Free Fall (17 page)

Fuck. He hated how damn agonized the words sounded when he said them.

She swatted his shoulder. “Jeez-Louise, Jose. You are so damn dramatic. It’s going to be okay.” She tapped his temple. “Think about it. We love each other. You’re just stressed right now, and I get that the kind of work we do is rough on the nerves. We’ll get home, indulge in a full week of jam and tantric sex…”

“Stop, Stella.” He eased her off him and stood, yanking on his shorts. “Going home will only make things tougher, not easier. The
me
out here in the field, that’s the better
me
, and I’m still struggling.”

At least she didn’t laugh. She quickly pulled on her bra and panties, avoiding his eyes. He sat beside her again, watching her warily as she stared off in the distance.

An ostrich ambled by on lopey legs, staying way clear of the rhinos on the other side of the lake. The smell of syrupy jam clung to her skin and he just wanted to roll her underneath him and make love again. But after four months with Stella, he knew her pensive face and she wouldn’t budge until she’d sorted through all the “facts” in her mind.

Finally, she sat again, hugging her knees, her spine so vulnerable, at odds with her indomitable air. “You’ve spent over five years pushing yourself to the limit in one of the most stressful jobs there is. You’ve gone overseas, seen combat, natural disasters, and no one would have faulted you if you’d cracked and taken a drink. But you didn’t.” She searched his face with those too wise and logical green eyes. “You’re an expert at running, Jose. Why do you doubt that you can go the distance in your personal life as well?”

“It’s not about the pace or the distance.” He toyed with the tail of her braid, brushing it along the back of her shoulders. “It’s the ‘afterward’ that has me worried, the everyday life part, the quiet moments. As long as I keep running, I’m good. When I stop, I crash.”

“A crash? Why not think of it as a cool down, relaxing and reveling in success? You don’t have to keep running until you burn out.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” He dropped her braid and scratched his collarbone, itchy from more than jam.

She stayed silent while an albatross flapped low over the water, then sighed hard, a forced smile on her face. “What made you start racing?”

He grasped the subject change with grateful hands. “I was a hyper kid. My grandma would make me run around the outside of the house until I got so tired I wouldn’t run around the inside.”

“Smart grandma.”

“Then I started running in school, especially near the end of high school.” He’d stuck around to avoid going home, taking on extra workouts and stints in the weight room.

“When your mom was drinking, after your grandmother got sick?”

“It was simpler for everyone if I stayed busy at school. Dad would swing by and pick me up on his way home. We made it work.” He started to stand.

She clasped his hand and tugged him back down beside her. “What about your niece and nephew? Are they into running? How old are they?”

“My niece is twelve and my nephew is eight. Madison is into soccer…” He paused, stuffing painful images to the far corners of his mind. “Michael swims.”

“Those are fun ages. My brothers and I were all athletic. Of course, I pretty much had to be if I wanted to keep up with them.”

“Paid off for you in the field,” he said, his breathing leveling out again as she veered off the subject of his family.

“You’re right there. Little did I know, all of our tree climbing to prove I wasn’t a scaredy-cat would help in survival and resistance training.”

He’d seen firsthand how tough she was in the field and right now he felt like the scaredy-cat, shaking at the thought of her injured, captured… Or dead. “What do your brothers think of your job?”

She crinkled her sunburned nose. “They’re under the impression I’m an interpreter for Interpol.”

“Good cover story. I guess ignorance
is
bliss.”

“I actually thought I might segue back into that field someday…” She looked at him through her eyelashes. “When I’m ready to settle down and have a couple of rug rats of my own.”

Time to veer off that topic ASAP.

He looped an arm around her waist and hauled her close. “Talking about kids when you smell like guava and sex feels somehow wrong to me.”

Pressing a hand to his chest, she arched her back. “Are you going to be
that
guy? The stereotypical dude we see in Hollywood movies who’s afraid to commit? I really expected more originality from you than that.”

Now that stung. “Call it what you want. I have a commander who’s on his fourth marriage. Stories like that can give a guy pause.”

“How’s his fourth marriage going?” She snapped the waistband on his shorts.

Damn, he loved her sass. “I believe he’s got a keeper this time,” he admitted begrudgingly. “Of course, he’s not in the field as much anymore. Good thing, since they have a kid on the way.”

“You’re not helping your case here. Any other tales of military life misery you want to share to shore up your argument?”

“You’re too smart, you know that, right?” His teammates and their wives were producing like rabbits these days. Brick and his wife had a new baby. So did his old teammate Hugh Franco.

“So it can be done,” she pressed, her smile tight. “You just don’t want to.”

“Roger.”

“Care to elaborate?”

“Not really.” Images of his nephew tormented him, little Michael scarred for life because he’d been neglected by an alcoholic mom too drunk to hear her child’s screams. Bianca had already been through rehab. They’d thought she’d turned her life around.

They’d grown complacent and Michael would pay the price for the rest of his life.

Jose refused to be complacent. Every day he fought the urge to take a drink and yes, so far he’d won. But this was his battle. He’d devoted his life to saving others on the job. How in the hell could he justify the risk of breaking the sacred promise of a parent to protect a child?

Intellectually, he understood from AA meetings that others found a way to rebuild a family life. But that didn’t stop the images of Michael for him. Only work offered him complete forgetfulness and he was beginning to realize Stella wouldn’t be able to accept that. Hell, she deserved more.

He slid an arm under her legs and lifted her against his chest. “Enough talking. I’d rather take you for a swim.”

He waded into the Shebelle River, knowing he’d only delayed the inevitable with Stella. They were headed for the crash…

***

Holding her sleeping body against him now as the sun rose on a new morning in Mogadishu, he let the memory of that afternoon kick around inside his head awhile longer. They hadn’t broken up that day, but it had marked the beginning of the end for them.

Orange gold rays just beginning to streak through the window reminded him their pocket of time—this unexpected last chance to be together—was ending. In less than an hour, he would have to wake her so they could report for duty.

Report in to do their jobs in a world where missions like this one were becoming too frequent, near brushes with the possibility of a cataclysmic attack. How long could they keep dousing these threats? Was he wrong to hold out on committing to Stella because of what might happen when time was already so damn precious?

No, damn it. Because he did love her, too much to risk adding another ticking time bomb to her life.

He kissed her shoulder lightly, whispering against her freckled skin, “Love you.”

Easing from the bed to shower alone, he left her.

***

Annie leaned against the wall in the back of the cafeteria where eight classes of students had been gathered to watch news footage streaming out of Mogadishu today. The broadcast was subtitled. Her stomach knotted. The lingering scent of goat liver from lunch made her nauseous.

The room was packed with wooden tables and chairs, and she couldn’t stop the illogical thought of how the number of people would be a fire code violation back in the States. She just needed to keep reminding herself that a school, home, and regular meals were tough to come by for children in this region, much less for orphans. This concrete building with a cracked foundation and peeling paint was a godsend to these kids.

She was making a difference here. Saving lives rather than taking them. And yes, there were days she wanted to rage in frustration over the lost children, the stolen lives, and unbearably poor odds for a free future. However, she couldn’t turn away. Teaching here, spending her life, being as much of a mother to these children as she knew how—that was her atonement for the harm she’d caused in the line of duty.

For abandoning her own children.

An arm’s reach away, an eleven-year-old girl named Khaali leaned back in her chair. “Why do we have to watch this, Mrs. Johnson?”

Khaali had lost her mother to a post-childbirth infection. Her father left the infant with her grandparents and disappeared. The grandparents were killed in an uprising three years ago and she’d been brought here. She was one of the lucky ones. She’d had a fairly stable, well-fed first eight years and hadn’t ended up on the streets after her grandparents were killed.

Luck was a relative thing in a country that stoned women to death.

Annie knelt beside her. “Because I teach you English, I also teach you about English-speaking countries. This is a visit by a very important American woman. She is the wife of the vice president of the United States. Look at all the celebration in place. This is a big deal.”

The television screen was filled with images of the pre-ceremonies keeping the crowd entertained while they waited for the plane to land. Dancers performed in regional garb. The colors and sounds of local culture drew Annie now, just as it had when she’d left the States. She loved this country and its people. She turned back to Khaali.

“Boring.” The girl tipped her chair back and forth.

“She cares what happens to you.” Annie palmed the back of the chair, gently forcing all four legs on the floor again. “She cares about things that are happening to young girls and boys in this country.”

Khaali stared at the television, twirling the edge of her long yellow headscarf between two fingers. “Do you really believe the words from one lady, a lady who just happens to be married to someone important, will bring back our friends, like Ajaya?”

A sense of hopelessness washed over her because no, she didn’t think this political visit would make any lasting difference. It was a gesture. She’d been idealistic a long time ago, but not anymore. Now she was a realist. She lived one day at a time, ensuring that for today, these children were fed, taught, loved.

And telling Khaali that would not make her feel in the least secure or loved.

So Annie settled for, “I believe her trip here is a good thing, maybe even a start of something bigger.”

“I believe her coming will only start trouble.”

Wise child. Then old instincts tugged at her, making her wonder. “Why do you say that?”

Khaali traced a scratched word in the tabletop. “No special reason.”

Two rows up, the uptight math teacher—Mr. Gueye—shushed them and Annie rose, stepping back to her post on the back wall, by the rear exit. She bumped against—not a wall.

Gasping, she turned. “Samir?”

She eased away. Public contact between men and women was a tricky thing, even here. But their dinner together last night had been… nice. Really nice.

She’d expected some elaborate wooing, but he’d opted for a simple dinner he cooked himself, followed by watching a video. The normalcy of that appealed to her on a far deeper level. She’d had delicacies around the world.

Normal was actually more the non-norm for her.

He pressed a finger to his mouth and moved into the hall. She followed without even thinking—because she wanted to be with him. She wanted to sit across the table from him and just gaze at his handsome face with a strong jaw and the most adorable scholarly glasses. Oddly in some ways he reminded her of her husband with his calming quiet manner. But back in her youth she hadn’t appreciated that—and then it had been too late. Their marriage crumbled. Her chance to go home was gone. Now he was dead.

“Annie?” he asked, frowning. “What is wrong?”

She swiped a hand over her mouth and realized she’d been frowning too. “This isn’t the time. I should stay with the children and I want to hear the speech.”

“They’re fine with Mr. Gueye and Miss Veronique. You have time. The guest of honor’s plane hasn’t even landed.” His deeply melodic accent washed over her frayed nerves. “Now tell me. What’s wrong?”

She surrendered. For now. “I’m not sure.”

“What Khaali said bothered you.” He touched her elbow so lightly she almost missed the contact as he steered her farther away from the cafeteria. “Why?”

The television grew softer, the low hum from other classes behind closed doors giving a muffled melody of their life, the same year in and year out—until Samir arrived.

She walked alongside him down the deserted corridor, their students in good hands with the half-dozen other staff members watching over them. “It’s just a feeling, like when I knew my children were lying or maybe even just holding something back.”

“You have children?”

She stumbled over her own feet. How had she gotten this comfortable with him after one shared meal of beef and rice, followed by watching
Crouching
Tiger, Hidden Dragon
? “I did,” she answered carefully. “They’re gone now.”

“Why did you never tell me this?”

Because it was damn stupid to discuss her old life. “It’s painful to talk about the past.”

He tucked her into a supply nook, away from any possible prying eyes and nestled her among the stockpile of paper, paste, and pencils. “I would like very much for you to talk about your past with me, let me help share the pain so it is less.”

“When you speak, it sounds so poetic.”

He scowled, his proud cheekbones more pronounced. “You make me sound weak.”

“That was not my intention at all.” She touched his chest lightly and oh my, the scholar must work out. “It’s nice to be around a man who can express what he thinks.”