Heart Strike (11 page)

The officer turned and was gone.

Richie was back to scowling at the floor.

“Six hours?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Is that enough time to get that Bahamian lobster and Angus beef thing you promised me?”

Richie looked at her cross-eyed for a moment, then he laughed. He leaned back against the cell wall and just howled with it.

This time when he looked at her, there was a warmth in his look that reminded her of what they had been on the verge of doing the moment before they were arrested.

“Ilsa, honey,” Richie paraphrased a fair Humphrey Bogart imitation. “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

“Friendship? Feh! I want some good food or else I'll tell everyone that in addition to being a lame-o of a drug runner, you're a total welcher on your promises. You promise me good food and great sex, and what do you deliver? I ask you. Dry roast beef”—she waved her half-eaten sandwich in his face—“and a cold jail cell doesn't cut it.”

Richie looked at her through the bars, his face just inches from hers. “Trust me, I fully intend to deliver on both accounts.”

“Good.”

“Especially the latter.”

“You better.” She left the threat hanging.

* * *

As they left the police station, Richie was wondering if they had enough cash for two plane tickets and the meal. He definitely owed her. The whole idea of stealing the plane and whisking her off to the Bahamas had been his in the first place.

The desk officer had been less than polite when Richie had inquired after a nice place for a late lunch.

“Maybe we should have opted for Disney World,” he mumbled as they stepped out the front doors. Three stories of cool brick and concrete opened onto a narrow lane baking with the early afternoon heat. They'd arrived in the Bahamas at seven this morning, been diving by eight, and arrested by ten. It was now two and he hadn't slept in two days. What he really needed was a hotel room, but he was more than ready to be gone from this country.

Straight across the one-lane road was a parking lot for visitors and the police cruisers. To the left was a busy commercial street that probably had a decent restaurant. To the right was a small park with flowering shade trees—each bloom the size of his head.

And sitting on the bench under the nearest tree was…

“We definitely should have gone for Disney World,” he told Melissa.

“No way you could have talked me into an Elsa gown. I'm merely warning you of that.” Melissa slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow. Now they looked like any average tourist couple. She turned them toward the park; showing her Delta training, she too had picked out the man waiting in the shade.

“Would have been fun to try.”

“Better luck next time, Richie. Besides, you got me into a bikini. Can't think of any man I've ever done that for.”

“But I didn't get you out of it.” They crossed the street.

“Partway.”

“Doesn't count as I didn't get to take advantage of it, though you were right about looking even better out of your clothes.”

“Then you'll have to try again, won't you?”

And they came to a stop in front of Vito Corello beneath the brilliant red blooms of a Royal Poinciana flame tree.

“Well.” He looked up at them as if in surprise—not a chance. “What was your maximum altitude on the flight over?”

“A hundred feet,” Richie grumbled at him.

“Determined how?”

“We used three different methods,” Melissa explained. “Radar, angle to horizon, and angular distance between successive waves to maintain altitude.”

“Good. I'd say that means that your training is over.”

“Hello to you too.” Richie tried not to be angry. He didn't mind, he really didn't, the mess he'd walked into. But he felt awful that his treat for Melissa had backfired so badly. “Do you have a real name?”

“Yes,” Vito The Priest replied without elaborating.

Richie sighed. Some things were harder to get used to than others in the black ops world.

“You have a flight clearance for the next thirty minutes.” Vito dug into his pocket.

“No. I'm taking Melissa out to dinner.”

Vito tossed him a set of keys. It took him a moment to recognize them as the keys to the same Twin Otter that had been confiscated when he was arrested.

“Sure you are. In Aruba. I'd recommend the scallops Florentine on black fettuccini at the Flying Fishbone. It's about ten miles south of the airport.” He pointed at the keys. “Fully fueled and the duffel bags that you left at the hotel in Clearwater are aboard.” Vito looked at his watch. “You have a reservation at the Flying Fishbone in seven hours and it's a six-hour flight. I'd suggest you hustle.”

Richie opened his mouth to protest.

“Reservation is in the name of Anderson.”

Carla. Richie shut his mouth.

Vito turned away, then turned back and shook their hands. The smile on his face suddenly bright and sincere.

“Damn fine job, you two. I had real trouble following you from less than ten miles back. You need to watch your six more carefully. They're not expecting you to be Special Operations pilots, just unrespectable drug runners, but you need to be more aware of what's coming up from behind you—not that you would have seen me. I'll make certain that the FAA gets the floatplane and multi-engine certs on your civilian records. We'll back date them, of course, for authenticity's sake. It's been a pleasure.” Then he turned and headed away, whistling merrily to himself.

Richie and Melissa looked at each other; her expression matched his own bewilderment. And that laugh that Melissa had impossibly dragged out of him while they sat in their side-by-side jail cells bubbled up once more.

“They want us out of their country so badly.” Melissa offered a smile that belied her aggravated tone as she fisted her hands on her hips. “Fine!”

“Yeah!” Richie agreed imitating her stance. “We'll never run our drugs here again!”

A policeman on the way to the station from his cruiser looked at them aghast, and then hustled toward the station.

This time Richie caught Melissa's bright laugh in a kiss.

Ice Queen, hell! She melted against him with an undeniable heat. And while they hadn't made love, he'd certainly had those amazing curves imprinted on his mind.

The kiss fired through him and left them both gasping for breath.

“C'mon!” Melissa managed with an impressive amount of vocal control.

He couldn't speak at all after a kiss like that.

“Let's get out of here before that officer comes back with reinforcements and we miss dinner too.”

He grabbed her hand and they rushed toward the police impound docks floating just a few blocks away. But it was hard to keep his feet when all he wanted to do was hold onto his Ilsa for as long as she'd let him.

* * *

They'd been aloft less than twenty minutes when Richie spotted what he was looking for and took the plane back down.

“I thought we were going to Aruba.” Melissa looked up from the last of her conch fritters, ketchup-lime-Tabasco dipping sauce, and soft panny cakes that they'd grabbed from a street vendor on their rush to the dock.

“We are. Just have to make a quick stop first.”

She checked their GPS location. “Hey, we're still in the Bahamas. I thought you couldn't wait to get out of this country.”

Richie kept his reply down to an “Uh-huh” of agreement, so that he didn't give anything away, and settled the plane down on the rolling waves with the ease of several dozen water landings all in the last twenty-four hours.

She was craning her head about trying to see where he was heading. “Where are we going?”

“Nowhere.” He slid to a stop and cut the engines. Unbuckling the seat harness, he headed back into the rear cabin. “Come on.”

He could feel her staring at his back in confusion. Knew he had her completely lost. No sound of her following him yet, so he grabbed a couple of blankets and tossed them out on the cargo deck. He swung open the double rear door to let the warm Bahamian breeze into the cabin. The turquoise water spread for miles in all directions. He could see clearly down to the sand and coral a half dozen meters below the planes pontoons. He knew it wasn't a luxury hotel bed and they didn't have much time, but he hoped—

Melissa crashed into him from behind and drove him to the deck, pulling the hem of his shirt up over his head.

He'd forgotten what she'd said about being stealthy as a cat.

He managed to roll onto his back and dragged his shirt off the rest of the way so that he could see her.

Sitting on his midriff, proud as a peacock, sat Melissa The Cat Moore and she was grinning down at him.

“We don't really have time,” he started to explain, “for a deserted tropical island, but I thought that maybe we could—”

“Shut up, Richie.”

“—because I want you more than…” And then his words did run dry.

Melissa peeled off her T-shirt and bra in one smooth pull. Once again she was clothed only in a four escudo doubloon coin and her pants. The gentle rocking of the plane on the low waves had the medallion swinging back and forth between her breasts like a hypnotist's watch. And he was wholly hypnotized by this woman.

“I—”

“Did anyone ever tell you that you talk too much?” She was grinning down at him.

He thought of a good rebuttal, then traded it in on dragging her down against him.

She laughed as he did so. Then, when they finally lay skin to skin, they both sighed.

Her kiss tasted of conch fritters and dipping sauce. Her skin still tasted of the sea. And her moan sounded softly through the plane's cabin, even quieter than the lap of the waves on the pontoon.

Finger-brushing out her French braid, he was soon lost in a golden shroud of her hair.

She began brushing her chest side to side against his. She broke the kiss and they both dragged in desperate breaths for air.

“Not a word, Richie.”

As if he could speak at the moment. He was lost in her wonder of sensation. There were no words that could describe them, that could capture this moment in time. His heart was running so fast that he was unable to supply it oxygen fast enough. What he had first thought was merely lust was rapidly being converted to heat.

Melissa's fair skin was already flushed and when he dug his fingers into her back muscles, she groaned, a vibration that passed between them chest to chest more strongly than mouth to ear.

He hadn't slept in days and yet had never in his life felt so awake. He floated beneath Melissa much like the airplane did on the softly rolling sea.

Unsure quite how he lost his pants, he'd never in his life forget the moment when she slid down his body and pressed him between her breasts. In a helpless, desperate need for more, he arched against her. A remote corner of him thought that helpless might not be the best possible state for a Unit operator. If there was an attack right now, he'd be toast.

Actually, there was an attack right now, and all he could do was run his hands into his attacker's hair, massage the nicest set of shoulders he'd ever felt, and feel her triumphant smile against the center of his chest.

He wanted this to last all day, all week, but if Melissa kept doing what she was doing to him, it wouldn't last more than a few minutes. He knew they didn't have time and he didn't care, but he did care about prolonging such a perfect moment.

* * *

Melissa was discovering the pure pleasure of absolute control over such a body. She had Richie writhing against the cargo deck. Since when had a man ever been so beautiful? So sculpted that he belonged in a museum? His eyes practically rolled back in his head as—

With a move so smooth and powerful that she never had a chance to counter it, Richie flipped their positions. The man she had thought helpless beneath her now lay beside her, pinning her in place with no more than the light pressure of one hand.

The eyes she'd thought gone blind now studied her with an intense brown darker than wooded hills at sunset, a shade between umber and hickory.

With a brush of his thumb over her lips, he marked where he had left off back at the resort. Then he traced her face with light fingertips as if memorizing every shape. Down her neck. She lay her head back and closed her eyes, allowing herself to enjoy his light ministrations.

His hand traced down between her breasts and came to a rest on her flat stomach. She could feel her skin quivering beneath his touch. She hoped that her gentle geek wasn't always this gentle a lover, but it was so soothing that it was hard to compla—

When his mouth closed on her breast, all the tension that had been rising inside her released in a desperate, arching need. Her hard gasp was part sensation and part shock at the suddenness of the change that she felt wash over him as he feasted upon her. He kept her there, vibrating like a harp string, as his hand continued its explorations.

Where had this come from?

Melissa had wanted Richie. In the Maracaibo hotel she'd thought he was cute, quickly amended to handsome and cute. Over the last few days she'd come to know and appreciate the gentle genius. This man silently driving her body toward madness was an unknown to her.

Her eyes shot open when he cupped her solidly—not hard, but as if he was going to hold her there and never ever let go.

Richie was gone. A dark-eyed warrior was watching, studying her from just inches away. Those laughing, light brown eyes had gone nearly black, so intense she couldn't bear to look into them for long. She pulled him back down to her breast and allowed her body to drink in all he could give her. She went from arch to thrash faster than a plane skipping one wave to the next.

The waves rocking the plane felt like they were abruptly hurricane force and then the storm broke over her and all she could do was wrap her legs tightly over his hand and hang on. No man had ever given her so powerful a ride.