She thought about admitting to him that it’d been a very close thing. But, instead, she went with, “Nope. I think the salt water is just testing the limits of my waterproof mascara.”
He gave her a sidelong glance. “Well, I think it’s found those limits, darlin’.”
She flattened her lips, but silently blessed him for making a joke and lightening the mood. Then she remembered he’d been shot.Goddamnit!How the hell could she have forgotten that? Her gaze darted to his right shoulder and the red bandana tied around it. Given the color of the fabric, it was hard to tell how bad the wound was.
“How bad are you hurt?” she demanded.
“It’s nothin’,” he assured her, and nowshewas the one to give him a sidelong glance. “The bullet just grazed me. I’ve had much worse.”
And she knew he had. After all, she’d seen some of his scars. Still, she was tempted to undo that bandana and assess the damage herself. But a quick flash of movement over his shoulder caught her attention. She narrowed her eyes.
“What’s up?” he asked, craning his head around. There was nothing back there except waves upon waves, a few floating pieces of white Styrofoam, and the sleek, black body of the yacht.
“I guess it was nothing.” She shook her head, wondering if the wind and sun and tide and…exhaustion—both physical and emotional—had finally gotten the better of her. “It’s entirely possible I’m hallucinating at this point.”
“The sunlight on the waves can play tricks on you.” He winked. And how the man could act so blasé after watching his ship get blown to smithereens, after being shot, and after fighting an underwater duel with a terrorist was beyond her. She was a wreck.Ihopeitdoesn’t show.
“Are you okay to swim to the yacht?” he asked. Okay, so obviouslysomeof it showed.Damnit!“I’m itchin’ to go see how the others are farin’.”
Oh yeah. The others. The men she’d dragged into this mess who were probably, right at this very moment, fighting off who-knew-how-many more tangos. “Hell yeah,” she told him, glad her tone was filled with far more determination than she actually felt.
He bobbed his head once, but before he could turn, a big, black weapon appeared behind him. And behindthatwere the murderous eyes of a radical. It felt like a bolt of lightning had buzzed across the top of her skull. She opened her mouth to scream a warning, but Leo’s spec-ops soldier ESP beat her to the punch. Before the tango could squeeze the trigger, Leo whirled in the water, grabbing the end of the barrel in one hand and the stock of the AK-47 in the other. As he twisted the weapon out of the radical’s grip, a spine-tinglingcrackechoed through the air. It could only be one thing: the terrorist’s finger bones against the trigger guard.
And, sure as shit, the man screamed in agony. His piercing cry cut off a half second later when Leo propped the confiscated AK against his shoulder and—Bam!—fired. A red hole bloomed in the middle of their enemy’s cheek, the back of his neck—
She looked away, fighting the urge to puke.
“Come on,” Leo said, slinging the strap of the AK over his shoulder before grabbing the front harness on her life jacket. He dragged her through the water toward the yacht and away,thankGod, from the corpse of the radical.
For a couple of seconds, she was too nauseous to help him. Then she gave herself a mental kick in the ass for being a big, ol’ ninny and began paddling. “I got it,” she said, swallowing the bile burning at the back of her throat and forcing it back down into her roiling stomach. Eyebrow raised, he gave her a look so stoic that one would never think he’d been a split second away from taking a bullet to the brainpan. “Really. Igotit.”
With a quick nod, he released her to make her own way. “Sorry you had to see—”
“You’re not really going to apologize for saving my life, are you?” she huffed.
“Nope.” A muscle near his mouth trembled. “Wouldn’t think of it.”
“Good,” she grumbled. “Because that would be ridiculous.”
“Like a trapdoor in a canoe or a back pocket on a shirt,” he said, intentionally thickening his accent.
Huh?Oh, she got it. Things that were ridiculous. “Like a screen door on a submarine,” she added.
“Like an ejection seat in a helicopter.”
“Like a white crayon.”
“Hey, now!” he said. “I used white crayons on black construction paper the time I made Casper the Friendly Ghost Halloween cards for my second-grade class.”
“My bad,” she relented, trying to imagine big, bad Leo “the Lion” Anderson as a second grader. She’d bet money he’d been adorable and smart and brave, the kind of kid to stand up to the playground bully. “So you win that round.”
“As it ever was and ever shall be, darlin’.”
“Ugh. Andthere’sthat oversized ego all SEALs come equipped with. Somehow I was under the impression the Navy factory inadvertently forgot to install yours.”
“That ain’t the only thing that’s oversized on me.” He wiggled his eyebrows.
She rolled her eyes, fighting a smile. This was the kind of flirtatious banter they’d bandied about for three long months. Banter that made her hoot with laughter one minute and want to jump his bones the next. And now, like then, he always seemed to know when she needed him to throw in a little levity. Or, more specifically, in their jobs it was known as “gallows humor.”
