LITMIR.BIZ

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seven years later she’d lost Jack in a mortar attack.

      Her champions. Her own personal superheroes.

      Frankie’s heart squeezed. And now she and Nate were heading for the bottom of the gorge and she’d never get the chance to prove that she’d—

      The safety line abruptly snapped taut, halting their graceful pendulum arc into empty space; halting the wild, regretful thoughts flashing through Frankie’s mind. The next instant they were headed straight for the unforgiving rocky surface of the cliff face.

      She tensed, because this was going to hurt.

      Nate tried to turn, probably to take the brunt of the impact, but Frankie was attached to the safety line and the collision was hard enough to force the air from her lungs...and Nate’s big warm muscular body between her thighs.

      Stars exploded behind her eyes. Whether they were from the jolt to her skull or his hard, tough body, Frankie wasn’t sure. But it was enough to rattle loose her good sense and cause some seriously inappropriate thoughts to flash through her mind, sending heat exploding through her body.

      Nate Oliver was still the hottest man she’d ever known. The kind of hot that made women think inappropriate thoughts even while dangling hundreds of feet in the air by a slender nylon rope, and one wrong move away from falling to their deaths.

      “Don’t look down,” he ordered. “And for God’s sake don’t let go. Not yet.”

      Of course Frankie didn’t listen. Craning her neck, she looked down and then promptly wished she hadn’t when a distressed squeak escaped without permission. All she could see beneath her was a dark cold emptiness. Vertigo abruptly clamped queasy fingers around her throat and her belly churned.

      “Dammit, Frankie,” Nate growled in her ear. “I said don’t look down.”

      She wanted to tell him that he wasn’t the boss of her but her breath was lodged in her throat and she could only gasp.

      Oh, God. How mortifying. Inside, Fearless Frankie—Port St. John’s former wild child—was freaking out.

      “I’m going to let you go,” Nate said calmly, and it took a couple of beats for his words to register.

      When they did, she snapped, “No!” and tightened her grip on him. No way was he letting go.

      “Just enough to free my hands and feet,” he explained quietly. “Then I’m going to crab-walk us to the ledge. Okay?”

      She wanted to say no, but she knew it would take a little strain off the safety line and keep it from shearing off on the rocky outcroppings.

      She really, really didn’t want that to happen.

      She looked up at the suspended medevac litter, which was now hanging motionless a few feet to her left.

      Go figure.

      Gritting her teeth, she nodded jerkily, tightening her grip on Nate’s harness. Her thighs clenched around him until they ached, and all she could think was, Thank God for all those squats and lunges I’ve been doing lately.

      “Good girl,” he murmured, and she wanted to snort because she was about as far from being a good girl as they were from the ground. He eased his grip until all that kept him from succumbing to the law of gravity were her arms and legs.

      He murmured into his comms and then with his feet planted flat against the cliff face, he began to move them toward the ledge.

      It couldn’t have been more than a minute since Frankie’s spectacular leap off the edge but her muscles had begun to shake and she didn’t know how much longer she’d be able to hold on.

      Beneath Nate’s jumpsuit, muscles bunched and flexed, giving her a few more inappropriate thoughts. Thoughts that might have freaked her out if she hadn’t been closer to death than she liked. Frankly, in the circumstances, she figured she was allowed.

      Besides, it had been so long since she’d had inappropriate thoughts of any kind that she might as well enjoy them. They were the closest she’d had to actual sex in forever.

      Finally, the tension on her harness lessened and Nate straightened, big feet planted shoulder width apart.

      After a couple of beats he said, “You can let go now, Francis,” the dry tone as much as his use of the hated name bringing her head up. The first thing she saw was his mouth, beautifully sculpted and much too tempting.

      Tearing her gaze away, she looked up into eyes as dark and fathomless as the death they’d just escaped. Sometime in the past couple of minutes—probably while she’d been having those hot thoughts—he’d lifted his visor and the warmth in his usually unreadable gaze stunned her.

      “You okay?” His mouth was barely an inch away and all it would take was one tiny move from her and—

      Spooked, Frankie flashed a quick look to the left and saw they were once more on the ledge. Her patient, wrapped in a silver emergency blanket, was a few feet away, waiting for her to get her act together.

      “I’m fine,” she croaked, her throat desert dry and tight with tension while adrenaline still pumped through her at their near disaster.

      Eager to put a little distance between them, Frankie released the stranglehold she had on him and slid to the ground until all that connected them were her fingers still locked on his harness.

      “Francis.”

      She opened her mouth in a snarled protest but it gave her the impetus she needed to let him go. She might have pushed away from him if they hadn’t been perched on a narrow, slick ledge and she hadn’t just taken a decade off her life with that one daring leap.

      “You good?” he asked again, ducking his head to look into her eyes. He must have been reassured because he didn’t wait for her to reply. “Help me secure the PEP so we can get off this ledge.”

      Frankie shook her head even though she knew he meant the patient extrication platform. Sucking in a shaky breath to still the churning in her gut, she shoved all her messy emotions aside and got her head in the game. She had a patient who needed her undivided attention and the litter swaying gently just over their heads was waiting to airlift him to the closest trauma center.

      Everything else could wait. Including her freak-out because no way was anyone witnessing that.

      Within minutes, they’d transferred the student to the backboard and strapped him into the litter. Nate then reattached the hoisting strapline and with a hand signal from him, Frankie’s patient rose into the air. She watched as hands reached out to snag the litter and pull it aboard the chopper before expelling the breath she’d been holding.

      Litter rescues occasionally went bad but, despite the rocky start that had almost cost Nate his life, this one had gone relatively smoothly. But she wanted to be off the ledge before something else went wrong. Before she lost the tight grip on her emotions.

      She wasn’t looking forward to climbing back the way she’d come either. Her arms and legs shook, which would make the ascent a little tricky even though the rangers at the top had set up a standing body belay and would take most of her weight as she “walked” up the cliff face.

      She’d wait until Nate left with the chopper before attempting the ascent for fear of completely humiliating herself any further.

      Out of the darkness the hoisting strapline appeared again and Frankie let out a tiny relieved breath. Any minute now she’d be free to fall apart without an audience.

      She watched Nate catch the metal connector clip and murmur something that she couldn’t quite catch. Now would be a good time for Fearless Frankie to regain control, she thought, because smartass and cocky was way better than cowering, trembling and freaked out.

      She gave a cocky grin and quipped, “So long, soldier,” adding a snappy salute for good measure.

      “It’s sailor, not soldier,” he growled, as he unclipped her

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