
all
your tight muscles … later. It’ll help you sleep.”

“I can’t believe…” she sputtered. “I’m not a … a … parcel to be placed somewhere. And I told you to stop all the touching stuff.”

“Tessa, you’re definitely not a parcel.” He shot her a sexy grin. “But I did place you where I wanted you.” His voice was husky as he added, “And I like touching you.”

Her little snort and fiery-eyed glare made him want to chuckle. Time to change the subject. At least, she wasn’t pale-skinned or sad-eyed any longer.

Earl grabbed an apron hanging on a hook by the kitchen door; it had a Navy insignia on it. He grimaced, a knee-jerk reaction since he was Army all the way, but put on what had to be Scotty’s apron. “By the way, where’s the old salt? Shouldn’t Scotty be making breakfast, and you, a guest, be in bed sleeping and not risking your precious fingers in his kitchen?”

“Precious fingers, my ass.” Tessa sniffed. “The old salt, as you call him, is hung-over. He looked pretty pathetic when I came down to get some coffee at five-thirty, so I sent him to bed. I have Cordon Bleu training—I don’t normally cut my fingers.”

The sound of her cute little sniff had his cock stiffening to steely hardness once more, just as he’d thought he had the unruly appendage under control.

All this inflation and deflation of his dick couldn’t be good for his health. The situation was totally out of his control. He’d jerked off last night and again this morning, but it hadn’t helped. He had a constant hard-on around the little darling. This level of intensity had never happened with any other woman. The only satisfactory solution he could think of was to take Tessa to bed and make love to her, but he couldn’t, not yet anyway. So he’d continue to use his hand.

Sooner or later, Tessa would be sure to notice the large bulge he constantly sported around her. He didn’t want to scare her off. At least, for now, the apron would cover his predicament.

“Drunk? Scotty looked sober when I turned in.” He finished chopping the green pepper she’d been working on and pulled another from the colander of rinsed vegetables. He cored it and then quickly sliced and diced it into pieces.

Tessa hummed approvingly under her breath. He grinned. Good, he’d impressed her with his culinary skills. They shared an interest in cooking, one area of common ground he could use to court her. Their shared friendship with Callie was another such area.

Tessa stood.

“What the hell?” Earl put the knife down and prepared to plant her sweet butt back on the stool. “Sit. Rest. Watch.”

“No.” She went to the refrigerator and pulled out eggs and milk. “I promised Callie’s brothers I’d make them
pannekuchen
. They love my
pannekuchen
.”

“German, Swedish or Dutch?” he asked as he turned back to dicing potatoes for hash browns. He’d have to pick his battles with sweet Tessa. Plus, he’d keep an eagle eye on her. At the first sign she might injure herself, her ass would be back on the stool.

A look of pleased surprise crossed her face and lingered in a slight smile on her full lips. “German.”

Earl nodded. “Do you separate the eggs and then add the beaten egg whites to the pancake batter right before you put them on the griddle?” That was how Earl’s Swedish mother had done it; he knew Germans often did it the same way. He craved the resulting fluffy pancakes, especially with fruit and whipped cream on top.

“Is there any other way?” Tessa smiled at him fully for the first time since he’d met her. A smile that acknowledged they shared a common life experience.

He wanted more smiles like that from her. Smiles just for him. It was all he could do not to walk over, take her into his arms, and put another kind of smile on her face.

Instead, he stayed where he was and replied to her quick quip. “Not in my book, there isn’t. But then there are a lot of cooks who are plain ignorant and not savvy like us.”

Tessa laughed, a deep-throated, sexy sound that caused his heart to stutter for a split second. He now made it his life’s goal to make her laugh a lot in the future. Although he wasn’t sure his over-active libido could handle any more Tessa-stimulation.

Earl coughed to clear a boulder-sized lump of desire from his throat. Changing the subject, he said, “So… Scotty got drunk? Does that mean we’re doing lunch, too?”

He hoped so. It would be a perfect opportunity to continue to gain her trust and woo her as they shared cooking chores.

“Most likely.” Even with a bum finger, she expertly broke and separated the eggs into two bowls. “He was sloshed.” She chuckled, a sound he liked almost as much as her laugh. “After you turned in, Scotty joined us to watch the
Rocky Horror Picture Show
. He challenged the Walsh twins to a drinking game to demonstrate the superiority of the regular Navy over the SEALs. They did shots of top-shelf tequila. The twins won, I think—or, at least, they aren’t as hung-over since they went out about an hour ago to help clear paths to the main buildings and plow the entrance road. The snow just doesn’t seem to want to stop.”

Earl glanced at the window in the breakfast nook area and saw white upon white as far as he could see. Looked to be near white-out conditions at the moment. No one would be leaving Idaho anytime in the next day or so. He probably should go out and offer to help dig the facility out, but he was a damn good cook and didn’t want Tessa to chop off a finger in her exhaustion.

Plus, he wanted to be with her.

They worked companionably and silently for several minutes. Earl finished off the vegetables and then went to the refrigerator and pulled out two dozen eggs to start a western-style egg scramble for the buffet table. He checked on Tessa from time to time to make sure she wasn’t overdoing it.

Somehow, he would convince her to take a nap after breakfast. He and some of the others could do clean up and start lunch.

A clattering sound had Earl looking up from his eggs.

Tessa had dropped her spoon on the granite island. She visibly swayed and then leaned on the counter for a few seconds. Her head bowed as if it was too heavy for her neck to hold up. After a second or so, she straightened and resumed working on her batter.

Earl growled in the back of his throat and viciously rapped an egg against the island countertop. He didn’t say anything, nor did he intervene. She wasn’t in danger of injury at the moment, and he didn’t want to spoil the camaraderie he’d managed to establish. But later, after breakfast, Tessa would rest if he had to tuck her in bed himself.

Tessa turned to look at him; her eyes widened either at the noise he made or maybe it was the way he attacked the eggs. “Um, Callie told me about you.”

Earl stopped breaking eggs and returned her look. From the way she chewed her lower lip, he could tell she was nervous about whatever Callie had shared. “She did?”

Tessa heaved out a huge breath and looked anywhere but at him. “Um, she thinks we should date—or something.”

God, Callie had not only fed Tessa his background, but the minx had also out-and-out plowed the field and sowed seeds for his pursuit. He didn’t know whether to applaud or curse Risto’s new wife.

“And what do you think?” He kept his tone neutral and his voice low and soft so as not to frighten her with the strength of his interest.

When she didn’t say anything and refused to look at him, he wiped his hands on a towel and approached her.

Tessa’s head shot up, and she took a step away. Her retreat was blocked by the island at her back. She cast her gaze down and worried her lower lip with her teeth until it was rosy red.

“Tessa, look at me.”

She shook her head.

Sighing, he tipped her face up to his with a gentle finger and groaned when he saw tears in her eyes. His heart hurt. “Sweetheart, what’s wrong? Am I that scary? Is the idea of dating me, getting to know me, that frightening? I’d never hurt you. I’ll protect you with my life.”

“Oh, no … it’s not you. I really like you. A lot.” She sniffled. “It’s me. I’m not l-l-like Callie. I … I’m not a … good person.” She reached for and squeezed his arm. “You’re a hero. A good man. A man of law and order…” she trailed off and shrugged. “You deserve someone better.”

“Bullshit.” Earl moved into her body, forcing her to let go of his arm. She braced her hands on his chest and looked at him in shock.

His arms around her, he held her trembling body close to his. He took several deep breaths in an attempt to calm down. Not good enough for him? That was crap. She was so far above him, well … he could barely manage to hold back the full force of his anger at hearing her disparage herself in such a way. He’d like to meet the person who’d put those thoughts into her head; it was obvious she believed them.

He forced his voice into an even, soothing tone. “Tessa, you’re everything that’s good and precious in this world. Callie told me a little about you also.” Tessa whimpered and shook her head. “Shh, hush, it’s okay.” He rubbed her back. “The past is just that … past.”

“No, it isn’t,” she choked out. Tears streaked down her face.

Earl held her firmly with one arm and captured the glistening drops with his thumb.

Ahh, so whatever is bothering her originated in her past.

It had to have happened before Evan found her, during her abusive home life as Callie had called it. Tessa had never had any scandals attributed to her during her modeling career that he could recall. She’d become almost a hermit since she’d begun writing superb, best-selling thrillers as T.A. Parks.

Whatever the problem was, he’d take care of it. But first, he had to convince Tessa there was nothing that would ever put him off pursuing a relationship with her.

“The past
is
past,” he kissed her forehead, “and it will remain the past if I have anything to do with it.”

“What
exactly
did Callie tell you?” Tessa sniffed and rested her forehead on his chest.

“That you’d overcome an abusive childhood.” She stiffened. “That Evan and Chad found you living on the streets of Chicago. That they took you to Callie and you became a loving sister to her and her brothers.”

He stroked his hand up her back and kneaded the tight neck muscles at the top of her spine. The thick fall of her ponytail caressed the back of his hand like a silken veil. “I know all about your charitable work in third world countries. I also know you provided human intelligence to the CIA as an open source intelligence agent during some of your modeling assignments. The information you gathered, Callie said, saved a lot of civilians and US military personnel.”

He smoothed his hand down her spine, from her nape to the curve above her butt, soothing her as it also soothed him. “You used your travels for modeling assignments and your work for the CIA to plot your books, didn’t you?” He wondered if something bad had happened when she’d collected information for the government. Was it coming back to haunt her now?

She nodded, the movement so slight he would’ve missed it if he hadn’t been so in tune with her every move and breath. He pressed a light kiss over the top of her silky, dark hair.

“Your books are so realistic. I see myself in them. I’ve been in many of the places you write about. Been in many of the same situations.” He tipped her head back and looked into her golden-brown eyes still awash with tears. “You’re talented, loving … and beautiful, inside and out. You’re a survivor. All of those things are good and outweigh anything that happened in the past.”

Rescuing Tessa
, is what Callie had told him. Evan and Chad had
rescued
Tessa. Evan and his partner were heroes in his book and had gained his undying gratitude and respect.

“You don’t understand.” Tessa shook her head and then lowered her face into his chest once more. Her tears soaked through Scotty’s apron and the thermal turtleneck underneath.

Whatever had happened in her past—and whoever had resurrected it, because he’d bet everything he owned that was what was in the text messages that scared her so much—had to be bad.

Worse than an abusive home, worse than living on the streets, and those two things were bad enough. Maybe even worse than something she had seen or done for the CIA.

No matter what Tessa thought, Earl had to make one thing clear. “When I met Callie for the first time, I asked her if she had a sister. She told me no. So I asked her to find me someone just like her.” He paused. “She introduced me to you.”

Tessa stiffened against him and all but stopped breathing.

“Breathe, sweetheart.”