Striking Distance by Pamela Clare Page A

something important she needed to say. “It’s good to see you again, Javier, but you should know that I . . . I’m not the same person I was in Dubai. Too much has happened since then.”
    She hoped he understood what she was trying to tell him. This wasn’t going to be like last time. She wasn’t going to rip off her clothes and fall into bed with him. Even if she’d wanted a relationship, a lover, she couldn’t have one. She didn’t think she was capable of enjoying sex right now. Besides, her body had changed.
    If they slept together, he would discover the stretch marks on her belly, and he would know she’d had a baby. She couldn’t share that secret with anyone—not yet, not until Klara was safely with her here in the U.S.
    “I’m not going to make demands of you. I’ve got no expectations.” His lips curved in a lethal lopsided grin. “But it is good to see you, too,
bella
.”
    Bella.
Beauty.
    That was what he’d called her in Dubai.
    She looked away. “So . . . what branch of the military were you in?”
    “The navy.” He seemed to hesitate for a moment. “I’m a SEAL.”
    * * *
    “YOU’RE A . . . A SEAL?”
    “It’s not something I’m supposed to spread around.” Javier watched some of the tension leave Laura’s body and found himself feeling both pride at her reaction and annoyance at the fact that she seemed more at ease with him as a frogman than as the man who’d made love with her.
    “I’m sure you already know this, but a team of SEALs saved my life. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for them.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, her motions revealing dark bruises around her wrist where that bastard Tower had grabbed her.
    Someone needed to deal with him.
    But before Javier could give any thought to that, he found himself in the awkward position of listening as she described her rescue. How she’d woken up to screams. How hearing American accents had made her panic. How the other women had held her back, the one Javier later killed threatening to cut out Laura’s tongue if she spoke. How she’d realized with a shock that she was American, too. How the sight of “the tall SEAL” walking toward the helicopter had pushed her into shouting out.
    And Javier realized she was talking about
him
.
    “I didn’t think he’d heard me, and I knew Zainab would kill me, but then he turned. He shouted at me to stop and get down, and I thought he was going to shoot me, but he shot her instead. He killed a woman. He didn’t even hesitate. He tore off my burka, and the next thing I knew, he was carrying me onto the helicopter.” Laura’s hands balled into fists and pressed together tightly in her lap, the only outward sign that talking about this was hard for her. “He punched Al-Nassar in the face when Al-Nassar threatened me again. He was my hero.”
    How do you like that, Corbray? You’re upstaging yourself.
    Javier cleared his throat. “I bet he remembers that night, too.”
    Oh, he did. Yes, he did.
    “He and his men were all so kind to me. I never got to thank them.”
    Javier wanted to forget he’d ever heard of OPSEC and tell Laura that
he
was the tall SEAL, that
he
had carried her out and punched that bastard in the face. He wanted to tell her that no mission had ever meant as much to him as that one, that rescuing her had been the highlight of his career as an operator. God, he wanted to tell her. He knew she wouldn’t run to the press or write an article about it, but he’d been ordered not to discuss the mission with anyone who hadn’t been a part of it.
    He fought to keep his voice and his facial expression neutral, choosing his words carefully. “I was amazed to find out that you were alive—and damned grateful.”
    Laura’s eyes went wide, and she stared at him.
    You gave it away,
cabrón
! She knows. She figured it out.
    “You could do it! You could thank them for me, couldn’t you?” She looked at him with such hopefulness. “Naval