Two flares blazed across the room. Reflexively, he reloaded. Only three more left in his vest.
The flares caught the looming figure in both shoulders. Howling, he stumbled back, toppled.
Falling into the second intruder. Both landed in the snow.
Luck, logic or miracle? Josh didn't care or have time to analyze. But he was mighty grateful.
"Don't move," Josh shouted to the screaming man beating at the poker-hot torches in his shoulders. The bastard was lucky the snow gear had blunted the impact and the heat had likely cauterized his wounds. "One twitch this way and we'll pin you both with another round." Josh glanced back at Alicia. "Cover me while I get their weapons, then we can pop a flare for rescue."
"Roger." She reloaded and raised her flare gun level. "I've got your back."
Her words knocked around inside his head before settling in his gut with a new tightness. He'd heard her say it before, hell, had even brought it up himself earlier. But now the words solidified and became a part of him beyond just applying to the plane or battlefield. After a lifetime of living in a world where people put up walls around him, where he put them around himself, he wasn't alone anymore.
Enemy weapons gathered, Josh launched a rescue-signal flare into the sky. An umbrella of light exploded in the midst of the purple-and-pink haze of the aurora borealis. Staring up into all those lights, he decided that it wouldn't be too far a stretch from trusting instincts to believing in miracles. And more than anything, he wanted the miracle of forever with the wary, stubborn, incredible woman he'd married.
Alicia clicked off the cordless phone, placing it on top of a stack of packing boxes by her kitchen stove, her Christmas calls complete. Since her family hadn't been notified about her ordeal, there hadn't been any need for tears or explanations. Simply rejoicing.
Her father was celebrating with her sister and sister's fiance. Her brother was enjoying a bachelor dinner with his girlfriend. Josh had even taken his turn speaking with everyone so she didn't have to make explanations about their breakup.
Were there even explanations to be made?
Alicia slumped against the towering boxes and stared at the starkly bare apartment walls that had yet to be warmed into a home. She'd had such plans for decorating their first place together with all her favorite colors and Pier I rattan. She still hoped to...
Except she didn't know where she stood with Josh. After their life-and-death struggle, it seemed their problems should be insignificant. But they weren't. She knew better now than to ignore troubles in hopes that they would fade of their own volition.
She couldn't delay much longer settling things one way or the other. The archway afforded a clear view of Josh starting a fire in the fireplace. Northern lights streamed through the wall-size picture window during the final hours of night.
Alaskan snow-capped mountains loomed as large and indomitable as the man in her living room.
Long legs were encased in faded jeans, broad shoulders covered by a T-shirt and white cable sweater.
Her stomach did a quick loop-de-loop.
She would talk to him. Soon.
First, she just needed to find the darned microwave so she could heat the carry out meal they'd snagged on their way home from base. She wasn't delaying. Much.
She sliced through the tape on a box. They'd been picked up by the military helicopter and taken to Eielson Air Force Base in Fairbanks for a once-over by the doctors. Once the flight surgeon declared them healthy with only minor frostbite and no tissue damage, they were both released.
Sifting through the box, she uncovered...no microwave. Damn. Why hadn't she paid more attention to how the packers labeled the boxes? She shuffled down to the next box and hacked it open.
A debrief with the Office of Special Investigations had taken up the rest of Christmas Eve, but well worth it. All intelligence indicated the illegal uranium mine was being used to funnel material for nukes over the Bering Strait into Russia. From there, it went to radical factions in Cantou. The two goons on snowmobiles were already spilling vital information in hopes of immunity and new identities. Hopefully, that information would help keep things chilled in Cantou for Josh's squadron.
The plane hop from Fairbanks up to their base in Anchorage had been silent due to lack of privacy. And now they had privacy to spare during the dark of Christmas morning. Alone. Neither one sure what to say. But she had hope after the way they'd worked together at the Quonset hut in bringing down their attackers. Afterward, Josh hadn't even suggested going to his BOQ room or office.
Abandoning her microwave search, she leaned against the open box and just enjoyed staring at her hunky hubby. Josh knelt in front of the grate, adjusting the kindling on top before reaching into his back pocket for...his trusty Bic lighter. She smiled, suddenly glad there hadn't been time yet to install gas logs, this moment wonderfully reassuring in its reminder of how they'd worked together to survive the past days.
She wanted to settle in front of that fire with him and make love through the day. Years of stored hormones demanded release. But she also wanted more with Josh. She always had, but now realized she'd sabotaged their relationship from the start out of fears and insecurities, her refusal to plan for a future because making that final commitment symbolized a loss of control. Fixing things between them would be a delicate balance.
Absently scratching a moving sticker off the box, she let herself savor watching Josh in motion, the man always so sure of himself and his actions. He never seemed to need anyone.
Or did he?
Her thumb slowed on the sticker. He often joked about carrying a Scooby-Doo lunch box to his doctoral dissertation defense. Sure he got along well with people. His sense of humor earned him plenty of pals. But why had she never noticed he lacked close friendships? And he outranked almost everyone his age since he'd entered the Air Force young and been promoted early.
Alicia looked again at the solitary man blowing gently to coax the fire to life with patience and single-minded determination. He'd probably already calculated the exact wind power needed.
Beyond missing out on having a real senior prom, how many friendships had he missed out on as well?