Troubleshooters - Into The Night Part 14

Perfect. Now she was blushing, too. She was about to matter-of-fact her way through it, though, when Upstairs Sally came home. Loudly.

Her sitting room wasn't directly overhead, but her footsteps still managed to sound as if she were flamenco dancing on Charlotte's ceiling.

The radio went on. Benny Goodman was at a high enough volume almost to mask the sound of voices. Sally's high-pitched laughter. And a second voice. A low rumble of a voice.

Her heart sinking, Charlotte looked at her watch. It was 5:45 in the evening. And Sally had already brought her date home.

Rapid footsteps sounded overhead and the laughter got louder. They were in Sally's bedroom now, and from the sound of things, Sally was being chased over and around her bed.

There was a sudden giggling shriek as the bedsprings above gave a loud creak.

Whoever he was, he'd caught her.

At this point, there would usually be a few moments of silence, as Sally and her friend undressed. But whoever this "friend" was, he was in a hurry. Because it wasn't more than five seconds before the bed upstairs started creaking. Rhythmically.

Unmistakably.

And the laughter turned to moaning.

Poor Vincent was as embarra.s.sed as she was. Maybe even more so. If that was possible.

Charlotte all but ran for the door. "I'll go see about dinner." But then she turned back. The polite thing to do in mixed company was simply to ignore the fact that her upstairs neighbor was fornicating loudly, but unlike her, Vince couldn't run from the racket. She simply couldn't leave him there without saying, "I'm so sorry about this."

He'd already picked up the book again, but now he closed it, one finger holding his place. "It's not your fault that the walls and floors are so thin. He's probably home on furlough."

"Her husband died in the war."

That made him pause for only a moment. Then, "I guess everyone has their own way of dealing with their grief," he said quietly.

"Well, she 'deals with her grief endlessly," Charlotte told him. "Nightly. It gets tiresome after a while. Trust me. The night can be very long."

"I spent a night pinned down by the enemy," Vince said. "We dug ourselves into the sand, on the beach. Me and a guy who'd had his leg... who'd been badly wounded. I spent the night listening to him crying for his mother."

Charlotte couldn't speak, couldn't move.

"That was a long night," Vince told her as Upstairs Sally achieved fulfillment with a quavering scream.

"I'm sorry," she managed to whisper, then pushed herself out the door.

Chapter 8.

"RUMOR HAS IT that your little 'oh, it was nothing' knee injury was in fact a broken kneecap," Joan said as Mike Muldoon approached.

He was wearing his uniform again today. It couldn't have been more white than anyone else's, yet on him, it truly seemed to glow.

For a moment he looked as if he were about to turn around and walk back into the restaurant's parking lot, where he'd left his truck. But instead he smiled. It was definitely forced. "There're always lots of rumors circulating," he said. "You've got to take 'em all with a grain of salt."

"So you didn't break your kneecap in Afghanistan," she clarified.

"No comment."

She rolled her eyes. This again. "I'm not the press."

"And I'm not at liberty to talk about where I may or may not have been and what I may or may not have done there, particularly in terms of the A-word," he countered. "Joan, do we really have to fight again today? Because I was kind of looking forward to having an indigestion-free lunch."

Joan was nervous, and it was true, she tended to pick fights when she was nervous.

It was weird. She'd purposely given Muldoon the kid brother speech last night on the phone, and he'd seemed to accept it readily enough. Except now she was the one who needed convincing. Seeing him face-to-face again, in all his shiny, youthful Navy SEAL splendor was enough to make her forget her own name, let alone her resolve not to wake up in a few weeks' time with a raft load of regrets and a new skeleton for her closet. She had career aspirationsa"and hers was a world where skeletons didn't stay inside of closets for very long.

She cleared her throat. "The men in your team really love you. Am I allowed to say that?"

Muldoon shook his head. "Definitely not. They can admire and respect me, but love? The word's not in the working SEAL vocabulary. At least not in reference to teammates, thank you very much."

She laughed. He was smiling, too, and this time it was more genuine. "I really am sorry about yesterday," he added as he held open the door to the restaurant, "and I really do appreciate your willingness to have lunch with me."

"I thought I already forgave you last night," she said, taking off her sungla.s.ses and letting her eyes adjust to the lack of blinding sunlight inside. "Although, if you're really that contrite, I'll let you make it up to me by telling me where most of Team Sixteen were this morning, all morning. Training, I'll bet. But what kind of training?"

"Joan, there are things I can't tell you, no matter how contrite I am. You know this. Don't pretend you don't. I cannot answer any questions that are about past, present, or future operations." She opened her mouth, but he stopped her. "Yes, you can shout about your security clearance until you're blue in the face. You can even proposition mea"promise me kinky s.e.x till we both drop from exhaustiona"but it won't do any good. You can marry me, for crying out loud, bear my children, and spend the next fifty years with me. But I still can't and won't answer questions about operations." He stepped up to the hostess. "Table for two. Near the windows, please."

The young woman flashed her dimples at Muldoon as she gave him a very deliberate once-over. It took her far less time to size up Joan. "One moment, Lieutenant." She vanished into the restaurant, and Muldoon turned back to Joan.

Avoid, avoid, avoid his kinky s.e.x comment. She had to ignore it as completely as she ignored that dismissive look from that hostess b.i.t.c.h. Don't take that bait, Joan. Don't do it. He was testing her, but she was strong.

"Okay," she told him.

Her surrender completely caught him off guard. The expression on his face was comical. "Okay? Just like that, okay?"

"Are you really going to argue about my agreeing with you?" she said. "Aren't you the one who wanted an indigestion-free lunch?"

"Yes, buta""

"If I ask you a question that you can't or won't answer, you just say pa.s.s. Is that okay? It's easier than me trying to figure out what I can and can't ask. This way I'll just ask everything and you can be the censor."

He was looking at her as if he were wishing he could climb into her head to find out what she was really up to.

"Lieutenant Muldoon. What a pleasure."

Joan turned to see sheer perfection holding out a manicured hand and smiling up at Mike Muldoon. Pet.i.te and blue-eyed with perfectly coiffed honey-blond hair and a figure reminiscent of Pamela Anderson's, perfection wore Armani today and carried a handbag that matched her high-heeled shoes.

On closer inspection, perfection was in her early to mid-forties, but since she could probably still cause a riot by wearing a bikini, that quite possibly made her even more perfect.

Muldoon shook the outstretched perfect hand, morphing neatly into his too-polite evil twin. "Mrs. Tucker. How are you, ma'am?"

Tucker, Tucker. Joan had heard that name before. And she couldn't deny she got a charge of s.a.d.i.s.tic delight in hearing perfection get blatantly ma'am-ed.

"Call me Laurel, please, and I'm wonderful. Larry's gone to D.C. for a few daysa"it's always a nice break to have him out of the house." Her voice was as perfect as the rest of her. Musical and sweetly sultry. Shades of Barbara Eden's Jeannie. Thank you, Master. "You remember my daughter, Lindsey."

Lurking behind perfection was a skinny, freckle-faced teenager with short brown curls and a bad habit of biting her fingernails.

Muldoon nodded at the girl. "Yes, I do."

Oh, poor little Lindsey. Joan couldn't imagine how hard it would be to go through life with perfection for a mother. Talk about difficult childhoods. How could the entire world not compare them and find the daughter lacking? The whispers and stares must be excruciating.

And poor Lindsey was too young yet to know that the best men, the worthwhile mena"the ones worth having and sometimes even keepinga"didn't want anything to do with perfection.

Muldoon, who was doing his SEAL robot impression with real finesse, turned to Joan with his polite smile carefully in place. "This is Joan DaCosta. She's on staff at the White House and in town for a couple of weeks."

Joan felt the warmth of his hand at her waist and realized that he'd actually put his arm around her. As if they were there on a real date. As if lunch weren't the most nonromantic meal of the day.

Perfect Mrs. Tuckera"whom Joan finally remembered was married to the skeevy admiral with the thinning haira"had a dead-fish handshake. "Lovely to meet you, Joan. I'm Laurel."

"Nice meeting you both," she said. Lindsey didn't seem to want to shake her hand. The girl was fiercely occupied by a hangnail.

"Lieutenant, your table is ready." The hostess b.i.t.c.h was back, holding a pair of menus.

"Please excuse us," Muldoon said. "Mrs. Tucker. Lindsey."

He kept his hand on Joan's waist all the way to their table, only letting her go to hold out her chair for her.

She waited until he'd sat down and the hostess had handed them both menus. By that time, her imagination had gone into overdrive.

"Don't you dare," she said, leaning across the table so that she could speak in a low voice, "tell me that there's something going on between you and Laurel." She imitated the way the woman spoke.

He laughed, and just like that the robot SEAL was gone and Mike Muldoon was back. "Why not? She's pretty hot. Don't you think she's hot?"

"Oh, my G.o.d, Michael!" She put down her menu without giving it a glance. "Were you..."

She shut her mouth, able only to make questioning, disbelieving eyes at him, as a waiter brought them bread and filled their gla.s.ses with water. Finally he left, and she leaned closer to Muldoon again, lowering her voice even more. "Were you trying to make her jealous or something? Was that what that was? You know, the arm around me thing?"

"Jealous? Wow, no," he said, with a laugh. "I was just... I don't know. She freaks me out a little. She's always there when I turn around, like she's maybe looking for some play, or ... I don't know, it's probably just my imagination, but I thought if she thought I was involved with someone..."

"Like that would stop her. I thought she was going to drool on your hand. I mean, h.e.l.lo, subtlety! News bulletin just in: Larry's gone to D.C. for a few days. Why don't you come up and see me sometime, sailor? Talk about blatant. And right in front of her daughter. s.h.i.t. Ain't no maybe here, babe. She wants your a.s.s."

Muldoon smiled weakly. "Maybe you're right."

"Maybe again." She couldn't remember the last time she'd laughed so much. "Come on."

"I'm pretty sure she's just playing a game. You know, just flirting with me."

"Honey, she was looking at you as if you were dessert, and today was National Break-the-Diet Day."

He glanced across the room to where Laurel and Lindsey were being seated with a woman who looked as if her bathroom mirror was a time portal to 1983. Big hair. Big hair.

"I don't know," he said, shaking his head. "Her husband's a player. I think on some level it would really appeal to her, you know, to sleep with a SEAL to get back at him for all the times he's cheated. Particularly since he's not a fan of SpecWar, and in particular since he's not a fan of Team Sixteen. Some of the guys think I should play out the scenario, see what she'd actually do if I responded to one of her innuendoes, but I can't do that. I mean, what if she's serious? Then what do I do? She's married And I don't mess around with women who are married. Even if they are hot."

That was what was holding him back? She was married? "But, ew, isn't she, like, too ..." Joan couldn't think of the right word.

"Old?" he suggested.

"Yes," she said. "Yes! Old. She's old enough to be your mother."

"Actually, my mother had me pretty late in life. She just turned seventy, soa""

"I didn't mean literally, Einstein. I meant in theory. Laurel Tucker's got to be fifteen or twenty years older than you. That's creepy."

"Why?"

He was serious.

"Because it is," Joan told him.

"No, it's not. Susan Sarandon's almost thirty years older than me. She's been my fantasy date for years. Still is: She's in her fifties and I'd do her in a heartbeat. Whoa, that was pretty crude. Sorry."

"Crude, schmood. I'm thrilled to death to find out that beneath that glowing exterior, you're a real, normal, red-blooded human male."

"Yeah, I'm not sure about normal," Muldoon told her with a laugh.

"Susan Sarandon, huh? That's... very interesting."

"Put her in black leather, and I wouldn't even care if she had a significant other or not. All rules would go right out the window."

Mike Muldoona"the closest thing to an angel in all of SEAL Team Sixteen, h.e.l.l, in probably all of the SEAL teams on both coasts of the U.S.a"liked black leather when worn by mature celebrities. Oh, dear. Joan didn't know whether to laugh hysterically or run out of the restaurant. "Next you're going to tell me you're into domination."

She'd meant it as a joke, but he just smiled. "Yeah, well, put a whip in her hand and I'm not running away."

She couldn't manage to keep her mouth shut or even change the subject to something more safe, more staid. "Susan Sarandon's skinny, isn't she? I thought you didn't like skinny women."

"Actually she's extremely curvaceous. Go rent Bull Durham. I think she was a few years older than you when she made that movie. That was the one that made me completely fall in l.u.s.t with her." He held out the basket of bread to her.

It was Italian with sesame seeds on the top. Joan took a piece, and he did then, too.

G.o.d, he was about as subtle as Laurel Tucker with this talk of older women. She helped herself to some b.u.t.ter and tried to pa.s.s it to Muldoon, but he shook his head. "No thanks."

Joan knew exactly what he was doing here and it was not going to work. Even if he was sincere, which he certainly seemed to be, the rest of the world didn't have his open-minded perspective.

So, okay. Maybe she should try her "bad idea for people who work together to date" speech, because apparently the "little brother/let's be best friends" approach wasn't working. Or maybe it would work, if she just kept reinforcing it, the way she'd planned.

She b.u.t.tered her bread. "What do you think about Brooke Bryant? Hot or not so hot?"

He didn't hesitate. "Very hot. Another woman who's not too thin." Or too young. He didn't have to say ita"she could read that loud and clear from the look in his eyes.

"Actually, she yo-yos," Joan told him, ignoring both his eyes and his unspoken message. "I know her pretty well."