Free Fall (Elite Force 4)

A home filled with his babies. “You shirtless, of course.”

She swiped the edge of her wrap along his chin. “We could even use a sarong as a tartan.”

His brow furrowed and he watched her while cars honked and beeped on the street below. “You really are dreaming big. How did I miss that about you these past five months?”

Suddenly, they weren’t talking about sex or playing dress-up games. She couldn’t hide her longing for more. “Do you ever wonder what we’re doing here?”

“I’m here to save lives. One at a time. How about you?”

“Pursue bad guys around the world, I guess.” Uncover the truth about her mother’s death. “Except sometimes it’s tough to tell who the bad guys are when some seem to keep switching sides back and forth.”

He traced the furrows in her forehead. “There’s an Arab proverb that goes something like ‘People fear time. Time fears the pyramids.’ Which I interpret as ‘take each day as it comes. There’s a picture bigger than us going on.’”

“You’re not helping me.” Not when she so desperately wanted to talk about the future, their future, not some existential view of the whole freakin’ world.

“Okay, how about this one?” He lifted a lock of her hair, rubbing it between his fingers. “‘God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things I can. And the wisdom to know the difference.’”

His alcoholism. There it was. The big pink elephant in the room, the issue that guided every decision he made regardless of how long he’d been sober.

She accepted that but couldn’t understand why he couldn’t allow himself to celebrate his success, to move on and have the happiness he deserved. “Where do we fall in that philosophy?”

“Honestly? If I had my way, I would tuck you someplace safe, because thinking about you out there…” He reached into his jeans pocket and tossed a coin onto the mattress where it bounced once before settling.

His five-year sobriety coin.

He stared at her with tortured eyes. “I want to get you the hell out of this place.”

A cold chill started in her stomach. She hadn’t considered until now that her work, this mission, would be a threat for him, could be a stressor that sent him over the edge.

“I’m good at my job, trained, just like you are.” She scooped up the coin and pressed it in his palm, holding on tight. “I’ll be okay.”

“I get it, Stella, I do. But that doesn’t make this feeling go away.” His eyes closed, the tendons in his neck straining. “How the hell am I going to make it if something happens to you?”

She squeezed his hand. “I could say the same.”

“So this is it,” he said against her loose hair. “We’re laying it out there on the line, that crazy-ass, unconditional love that tears a person up inside.”

She kissed the heavy pulse throbbing in his neck. “Uhm, I was thinking it’s a crazy-ass love that lifts you up, makes you happy. But you don’t look very happy. In fact, you look like you want to run.”

“I should run, Stella.”

Her gut twisted. This wasn’t taking the direction she’d hoped.

“Jose, this could be my last mission, then I could step out of the field and take a desk job cracking codes and writing new software. If you’re not ready to step out of the field yet, I understand. I want you safe too, but I can wait on that part as long as I know you’re coming home to me.” She swallowed hard then blurted, “Let’s get married.”

There. She’d said it.

His cheeks puffed with an exhale, the rest of his body going very still for a heartbeat too long. “Did you just propose to me, woman?”

“Did you just call me ‘woman’?” Her heart was still stinging from his hesitation.

“Fuck. I did.” He scrubbed his face with his hand. “Sorry. I try to be more enlightened than that. Let’s move in together.”

It was her turn to pause, to mull over his words and tamp down her disappointment. She tried to reason through the fact that she was likely moving too fast. She should just be patient, logical.

Except her feelings for Jose had nothing to do with logic and everything to do with impulsive emotions. “So you’re saying a long engagement?”

“I love you, no question; I want us to get this right. I can’t let you down.”