Troubleshooters - Into The Night Part 46

"I'm scared, too, because I thought I was playing it safe. I thought I'd learned how to do that, how to protect myself, and I still got hurta"way worse than I antic.i.p.ated."

G.o.d in heaven, the man was serious. He was going to have this entire conversation in front of Dave and Angela and Liz. Dave was squirming, but Angie and Liz looked like they'd settled in for the show, all but ready to order popcorn from the waitress.

And Liz was a b.i.t.c.h and a half. Everything Muldoon said was going to be public knowledge by tomorrow morning, and he'd already said quite enough.

Joan stood up. "Excuse us," she said to them, smiling extra sweetly at Liz. "Let's take a walk," she told Muldoon.

He was blessedly silent, thank you, Jesus G.o.d, as they went down the stairs to the beach.

"Well, that was nifty," she said as they hit the soft sand. The wind was stronger down here, and she wrapped her arms around herself in an attempt not to freeze. "But I guess you couldn't have hired a skywriter and made it even more public, huh? That doesn't work too well at night."

"You're not going to get me to apologize for that," he told her. He was wearing far fewer layers than she was, but it was as if he didn't even notice the cold as they headed down the beach. "I am sorry about everything else, though." He shook his head, laughing softly. "I'm even sorry we slept together. I knew that would be a mistake from the first moment I saw you."

Joan stopped walking. "If that's supposed to be your idea of an apology, I'm not sure I want toa"

"I'm sorry, because even though I knew I'd end up hurt, what I didn't figure was that I'd end up hurting you, too. That's what I'm sorry about That's the last thing I wanted, please believe me. Those things I said to you were..." He shook his head. "I've never spoken to a woman like that before in my life. I've always just... I don't know. Crawled away to lick my wounds, I guess."

Spotlights from the hotel lit the beach for only a short distance. After that, it was entirely up to the moonlight.

Joan pulled a strand of her hair out of her mouth as they started walking again. "The things you said to me were honest," she told him quietly. "I'm the one who should be apologizing to you."

"No. You came and found me this afternoon," he told her. "According to the gigolo handbook, I was supposed to lie and tell you that something came up this morning, and of course I would never have sent Steve in my place if it wasn't vitally important. I was supposed to sweet-talk you and kiss you and tell you everything you wanted to hear until you agreed to see me again tonight. But I was angry and frustrated and .. . Jesus, I'm just going to say it, okay? My heart was breaking. All because you were sixteen hours late."

And okay. That bit about the breaking heart made her fail to comment about his "gigolo handbook" crack. In fact, she couldn't think of anything to say at all.

"Talk about being scared to death," he continued, the wind sweeping his hair into his eyes and then back out again. "I knew I was being irrational. I knew it was because of ... some intense thing I've got going here for you. And I couldn't play by the rules. When we first made love, Joan, I swear, I went into it the way I always go into a short-term relationship. Thinking what will be, will be. Don't think about tomorrow. Just, you know, get laid. As often as possible. Have a good time. I was completely intending to let it just play out all the way to the end, all the way to the point where you got on that plane and went home. But I couldn't do it." He struggled to find the words, to explain. "See, getting over you after just one night was ... really hard. I mean, I haven't managed to do it yet. I'm still ... But all I could think about was how much worse it was going to feel after a couple of weeks. I just... it'll be bad."

He laughed in disgust. "But this is bad, too. I want to be with you while you're here. Life is too short not to take chancesa"I was reminded of that today in a major way. So here I am. You want to give me part of your next three weeks, I'll take it. We can even do this one day at a time, if you want. It's your call."

It's your call. Joan kept on walking, afraid to look at him, afraid to speak. He honestly saw himself as insignificant and disposable. Someonea"or a lot of someonesa"had taught him that he wasn't worth keeping. How sad was that?

He was living what was usually a woman's nightmarea"his relationships were defined by his image as a s.e.xual object. She had been wrong this afternoon when she called him a coward. He'd been trying to maintain some self-respect, and from a person whose sense of self-esteem as an equal partner in a relationship was close to zero, he had, in fact, been valiantly strong.

But here he was. Ready to surrender and take whatever she was willing to give him. Ready to give up total control.

What would he do if she said, Okay, bucko. Let's try ten years.

Oh, G.o.da"and wasn't that a scary thought? There was no way she was going to say that. She sympathized, sure. And she cared for him. Deeply. Far more than she wanted to. But she couldn't be the woman who would show him that he was wrong, that he was the least disposable man she'd ever met. She just couldn't do it.

"Michael," she finally said.

He grabbed her and swung her around, pulling her hard into his arms, and kissed her.

And, oh my G.o.d. The man could kiss.

"Don't say it," he said, between attacks on her mouth with his. "Whatever it was you were going to say. Let's just go back to your room. G.o.d, I want you. I want to be inside you again. Let's just have it be completely about s.e.x for right now, okay? We don't have to talk, we don't have to think. Let's just get it on all night long and all tomorrow night anda""

"Michael..."

When he kissed her like that, she was ready to agree with anything he said. She was ready to tell him anything, promise him everything else.

"Mike..."

But none of it would be the truth.

"Michael, stop!"

He stopped kissing her, but he didn't let her go. He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers.

"I'm sorry, too," she said. "I'm really sorry. I'm going to be completely honest with you and please don't hate mea"'

"I won't," he said. "I couldn't."

"You were mostly right," she admitted. "What you said this afternoon. I'm ashamed to say it, but you were going to be just part of what I did on my summer vacation. And when I went home... I would've called you back, absolutely I would have tried, but we probably would have just played phone tag. And even if we did connect, I wouldn't have time to talk for very long. You probably wouldn't either and... G.o.d, I don't have time for a relationship with a man who lives down the street from me. There's no way I could sustain something long distance. We'd end up hating each other."

"Okay," he said, opening his eyes and pulling back slightly to look at her. "So, okay. We let it end after a few weeks. At least we get these weeks, right?"

Joan shook her head. "I don't think that's such a good idea anymore. And you really don't want that, either. I mean, it's one thing to pretend that there's a chance of a future, but actually to know that the relationship is doomed from the start... ?"

He let go of her. Forced a smile. Pretended he was joking. "Ah, Joan, you're going to make me beg, aren't you?"

"Don't," she said. "Please. Unless..."

"Unless what?"

"Unless you plan to quit being a SEAL or to transfer easta"" Joan laughed, rubbing her forehead. Where had this terrible headache come from? She needed a warm, dark room and at least four hours of uninterrupted sleep. "I can't believe the words that are coming out of my mouth." She turned and started walking rapidly back to the hotel. "Forget I said that, all right?"

"Maybe we should talk about it," Muldoon said. She was practically running, and all he had to do was lengthen his stride a little to keep up. "I mean, you're not going to work at the White House forever, are you?"

"I might. G.o.da"and the American votersa"willing. I love my job, Mike."

"Well, I do, too, but I can tell you right now that there's no way I'm going to be a SEAL forever," he said. "My knee's already screwed upa"I took at least three years off of my career with that one. I have maybe ten years left before I can't hold my own anymore. And the day I start slowing down the team is the day I leave."

"Perfect then," she said starting up the stairs to the deck of the hotel. "You want to see me again? I'll meet you right here on the beach ten years from tonight. I'll be the one who's approaching fifty. I'll wear a carnation in my lapel so you can recognize me beneath my wrinkles."

He laughed. "You'll be forty-two. That's nota" What am I saying? I don't want to wait ten years to see you again!"

She turned on the stairs to face him, and for once she was taller. "I don't want to do this," she said. "I do not. And you're scaring me because if I'm not careful, I'll start thinking we might actually have a chance. But we don't. There are too many obstacles for me to handlea"including our age difference, which completely freaks me out. I can't do it. I'm just... I'm not going to play this game with you. We had one night of s.e.xa"great s.e.xa"but you know what that means? Nothing. It means you're good in bed. Terrific. Thank you very much, it was wonderful, I loved every minute of it. You're a very sweet guy and you kiss like a dream and you know just where to touch me to make me crazy and I like you so much, I do, but I can't do this to you and most of all I can't do this to myself."

"Joana""

"This conversation is over," she told him, praying he would leave before she started to cry. "Please. Just let it go."

He opened his mouth as if he were going to speak, but then he closed it. And he nodded. "Can we still be friends?"

She laughed. "Yeah, right. Good friends, right? The kind of friends who have s.e.x? G.o.d, Muldoon, sometimes you are such a guy."

He followed her up the stairs. "Well, yes, okay, that would obviously be my preference, I won't lie about that, but that's not what I meant. I meant friends friends. As in no s.e.x. As in 'Hi, Joan, it's me, Mike. Are you free to meet in a crowded well-lit room where we can sit and have lunch and talk while we keep all of our clothes on?"

The deck was empty. Dave and Liz and Angle had gone inside. Where it was warm. Where sane people went when the wind was blowing hard off the Pacific. "I don't thinka""

"I like talking to you," he said softly. "Please don't take that away from me, too."

And what could she say to that? "All bets are off if you try to talk me into sleeping with you again."

"Fair enough."

s.h.i.t. She wasn't sure she could be his friend after being his lover.

"Please," he said.

"All right. G.o.d."

"All right." He smileda"much more widely and happily than she would have thought possible. "All right. We've got a walk-through of the dog and pony showa"the demo for the presidenta"in the morning. You'll be there, right?"

"Yes," she said. "It's on my schedule."

"Okay," he said. "I'll see you tomorrow then."

And with that he walked away, leaving her to wonder why on earth he seemed so pleased with this arrangement. Friendship and no s.e.x.

No s.e.x, provided, of course, that she could keep her hands off of him.

G.o.d, he probably thought that she wouldn't be able to resist him.

"I'm not sleeping with you again," she called after him. "Really. I'm very strong when it comes to temptation."

He just waved and kept on walking.

What are you going to do if she's alive...

Sam stood in the hallway outside of Alyssa's hotel room for twenty minutes before he even got close enough to the door to knock.

He shouldn't be here. He knew that. But he just wanted to see her. To look into her eyes and know that she really was okay.

She'd had five st.i.tches after being cut by flying gla.s.sa" little more than a scratch compared to Jules who, last time Sam checked, was finally out of ICU.

Even Jules's injuriesa"getting plugged in the shoulder and the thigha"were nothing compared to those of FBI agent Carla Ramirez. Ramirez had been shot in the head and p.r.o.nounced DOA at Mission Bay Memorial Hospital.

The news had trickled to Sam maddeningly slowly. The first thing he'd heard was that two FBI agents had been shot, one fatally.

Then, that the fatally wounded agent was a female who'd been part of Max's team off and on over the past few years. Just like Alyssa.

The fatally wounded agent was a woman of color. Just like Alyssa.

When Sam had heard that, he'd thrown up. He'd been in that meeting finalizing the details of the dog and pony show, and Jenk had slunk in and handed him a message that was really supposed to go to Commander Paoletti. The note said that the name of the deceased agent wasn't being released yet, but the agent in the hospital was definitely Jules Ca.s.sidy. Sam pa.s.sed it over to the CO, excused himself, and went into the nearest head and puked until his stomach was empty.

He'd been that certain Alyssa was dead.

But it was while he was in there, sitting on the bathroom floor and wondering how he was going to pick himself up and walk back into that other room, that Jazz came in.

"Her name's Ramirez," he told Sam. "The DOA is FBI agent Carla Ramirez."

And so it was someone else who was grieving tonight. More than one someone, actually. Ramirez had a husband and a couple of kids. Sam had met the woman only a few times when Team Sixteen had worked with the FBI counter-terrorist team. He didn't know her very well at all, but the one time they'd talked, she'd mentioned her kids.

He didn't know her well, but he knew Max Bhagat's/ reputation. If she was on his team, she was one of the agency's best.

And Sam knew that if Carla Ramirez could die on this op, then Alyssa could be blown away on the next.

And all the thoughts he'd had while he was sitting on that bathroom floora"things that he knew he should have told Alyssa before she dieda"kept echoing in his head.

Which brought him here.

To the hallway outside her hotel room.

So what was it going to be?

To knock or not to knock?

Okay, work this through. Say he knocks. She answers the door and he says... ?

What?

"Are you okay?"

It was simple, it got right to the point. It conveyed his concern without giving away the fact mat he'd been frantic about her just a few hours ago.

But there she would be. Standing there in front of him. Of course she was okay. It was simple and to the point, sure, but it was also stupid as s.h.i.t. "Are you okay?" Well, yeah...

Unless, of course, she realized that he wasn't talking about her physical okay-ness, but instead her emotional well-being.

So, okay. Take that a little bit further. How about, "I heard about Jules. The hospital wouldn't let me see him, but the word is he's going to be all right. Have you heard anything? That must've been tough to go through, thinking your partner might die. Are you okay?"

Uh, no. Way too long and complicated. And, Jesus, it sounded like he was in love with Jules and had rushed to see him upon receiving word that he was injured. Not quite the message Sam wanted to send, even if he had stopped at the hospital on his way over here.

How about, "I was sure you were dead for about ten minutes tonight, and I puked my guts out because I couldn't bear the thought of a world without you in it. Even though we're not sharing our lives, Lys, I know you're out there and I think about you and miss you every f.u.c.king day."

Make that "every single day." He had to keep the f.u.c.king out of everything here. Out of his language and out of his head as well. He couldn't even think about her that way right now. That's not why he was here. He didn't want her opening up this door and knowing that one of the first thoughts that came into his mind whenever he saw her had to do with him licking every inch of her body.

Which he actually had done. A million years and another lifetime ago.

Sam took a deep breath and cracked his neck. Okay. He was going to do it. He didn't know exactly what he was going to say, but he'd think of something. He always did better anyway, thinking on his feet. He raised his hand and knocked on the door.

Nothing. No movementa"at least none that he could hear.

He knocked again, louder.

And there it was. Stirring from within. Then the sound of feet against the carpeting, coming closer to the door.