Military Man

“Ferrarella has penned a guaranteed page-turner!”

—Romantic Times on Internal Affair

“Time and again, Marie Ferrarella demonstrates her gift for storytelling in the romantic suspense genre, and Crime and Passion is no exception.”

—Romantic Times on Crime and Passion

“…the saucy quips will draw a laugh, and the chemistry will make you shiver. Marie Ferrarella does it again!”

—Romantic Times on Mac’s Bedside Manner

“Great romance, excellent plot, grabs you from page one.”

—Affaire de Coeur on In Graywolf’s Hands

“…the pleasure of this journey is in the getting there. Reading about warm, caring people and watching relationships mature under stressful situations is a pleasurable way to spend an afternoon. As usual, Ferrarella’s dialogue is in voice, crisp and moves the story along without ever bogging down in the emotional angst each brings to the relationship. Once a Father is a hearty recommend for a skilled writer.”

—The Romance Reader on Once a Father

Dear Reader,

No, you are not experiencing déjà vu, this is actually my second time up at bat. I had the privilege of working on Book #2 of this continuity, A Baby Changes Everything, and here I am again, managing the lives of the people in Book #10. This time I’m meeting new people as well as beloved old favorites such as Vanessa Fortune and her father, Ryan.

Doing a continuity is like being invited to become part of a large extended family and finding your place within it. Over the last twenty-two years I’ve written about a lot of heroes, but Lt. Collin Jamison is my very first military man. He’s a dashing, daring army ranger accustomed to risking his life on an almost daily basis. But here, he finds that he is asked to do the most dangerous thing of all—risk his heart. The same is asked of Lucy Gatling, a bright young third-year medical student who is more interested in medicine and forensics than she is venturing out into the real world. She doesn’t want to risk being hurt, either. But the chemistry between them is more than either can deny.

Come with me and watch these two find their way into love, struggling and resisting all the way.

I wish you love,

To Patience Smith and the team we have become.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Bonus Features

One

“You know I wouldn’t ordinarily be asking you to do this, but…”

Lt. Collin Jamison heard his cousin’s voice awkwardly trail off on the other end of the line. Collin’s lips curved slightly in an understanding smile. That had always been his gift, for as far back as he could remember. Understanding. Although it took no special gift to know where Emmett was coming from.

His cousin had trouble asking people for favors, even from someone he’d once been close to, the way they once had been.

Granted it was a hell of a favor to ask. But at least, since he’d sought him out like this, it meant that Emmett had decided to come back to join the living. That alone would have had Collin saying yes, no matter what the obstacles.

It wasn’t easy for Collin to arrange free time. When you worked as an Army Ranger for CIA Special Operations, specializing in manhunts and intelligence gathering, it wasn’t exactly as if you were just another easily replaceable cog.

But he had a lot of time coming to him, time he’d never bothered using because there hadn’t been anything else he’d rather be doing than his job.

Things could be managed, Collin thought. Things could always be managed.

Collin shifted the receiver to his other ear. He’d barely walked into the small, two-bedroom condo he owned right outside of Langley, Virginia, when the phone had rung, demanding his attention. He’d thought it was a call to come in for a new assignment.

In a way, he supposed it was.

Exchanging quick, perfunctory pleasantries for less than two minutes, Emmett had swiftly filled him in as to why he’d called. Even when they were young, Emmett had never believed in wasting time. Neither did he. That was why they got along so well.

“Yeah, I know,” Collin said in response to his cousin’s awkward pause. “I’ve got to admit, it’s a hell of a surprise, hearing from you. Uncle Blake said that you had gone off somewhere into the mountains in New Mexico to be by yourself.” He recalled the conversation in its entirety. Blake Jamison had been sincerely worried about his youngest son, not knowing if Emmett was going to permanently withdraw from life, or if he just needed time to come to terms with the things he’d witnessed during the course of his work as an FBI special agent.

“I did.”

He heard Emmett sigh quietly on the other end, as if a part of him still wanted to be back there, hidden in the mountains, away from the world. Collin knew how that could be. There were times when he’d thought seriously about just saying the hell with everything and retreating himself. That usually lasted until the next interesting case came along to challenge him. He was no good with free time. Free time made you think.

“I needed some peace and quiet,” Emmett was saying. As always, his cousin was given to understatement.

For a while there Collin had worried about Emmett’s sanity. Everyone thought about running away, but very few ever did it. Those who did generally invited speculation about the state of their mental health.

But now that Emmett was back, Collin breathed a little easier. “Couldn’t find any, huh?” he joked.

His uncle Blake had told Collin that when Emmett’s older brother, Christopher, had turned up murdered, it just intensified Emmett’s desire to stay away from the world. It was only after his father had made the pilgrimage to his shack to tell him that Christopher had been killed by Jason, the brother both he and Christopher had watched descend into madness, that Emmett had snapped out of his depression and left his self-imposed exile to battle the “bad guys” again. This time, the bad guy was his older brother.

“No, it’s not that,” Emmett responded wearily to his cousin’s joke. “The world just won’t let me alone.” He took a deep breath and reiterated his initial plea. “I need your help in finding Jason.”

Collin didn’t bother saying the obvious, that Emmett had greater resources than him to employ. Or the more obvious, that the FBI was never thrilled having someone from the CIA nosing around. He said, instead, what they both knew to be true.

“Jason’s sick, Emmett. He has been for a long time now.” Jason had been different as a boy, given to hero-worshiping their grandfather to the point that it became a near obsession. All of Farley Jamison’s past history became Jason’s by proxy, to cherish and, more importantly, to vindicate.

“No,” Emmett contradicted, his voice harsh. “He’s evil. You know that.”

Yes, Collin thought, he supposed he did. Accustomed as he was to the ugly underbelly of the world, he still found it hard to pin that label on someone whose blood ran through his own veins.

Pausing, Collin tried to guess at Emmett’s reasons for what he was doing. The brothers had never been particularly close, even as children.

“You afraid the FBI’ll kill Jason if they find him?”

Emmett’s voice was steely as he replied, “No, I’m afraid he’ll wind up killing someone else. He’s my flesh and blood and I don’t want that on my conscience.”

Emmett always had enough conscience for three people, Collin thought. For a man who was only thirty-one, he acted as if he’d been born old. “You’re not your brother’s keeper, Emmett.”

There was another long pause on the other end of the line. Collin wondered if he’d insulted Emmett. After all, he hadn’t seen or spoken to him for a while now and people had a habit of changing.

Everyone but him, he mused.

“Maybe not,” Emmett finally said, “but I’m an FBI agent. What I’m supposed to do is keep the public safe from maniacs like Jason. Frankly, I’m afraid that he’ll surface somewhere and kill Ryan Fortune before I get a chance to take him down.”

Collin was vaguely familiar with Fortune, mainly from newspaper articles. The billionaire rancher was the epitome of generosity, giving to so many charities that the public had lost count. Collin was also aware that there was some sort of a family connection, but he had his own world, his own concerns. The Fortunes were a world apart from him.

“Ryan Fortune? Why?”

In the background, he thought he heard someone call out, “Room Service.” Emmett responded with a crisp, “Later,” before continuing and telling him what he’d pieced together. “Because Grandpa’s stories turned Jason’s mind to the state of an overripe, rotting apple. Because Grandpa blamed the Fortunes for turning him into a pauper and making him live out the rest of his life in that state. Grandpa needed a scapegoat for his problems and an audience to hear about it. Jason adored him and now he thinks he’s bringing some kind of divine justice into play.

“I know him, Collin. Jason’s crazy enough and evil enough to try something desperate. I mean, if he killed Christopher because for some reason Christopher got in the way of his big ‘plans,’ then—”

Collin was quick to stop him. He needed confirmation. “Is that what happened?”

A rare fondness slipped into Emmett’s voice. “You know Christopher. He’s always—” Emmett stopped; Collin could almost feel the other man’s physical pain as he corrected himself “—was always bent on bringing out the best in everyone. He knew Jason was obsessed with avenging Grandpa and followed him down here to Red Rock to talk him out of whatever it was he was planning.” All feeling drained out of his voice. “But nobody messes with Jason. At least, that’s what Jason believes.”

Even as a small boy, Collin remembered, Jason had always been headstrong, always needed to be center stage, or else he was given to destroying the stage.

“So he killed Christopher.” Even though Jason had been arrested and charged with the crime, with most people believing he was guilty, it was still something that Collin found difficult to say.

“And that girl who was posing as his wife,” Emmett interjected. “And that guard who was transporting him to another prison.”

And who knew how many others who hadn’t come to light, Collin couldn’t help thinking.

“Human life means nothing to him,” Emmett said with utter disgust. “And a second transport guard is just barely hanging on.”

“Maybe he can tell you something—” Collin began.

Emmett cut him off. Not because he felt angry or impatient, Collin knew, but because it was the way he was. Clipped and to the point.

Collin knew that was his cousin’s way of keeping everything at bay except for the facts. Emmett was not about to allow his emotions to suck him down to the depths he’d already been pulled to once.

He couldn’t survive a second trip down that far.

“The guard’s in a coma.”

“Oh.” That rather curtailed his ability to talk to the man, Collin thought. “So what exactly do you want from me?”

“I need you to do what you do best,” Emmett told him. “You can get into the mind of a criminal, find him, second guess his next move.”

The words were flattering, but not without foundation. Still, he did that with strangers, getting into their heads, under their skins. But in this case Emmett had an advantage over him. “He’s your brother, shouldn’t you be the one who’s able to—”

Again Emmett cut him short. “Jason’s been a mystery to me from day one. Christopher was the brother I always admired, not Jason.” Collin could hear the pain in his cousin’s voice. “Jason was always evil, always out for just Jason.”

With one notable exception, Collin thought. “Except in the way he felt about your grandfather.”

“I think he saw Grandpa as an extension of himself.” Emmett made his final entreaty. “This is family business, Collin. I need someone on my side.”

It was clear to Collin that even though his cousin was part of the FBI himself, the organization saw them as intruders in this case.

The request was something new for Emmett. Collin knew that his cousin was accustomed to working alone. So much so that the Bureau did not view him as a team player. But Emmett was very good at what he did, which made him a valuable asset to the FBI. Valuable assets were allowed some leeway. So when Emmett had put in for an extended leave of absence, saying he’d needed time to pull himself together, Collin knew the objections had been few. The Bureau did not want to risk having a stressed-out agent amid their number.

For a while there Collin had thought that his cousin’s withdrawal from the world was destined to be a permanent one. And maybe it would have become that eventually, if family honor and Emmett’s own sense of pride hadn’t joined together to pull him out of the tailspin he’d found himself in.

Leaning back, Collin put his feet on his coffee table and formed the only conclusion he could from Emmett’s tone. “I take it our end of the investigation is going to be unofficial.”

Even if it hadn’t been his choice, it would have had to be this way. “You know the Bureau frowns on their operatives handling anything that remotely involves their personal lives.”

The army was the same way. He was going to have to request a leave of absence, Collin thought.

He laughed softly to himself, relishing the image. “So as far as the local law-enforcement officers are concerned, we’re going to be just two pains in the butt for them.”

As always, Emmett put a serious interpretation on the words. “Let me worry about the local law-enforcement officers.”

Swinging his legs off the table, Collin shifted to the edge of the sofa, his attention focused on the nature of Emmett’s words. “You are planning on checking in with them.” He wanted to know.

Emmett was honest with him. Collin knew Emmett could never be anything less than that. “As little as possible and only when necessary. You know that every agency thinks they’re supreme.”

Collin grinned and laughed again, unable to help himself. “When we all know that it’s only true as far as the FBI is concerned.”

The easy give-and-take they’d always enjoyed as boys and then young men was still held somewhat in abeyance. Invoking the memories, he might feel comfortable around Emmett, but there was no sign that Emmett reciprocated the feeling. He seemed to be nothing but all business and as rigid as an iron bar.

“So.” Emmett wanted to know. “Are you in?”

There had never been any question in Collin’s mind from the moment he’d said hello and recognized Emmett’s voice. “I’m in.”

In what, Collin wasn’t altogether sure. But at least this seemed to have drawn Emmett out of seclusion. He’d been seriously worried that his cousin had succumbed to the mind-numbing allure of alcohol to the point that there was no turning back. If trying to find Jason and bring him back to face the consequences of his actions helped dry Emmett out, then he was all for it.

And if it ultimately kept Jason from killing anyone else, that could only be a good thing.

“I’m staying at the Corner Inn in Red Rock,” Emmett said. “Room twelve.”

Collin was stationed in Virginia, where he now hung his hat and called home, but he could be in Texas in a matter of hours once his leave was approved. Because of the nature of his work, he was always semipacked and ready to go at a moment’s notice. He never knew when the next day might find him half a world away.

“I’ll be there by noon tomorrow.” It was a promise he meant to keep.

“Thanks.”

Hanging up, Collin rose from the sofa, prepared to return to the base he’d left less than half an hour ago. Since his case was wrapped up, getting a personal leave shouldn’t be a problem, especially if he cited a family emergency. The colonel was very big on families. So much so that on the occasional times that Collin had been invited to the man’s house for the purpose of socializing, Colonel Eagleton had always had an unattached female in attendance. The man fancied himself a matchmaker. Collin had once commented that his C.O. shouldn’t give up his day job.

“Got another one for you, Luce,” Dr. Harley Daniels announced cheerfully, coming through the rear double doors into the sterile arena where they conducted most of their work. He was pushing a gurney ahead of him. The one with the right rear squeaky wheel that defied any and all attempts to mute it.

Lucy Gatling, third-year med student, braced herself as she looked up from the small desk she occupied. She knew that the medical examiner had to be referring to yet another body upon which he was about to perform an autopsy. As a student observer, she got to watch. Right before her very first autopsy, she’d made up her mind to mentally stand apart, as if what was going on in front of her was just a movie. It helped. Some.

Lucy knew that if she was going to become a doctor worth her salt, she was going to have to get over that initial queasiness that struck every time she was faced with the prospect of looking at a dead body being dissected. There wasn’t too much she could do about the queasiness, but she knew she could control her outer reaction to it.

Because she was so good at masking her emotions, no one ever had a clue as to what she was actually feeling, but that didn’t negate the fact that it felt as if a tidal wave had suddenly been created within her stomach and was wrecking havoc on the coastline.

Dr. Daniels parked the gurney under the overhead lights. He was a big man, brawny and bald, more apt to be mistaken for a professional wrestler than a dedicated doctor bent on uncovering the mysteries of death.

“You know,” he said, “every other student we’ve had here has always spent the first couple of weeks of their stay flinching every time they heard one of the gurneys approaching.” He chuckled, the deep sound echoing in the Spartan-like chamber. “Hell, we had a big burly guy pass out three times before he finally requested a transfer. But you—” there was admiration in his eyes as Lucy felt them pass over her “you’re something else again.”

Lucy took that as a high compliment. She’d heard that Daniels was not free with them. Her mouth curved ever so slightly.

Something else again.

That was the way her father had described her, more than once, always marveling at such stoicism in one so young.

What he hadn’t known, what no one seemed to even guess at, was that her particular brand of stoicism had been put in place to keep back an ocean of tears. If she had permitted herself even the display of a single tear, Lucy knew in her heart she wouldn’t be able to stop crying. Perhaps ever.

At least that was the way she’d felt for a very long time. As the only child of two parents who’d proudly served in the military, her whole life had been a series of leavings and of battling the feeling that she was being abandoned by one or the other of her parents. Sometimes both. When their tours of duty had conflicted with parenting, she’d been shipped off to her grandparents. She’d been a world traveler whose home was anywhere her suitcase went.

The nomadic lifestyle she’d been forced to lead had taught her at a very early age that she could not keep her parents at her side, nor could she remain where newly formed friendships had begun to push tender shoots through the earth and flourish. She certainly could not remain complacent or feel remotely secure because of any outer trappings.

She’d come to the realization early on that if she wanted security, she was going to have to look inward. The same was true of complacency. That only came from depending solely on herself, so that no matter where in the world she woke up or whom she found herself speaking to, she was her own person, secure and confident that she could go on despite whatever curves life suddenly threw her.

Damn but it was wearying at times to know that she was all there was.

Oh, there was her father and now that he had retired and moved close to her, that was a good thing. But strictly speaking, it almost felt as if it was too late. Lucy dearly loved Retired Lieutenant John Gatling, but she wasn’t the little girl she knew he was hoping to resume a relationship with. There was no going back and picking up where they had left off. Those years had long gone. She was a woman now, had become one long before her time.

And she had become so self-reliant that no one had seen her cry when she’d been told of her mother’s mysterious death halfway around the world. All she’d been told, by the military and by her father, who she suspected had no more information than she did, was that her mother had died “in the line of duty.”

In the line of duty. It was a phrase that was supposed to cover a myriad of things and explain everything. It covered little and explained nothing, but she’d ceased asking for answers.

At least, answers that had to do with the military. Answers that had to do with medicine and life in general as seen through a microscope were another matter. Her naturally inquisitive mind, her desire to do good, to help, had made her turn to medicine in hopes of allowing her to act upon her good intentions. At least in the field of medicine she had a fighting chance to solve a few of the mysteries, answer a few of the questions.

Maybe, if she was very lucky, they would be the ones that counted.

Now she moved out of the doctor’s way, eager to learn whatever it was that this newest victim had to silently teach her.

“What’s his story?” she asked Dr. Daniels as she glanced down at the corpse. Before the medical examiner could tell her, Lucy answered her own question. “Hey, wait, isn’t that one of the guards who was involved in that prisoner getaway?” She looked at the Y incision that ran the length of his torso. “Didn’t you already do him?”

Looking down at the still face, she recognized the man from the front page of the newspaper. Death had taken away his color and left a pasty gray in its place, but the man’s features had struck her initially because his face was almost a perfect square. Cruel though it was, that was something death hadn’t altered.

“We lost the paperwork. Don’t ask,” Daniels said. Then his brown eyes grew serious. “We might be getting his friend down here any day now. They’re keeping him alive at County, but who knows how long he’s going to hang on?”

She caught an undercurrent in the physician’s voice. Because of the nature of her childhood, she’d learned how to make quick assessments of the people around her. “You really like this job, don’t you?”

He looked surprised that she would make the comment. After all, she was the student, he the teacher. After a moment of stony silence, his rounded cheeks widened in a smile.

“Yes, I do. Dead people don’t talk back. They don’t make comments about how little money you have or how inferior they think you are.”