A Wicked Persuasion: No Going Back / No Holds Barred / No One Needs to Know

11

AFTER A LONG day of visiting the concert sites, meeting with the USO representatives, and exploring the small bazaar at the center of the base, Kate returned to her housing unit after dinner to find it occupied by her two roommates. Both women were in their forties, and welcomed Kate with a mug of hot tea brewed in an electric kettle that sat on the small side table. The women played characters on a popular sitcom. Kate knew she should recognize them, but she rarely watched television, preferring movies or books when she had any spare time.

“So, what brings a pretty young thing like you out here all by yourself?” asked Jessica Cochran.

“You have to ask?” Marion O’Connell gave a suggestive wink. “Have you looked around here? There are literally hundreds of good-looking, hard-bodied young men running around. I’ll tell you what. If I was as young and attractive as Kate, I’d be looking for excuses to come over here on a regular basis!”

Kate laughed. “Well, I agree that some of the guys are pretty amazing, but I’m hoping this will be my first and last visit.”

“The USO said you’re a singer?” asked Jessica, sipping her tea.

“Not me,” Kate said quickly. “I’m Tenley Miles’s publicist. I came over a few days early just to check things out and make sure everything’s ready for her. She flies in tomorrow.”

“Tenley Miles?” Marion’s face lit up with recognition. “My niece adores her. But wasn’t she involved in some recent scandal?”

Kate took a gulp of hot tea, hoping to avoid answering, but Marion was going through her mental Rolodex of celebrity scandals until finally her expression registered recognition.

“I know,” Marion declared in triumph. “She made some disparaging remarks about the military. I’m surprised she wants to come over here and entertain the troops, considering some of the negative things she had to say.”

“Yes, well that’s why we decided to come,” Kate admitted. “Tenley’s only eighteen and she can be impulsive. She doesn’t really mean what she said, and we’re hoping that this tour will help to demonstrate that.”

Jessica shook her head and made a tsking sound. “I don’t know. You can do a lot of stupid stuff, but when you start maligning our men and women in uniform, that can be a tough one to recover from.”

Kate set her cup down. “I think I’ll head over into the shower before it gets too late.”

“That’s a great idea,” Marion said, putting her own teacup aside. “I hate the thought of walking all that way by myself.”

“How far is it?” Kate asked. She had been looking forward to calling Chase on his beeper so that he could walk with her.

“It’s about a ten minute hike,” Jessica replied, gathering her gear together.

Realizing she had no valid reason to call Chase, Kate reluctantly pulled her toiletries out of her duffel bag, along with a clean change of clothes. It was still light outside as they set off. At the end of the road, they turned left and continued along another row of housing units, until Kate saw the shower facilities in the distance. They passed groups of soldiers, who nodded politely to them, and twice they had to stop so that Marion and Jessica could sign autographs.

While Kate waited for them, she noticed a female soldier walk past and found herself staring, mainly because she was so tall. Kate guessed the woman was close to six feet, but she walked with a feminine, athletic grace. Rather than the typical camouflage uniform, she wore a green flight suit, and something about her struck Kate as familiar. As the woman drew closer, she looked at Kate and smiled.

Kate raised a hand in greeting, recognizing the woman as the Black Hawk pilot who had flown both her and Chase from Bagram Air Base to Camp Leatherneck. She watched as Captain Larson stopped outside one of the housing units and fitted a key into the door, opening it and disappearing inside. Kate frowned, wondering if Chase knew that she was at Kandahar. She recalled the way the other woman had looked at Chase when they had boarded the helicopter, making her suspect they might be involved. She couldn’t blame the other woman for ogling Chase; he was pretty hot. But she knew she wouldn’t be the one telling him that Captain Larson was less than a stone’s throw away.

“Are you okay, hon?”

Jessica was watching Kate with a mixture of concern and curiosity.

“I’m fine,” she assured the older woman. “I thought I saw someone I knew, but I was wrong.”

“Well let’s get going. I want to be back in our own little house before it gets dark.”

Jessica was right; daylight was disappearing, and the temperatures was dropping. But the showers were private and hot, and Kate took her time under the steaming spray until she could hear the other women in the outer changing area.

Kate quickly dried herself off and got dressed, wrapping a towel around her wet hair for the walk back. When they left the shower facilities, the sun had set and the sky was beginning to darken. Kate listened to Marion and Jessica’s chatter, mostly gossip about the sitcom and who they thought would get the ax next.

As they turned the corner to the street where Captain Larson’s housing unit was located, Kate saw a familiar figure walking toward them. Chase. Her pulse kicked into overdrive in anticipation and her hand flew self-consciously to the towel wrapped around her head. He was still more than fifty feet away, and hadn’t yet seen her and her companions rounding the corner.

She couldn’t prevent a smile, and was about to call his name when he suddenly stopped and knocked lightly on Captain Larson’s door. Kate stopped, too, stunned when the pilot opened for him. Unaware that they had an audience, Captain Larson reached up and planted a lingering kiss on Chase’s mouth, before she drew him inside and closed the door quickly behind him. Although the shade in the small window was pulled down, Kate saw a shadow pass in front of it, and then another. But when the two shadows merged, there was no doubt in her mind what was happening behind that closed door, and for a moment she thought she might actually be ill.

She continued walking, her eyes glued to the silhouette of the embracing couple. As she drew alongside the unit, Kate heard the distinct sound of a man’s voice, followed by Captain Larson’s low, throaty laugh.

Both Jessica and Marion gave each other knowing looks, and Kate hoped the fading light disguised her own stricken expression. It took all her strength not to race up to the door and wrench it open.

Instead, she tipped her chin up, aware that her breathing was coming in quick, shallow pants. Her throat felt tight and her chest ached. What had he said to her just hours earlier? That he had no willpower where she was concerned? It seemed he had no willpower where Captain Larson was concerned, either. She recalled his agonized words as he’d turned away from her in the housing unit. There’s no future in it, and I can’t—I can’t—

It all made sense to Kate now.

The reason there was no future in it was because he was already committed—to Captain Larson. She nearly groaned aloud. He’d tried to tell her that they had no chance for a relationship, and she hadn’t listened. But he hadn’t put up much resistance, and he certainly hadn’t seemed overly concerned about his pilot girlfriend when he’d spent the night with Kate in her tent.

She was such an idiot. When would she ever learn?

They reached their housing unit, and Kate made a pretense of being interested in the women’s conversation until she thought she might scream.

“You know, I have a splitting headache,” she fibbed. “Would you mind if I just climbed into my bunk and went to bed?”

“Oh, honey,” Marion said in sympathy, “you go right ahead. In fact, we’ll go to bed, too, and then the light won’t disturb you.”

“Oh, no,” Kate protested. “Please don’t do that on my account. Besides, I overheard you telling Jessica how much you were looking forward to another cup of tea, so you should have one. I promise you, I’m so tired that nothing will disturb me.”

After convincing the two women to have their tea, Kate climbed up into the top bunk and pulled the blankets over her shoulders, turning her face toward the wall. She replayed the scene over and over again in her mind. At one point, she’d nearly convinced herself that it wasn’t Chase she’d seen; it had been another soldier who’d merely resembled him. But when Captain Larson had opened the door, the interior light had clearly revealed his face. There was no doubt in her mind that it had been Chase. She still couldn’t believe how well he’d hidden his feelings for the pilot when they’d flown in her helicopter. Captain Larson hadn’t hidden her interest in Chase, but he had been all business.

Kate lay curled on her side and determined that he would never know how much he’d hurt her. If he’d been honest with her and had just told her that he was already involved with someone else, she would have backed off. But he hadn’t. He’d taken full advantage of everything she’d offered. She’d been foolish enough to sleep with him, but it wouldn’t happen again. She deserved better. Tomorrow, she thought fiercely, things would change. She would be all business, and nothing Chase said or did would break through the protective barrier she was erecting around her heart.

CHASE SPENT THE NIGHT at the Special Ops headquarters office on base. He and the special-operations teams stationed at Kandahar performed many joint missions, and one of them was the hunt and capture of Al-Azir. The previously issued stand-down order was still in effect, but that didn’t prevent him and his team of commandos from gathering intelligence and planning their next move. Chase and the other team members spent hours analyzing satellite photos and images taken from their drone aircraft, which indicated a large group of men had left the village where Al-Azir had been hiding, and had moved into the nearby mountains.

Chase knew the area was riddled with caves, and that Al Azir and his men could successfully hide out there for months. But at least they had an idea where he had fled to, and once the stand-down order was lifted, his team would resume their hunt for him.

Having gotten less than four hours of sleep on a cot in the back room of the operations shack, Chase woke up at dawn and made his way to the showers. He passed the housing unit where Kate was staying, and his footsteps slowed. Had she been in there alone, nothing would have prevented him from going inside and climbing into her bunk with her. He desperately wanted to be with her again, and he’d known a keen sense of frustration when the USO personnel had told him that she would not have her own housing unit while at Kandahar. With her sister arriving that morning, there would be no opportunity for them to be alone again before she returned to the States. Reluctantly, he continued past Kate’s unit toward the showers. He was lost in his own thoughts and didn’t see the soldier who stepped quietly out of a housing unit on his left, until he heard his name called.

“Chase!”

He stopped and turned, surprised to see his brother walking swiftly toward him. “Hey, I was wondering if I might see you here,” he said, grabbing his brother’s hand and pulling him into a swift, hard hug. “I thought you might be up at Kabul.”

They drew apart, and Chase stared at his brother’s face, identical to his own except for the perpetual cocky grin.

“I was,” Chance grinned, “but they sent us down here yesterday to provide cover for a VIP visit.”

Major Chance Rawlins was an Apache helicopter pilot, permanently stationed at Bagram Air Base, although his missions frequently took him to the other bases in Afghanistan. He and Captain Jenna Larson had had a brief fling several months earlier, when they’d both been assigned to Fort Bragg in North Carolina. But when she’d turned up in Afghanistan, Chance had been quick to turn their relationship into something a little more permanent. Now the two were committed to each other.

Chase glanced from his brother to the housing unit he had just left, and felt a smile tug at his mouth. “I take it you didn’t stay alone last night?”

Chance’s eyes gleamed. “Are you kidding? How often are Jenna and I ever on the same base? Just try keeping me away from her.”

“Yeah, well, don’t get caught.”

His brother sobered. “She’s returning to the States in just a few weeks, while I’ll be over here for another six months. Man, that’s going to suck.”

Chase felt his brother’s pain, he really did. Just the thought of Kate leaving made his chest feel tight. He hadn’t really explored his feelings for Kate, but he knew he wasn’t ready to say goodbye to her. Not by a long shot.

“How long are you going to be at Kandahar?” he asked.

Chance shrugged. “I’m scheduled to escort a VIP to Bagram tomorrow, but Jenna left around 4:00 a.m. this morning for the Kalagush region.”

Captain Larson’s primary mission was to transport troops and personnel from one base to another, and although she was assigned to Kandahar, her missions took her to every base in Afghanistan, including some of the remote operating bases. She usually flew in tandem with another Black Hawk, and sometimes with an Apache escort, as well.

“So I take it you’re not flying escort with her?”

Chance shook his head. “No such luck, I’m afraid.” Reaching out, he gave Chase’s shoulder a friendly punch. “But what the hell are you doing here? Jenna said she gave you a lift from Bagram to Camp Leatherneck, but I didn’t know you were going to be here at Kandahar.” His grin widened. “Not that I would have changed my plans with her to come and see you, of course. So why are you here?”

“The Pentagon has temporarily halted all special-operations missions,” Chase said grimly.

“Ah,” Chance replied. “I heard an airstrike went wrong about thirty miles from here last week. Is that why you’re here? Part of the investigation?”

Chase gave a snort. “Hardly. I was yanked out of the field and given a personal security assignment.”

“Really?” His brother’s face registered interest. “Anyone good?”

Oh, yeah.

Chase shrugged. “Some teenaged country singer and her publicist. Part of the big Independence Day concert tour that begins tonight.”

“Oh, man. I’m sorry, bro. I know how you hate those assignments.”

“Yeah.” His voice was noncommittal. He hated the assignment so much that he couldn’t wait to get showered and dressed and over to Kate’s housing unit to see her. But he wouldn’t tell his brother just how soft he’d become. Chance would have a field day if he knew his tough-as-nails, allbusiness brother had violated even one rule for the sake of a woman.

To his surprise, Chance burst out laughing.

“What?” he demanded.

“Man, you are so freaking transparent,” Chance said, still laughing. “Jenna told me all about your assignment. A pretty, curvy brunette who looked like she wanted to kill Jenna for just talking with you.” He gave Chase a knowing look. “You dog. You put the moves on her, didn’t you? C’mon, you can fool some people with your badass attitude, but not me, bro. I can see the truth. It’s written all over your face. You like this woman.”

He said it as a statement of fact, and not a question. But he was right; Chase had never been able to keep a secret from his twin and there was no point in even trying.

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