Army of Two (7 page)

“They’d hear the motor.”

“Not if we paddle it far enough and then keep it at low throttle.”

She rubbed her hand against her leg. He made it sound easy. He was deliberately downplaying the risk. There were countless things that could go wrong, yet what other choice did they have? “We don’t have to go back by the road,” she said. “There’s a hiking trail that runs along the base of the hill, closer to the lake. It’s shorter.”

“Then we’re agreed.”

“Yes, I guess we are.”

“Great.” Mitch touched his index finger to her chin. “And for the record, I could never confuse you with one of my men, Chantal. They wouldn’t dare to question my orders.” He moved his finger to her lip. “Not as often or as openly as you do, anyway.”

In spite of the headache, pleasure zinged through her heightened nerves. Beneath his touch, her lip throbbed. And just like that, the urge to kiss him returned.

It was the situation, she told herself. Her emotions were raw. This urge had to be the result of some primitive, physical reaction to the excitement of their escape. It meant nothing. She tipped her head, breaking the contact. “And that’s the only difference?” she asked.

He was still looking at her mouth. “Hell, no.”

She could feel his gaze as vividly as she’d felt his touch. In spite of what she’d just told herself, the pleasure spread.

“You’ve become a beautiful woman, Chantal. You didn’t really think I hadn’t noticed, did you?”

Deep inside, the girl she used to be pumped her arms in the air and did a twirl of triumph. There was a time when she would have given anything to get a compliment like that from Mitch and to see the interest in his eyes.

But that was all the more reason she shouldn’t believe what she saw or trust what she felt. Too many echoes from the past remained. Sunlight glinted from his wedding band. The noise of the stream beyond him sounded like distant laughter. “I would never presume to guess what you notice about me, Mitch, or what you think. We both know I was dead wrong before.”

“Chantal…”

“So thank you for the compliment, but considering what you called our history, and the problems we need to deal with right now, I don’t think this is a topic we should pursue.”

Chapter 5

T
he wind died with the approach of dusk, leaving the lake as smooth as glass. A loon was calling again. Its plaintive cry echoed across the water and reflected from the rock slope beneath the Aerie. Though the lodge was hidden by the trees and the curve of the hill, the next bend in the trail gave Mitch an unobstructed view of the boathouse. He halted to study it.

Like the other buildings he’d seen here, it had been constructed of logs, except the ones used on the boathouse were smaller in circumference and aligned vertically instead of horizontally. It was roughly square, with two windows on each side, a pair of double doors like a garage in the front and one man-door at the back. The limited access points would have made it a potential trap, if not for the fact it sat over the water.

“Is there electricity in the boathouse?” Mitch asked. “I don’t remember seeing any cable running down the hill.”

Chantal moved beside him. A layer of pine needles muffled her footsteps. “There are solar panels on the roof,” she said. “They’re enough to power the lights and the cooler, but there’s less chance of being seen if we use flashlights.”

“Hang on. Did you say ‘cooler?’ As in food?”

“As in bait. Night crawlers and minnows.” She paused. “You and your men might be trained to live off the land and subsist on grubs and such, but I’ll hold out until we get to Waterfalls.”

He heartily agreed, although the prospect of getting a square meal was fast becoming as urgent as getting help. He and Chantal had found berries and plenty of clean water to keep up their energy during the day, yet without proper nourishment, they would start losing their strength as well as their judgment. “Where are the flashlights?”

“There’s an equipment cabinet inside the boathouse. That’s where we store life vests and other boating supplies. There should be a few Maglights in there.”

“In that case, we’ll be able to wait until full dark before we go in. That’s good. It’ll give us a chance to make sure the place is empty.”

“You said they wouldn’t be expecting us. They think we’re dead.”

“It never hurts to be careful. If I were in command up there,” he said, gesturing toward the top of the hill, “I wouldn’t be taking anything for granted.” He leaned his back against a tree at the side of the trail so he could shift his weight to his right leg. “How’s your head?”

“Better. How’s your ankle?”

Rather than lie, he shrugged. The ankle hurt like hell, but it would have been a lot worse if not for the improvised wrap Chantal had provided. It hadn’t helped in the way she’d intended, though. The blouse hadn’t yielded enough fabric to give much support to the joint. Its chief benefit was as a distraction.

The garment had been against Chantal’s skin. It had still carried her scent and the warmth of her body when she’d given it to him. So instead of being aware of the pain with each step he took, he found himself thinking about where the blouse had been. And how she had stripped in his presence. What would have happened if he’d turned his head at that moment? What would he have seen?

He’d already noticed that her breasts were larger than they used to be. The years had added fullness. Was her skin still as creamy? Were her nipples still as pink?

The image of the night he and Chantal had parted flashed through his mind. Again. He clenched his teeth and shoved it away. He had no business remembering those details. It was sick. She’d been a kid.

That’s what he used to tell himself, anyway. It hadn’t been entirely accurate. As she’d reminded him already, she’d been eighteen the last time he’d seen her. She might have had the innocence of a girl, but it had been damn hard to view her like one when she’d been naked.

There was no question that she was all woman now. Had she felt the same spark of chemistry that he had back there by the stream? Or had he read those looks on her face wrong?

“Are you sure you’re all right? You seem in pain.”

He had to find a better way to distract himself. If his thoughts continued in this direction, he’d have a whole different problem. “I’m fine.”

“I can get the launch out on my own and pick you up here.”

“I said I’m fine.”

She stepped closer. “You might want to keep your voice down. Sound can travel for miles over water on an evening like this.”

Mitch rubbed his face, squeezing his jaw until the scratches on it stung. What the hell was wrong with him? How many times had he warned his men not to let their personal feelings get involved when they were on a mission? He’d never imagined he’d be reminding himself. Granted, this might not be an official mission, but he had to approach it that way. Regardless of how attractive he found his teammate, he had to keep a clear head and remember his priorities. Their lives could depend on it. “How are you with guns?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

He unslung the AK47 from his shoulder and held it out to her. “Ever used one of these?”

Chantal made no move to take it. “What? No!”

“It’s a relatively simple weapon. See this lever on the side?” He turned the right side toward her. “It’s a combination safety and fire selector.”

“Why are you showing me?”

“You need to know how to use this in case I can’t.”

“Well, that had better not happen because I could never shoot anyone.”

“You’d be surprised what you’re capable of when your life’s at stake.” He took her hand and placed it beneath the stock of the gun. “Here.”

She flexed her fingers under his. “There’s no point.”

“If you handle it as if you know what you’re doing, that might be enough. You might never need to fire it.” He took her other hand and put it over the safety. “First step, memorize where this is.”

She held herself stiffly. He could see the revulsion on her face and something more, a trace of real fear. It took her a while before she was willing to grasp the weapon herself. Her arms dipped. “It’s heavier than it looks,” she said.

It was almost nine pounds. Twice as much as the M16s his men preferred to use. “Try lifting it to your shoulder.”

She did as he instructed. She winced as the strap caught a lock of her hair.

He helped her ease it loose, then showed her how to hold the pistol grip and directed the barrel of the gun toward the ground. “Important lesson: only point at what you intend to shoot.”

“I’ve always hated guns, Mitch. I really don’t think I can do this.”

“Look at it as a tool. It won’t do anything without your consent. You’re the one in charge. Now, where’s the safety?”

She seemed as if she wanted to protest again, but practicality apparently won. She tilted the gun to the side and set her fingers where he’d shown her.

“Right.” He put his hand over hers again and guided her through the motions. “All the way up means it’s safe. One notch down means full automatic fire.” He moved the lever down, then down again. “The bottom position is single shot, but you’d be better off keeping it on automatic. It can fire ten rounds a second, so as long as you do a steady sweep you’re bound to hit what you’re aiming at.”

She shuddered. “Are you done?”

“Not yet.” He returned the lever to the top setting then moved her fingers to the trigger. “Do you feel that? It’s directly under the safety.”

“Okay.”

“So when you need to shoot, just move the safety down and squeeze the trigger.”

“And that’s it?”

“That’s it.”

She pulled the gun from her shoulder and thrust it back into his hands. “Thanks for the crash course, but I hope I’ll never need it.”

So did he. The grip was slick from the sweat on her palms. Her dislike of guns was genuine. It was a curious thing for a general’s daughter, like her professed dislike of the army. “Why do you hate guns?” he asked.

“Where should I start? They’re ugly.” She wiped her hands on her jeans. “They smell like metal. They kill people. And they scare me.”

“Why do they scare you?”

“What difference does it make?”

“I’d like to understand.”

“For the good of our team? Morale of the troops?”

“You told me earlier that I don’t know you,” he said. He set the butt of the gun on the ground and leaned it against the tree beside him. “I think you’re right. I’m trying to remedy that.”

She looked away. Her right hand moved absently against her thigh, rubbing at a spot to the outside of her knee. At first it didn’t appear as if she would answer him. Then she blew out a wobbly breath and spoke. “Did you ever see my father’s gun collection?”

He remembered it vividly. The general had been exceedingly proud of the assortment of handguns he’d accumulated over the years. They’d included everything from a muzzle-loading relic of the Revolutionary War to a stainless steel Colt Anaconda. “Yes, I did. It was impressive.”

“He kept it in a huge glass case that hung on the wall. No matter where we were posted, that case got moved with us. One of my earliest memories is my father lifting me up to show me the guns. He’d always be careful to keep the case locked when he wasn’t around.”

“That’s good to hear.”

“He knew how much damage they could inflict. He used to tell me exactly how dangerous they were. That’s another one of my early memories.”

“Do you think he overdid it?”

“Oh, no. He did the right thing. He taught me they weren’t toys. I knew better than to touch them.”

“So what happened?”

She crossed her arms and rubbed her palms over her jacket sleeves. The temperature had been dropping as the sun lowered, though it wasn’t yet cold. Mitch suspected whatever chill she felt was from something else. “When I was around six,” she said, “I came home from school and found that the case was open. My father was away, as he often was. My mother knew where he kept the key, because she was the one who had to deal with all the details of packing and unpacking whenever we moved. When I saw the case open, I thought we were moving again.”

“Were you?”

“No.” Her voice dropped. “My mother…had an accident.”

“What kind of accident?”

“She was handling one of the guns and it went off.”

“Was anyone hurt?”

“No. I helped her clean up so no one would know. After that, I didn’t even want to look at a gun.”

Mitch suspected there was more to the story. For one thing, the officer he’d known and admired wouldn’t have kept loaded weapons in his display case. That just didn’t fit. For another, he didn’t think that having to sweep up some shattered china or crystal would have been enough to give Chantal such an aversion to weapons.

On the other hand, he was thinking of
this
Chantal, the one who had been proving her courage and resourcefulness all day. She’d kept her cool under fire. She had hiked for miles without complaint, even though she’d been hungry and her head had probably been killing her.

There had been plenty of changes in the last seventeen years. A lot of them were more subtle than the size of her breasts.

“It’s ironic, isn’t it?” she mused.

Yes, it
was
ironic. There had been a time when his main problem had been how to discourage her from chasing him. Now he was the one becoming preoccupied with her.

But he knew that wasn’t what she was talking about. “What is?”

“That I hate guns, even though the Aerie’s current client happens to head one of the country’s largest arms manufacturers.”

“Not really. You’ve made a success of this place, so you must be a practical woman. You wouldn’t let your personal feelings interfere with your business.”

“That’s true. I wouldn’t.”

“The same way you’re not letting your dislike of me stop us from working together.”

“I don’t dislike you, Mitch. I don’t think I know you well enough.”

He was surprised into a laugh. “Ouch.”

A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “That didn’t come out right. What I meant was that my memories of you were colored by what I wanted you to be. I couldn’t see past my crush. Now that it’s behind us, I’m not sure who you are.”