The masculine voice dimly pierced her narrow focus.
"Kathleen! It's me. Tanner. Stop before you turn me into a gelding."
Tanner.
She sagged against his arm. His corded muscles relaxed. Fear had skewed her senses until she hadn't even considered it could be him. Tanner. Who'd taken too damn long in announcing himself.
Kathleen spun around and found him directly behind her. His face was dimly distinguishable in the poorly lit parking lot, but no doubt about it. With the aid of a harvest moon, she could see him well enough. She should have known when she'd leaned back against him, except she'd been too damned scared to death.
She wanted to gut punch him, but hesitated at the last second because of his back. If he ended up in the infirmary, he would get pain medication.
He didn't deserve it. The jerk should hurt for scaring her.
"Tanner."
"What?"
"This." She grabbed his pinky and bent it back. She'd taken men to their knees with the move at survival camp and considered the option now.
"What the—" He stumbled a step but stayed on his feet. "Geez, Kathleen! That hurts."
"Good!" She flung aside his hand. "You scared the hell out of me! Don't you know better than to sneak up on someone like that?"
His brows slammed down into a foreboding scowl. "Don't you know better than to walk through a dark parking lot alone? You didn't even check inside the car before you reached to open it."
"So you were teaching me a lesson?" Her voice rose as postadrenaline shakes set in. "Protecting me? Well, I'm not interested in participating in your testosterone tango tonight."
"This has nothing to do with testosterone, lady, and everything to with common-sense safety. What would you have done if it hadn't been me?"
"Broken your nose. Poked your eyes out." Shards of fear still scratched at her insides, not that she would admit it to Tanner. "Gelded you."
"Maybe. If you were lucky. But maybe not. Why take that chance? I outweigh you by over a hundred pounds."
"So size matters after all?" Kathleen suppressed a wince as her mouth ran away with her yet again. Damn but she was tired of being a victim to her emotions around this man.
The normally lighthearted Tanner didn't even crack a smile. "I'm not in the mood for jokes."
"I'm just playing by your rules."
"You don't get it, do you? You were so zeroed in on your anger at me, you didn't think about blasting out here alone. You forgot the most basic Air Force rule. Never, never leave your wingman." His head tipped back, displaying an unrestrained view of his flexing jaw. His throat moved with a long swallow before he looked down at her again. "Answer one question. Why didn't you shout?"
"What?" Confusion muddied her anger. "Shout? Back at the bar? I tried to keep our argument low-key for the sake of the investigation."
"No. When I caught you around the waist. Or even earlier when I put my hand on your shoulder. Why didn't you scream for help?"
"Oh. Because … I was just…" She scrambled for a reason … and came up blank. She didn't know why. For once she had no quick comeback for Tanner, and she didn't like the uneven footing.
Time to retreat and regroup. Kathleen scooped her keys from the gravel. "Forget it. I refuse to fight with you tonight."
His arm shot forward, blocking the driver's door. "I didn't put my hand over your mouth, something a mugger wouldn't be so generous about. You never made a sound. Just dug your heels in—granted you dug them into my boot—and fought the battle by yourself when help could have been three cars down. Why?"
The intensity of his eyes held her with a power that frightened her, stirred her, immobilized her in a way that had nothing to do with Tanner's size. "Let me go, and we'll talk more in the morning when we're both calmer."
"We'll talk about it now." His other palm pressed against the car as he bracketed her with his arms. "One in every four rapes takes place in a public area or in a parking garage."
His sister. Kathleen sagged against the quarter panel.
How could she have forgotten his sister had died in a carjacking attack? That explained his overreaction, made it forgivable.