LITMIR.BIZ

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increasingly demanding exercises were excruciatingly painful. Sweat was beading on Michael’s brow, but Kelly had asked for ten more repetitions and, by God, he was going to give her ten. A SEAL never quit. Sometimes, in the weeks and months following his injury, he’d had a hard time remembering that. For a few weeks in San Diego, the news had been relentlessly discouraging. Eventually he’d taken it to heart and resigned himself to his sedentary fate.

      But ever since the morning after that unforgettable kiss, Kelly had flatly refused to let him sink for one single second into a morass of self-pity. Whenever he muttered about all this effort being a waste of time, she sent him a chiding look and demanded even more from him. In the last couple of weeks, he’d learned to keep his mouth shut and do whatever she asked without protest.

      The two hours she spent with him three days a week flew by. And after she left, it took him hours to recover from pushing himself to the limit, but he would not allow himself to quit.

      She thought he was making excellent progress. He disagreed, but kept his opinion to himself. If he so much as hinted that he was discouraged, he was afraid that one of these days she would stop responding with extra work and simply walk out the door. If she did that, she would take his only hope with her.

      Besides, aside from the rigors of her therapy, he enjoyed spending time with her. He liked the way she got in his face, refusing to back down. He liked even more the faint feminine scent she wore. He was beginning to remember just how much he liked having a woman in his life. Not one special woman, just someone to flirt with, maybe dance with, make love to.

      He sighed, then realized that Kelly was staring at him with a puzzled expression.

      “Where did you go just then?” she asked. “You stopped right in the middle of the eighth leg lift.”

      “Sorry. I guess my mind wandered.”

      “Really?”

      “It happens,” he said gruffly.

      “Of course it does, but you’re usually so focused.”

      He reached for a towel and wiped his face. “Well, today I’m not. Sue me.”

      There was no mistaking the hurt in Kelly’s eyes. It wrenched Michael’s heart. He honestly couldn’t blame her for being on the brink of tears. His mind had wandered down a forbidden path and now he was unreasonably taking it out on her. Why was it that he could look into the eyes of soulless terrorists and remain completely unmoved, but one glance into Kelly’s soft gray eyes and he was lost?

      “Sorry,” he said, apologizing yet again for his thoughtless behavior.

      “Why don’t we quit for the day?” she suggested, her tone neutral. “You’ve been working too hard for the past couple of weeks. You could use a break.”

      Michael was smart enough to acknowledge that she was right. He had been overexerting himself and his muscles were complaining. The last thing he needed was a tear or some other injury that would put his rehabilitation on hold. Nor did he need to risk offending Kelly any more than he had already.

      “I’ll tell you what,” he said, trying to make amends. “I need to go see someone today. If you have time to give me a lift over there, I’ll buy you lunch on the way.”

      Kelly seemed so taken aback by the suggestion, he couldn’t help chuckling. “I’m not scared to be alone in a car with you,” he teased. “Or in a restaurant. You’ve been on very good behavior lately. I think I can let down my guard for a couple of hours.”

      She gave him a rueful smile. “You have no idea how stressful it’s been,” she responded.

      Michael had the distinct impression that she wasn’t actually joking. He could understand exactly where she was coming from. Despite his overwhelming relief that they’d been adhering to the ground rules about no intimate contact, the strain of it was telling on him, too. Maybe that was one more reason why he’d suggested lunch. He figured they both deserved a reward for their incredible restraint.

      “Probably best not to go down that road,” he told her. “Not when we’ve been doing so well.”

      An expression of what might have been disappointment flashed in her eyes, but then she regained her composure.

      “So where are you going that you’re willing to risk spending time alone in a car with me? It must be important.”

      He nodded slowly. “It is. I’m going to stop by to see the Havilceks.”

      “Your family,” she said at once, her expression brightening. “I met your mother a few times when we were kids. I guess she was actually your foster mother, though, right?”

      He nodded. “I didn’t think of her that way, not for long, anyway. She wouldn’t allow it. She said that even if she couldn’t adopt me, she intended to be my mother. No boy could have had a better one.”

      “Then why have you waited so long to get in touch with her since you got back to Boston?” she asked. “I still don’t understand that.”

      “Self-protection,” he admitted candidly. “She’s the kind of woman who assesses a situation, then takes over. It doesn’t matter to her that I’ve been a grown man for a long time and that I’ve handled extraordinary responsibilities with the Navy, I’m still her baby.”

      “Hard to picture anyone thinking of you that way,” Kelly said, surveying him with blatant appreciation. “Then again, that’s exactly how my folks treat Bryan and me. It would probably help if Bryan and I moved into our own places, but it’s been so comfortable living at home, neither of us have bothered. Hovering and worrying is probably just a universal parental trait.”

      “That doesn’t make it any less annoying, especially in a situation like this,” Michael said.

      “No, it certainly doesn’t.” Kelly regarded him with undisguised curiosity. “Do you remember your real...” She immediately stopped and corrected herself, “I mean, your biological mother at all?”

      Michael had thought about that very question a lot over the years, even more so since Ryan and Sean had found him in San Diego. They both had such vivid memories of their mother, but Michael’s were all hazy. When Mother’s Day rolled around, it was Doris Havilcek—with her sweet smile, graying hair, sharp intelligence and steely resolve—whose image filled his head. Kathleen Devaney was a name on his birth certificate, nothing more. She stirred no sentimental feelings in him at all.

      “Not really,” he told Kelly. “I don’t have the same kind of anger about her and my dad that Ryan and Sean feel, either. Maybe if I’d been a little older or if I’d wound up in a different situation the way they did, I’d hate them, too, but basically when it comes to my biological parents, I feel nothing at all.”

      Sorrow spread across Kelly’s expressive face. “Aren’t you even the least bit curious about them? I know I would be. I’d want to know what they’re like, why they did what they did, where they are now.”

      “Why bother?” he said cynically. “There are no good explanations for any of it. If it were up to me, Ryan would give up searching for them, but he’s determined to finish what he started. Sean has some reservations, but in general, I think he’s backing him up. I think one reason they’re so determined to find our parents is to find out what happened to the twins. For all we know, they were abandoned along the way, too, when it got to be too inconvenient to keep them around.”

      “Twins?” Kelly repeated incredulously. “There were more of you?”

      He nodded. “Twin brothers, Patrick and Daniel. They were only two when we were all split up. Ryan seems convinced our parents took them when they left.” He tried to dismiss the little twinge of dismay that stirred in him, but he wasn’t entirely successful. If it was true, it made the whole mess even more despicable.

      He met Kelly’s gaze. “If you ask me, Ryan’s going to be opening up a whole lot of emotional garbage by tracking them down.

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