Mary Wine (3 page)

“paul’s been trying to reach you but your phone’s not getting a clear signal. these mountains have a large iron core and it’s producing a lot of static. but i’ve changed the setting on your dish network so you should get that signal now.”

loren’s son loped back into his living room a half second after he finished talking. rourke’s phone buzzed for attention almost on cue. staring at the empty doorway, rourke grabbed the cellular device from his pocket.

“campbell.”

“your tone implies that i’ve caught you at a bad time, major.”

“dr. jasper?”

“yes, your message did say it was urgent.”

“it is… stand by.” ripping a towel off its drying rack, rourke pulled it across his face and neck. three hours of hard running and that woman was still stuck inside his skull! “all right, doctor, i apologize. i need some information on a tobias loren.”

“toby. yes, quite a unique young man.”

“how unique?”

“you would have to meet the young man to know, major. i became acquainted with him when he broke into my encrypted files.”

“the boy’s a hacker?” tossing the towel aside, rourke cast a narrow look at the living room doorway.

“toby is a genius. we don’t conduct interviews here. if you can’t get our attention, you don’t have the brains.” that was clear enough. disconnecting his phone, rourke considered his kitchen. a

walk on the beach was rapidly becoming more interesting by the second.

the slight grating sound of a computerized printer drifted through the doorway. he really needed a shower but…had that kid said he’d adjusted the satellite dish?

approaching the doorway felt remarkably like a covert operation. his body tensed just the right amount to heighten his senses. his feet didn’t make a sound as he stopped behind the wall before easing his head around for a look.

“holy christ!” the living room was rourke’s office. at the moment it had been transformed into some kind of electronic nucleus.

right in the middle of it, toby sat conducting a symphony of movement. rourke’s own computer had its plastic housing pulled free. there were cables and wires connecting it to the small laptop system that toby sat punching information into. the printer was still grinding along on some project.

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the kid might have been messing with his dish but he also had his own along. perched atop a bookshelf, a small collapsible dish was aimed out the open window it faced. it was a state of the art piece.

rourke’s unit carried a similar one for combat. they weren’t even available to the civilian market yet.

“that’s for you. dr. jasper is sending you a novel on me. he said i could look the

panther over ‘cause there’s an information lag in the targeting system.” the kid’s hands didn’t stop while he spoke. instead they continued punching in numbers and letters alike into the keyboard. he’d switch off to the mouse but return rapidly to the keyboard. it was a frantic pace that made your eyes ache if you watched it too long. but the kid appeared completely in control.

an open box of cereal was shoved off to the corner of his makeshift desk while the trash can was piled high with empty soda cans and crumpled up printouts. the kid’s shoes were kicked off in the corner and his backpack was lying open on the floor.

“have you been up all night?”

“yeah.” the punching and printing continued.

“geniuses don’t sleep?”

that got his attention. he turned a huge grin toward rourke before he sent his chair across the space between their joined computers. the wheels on the bottom of the chair skidded as toby ripped the completed pages from the printer’s output tray. another shove and the chair sprang back to his original spot. toby bounded from it before it came to a full stop.

“here. now i’m gonna go tap into the onboard computer system.” toby shoved the stack of papers at rourke and lunched himself past him at near light speed. dropping the mess, rourke made a grab for the kid but his hand fell short.

“toby.”

“tobias kenneth loren! halt!” the kid froze in his tracks. loren stood in the opposite doorway leading to the kitchen with her hands propped on her hips. rourke’s mouth dropped open. she’d obviously jumped right out of her bed. she was wearing nothing more than a tank top and underwear. little blue lace panties, bikini cut.

“i told you not to get shot while i’m off duty, young man.”

“jasper said i could, mom!”

“fine, but you might want to wait ‘til major campbell tells the armed guard out there that you’re clear with him. i’m talking about the guy holding the rifle.”

“ah, sure.” the kid swung his eyes back to him making rourke jerk his own away from loren’s tempting flat stomach. getting caught looking his mother over made a thin tide of red creep up his neck.

“why don’t you give me a moment to go over this?”

“okay.” toby reversed course and dove back into the office. the chair sent out a small squeal as the sound of the kid’s punching began again.

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“is that normal?”

“for toby? yes.” loren had learned to sleep light the day her son learned to roll over. he was a bundle of nonstop action. from toddlerhood to teenager. a second of inattention was an invitation for disaster. raising her hand up, she rubbed her eyes and forced the last bits of sleep away.

coffee. it was coffee time!

loren rubbed her burning eyes as she took a deep breath to clear the cobwebs from her sleepy brain. she lifted her eyelids to see rourke staring at the bare skin her lifted arm gave him a glimpse of across her belly. male satisfaction was written across his eyes as he caught her watching him and grinned at her temper.

“pig.” the bark of laughter her comment gained almost moved loren to violence. glaring at rourke campbell and his obvious superior physical size, she flipped around and settled for slamming the door of her bedroom in his face.

arrogant, lust-driven, crimsoned…pig!

which could conveniently be rolled up into a single word—man. maybe male.

at the moment, pig just sounded just about perfect.

loren was going to have bacon with that coffee.

“mom, is that guy my dad?”

* * * * *

loren felt her blood freeze in her veins. she’d always known her son would ask about his father some day. in fact, she was amazed toby had waited this long to ask for some information on his absent father. “yes.” turning her face toward her son, loren picked out the details of chris that were in toby’s face. it just wasn’t fair that biology was dictating that her son look like the man who had abandoned him before he was even born. chris hadn’t wanted his child so it just wasn’t fair that toby was becoming the image of his father.

“okay.” toby stuck his hands into his pockets and turned back toward the living room. loren watched him go and felt her mouth drop open. it wasn’t supposed to be that simple. she’d expected demands for details and maybe accusations. instead her ears picked up the sounds of her son resuming his programming frenzy.

“i should break your neck for stealing my son.” chris came around the corner and planted his body in front of her. it was strange the way her eyes moved over him with such calm. the last time she’d seen her husband he’d been in a rage and it had reduced her into a cringing animal that was controlled by fear.

loren looked at the black spot marking his jaw and felt her confidence grow. she would never give her husband the power of fear over her again.

sticking her chin out she let her eyes dismiss him. chris’ face flushed in anger and he shifted his weight from side to side as he struggled with his temper.

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but it was clear that her husband wasn’t about to cross his commanding officer by getting into another fight with her. at least not a physical fight.

“i’ll get you, loren, the second you think you’re safe.” his boots shuffled and he turned away but stopped and sent her a sickening grin. “then i’m going to watch you bleed.”

loren wasn’t afraid of her husband. not even as he threatened her. but she was afraid of herself. inside her there was the growing need to avenge herself. she was sort

of hoping chris would make good on his threats, just so she’d have the chance to vent out all of her inner rage.

that was a rather stupid idea. maybe she had gotten the jump on him last night but chris was an army ranger, for christ’s sake. the fact was, he knew how to kill in more ways than loren could imagine. add to that, the fact that the man had a grudge to settle, and loren really should adjust her thinking.

dropping her body into a nearby chair, loren pulled a deep breath into her lungs. chris should never have discovered toby. oh, she knew he’d wanted a son. there had been times she’d stared at her telephone and pictured herself dialing the number that would bring her husband back into her life.

it hadn’t been easy to be a seventeen-year- old single parent.

but she’d survived. and now chris knew that the daughter he’d thrown out was in fact the son he’d longed for. oh yeah, chris would enjoy watching her bleed. that was

for sure.

“what did your husband say to you?”

the fear loren couldn’t find for her husband suddenly twisted her stomach, as his commanding officer demanded his question. rourke campbell’s green eyes weren’t moving over her in desire tonight. instead, they cut across her face like emeralds. there was absolute purpose carved into the solid stone of his face as he stood over her.

“answer the question, loren.” she pushed out of his porch chair and moved away from him. rourke watched her retreat and slowly followed her.

“nothing important.” loren didn’t exactly lie. chris wasn’t important, neither was anything he said.

“fine, then it won’t matter if you repeat it.”

“it was personal, major.” the edge of the porch bought loren to a stop.

there was a waist-high railing that she tried to slip past but rourke was too close for her to do it. he stepped closer and aimed his eyes straight into hers. there was the intense feeling of scrutiny that came with his stare. in fact, it was more like a probe, the way his eyes cut into her face. he reached for the railing and curled his fists around it, forming a cage with his body.

“tell me what your husband said to you, now.” his words were whisper soft and her skin rose into goose bumps in response.

there was such an intense level of awareness that her body had for him. loren tried to

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suppress it. chris had taught her just how dangerous getting close to a man could become. the major here was an animal higher up on the food chain than her husband.

“it’s none of your concern.”

rourke kept a careful hold on his temper. at the moment, he was torn between beating the truth out of his man and shaking it loose from loren. there was something going on between the pair and he wanted to dig it out of her.

it was more than simple attraction now. this close he could smell her sweet flesh. her chest rose and fell with a rapid rate that lifted the corners of his mouth into a grin. the level of arousal they brought out in each other was just as strong as the night they’d met. it was an intoxicating piece of information.

but nothing would be happening ‘til her husband was out of the picture.

rourke focused his attention on the barrier her married state presented.

she’d been abandoned

at the least. what he wanted to know now was if she’d run away from something.

“most women don’t step out on their husbands when they’re pregnant. why did you?”

“it’s none of your business.”

“why did you kick your husband last night?”

“he swung at me first!” loren spat her response out before she thought better. horror flooded her as the grin sitting on the major’s face widened to show her an even row of white teeth. she’d just given him exactly what he wanted. rourke campbell had not witnessed the attack himself and she’d just bet that not a single one of chris’ fellow rangers were willing to tell their commanding officer that one of their own had raised

his hand against his wife.

but now, she’d opened her big mouth and the major had all the information he needed to open an investigation against her husband. that would be a disaster for her.

as long as chris was out being a ranger he didn’t have the time to bother her. if he got

discharged for spousal abuse, well, the man would have nothing better to do than come looking for her.

“divorce him, loren.”

“i can’t.”

“you mean you won’t.” rourke moved his body closer and listened to the sharp breath she drew. there was a current jumping between their bodies that had his hair rising along the back of his neck. she wanted him and he wasn’t going to let her hide behind a marriage that was long dead.

“that’s right. i made my mistake and i’ll live with it, rourke.” 27

she’d called him rourke.

staring at his reflection in the bathroom mirror the next morning, rourke was still grinning. all right, he was acting like a teenager but hell, he liked the sound of his name rolling out of her sweet mouth.

picking up his razor, he applied it to his jaw with steady strokes. his thoughts were completely centered on his houseguest. that didn’t bother him in the least. a man was lucky to have such a lovely woman bunking under his roof, even if she wasn’t bunking

in the right room just yet.

a slight frown settled over his face. he wanted loren. the sexual attraction was intensely acute for some reason. the problem was he only had six days ‘til she’d be free

to head back home.

now that bothered him. wiping a towel across his face, rourke turned toward his closet. pulling a shirt out, rourke pulled it over his chest and began pushing the buttons through their holes.

maybe he should just let it drop. he found loren too intense.

the idea of their relationship ending bothered him. and that was the real reason rourke should let it go now, before it even got started.

for the first time in his life, rourke found his genealogy bothered him.

he’d always been psychic. his mother was psychic, his brothers were and they lived in complete acceptance of that fact. there had never been a time when rourke had resented his abilities.

he didn’t resent it now. but he was finding it popping up in his mind.

loren was a civilian. his psychic abilities were classified. that meant there was a solid wall standing between the two of them.

rourke considered the desire that was stirring just with the aid of his imagination.

it would seem that the hard facts weren’t going to intrude on his attraction to the woman.

but he didn’t want the attraction to stop. rourke was enjoying it. it had been a long time since a woman had such pull on him. in fact, he couldn’t remember it ever happening. six days was a nice long time to explore things.

beyond that, well, loren couldn’t become aware of who he really was. that was for her good as well as his. but rourke found himself considering the idea all the same.

it was just possible that a woman who could tackle the male-dominated field of firefighting wouldn’t run screaming for a priest the second she found out she’d kissed a psychic.

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even if she had run away from the man.