Free Fall (Elite Force #4)(53)
Author: Catherine Mann

Her nose scrunched and she pulled her knees away. “I’m a trained professional. It’s my job. That’s different from being freaked out.”

Actually, now that he thought about it, his vision of her shifted. “You’re a code breaker. I would have expected you to stay in a vault somewhere listening to clicks and reading bizarre printouts. That’s what you’re wired for, but you came here to put your mother’s ghost to rest. That’s admirable.”

She looked at the computer, then back at him, half grinning. “There’s no sunlight in a vault. My serotonin levels would be shot all to hell.”

He laughed along with her, her smile tapping some of the tension from him. “Things are tough right now, worse than tough. You can take the stress out on me if you want.”

“You’re propositioning me?” She cocked her head to the side. “I don’t know. Seems like maybe I’ve made this relationship too easy for you.”

“What in the hell gave you that idea?” he barked in surprise.

She linked fingers with him. “Our relationship was too simple. I just fell into your arms and told you I loved you.”

“What planet are you living on?” Following this woman’s “logic” was damn near impossible sometimes. “From where I’m sitting, nothing between us has been simple or straightforward. I still don’t understand half of what went down.” He lowered his voice to a whisper, talking about so much more than just how they’d met, how they’d fallen love. “The parts I do understand are tearing me up inside.”

She squeezed his hand with surprising strength. “Even if I make this easy for you now, it’s only going to get complicated again, then we hurt each other. I know that. But after what happened today, when things got truly tough, when I could have lost you…”

Her voice dwindled off with a strangled sob.

He gathered her close to his chest, grateful for the privacy of their cubicle in a corner, but wishing they could be in a room alone so he could hold her all night long while the rain washed away the horror of this day.

Sniffling, she eased out of his arms, swiping a tissue from a box by her computer and blowing her nose. “Sorry to fall apart on you like that. But after what happened today, I’m having a tough time being logical or smart.”

He wanted to kiss her so damn bad his teeth hurt. His hands slid up to cradle her face, and yeah, right now he couldn’t think of a reason why he shouldn’t just go ahead and…

Kiss her.

His mouth covered hers, not in any crazy, out of control way. Not here, where someone could walk up to them at any second. Just her lips against his. He needed to connect with her, affirm that they were both alive and on a day like today, nothing else seemed to matter. He drew in the eucalyptus scent of her shampoo, the satiny feel of her skin under his fingertips. Stella. It was always about Stella and had been since the first time he…

Ping.

He froze at the electronic chime. Stella jerked back, her eyes wide. She pressed her fingers to her mouth for an instant before she whipped around to look at the computer.

“Stella?” He sat up straighter. “Do you have something?”

“Hold on…” She held up a hand while she hunched closer to the screen, clicking the scroll button as she analyzed data cycling in front of her in what looked like gibberish to him, letters, numbers, and words shifting, realigning into distinguishable lists. Names.

“Oh my God,” Stella whispered, horrified.

Shit. On a day like today, there shouldn’t be anything that could shock them. Only something beyond imagining. “What does it say? What’s wrong?”

“The words coded into the cloth…” Her hands hovered in front of the screen as if she could gather up the information in her palms. “I’ve translated them and they’re names. When I put those names into the database, it came back a list of U.S. and European operatives in the area. Both alive and dead.” Her throat moved a gulp and she reached for a drink that wasn’t even there. Her hands fell back to her lap. “I thought at first they had my name on here.”

Her words damn near set his skin on fire, to think of her identity out there, exposed. It was one thing for Sutton Harper to have a vague sense of her as an agent in the area. But for enemy intelligence agencies and governments around the world to know specifics, to have her on their radar…

His brain grasped on one bit of hope in her words. “You thought your name was on the list? But it wasn’t?”

She shook her head, braid swinging like a pendulum. “It doesn’t say Stella Carson. It says Melanie Carson. It’s my mother’s name.”

“Your mother? Why would her name be there?” Unless. Holy crap.

“My mother wasn’t working for the Peace Corps.” Stella looked from her computer screen straight at him, her eyes hollow with disillusionment. “She was a CIA operative.”

***

Sam would miss these late night walks with Annie when they came to an end, and he knew they would have to end eventually. His job here would be over once she realized exactly why he wasn’t the man for her. For now, he wanted to breathe in the air heavy with humidity from the rain and make the most of every last second with her.

How far was he willing to take that, even knowing it couldn’t last? Somehow he’d lost sight of that end result in his yearlong pursuit of her. At some point he’d become so consumed with making her notice him, he’d forgotten there would be a very real expiration date.

After the way they’d kissed at the school earlier, his time to figure out his next move was coming. Most likely sooner rather than later.

Annie tipped her face into the night breeze, moonlight streaming down over her porcelain face, illuminating the freckles along her nose. “The kids recovered quickly from the disturbing news reports. By supper, they were acting like nothing had happened.”

“You were good with them in the cafeteria.” As they walked onto the playground, he squeezed her hand, a privilege he didn’t take for granted. “You calmly talked them through the television report then kept them occupied with all the cookies they could eat.”

Her laugh rode the gritty wind that twisted swings until the chains clinked. “They’ll be upset later when they realize there’s no dessert for the rest of the week.”

“We’ll add an extra recess.” He punted the ball farther, toward the swing set.