Radclyffe - Oath of Honor

the bench, and grabbed a couple of white terry cloth towels from the

shelf. By the thinness of the material, they’d been washed a lot of times,

but they were clean and dry, and that was all she needed. The shower in

the other room turned off.

“Need a towel?” she called.

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“I got one, thanks,” Wes called back.

Evyn wrapped a towel around her torso and waited for Wes to

leave the shower. The already small room shrank further when Wes

walked in, her wheat-gold hair bronzed by the water, hugging her scalp

and fingering along her neck. Sparkling droplets beaded on her chest

and rained in thin rivulets over the muscles of her upper abdomen. Her

skin was goose bumped.

Evyn unfolded a towel and held it out. “You’re cold. Cover your

shoulders. You’ve got a pretty good bruise going there.”

“Thanks. Looks worse than it feels.” Wes rubbed her hair and

draped the towel around her neck. “There’s still plenty of hot water.”

“Good, I’m ready for it. Your bag is over there.” Evyn gestured

to the bags she’d left at the end of the row of lockers. “I’ll be out in a

second.”

She edged past Wes, a foot of space between them. Despite the

lingering cold that had taken up permanent residence in her bones, she

was anything but numb. Being close to Wes charged her muscles and

flooded her blood with heat and expectation. She tugged off the towel,

draped it over the side of the shower stall, and stepped inside, twisting

the hot tap all the way open. She added a little cold but kept the water as

close to steaming as she could stand, immersing her head, turning her

face into the spray, desperately hoping to purge the image of Wes’s body

outlined by the thin cotton towel. Strong shoulders, sculpted arms, the

swell of firm breasts, the stretch of abdomen and slight flare of thighs.

She shuddered and braced her arms against the smooth tile wall. She let

her head hang down while the heat beat against her neck and shoulders.

She stayed there until the water started to cool and then twisted the

taps closed. Briskly, she toweled her hair dry, finger-combed it, and

wrapped the last dry towel around her chest. She strode back into the

locker room, not looking in Wes’s direction, and quickly pulled on dry

jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt. After donning thick wool socks and

kicking into her boots, she turned to Wes, who had stretched out on the

bench with an arm over her eyes. She might have been asleep.

Evyn smiled to herself. Wes was like every other first responder

she’d ever known—able to sleep anywhere, anytime, under any

conditions. She eased her emergency kit out of her go bag and crouched

next to the bench. “You asleep?”

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“No,” Wes said quietly. “Just enjoying being warm.”

“I know what you mean.” Evyn pulled out a blood-pressure cuff

and a stethoscope. “I want to check your BP.”

Wes moved to unbutton her cuff, and Evyn brushed her hand

aside. “I’ve got it.”

She unbuttoned Wes’s cuff and folded the sleeve up to her mid-

upper arm. Wes’s skin was lightly tanned, soft and smooth, the muscles

beneath firm and finely etched. She didn’t look at Wes’s face as she

wrapped the blood-pressure cuff around her biceps and checked her

pressure. “Ninety over sixty. Is that usual for you?”

“A little low,” Wes said, “but nothing worrisome.”

“Uh-huh.” Evyn wasn’t about to argue, but she wasn’t going to

let Wes self-diagnose, either. She checked her pulse. Sixty, slow and

steady, full and strong. Wes didn’t just look to be in good shape, she

was. “Do you run?”

“I row.”

“It shows.” Evyn pulled out a digital thermometer. “Put this under

your tongue.”

Wes moved her arm from over her eyes and turned her head to

look at Evyn. Her eyebrows rose slightly as she eyed the thermometer.

“I’m okay.”

Fatigue shadowed her eyes, darkening the green to nearly black.

Her lips were pale. She looked exhausted.

“Your vital signs are good, but you need fuel and rest.” Evyn

wagged the thermometer. “Under your tongue.”

Wes grinned wryly and opened her mouth.

Evyn slid the thermometer in, and Wes slowly closed her lips

around it. Her eyes held Evyn’s, and Evyn felt heat rush to her face. Her

thighs suddenly trembled, and she dropped onto her knees to steady

herself. Hell, she couldn’t even do something as simple as take Wes’s

temperature without starting to lose it. Well. She might be able to keep

her cool if she didn’t look at Wes’s mouth and imagine those moist,

sensuous lips closing around her. Wes put every one of her fantasies

to shame—and scared the hell out of her. She swallowed hard and

wondered if Wes could hear the tightness in her throat. Her heart nearly

froze when Wes’s hand moved toward her face.

Evyn stilled, feeling a little bit like a rabbit paralyzed at the sight

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of a predator drawing near. Wes’s fingers grazed her cheek, slid down

to her neck, and Evyn’s breath caught in her throat.

“You’ve got a bruise,” Wes murmured.

Evyn slipped the thermometer from between Wes’s lips and

pretended to stare at it. “Ninety-six. You’re too cold.”

“And your pulse is racing.” Wes’s fingertips rested over Evyn’s

carotid. “I bet if we took your blood pressure, it would be all over the

place. You need some rest too, Agent Daniels.”

Evyn wanted to move away from Wes’s touch. And she wanted

more of it. She wanted the fire streaming from Wes’s fingertips to

scorch through her, burning away fear and uncertainty and caution. She

wanted to explode. Her stomach trembled. She licked her suddenly dry

lips and eased away. “We both need a meal. Sit up, I want to check your

pressure while you’re upright. I’m not letting you walk out of here and

have you fall down halfway to the vehicle.”

“I appreciate your concern,” Wes said quietly, “but I’m not a

squid, you know.”

Evyn laughed. “I know. But I bet it’s been a long time since you’ve

had that kind of dunking.”

Sighing, Wes pushed upright. “True.” She closed her eyes. “And I

do have a little orthostatic hypotension.”

Instantly, Evyn forgot about everything except making sure Wes

was stable. She took her pressure again. “Seventy over fifty. You’re a

little dizzy, aren’t you?”

“Just a little.”

“Okay.” Evyn rose briskly. “We’re spending the night in Kitty

Hawk. You’re going to get some hot food into you and twelve hours’

sleep.”

Wes frowned. “I can sleep in DC. The trip back isn’t that long.”

“Sorry, I’m not taking a chance on you decompensating on an

airplane. Food, sleep, home tomorrow.”

“Should I ask who left you in charge?”

Wes sounded grumpy, which only proved she wasn’t at the top of

her game. Evyn had never seen her disgruntled by anything.

“I’m only in charge by default, Captain,” Evyn said softly. “I set

up that exercise. It’s my fault you went in today. I’m going to see you

make it home, safe and sound.”

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“That’s bullshit. The cable snapped. It was an accident.”

“It could’ve been worse.” Evyn shuddered inwardly. Wes had

been on her way down when she’d reached her. She couldn’t even think

about that without feeling as if pieces of her were going to tear apart

and shatter like glass on the rocks. “No matter what you think, I need to

take care of you right now.”

Wes drew a sharp breath. “I’m not sure how good I’ll be at that—

being the patient, I mean.”

“Not used to being taken care of?”

“Not really, no.”

“No one special?” The silence stretched and Evyn waited for the

shutters to close again. But Wes just searched her eyes, and Evyn was

too tired and worried to hide whatever might show.

“No, no one.”

“Then I guess I’m it tonight,” Evyn said, trying for lightness.

“It might take some getting used to,” Wes said softly. “I might not

be any good at it.”

“I doubt there’s anything you aren’t good at.” Evyn packed her

gear and bagged their wet clothes. She held out her hand to Wes. “Let’s

start practicing and see how you do.”

Wes rose slowly from the bench, wavering ever so slightly. Evyn

slid her arm around Wes’s waist. “Okay?”

“Don’t quite have my land legs yet.” Wes let out an exasperated

sigh and draped her arm over Evyn’s shoulders. “Just give me a

minute.”

“Take all the time you need. We’re not on a schedule tonight.”

Wes’s hand curved around Evyn’s shoulder, the pressure of her

fingers shooting tendrils of excitement through Evyn’s chest. Her heart

hammered and her legs quivered. She braced her muscles, hoping

Wes couldn’t feel her tremble. She planned on taking care of Wes and

nothing more.

“Ready to get out of here?” Evyn asked.

“More than ready.” Wes dropped her arm and stepped away. “I

think I can make it on my own.”

Evyn missed the contact instantly and said casually, “Never

doubted it. Let’s go find a room for the night.”

Wes laughed softly. “More practice?”

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“Uh…hell. You think maybe you could cut me some slack? My

brain is a little numb here.”

“Well, let’s go get you warmed up.”

Wes reached for the door and pushed it open, and Evyn wondered

how the tables had been so neatly turned.

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RADCLY f FE

chapter nineteen

The neon sign announcing the Bayside Motel blinked

erratically, illuminating the L-shaped motor court in flashes

of holiday red and green. A mud-spattered black Ford pickup truck

and a low-slung eighties Cadillac convertible with big patches of rust-

colored primer on the fenders were the only vehicles in the gravel lot.

A light burned in the room closest to the road. A hand-painted sign

propped in the streaked window proclaimed “Office.”

“Looks like a hot-sheet motel,” Wes said, laughing softly.

“Cord swears this place is clean and makes decent coffee,” Evyn

said. “That’s all we need, then.” Wes didn’t care where they bunked—

she’d slept in worse places, including a tent in the Afghan mountains.

Compared to that, this rated five stars.

Evyn pulled the rented Jeep into the lot just as the sun went down

and the wind came up. “I’ll run in and register.”

When Evyn pushed open the door, the wind clattering through the

branches of the red oaks surrounding the motel filled the Jeep with a

sound like machine-gun fire. Wes jerked and her stomach lurched. She

had been posted to a field hospital close enough to the front to hear the

firefights ranging in the hills at night, her tent a poor shield against stray