lame. “I apologize.”
“No apology is necessary, sir. Regardless of what you believe, I intend to perform my duty until I am officially relieved.”
“Captain—”
“This is nothing personal. If you object to the presence of a woman in your suite, I will station myself in the corridor outside your door.”
He’d been wrong. Her control wasn’t as total as he’d thought. Her pulse beat rapidly against the side of her neck. Her pupils had contracted to reveal flashes of gold in her green eyes. The elusive spice of her perfume mixed with the scent of hot skin.
Yet she’d been wrong, too. What was happening between them was definitely personal. It had been from the moment she had been willing to offer her life in order to save his.
Or had she?
He should send her away. Put an end to this charade here and now.
But what if he was wrong?
The question still couldn’t be answered with any certainty. And if he did send her away, what avenue would the government try next? Wouldn’t it be wiser to keep Captain Sarah Fox close until he learned what was really going on?
Hawk hated lies. His entire purpose as a scientist was to seek truth. So, not for one second did he believe the lie he’d just tried to tell himself.
His real reason for not sending this woman away had nothing to do with his work or his principles or whatever conspiracy might be playing out here. It was far more basic than that.
He didn’t want her to leave. Right now what he really wanted was to lean over and place his lips on that delicate, vulnerable spot where her pulse beat at the side of her neck and draw her taste into his mouth the same way he was drawing her scent into his lungs. He wanted to slip his arms around her rigidly held body and press her close until she softened against him, until he saw pleasure instead of pain from his touch, until he discovered what other passions she keep reined beneath her impressive control…
“Dr. Lemay?”
He shoved his hands into his pockets and straightened up. “You can stay.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“And I’d prefer it if you call me Hawk.”
“Sir?”
“Because I intend to call you Sarah.”
Her bare sole brushed lightly across the carpet as Sarah slid her left foot back and made a quarter turn. She shifted her weight, bringing her right arm forward in a smooth arc. She concentrated on her breathing, trying to focus her energy on the ritual slow-motion movements of tai chi. She often used the exercises to relieve stress, but so far she was finding no ease for the tautness in her muscles.
She had thought Hawkins Lemay was gallant. A gentle intellectual. A man of high principles. She had been impressed by the accomplishments she’d discovered when she’d studied his background. She had been determined to keep him safe, not only because she’d been ordered to but because she had honestly admired him.
Yes, she’d admired him. Who wouldn’t?
She hadn’t guessed that within a few hours of meeting him she would want to do him bodily harm herself.
How dare he question her integrity? If she hadn’t been on duty, if he hadn’t been the subject of her mission, if she hadn’t had the concept of personal honor drummed into her from the time she’d learned to talk, she would have…
What? Hauled back and slugged him?
That would have been dangerous. Not because he might strike back. He wouldn’t. She had recognized the way he’d been looking at her, and it hadn’t been violence that had been on his mind. Or hers, either, if she wanted to be truthful with herself. A large source of the tension that had sparked between them had been from something else entirely.
It had been sex.
Sarah wasn’t naive, nor was she a prude. During the course of her missions with Major Redinger’s team from Eagle Squadron, she regularly worked side by side with virile males in outstanding physical condition. She was accustomed to the effects of ambient testosterone. Most of the time she regarded the men as brothers, but a certain amount of low-key sexual awareness was inevitable. She’d never had a problem controlling it before. After all, it was only sex, not love. It was a normal, healthy physical response, nothing to be ashamed of and no big deal. She wasn’t going to let it interfere with her purpose now.
Call me Hawk.
She gritted her teeth. She had to think of him as Dr. Hawkins Lemay, Nobel laureate, renowned physicist and the subject of her mission. Even if she were interested, that final fact made him off-limits.
No matter how good he smelled.
She pursed her lips and exhaled slowly, trying again to relax. Stretch to the side, bring the forearm vertical, circle with the palm. She settled into the familiar sequence. For the next ten minutes she moved around the antique chairs and the spindly-legged sofa in the center of the small sitting room, her body relaxing as it flowed through the routine with practiced ease.
A low trill sounded from the table that was in the midst of the furniture grouping. Sarah hopped over the back of the sofa and snatched up her cell phone before the second ring. “Fox here.”
“I got your message, Captain. What’s the situation?”
It was Mitchell Redinger’s voice. Sarah shot a glance at the door of Hawk’s bedroom to verify it was still closed, then curled one leg beneath her and sank into a corner of the sofa. “My flight was delayed, Major, so Lemay had arrived at the hotel before me. There has already been one attempt on his life.”
“Report.”
She gave her C.O. a summary of the afternoon’s events, including the names of the embassy official she’d contacted when she’d arrived and the police officer who had been first on the scene. She finished by relating the security measures she’d coordinated within the hotel.
“Nice work, Captain.” There was a crackle of static. “Is Lemay cooperating?”
“Grudgingly, sir.”
“I have confidence that you can handle the situation.”
Sarah heard the note of dismissal in Redinger’s tone and spoke quickly. “Was Lemay offered a government position two days ago?”
There was another burst of static. “Say again?”
“Dr. Lemay claims to have been approached by a defense department representative who was interested in his research.”
“Yes, that is correct.”
“Is it true Lemay refused?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
Sarah felt a momentary unease but she dismissed it. She probably hadn’t been able to uncover this information while she had researched Hawk’s background because the event had been too recent to
