She could see he wanted to argue.. .but his cell phone rang again. His forehead creased with frustration, his hand gravitating toward his phone even as he obviously battled the urge to ignore it.
"You know you can't ignore the call. Take it. I'll be fine."
And she would.
If only his intense blue eyes didn't shout that he wasn't done with her yet.
Chapter 3
He was done.
Carson leaned against the quarter panel of his truck and stared past the pool up at Nikki's apartment. She was safely inside, thank God. He'd walked her to the door. She hadn't invited him in—no surprise—but he'd waited until she assured him the place was safe and empty.
Now he could return to the pile of messages waiting for him at the squadron since he'd accomplished all he could from a cell phone for one day.
So why was he hanging out in a half-empty apartment parking lot, rain drizzling until it dripped from his hair onto his forehead? If he loitered around, staring up at Nikki's image moving around inside for much longer, somebody would call the cops on his ass. If he didn't freeze to death first even though he had his leather jacket back. Damned if the thing didn't smell like her now, a light flowery perfume and something unmistakably her. And double damn, but why could he still recognize her scent even after seven months?
He should just lose himself in work, order a deep-dish pizza and dig in for another 2:00 a.m. punch-out. Given the time change over in the Middle East, pulling a few extra hours at night worked well for speaking with the deployed squadron commander about routine business. Sure he could ask the new boss for advice on the whole mess, but the guy was swamped with duties overseas. Their old commander, Quade, had left two months ago and moved his family to the Pentagon for his next assignment, so he wasn't on hand to ask for advice, either.
Mentors were in short supply to help him out with this one. He was on his own in a job he hadn't asked for, wasn't even sure he was ready for yet. But the position had come to him anyway and he refused to screw it up.
The phone rang in his hand—again. He tucked the headset piece in his ear. "Major Hunt."
"Captain Lebowski from scheduling." The Chicago area accent cut through the earpiece. "We've got a problem I know you're going to find hard to believe, but when Reach 2-1-3-1 landed in Hawaii, the plane broke."
A broken plane and a crew in search of a tan. Great. Just what he needed today. "Yeah, amazing how that always happens on flights to Hawaii and never in Thule, Greenland. Let me guess on the ETTC—" estimated time to completion for a return home "—is a week right?"
>"Of course I would tell you." She scavenged a smile. "And you would have found out all the details anyway since you're Gary's commander."
He kept his eyes forward on the traffic-packed road, watching the streetlight. "I would have found out because I'm worried about you."
She let herself soak in the concern in his voice until the light turned green.
"Thank you." She blinked against the glare streaking through the window as the sun peeked from behind the clouds.
Her head thunked back to rest and she watched the telephone poles whiz past as they drove toward the winding bridge. Everything blurred from exhaustion and more. Definitely more than she wanted to acknowledge because then she would have to admit that spending time with Carson was important. "The hospital put a rush on my lab work. Someone slipped Rohypnol in my drink last night."
His curse hissed long and low. "And somebody's going to pay for that, no damn question."
"At least I understand the memory loss." Although that piece of knowledge came with another sense of having been violated. Who'd done it? She'd finished one drink before Gary arrived, and been almost through the second when he slid up beside her, elbow on the bar smiling as if totally unaware that their relationship was going nowhere. How could he have not realized?
Or had he? "I should be relieved I'm not suffering some mental break from trauma, right? Instead I'm just…"
"Pissed off. Of course you are." He glanced over at her, gray eyes steely with a repressed anger glinting through. "You have every reason to be upset."
Damn it, he'd given up the right to be her friend a long time ago. "Please quit being so nice."
"You want me to be an ass?"
She cranked the heater higher even though she knew the chill went bone deep from things that had nothing to do with dreary January weather. "I'd like an excuse to holler."
"I could take you out on my boat to the middle of Charleston harbor and let you yell if you think it would help."
"It won't."
"Are you sure you don't want me to call your mother?"
"No. I'll tell her. Later though—" She stopped short as an awful possibility pushed through her muzzy mind. "Do you think what happened will hit the news soon?"