Still was.
"Can I start you off with drinks?"
The waitress' voice yanked me back to the present. I blinked, trying to clear my head. Amelia was staring at me. We ordered, then the waitress nodded and disappeared.
I shifted in my seat, willing my body to calm the hell down. My hands still remembered the weight of her ass, the way she'd fit perfectly in my palms. My mouth remembered the curve of her neck, the sound she'd made when I'd?—
Stop.
"So," I started, aiming for casual. "How've you?—"
She held up a hand. "I'm actually going to hit the buffet before I get nauseous. Jet lag."
She stood and walked away, hips swaying, shorts hugging her in ways that should be illegal.
I followed.
Not consciously. My body just … moved.
She was at the waffle station when she turned back, catching me mid-stare.
"Stop staring," she said.
"I'm not."
Her eyes narrowed. "Levi."
"Fine. I'm staring. Sue me."
She turned back to the waffle iron, shaking her head. But I caught the faintest hint of a smile before she hid it.
Amelia Emerson. Here. In Charleston.
What were the fucking odds?
I grabbed a plate and started loading it—eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns, a biscuit. My mind was still half in the past, replaying moments I'd spent two years trying to forget.
We'd met in a desert shithole. Forward operating base, middle of nowhere, temperatures that made hell look like a vacation spot. She'd stepped off the helicopter with a duffel bag, a press vest, and a look on her face that said she'd seen worse.
I'd been tasked with babysitting her.
At first, I'd resented it. Journalists were a pain in the ass—always asking questions, always getting in the way, always writing things that made operations harder.
But Amelia?
She was different.
She didn't complain. Not about the heat. Not about the dust. Not about the sleep accommodations that were barely a step up from sleeping on rocks. The only thing she complained about was access.
And she'd been right.
The Pentagon had promised her access to certain operations, interviews with key personnel, the kind of embedded reporting that was supposed to show the public what we were actually doing out there.
Then they'd pulled the rug out.
Classified. Too sensitive. Operational security.
Bullshit.
