Her mouth parted on an exhale of amazement — not that she really believed him. He’d probably learned all his smooth lines in “Hotshot Lawyer 101.” And the crude ones in “Sleazy Lawyer 102.”
“Didn’t you ever wonder why I followed you around all the time?” he persisted.
Helen was too dumbstruck to answer at first. It was true. He had seemed to be practically everywhere she was during their four years at Stonewall. “But you never asked me out.”
“Would you have gone?”
Her silence spoke volumes, and he waved his hand in a curt “So there!” manner. Rafe’s gaze held hers then, in challenge, and Helen detested the way he made her squirm.
Later, she would think about all he had said, but for now she sought desperately for some other subject, some way to rein in her roiling emotions and get back into her stoic military frame of mind. “I assume you’re ready for this jump, Rafe. You have been keeping up on your skydiving practice, haven’t you?”
He nodded, the twitch of mirth on his beautiful lips telling her he wasn’t fooled by her change of subject.
“Did you serve in Desert Storm?”
“Nope. Got an emergency deferment.”
Her upper lip curled with distaste.
“I did serve in the L.A. riots, though. Even though that’s not normal special forces duty.”
“What? Stealing televisions?” She rued her words at once, even before his eyes shot blue sparks at her. “I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry.”
“I’m used to it. Once a greaser, always a greaser, right? A wetback in a suit is still a wetback.” He looked away, dismissing her, but Helen saw the hurt in his revealing eyes.
“Rafe, I am sorry. I was reacting to you, not your heritage.”
“Well, that makes me feel much better.”
“You bring out the worst in me.”
“Keep talking. You might draw blood soon.”
She groaned. “I apologized. What more do you want from me?”
“Not a damn thing.”
Intensely humiliated, Helen shifted and unhooked her seat belt. She was about to stand and walk away.
“Wait,” Rafe said, halting her. He leaned so close that she could feel his warm breath against her neck. His gruff voice promised revenge for her insult. “I lied. I do want something from you,” he whispered near her exposed ear. “If I had my way, we would go behind that curtain there and engage in a world-class wall-banger. I’d wrap your legs around my waist and bury myself inside you. And I’d be kissing you the entire time to muffle your screams. Because, believe me, babe, you would definitely scream.”
Stunned, Helen just gaped at him.
“Don’t forget your clipboard,” he reminded her with an infuriating grin.
She growled and came very, very close to bopping him with a left hook. And she could do it, too. Instead, she did what she should have done fifteen minutes earlier. She stood, her back rigid and her face scarlet with mortification, and walked away from the insufferable slimeball.
But the images he had painted in her mind lingered, just as he’d intended.
She should have been livid. She should have been offended.
Instead, she was tempted.
Chapter Two
Rafe watched stonily as one after another of the soldiers completed their passes out into space. Helen, the jump master, stood at the exit door, expertly overseeing the jumps. The special forces unit in the guard were among the few servicemen permitted to do HALO, or high altitude-low opening, jumps.
Because of the engine and wind noise, it was almost impossible to hear a verbal command. But that didn’t matter because, in this type of exercise, it was the pilot who checked the wind drift and drop-zone location, and, when the time was right, the continual red light would change to green — a signal to go.
They’d already donned their nylon jumpsuits. Just before springing out into space, they hooked on their Kevlar helmets.
Helen avoided eye contact with him, and with good cause. He’d behaved like a bastard back there a little while ago. But, hell, she brought out the worst in him. He was thirty-four years old, but she made him feel all jittery and clumsy, like an adolescent with hormones oozing out his pores.