Alyssa put her arms around Sam’s neck and kissed him back.

This was a mistake. She knew it was a mistake. Every other time she had let herself fall under this man’s spell had been a bona fide, screaming, full-throttle, hit-the-wall-going-a-hundred-miles-an-hour mistake.

But while it was happening, while she was here in the denial phase, making love to him was, without doubt, the best idea she’d ever had in her entire life.

It had been too long since she’d been in his arms, in his bed, but every kiss, every touch was so familiar. She recognized the way she fit against him so perfectly, his taste, his scent, the heat in his eyes.

Sam was wearing only his boxer shorts and she let herself run her hands across his back—all that smooth skin, satin over rock-solid muscles.

His hair was short and darker brown than she remembered, all his golden, sun-bleached ends on some hairdresser’s floor back in Gainesville. She was used to it being much longer, down around his shoulders. She’d loved running her fingers through it.

But even cut short this way it was still nice to touch, so soft and thick, and without it in his face, his eyes weren’t hidden from her. She could watch him watching her as he kissed her, touched her.

She kicked her legs free from her jeans and yanked off her shirt and pushed off her panties.

Sam groaned, letting go of her and lying back on the bed, one arm up over his eyes. “Oh, Jesus, you’re naked.”

Alyssa laughed. “Is that really a problem for you?” She pulled off his boxers so that his erection sprang free. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Praise the Lord for his magnificent creations.... “It sure doesn’t seem to be.”

But he stopped her before she could take him in her mouth, pulling her up with him so that they were both kneeling on the bed. “Just tell me that you honestly know what you’re doing. Promise me this isn’t just a reaction to stress, or high emotion, or Jesus, I don’t know what....”

His eyes were so blue. He was looking at her so searchingly, as if he were trying to see inside of her head. Alyssa looked back at him. Was it possible that he was seriously going to stop them from...

She spread her legs apart, and he swallowed, his eyes following her movement. But he didn’t touch her, and when he looked back at her, he shook his head slightly, desperation in his eyes, even as he laughed. She could read his mind very clearly. Don’t do that to me. But she was determined to do that—and more. She reached to touch him, and he caught her hand.

“Please,” he said. “This is important to me.”

He was serious. And she couldn’t lie to him.

“I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing,” she admitted. “I just know that right now I want you so much.”

It was not the correct answer. She could see his disappointment.

“I’m sorry if that’s not enough,” she said. She brought his hand down, between her legs. “Are you sure it can’t be enough for tonight?”

There was no way he could miss the fact that she was completely ready for him. He didn’t pull his hand back, so she rocked against him, pushing his fingers slightly inside of her. Oh, yes.

“I’m not going to do this,” he said on an exhale, as if he’d been holding his breath. But just like before, when he told her he wasn’t going to kiss her, he began touching her, his fingers moving on their own, exploring.... He shifted closer.

And this time, when she reached for him, he didn’t stop her.

“Alyssa,” he breathed as her hand closed around him.

Oh, yes...

“I need you,” she told him, and kissed him.

His surrender couldn’t have been more obvious if he’d pulled out a pen and paper and signed it right in front of her.

He kissed her as feverishly as he touched her, all of her, skimming his hands down and across her body, then kissing and licking and, oh, yes...

He made a sound that made her laugh because it expressed so exactly all that she was feeling.

“Please tell me you have a condom,” she lifted her head to gasp.

“God,” he said, “I don’t.”

“I do,” she said. “In my fanny pack.” She carried them with her. Smart women did these days. “In my room.”

Not that she’d had the opportunity in the past few years to actually use one...

Sam picked her up, throwing her over his shoulder in a fireman’s hold. “Oh, my God,” Alyssa laughed. “Sam!”

He grabbed her jeans from the floor—that was where she’d stashed both her room key and her cell phone—and his room key from the top of the TV.

“Wait!” she shouted, but he just went on out the door.

They were both completely naked. No, Sam was more than naked. He was extra-specially naked, considering his body was standing at full, proud attention.

“Whoops, ‘scuse me, ma’am,” she heard him say, and she squeaked and closed her eyes. Oh, no.

But as he opened the door to her room and went inside, she opened her eyes to look back and to apologize, but there was no one there. She smacked him, hard, on the butt. “Sam, you nearly gave me a heart attack—”

He was laughing as he tossed her down on her bed. “No one saw us. Besides, I used a special ninja technique to make myself invisible.”

“You maybe,” she said. “But not me.” She scrambled for her fanny pack sitting on the bedside table. It was jammed full of all kinds of stuff, so she took it and dumped its contents on the floor.

“You have to work very hard to be invisible,” he agreed. “You’re too beautiful. Although you did a great job of it back in the Wal-Mart, you know.”

She looked up from her search, feeling almost ridiculously glad at his compliment. “You think?”

“Yeah,” he said, coming over to help. “I didn’t know it was you, so you caught me. You won.”

“I like to win,” she said.

He smiled at her. “I noticed.”

And there they were. Two little red packages, attached to each other by a perforated connection that hadn’t yet been torn.

She tore them apart and turned to Sam, who had a funny look on his face.

Oh, no. No, no. She was not going to let him put the brakes on. Not now.

“Are those—” He stopped. Shook his head. “Never mind. I’m just paranoid, I guess, when it comes to condoms.” He held out his hand, and she gave the package to him. “You still sure you want to do this?” he asked as he covered himself.

“What do you think?” she said, purposely lying back on the bed in an extremely provocative pose.

Sam laughed as he looked at her, as he took his time looking at her. She’d always loved the way he looked at her.

And she loved looking at him, too. His body was sculpted by hard work and the SEALs’ constant training. He’d put on muscle since she’d last seen him without his clothes. Every time she saw him naked, he was more filled out, more of a full grown man. It seemed impossible that he could be more gorgeous, but somehow he managed to pull it off. And the haircut really worked with that body. Dear Lord, he was an amazing-looking man.

“I think,” he said slowly, as he sat down on the edge of the bed, far enough away so that he couldn’t touch her and she couldn’t touch him, “that if I try to negotiate with you right now, I won’t stand a chance. But I know that I’ve sold myself way short in the past when it comes to me and you, so I’m going to give it a try. Okay?”

He was serious. She was here on the bed, dying for him, and he wanted to talk? Alyssa laughed.

“At least nod your head yes,” he told her.

He wanted yes? She’d give him a yes.

Alyssa ran her hand from her breasts to her stomach, and then lower. She caught her lower lip in her teeth as she looked up at him. Heat sparked in his eyes, as he laughed, too.

But to her total surprise, he still kept his distance. “Well, okay then. I’ll take that as an affirmative.” He cleared his throat, but when he spoke again, his voice was still hoarse. “Here’s the deal, Lys. If you want me, you need to promise, right now, that you’ll have dinner with me when this mess is over. You don’t promise—I turn around, right now, and go back to my room.” He laughed again. “Yeah, we both know there’s only one place I’m going, but I said it like I really meant it, didn’t I?” He closed his eyes. “I hate myself. I’m so fucking weak.”

He wasn’t completely kidding.

Oh, Sam... “Come here,” she told him, holding out her arms for him.

He came, crawling across the bed to her, all blue eyes and tanned skin and hard, male muscles in motion, and she kissed him.

“I didn’t mean to make light of what you’re saying,” she told him, unable to keep from touching him now that he was close enough to touch. “I appreciate your being honest with me, I really do. I think that I probably need to be honest with you, too, because you don’t seem to realize what a major event this is—my being here with you like this.”

“Yeah, actually, I do,” he said.

She touched his face. He had such a beautiful face, with those beautiful, beautiful eyes. “No, you don’t. I know you think I’ve spent the past few years with Max, and I have to confess that I purposely let you think that, even to the point of giving you—” She cleared her throat. “—misinformation about it when you asked me directly. But the fact is, I went out with him only a handful of times. And I never slept with him. Not even once.”

“But I went to your hotel room and Max was there,” he said. “In San Diego. It was that night Jules was shot—”

“And Carla Ramirez died?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“I think he sat in my room all night. I was a mess after—” Alyssa shook her head. “But we didn’t sleep together. Sam, I haven’t been with anyone since I was with you.”

There was wonder in his eyes now. “Holy shit, Alyssa...”

She caught herself. “To be completely honest, I probably would have hooked up with Max, but he didn’t want to.... No, that’s not completely true either. He wanted to, but he wouldn’t. Not while I was working for him.”

“He’s insane. He’s got to be completely—”

“He’s principled,” she corrected him. “He’s amazing. He really is a good man, Sam. I think if you didn’t spend so much energy hating him, you might actually like him.”

The wonder was replaced by worry. “Do you, um... Shit, I know I’ve asked you this before, but he makes me so jealous.... Do you love him?”

Alyssa looked at him. “Yes, Roger,” she said. “I love him. That’s why I took off your clothes. That’s why I’m dying to make love to you.”

He kissed her then, and kissed her and kissed her, pushing her back on the bed, his weight heavy between her legs. He kissed his way down her throat, licking her breasts, drawing her into his mouth.

“Oh, God!” She arched against him, searching for him, needing him inside of her, but he’d shifted back.

“Hey, Lys?” he said, and as she looked up at him, she saw that his eyes were luminous. “Could you maybe say that to me again?”

She knew what he meant, what he wanted to hear. Make love. Not sex. Love. The idea that hearing her say those words could mean so much to him took her breath away. She almost couldn’t say it. She had to whisper. “I’m dying to make love to you, Sam.”

He held her gaze as he shifted his position and... Oh, it felt so good.

“Sam,” she breathed, realizing that she hadn’t told him what she’d wanted to tell him, and needing him to know. “I know a really great restaurant, not far from my apartment in D.C. They don’t chase you out after you finish dinner. You can just sit there and talk all night if you want.”

If you really, honestly wanted to get to know someone. He understood what she was saying. She could see it in his eyes. He kissed her then, the sweetest, deepest, most perfect kiss of her entire life.

He remembered exactly how to touch her, how to move to make her crazy. Slowly. So slowly. Oh, the things he was doing to her... It was too good. Nothing could possibly be this good, but it was, because it was Sam, and it scared her to death that she was back here, right here again, like this, with him.

He was breathing her name. “Alyssa...”

It might’ve been a question. He seemed to want an answer. She gave him one, although it wasn’t quite a word.

“Tell me what you want,” he breathed in her ear.

“Please,” she managed.

“Tell me...”

“You,” she gasped. “I want you.”

And, oh, that got the right response, the response she’d hoped for. He knew damn well that she liked sex—making love—hard and fast, that she loved driving him crazy. This would do it.

Oh, yes. Oh, yes...

“Lys...”

She heard the tension in his voice and she opened her eyes to look up at him, and she saw it in his face, in the corded muscles of his shoulders and arms. She watched his eyes as he fought his release, as she fought hers, too. This was too good to end, too good, too—

“Come on!” He half growled, half laughed his frustration, because he somehow knew what she was doing, knew she was holding back. Sam knew her, knew her... He knew her.

Alyssa exploded. There was no other way to describe it. One moment she was looking into his eyes, and the next she was shattering. He was right with her, all the way, shouting something she couldn’t hear because she didn’t have ears anymore.

And then she was in little fragments, floating around him, settling back down so that her arms that were holding him so tightly were once again attached to her shoulders.

“It’s good to know,” Sam murmured into her re-formed ear, “that we’re finally both on the same page.”

Max watched Gina as she ran away from that young detective. Enrique Alvarado. Born here in Sarasota. Father originally from Cuba, mother a Valdez, as in Valdez Imports of Miami. After seeing Gina with him, Max had come back to his car to make a few quick investigative phone calls.

Detective Ric Alvarado had attended Dartmouth College, graduating at the top of his class. Went on to Harvard Law School but left after less than a year to focus on law enforcement. He’d apparently wanted to help put the scumbags of the world behind bars rather than get them out. And he’d done just that. His record with the Sarasota Police Department was beyond exemplary.

And Max had been wrong—how often did that happen?—about both his age and his status as a brand-new detective. Alvarado had been a detective for seven long years. The man was thirty-one years old. Either he was like Jules Cassidy and had a baby face, or as Max got older, anyone under thirty-five was starting to look like a child.

Max had watched as Gina and Ric came out into the parking lot. He’d watched them talk, watched Gina smile and laugh, watched Alvarado kiss her. He should have left. He should have driven away right then.

Instead, he sat there. Torturing himself. Hating the idea of her taking Alvarado home with her. That wasn’t what she needed—casual sex with some near stranger. Except, as he sat there, watching Gina, he had to face the honest truth. Max really hated the idea of her taking Alvarado home not because it wasn’t what she needed, but because it wasn’t what he wanted.

He could pretend that he’d come here tonight—a night when he should have been flying to San Diego—to protect Gina from herself. To make sure she didn’t put herself into any real danger. But that wasn’t the only reason he was here.

Out on the sidewalk, Alvarado had his arms around Gina, and damn it, now she pushed him away and started running, this time in earnest. Alvarado gave chase, but Gina just ran faster.

All right, this bullshit wasn’t going any farther. Max switched on his headlights and pulled out of the shadows, driving swiftly toward them.

Alvarado caught Gina’s arm, and she pulled hard to get away, only, son of a bitch, he tripped and they both went down onto somebody’s lawn.

Max screeched to a stop with his front tires on the sidewalk and jumped out of the car.

Gina was scrambling away from Alvarado. It was to his credit that he didn’t try to stop her, didn’t try to hang on to her or pin her down.

“That’s enough,” Max said. “Gina, get in the car.” He looked at Alvarado. “Thanks for your help. I’ll take it from here.”

The detective pulled himself to his feet. “I wasn’t trying to—”

“Note that you’re still alive,” Max said. “If I thought your intention was to hurt her, that wouldn’t be the case. Go home, Detective.”

Alvarado looked past him to Gina, who was standing now, breathing hard, one arm wrapped around herself as she wiped tears from her face with the heel of her other hand.

“Are you going to be all right with him?” he asked her, refusing to be bullied, gaining another point or two in Max’s scorebook.

Gina nodded. “I’m so sorry, Ric.”

He nodded, too, as he brushed off his pants, giving its torn knee barely a glance. “She needs some serious help, man,” he told Max in a low voice as he walked back toward the parking lot.

Max looked at Gina. She was watching him, her eyes huge, her pale face eerily lit by the streetlight. “I think he’s probably right,” he said.

She didn’t say anything. She just looked at him. “Get in the car,” he said again, adding, “Please.” Gina did. Her eyes still on him, she moved around to the passenger’s side and opened the door. And climbed in.

Max got behind the wheel, extremely aware that she was still watching him, extremely aware of the hope that was in her eyes. Oh, no, Gina, that was not why he was here.

“Did you like the music tonight?” she asked.

It didn’t seem worth the effort to lie and say he wasn’t there. He’d seen her looking in the corner where he’d stood. “It was... Well, I’ve never paid much attention to jazz, but it was... interesting.”

“That good, huh?”

“It’s not my thing,” he admitted. “It’s so chaotic and out there.”

“You know, it’s not that different from Hendrix,” she said.

She remembered that he’d once told her that Jimi Hendrix was one of his guilty pleasures.

“I think there’s actually more chaos in Hendrix’s music,” Gina continued. “I mean, he’s always on the verge of a meltdown. There’s such wildness and, I don’t know, a desperation to his guitar playing. The big difference is that, for you, it’s familiar desperation.”

“Yeah, maybe.” God damn it. Wildness and desperation. No wonder he loved Hendrix. He could relate so completely. He put the car into gear. “Where are you staying?”

“It’s not far,” she said. “You can drop me at the corner.”

Max just looked at her.

“So even though jazz isn’t your thing, didn’t you think I was good?” she asked.

She was sitting there with her nose red, with her makeup smudged and smeared around eyes that still looked as if she might start crying again any second, looking impossibly beautiful. She was wearing some kind of sports top, in a style that Alyssa had once told him was called a racerback. It had really showed off her incredible body as she’d played.

There was something about a healthy woman playing the drums that was a total turn-on. The few times she’d really cut loose, hair and arms flying, legs working, breasts moving, he’d had a definite physical reaction. Except Yeah, you gave me a real hard-on, was probably not the response she was looking for.

Max smiled despite himself. Although, knowing Gina, she would probably laugh. And then she would be all over him. His smile faded. All over him.

“What were you thinking just then?” she asked softly.

“I was thinking that you’re as talented as you are beautiful, and that I wish I’d never had to meet you.”

She understood what he meant. “Well, you did,” she said. “And here we are. Sitting in your car again, in the middle of the night.” She laughed, but it was only to cover up the fact that she had tears back in her eyes. “If I tell you where I’m staying, will you come in for a little while?”

He started to protest, but Gina cut him off.

“Just to talk,” she said. “Please, Max. You don’t know how much I miss talking to you.”

Oh yes, he did. It was probably just about as much as he missed talking to her. Sometimes it manifested itself in a physical ache in his chest or his throat.

“I’m at the Siesta Beach House,” she told him. “Take a right at the stop sign, fourth driveway on the left. My room is down by the water. Number 21.”

It was close. It was so close, Max hadn’t yet figured out what the hell he was going to do before he was there and putting the car into park.

He couldn’t go into her room with her. That would be a huge mistake.

“Please come in,” she whispered.

“I can’t,” he said just as quietly.

“Just to talk.”

“Really.” He looked at her.

“Yes.” She was lying. If he went in there, he wasn’t coming out until morning.

Some of his frustration escaped. “Are you going to tell me what happened tonight? Why you ended up running down the street, with some stranger you picked up in a bar chasing you?”

“Ric’s a police detective and you know it,” she responded just as hotly. “He’s not just some stranger.”

Max nodded. “Great. So you got lucky. This time.”

“You want to know what happened?” she said. “I got scared. He was all ready to come home with me, and I got scared. So I told him. Everything. And then he got... you know. The way guys get when it’s too heavy and they’d rather go home and watch Comedy Central. But he was going to do it anyway. I was going to be his pity fuck for the month—I’m real lucky, huh? But it felt really, really wrong, and I knew that it’s always going to feel wrong, unless you change your mind, because the only time anything feels right is when you’re with me. But I know you’re not going to, so God! Why do I even bother?”

Max felt his insides ripping open as she started to cry, as she got out of the car.

“Gina, wait—”

But she slammed the door and hurried toward the building.

Don’t follow. He couldn’t follow. But he also couldn’t let her go. He couldn’t leave her like this. He got out of the car, too, and followed her, because it seemed like the lesser of two evils. “Gina.”

“I’m sorry,” she cried. “I’m so sorry, Max.” She was standing there, trying to unlock the door to her room, fumbling with the key. She dropped it, and he cracked heads with her as he tried to pick it up.

“Sorry!” He moved her aside. “Let me get it.”

He picked up the key, unlocked the door, and pushed it open. Her room was dark, and he stepped inside, looking for the light switch.

He found it, but when he flipped it, only one lamp went on. It must’ve had a twenty-five watt bulb in it, because it barely lit the shabby room. Which was probably just as well, since the last time this place had been redecorated was back in 1975, and seeing it in bright light would have been too awful.

“Oh, Christ, Gina,” he said. “You sure know how to pick ’em.”

“I am sorry, Max,” she said. “Because I do understand. I do.”

The door closed behind her, and Max realized that he’d somehow ended up exactly the last place he should be. In Gina’s room. He had to get out of here.

“I know you blame yourself for what happened to me,” she told him, “and I wish you wouldn’t, because, really, the fault was mine. I pushed them—Babur and Al—on the plane. You told me not to. You told me to be careful, not to go too far. But I was trying to be Wonder Woman. I was trying to save the day.”

“No,” Max said. Damn it, did she really think...?

“I was trying to give you as much information about them as I could,” Gina told him, tears running down her face. “I thought they were asleep, but they weren’t and they heard me, and I gave away the fact that there were microphones planted and that you didn’t need the radio to hear me. It was my fault—”

“No.” He reached for her, but she pulled back.

“Yes. You told me not to provoke them, but I did. I provoked them, so they raped me, and the captain tried to stop them, so they killed him and it was my fault.”

She sank to the floor, and he followed her there, afraid to touch her, afraid not to. “No, Gina, you can’t think that way!”

“You told me,” she said, looking at him with such heartbreaking grief in her eyes. “You warned me. But I didn’t listen. And now you can’t even look at me without being haunted by it, by my mistake. It was my mistake, my fault, Max, not yours.”

Oh, God. Oh, almighty, vengeful, terrible God. Had she really been carrying this around for years?

“Gina, it was not your fault. Do you honestly think that?”

She did. She honestly did.

He put his arms around her and this time she didn’t resist. This time she clung to him, still sobbing that she was sorry. She was sorry for provoking her rape. It was all Max could do not to cry, too. But he’d wait and do that later. Right now, as quickly as possible, he had to correct this terrible misconception Gina had been living with for so long.

“Listen to me,” he said, working hard to make his voice calm. Soothing. Christ, he’d managed to sound matter-of-fact and unperturbed when he’d talked to the terrorists on the plane while they were raping her. Surely he could do it again now. But his voice broke. “Gina, you need to listen to me.”

“Don’t leave me,” she sobbed. “Please, Max...”

He would have promised her anything. “I’m not going anywhere,” he told her, holding her tightly, his cheek against the top of her head. “I’ll stay as long as you need me.”

He heard the words leaving his lips, and part of him stood off to the side and lifted his eyebrows at such an obvious error in judgment. But the rest of him took note in the fact that his promise seemed to work quite well in calming Gina down, and he actually said it again. “I’ll stay as long as you want me to. You just have to take a couple of deep breaths and listen to me. Really listen, okay?”

She nodded and breathed.

“Okay,” he said, smoothing her hair back from her face. “I’m going to tell you something that I’ve learned from years of negotiating and from years of dealing with people who are as desperate as the terrorists were who hijacked flight 232. I need you to listen carefully, and I need you to believe me. You trust me, right?”

Gina nodded again.

“I was straight with you about the jazz, right?”

Another nod. This one came with half of a laugh, too. Okay, good. She was listening.

“Can you sit up a little?” he asked. “I want you to look into my eyes when I tell you what I’m going to tell you. Can you do that?”

She lifted her head, and the sight of her face, pale and tear-streaked and weary with grief and the weight of responsibility she’d been carrying for so long, broke his heart.

She was much too close, dangerously close, her mouth only inches from his, but he was the one who was unwilling to let her move back any farther. He wanted his arms around her.

“When Babur Haiyan gave the order to Nabulsi to attack you,” Max told her, “he said, among other things, ‘You know what to do.’ Your attack, your rape, was something that they planned before they even got onto the plane. They thought you were the senator’s daughter, remember? Your rape was symbolic as well as a literal retaliation. It was a political statement, believe it or not. It was going to happen, Gina, no matter what you did.”

He could see her listening, see her struggling to understand what he was saying. He held her gaze, willing her to believe him.

“And it was also their means of provoking us,” he continued. “They wanted our troops to rush the plane. They had a bomb on board that was set to blow after the Navy SEALs had come into the plane, after the hijackers were dead, after we thought we’d won. You know this. They were tired of waiting—they were ready to die for their cause. So they attacked you, knowing that if they did, we’d probably stop stalling and send in our men.

“They knew we’d put those microphones and cameras in place. It was SOP—standard operating procedure—for a hijacking. You didn’t give anything away, I swear it. And if you really want to know the reason that you’re alive today, it’s because that pilot rushed to save you. Because they killed him, they had a body to throw off the plane. If no one had tried to help you, they probably would have killed you.”

He could still see a glimmer of disbelief in her eyes. She trusted him completely. He could see that, too, but she’d been living with another truth for so long. “But Haiyan was so angry when he caught me telling you about their machine gun clips.”

Okay. How could he make her understand? “I’m going to tell you what would have happened that morning if he hadn’t caught you feeding us that information,” Max told her. “You ready for this?”

She nodded.

“They would have said something like, ‘Don’t look at me when you speak to me. Don’t you know it’s disrespectful in our country for a woman to meet a man’s eyes?’ And you would have looked down at the floor and said you were sorry. And they would have said, ‘Are you smiling? Do you think the way our people have been murdered is funny?’ And you would have said no, and maybe you would have glanced up at them when you said that, and Haiyan would have hit you across the face for your disrespect, and you would have apologized, and it really wouldn’t matter what you said or what you did, because Haiyan would eventually have said to Nabulsi, ‘You know what to do.’ ”

Max pushed her hair back from her face. “You provoked none of that, Gina. Do you understand?”

If it was anyone’s fault, it was his for not insisting that the SEALs take down the plane the night before.

She nodded, and then, as if she could read his mind, she said, “If it wasn’t my fault, if it was destined to happen the way you said, then it can’t be your fault, either.”

It was Max’s turn to nod. “Yeah.” Right.

Gina settled deeper into his arms, her eyes distant, lost in her own thoughts, processing everything he’d told her.

“You should go back to that doctor,” Max told her, resting his cheek against the top of her head. “Talk it out some more.”

“I will.” She lifted her head to look up at him. “Do you have someone to talk to about it?”

He thought of Alyssa. He’d talked more to her than to anyone. But there was still so much he couldn’t say to her. Wouldn’t say.

And he’d just practically wrapped her up and put a bow on her and thrust her into Sam Starrett’s eager hands.

“You should find someone,” Gina said softly. “Someone you can be absolutely honest with. About everything.”

“Yeah, I should,” Max said, even though he knew damn well he’d never do it. Because before he could be honest with someone else—a friend or even a shrink—he first had to be honest with himself.

Jazz Jacquette touched Tom’s knee.

Tom looked up to see the nurse who had helped take Kelly to surgery coming into the hospital waiting room. He got to his feet. This was good, right? They wouldn’t send the nurse down to tell him that Kelly had died in surgery. Would they?

He searched the woman’s face but saw only fatigue.

Stan was sitting to his right, and he stood, too, putting his hand on Tom’s shoulder. It was the cosmic equivalent of a full body embrace from the nondemonstrative senior chief.

“The doctor would like you to come upstairs,” the nurse told him.

She’s out of surgery. So far so good. She’s going to be okay.

That’s what Tom had wanted to hear. Instead, he’d been summoned because... why? The possibilities that leapt to mind were all bad. Kelly was dying. Kelly was already dead. Fear hit him so hard, the room spun and blackened, and he nearly hit the deck. Jazz and Stan pushed him back into his seat, jammed his head down between his knees.

“Is she alive?” he heard Jazz ask through the roaring in his ears.

Please God, please...

“You haven’t gotten a status report?” The nurse’s distant voice got only slightly louder as she knelt next to him. “Oh, Commander, I’m so sorry—”

That was it. Sorry. The word he was praying that he wouldn’t hear. Kelly was dead. Tom stopped fighting the tunnel vision and checked out.