LITMIR.BIZ

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Chapter 4

      She stared at him a long moment more, and this time when her gaze slid away she didn’t force it back. He saw the muscles in her face flinch and her mouth quirk with an attempt at a smile. As he watched the emotional struggle play across her familiar features, it came to him that this was a Yancy Malone he’d never seen before. Jolted, he realized in all the times he’d shared her bed, as intimately as he’d known the secrets of her body, he’d never once seen her angry. Or wounded. Afraid or sad.

      Or if she had been, he’d been too selfishly involved with his own needs to notice.

      She shrugged finally and shook her head. But still no words came.

      Out of sheer self-preservation, Hunt did what he’d always done when unwanted emotions threatened to pierce his armor. He turned on the charm. He put on a smile, one that was just a bit crooked. “Don’t tell me Yancy Malone doesn’t have questions to ask, because I won’t believe it.”

      She made a sound that might have passed for a laugh if the light had been poorer. If he hadn’t been able to see that unfamiliar pain in her face. “I’d think you’d be happy about that.”

      “Come on. I always loved your questions.” He paused and added with another wry smile, “It was so much fun to shut you up.”

      For Yancy, the unmistakable growl of intimacy in his voice brought a fresh flood of memories... A face, a voice, a body...the sound of a laugh, a remembered look, the shape of a mouth.

      Almost in a panic, she thought, But I can’t remember the feel of that body...can’t remember what that mouth tasted like.

      Her memories were like recalling a movie or a television show she’d seen. She couldn’t seem to bring them into focus with her own reality or with the man standing before her now.

      Strange to think I once shared a bed with this man—more than once. So many times...and yet I don’t think I know him at all.

      What was it that was so different about him?

      Oh, certainly he looked different, with the full beard, the turban, the Afghan tunic, vest and loose-fitting trousers—though here in the privacy of his home he’d shed the turban and vest. But it was more than that. It was, she realized in a late flash of insight, not what he looked like, but the way she saw him.

      When she’d first met him he’d seemed to her like an invincible man-machine, a superhero, a life-size action figure. Later he was her shadow lover who came and went in the night like a ghost. But something had happened since the last time she’d seen him, the night he’d brought Laila to her and then disappeared without a trace.

      Something’s changed.

      Maybe I’ve changed.

      Older now, perhaps wiser, and from the perspective of motherhood, she saw him as a mere human being, a man, one with flaws, one who’d loved a woman, fathered and then abandoned a child.

      Though, oddly, he seemed no less imposing because of that.

      If anything, even more so.

      Yes, definitely more so.

      I don’t know how to talk to him now. We never talked much before. Never had to. Meaningless love-words, whispered in the darkness...laughter and sighs...forbidden thoughts and questions never voiced. It was enough then.

      Not now, though. Now the reality was, they shared a child. Like it or not, difficult as it might be, she would have to learn new ways to communicate with the man who was her adopted daughter’s biological father.

      Shouldn’t be too hard, right? Communicating is what I do.

      But it was he who spoke first.

      While she was still thinking how to begin, he said hoarsely, “You have to know I never intended to drop her in your lap and—”

      “Disappear?” Caught unprepared, she spoke with more bitterness than she’d intended or wanted to. Of course, it’s about Laila. It’s only about Laila. Remember that.

      He drew in a sharp breath. “That’s not—”

      “But you did,” she said, giving no quarter now that she’d regained her footing, skewering him with her gaze—her interviewer’s stare, the one that demanded answers, that refused to back down. “Didn’t you?”

      He nodded, glaring back at her like the warrior he was. “I thought I’d be able to come back for her.”

      “But you didn’t. You didn’t send word, leave me instructions, a message, anything.” Not accusing, simply stating facts they both already knew.

      “I couldn’t.” He didn’t raise his voice, and it was like stones dropping into a well. “You know what my job is—was—like. The mission was—”

      “Secret.” She nodded, smiled painfully. “This is where you tell me you can’t tell me anything, right?”

      “I sure as hell couldn’t then,” he snapped.

      “Does that mean you can...now?”

      “Some things...” he said stiffly. “Maybe...when you’re ready to listen.”

      She sucked in a breath and managed to keep a rein on her anger, though what she’d have loved to do more than anything just then was kick him. She managed not to, partly because it occurred to her, with her experience as an Emmy-winning reporter and hard-nosed interviewer of the famous and infamous, that his macho attitude—face set in stone, arms folded on his chest—was more defensive than imposing.

      Switching gears, she said quietly, “What did you think I was going to do, Hunt? I had no experience with kids, let alone a traumatized child. I was in no way prepared for...for that. Why did you do it—bring her to me, of all people?”

      He coughed, the universal indicator of masculine discomfort. “Well, hell, that’s a no-brainer. I came to you because I knew about that outfit you belong to...that—”

      “INCBRO.” And was that all, Hunt? The only reason?

      “Right. I knew you could get her to safety through them. I figured I’d come back and find her when I—” He stopped abruptly and ran a hand over his face and beard, a gesture of distraction she wouldn’t have thought him capable of—the Hunt she’d known, the superhero warrior. “That’s not— Look, you were the only person I could think of. That I could trust.” And then, in a voice that seemed to come from the depths of his soul, he whispered, “I sure as hell never thought you were going to adopt her.”

      She didn’t answer for a moment—her mind was too busy throwing up barricades and battening down hatches. Keep your distance, Malone... Don’t let your own emotions get in the way. Your job is to get him to reveal his. And his intentions. Is he going to try to take her away from me?

      But in that small silence Hunt must have seen an opening, and he took it.

      “Okay, Yankee. What made you do it?”

      It was her turn to suck in a breath—she hadn’t expected him to turn it around on her. At least, not so soon.

      Hoping to buy herself some time, she said sharply, “Do it? You mean, adopt her? What kind of question is that? Why does anyone adopt a child? Because—”

      “Usually because they want one very badly,” Hunt said, and though his eyes were hidden now by the deepening dusk, she could hear the steel in his voice. And the disbelief. “You said it yourself—you hadn’t had any experience with kids until I dropped one in your lap. It never occurred to me you’d suddenly develop motherhood instincts. I thought you’d get her to safety through that child-bride rescue outfit you work with. I figured you’d—”

      “Pass her off like a hot potato? A traumatized little girl?” Again her voice came sharper and louder than she’d planned, partly

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