Dahlia lay still, so spent she couldn’t move. He should have been too heavy but she wanted him draped over her, tangled with her, arms and legs everywhere so she couldn’t tell where he started and she ended. “What does kiciciyapi mitawa mean?”
He kept his head on her breasts. “What?”
“You called me kiciciyapi mitawa. It sounded so beautiful. It wasn’t Japanese. What was it?”
“It’s the voice of Lakota. It would sound silly in English.” He cupped her breast, his fingers moving lightly over her skin. His breath warm on her heart.
“I want to know. It didn’t sound silly when you said it. It sounded… beautiful. It made me feel beautiful. And loved.”
He kissed her breast. “I called you my heart. And you are.”
* * *
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
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The street, in the upscale neighborhood, was empty at three in the morning. The wind blew gently through the flower beds and across recently mowed lawns. A dog lifted its head as the breeze carried an unfamiliar scent. He got stiffly to his feet and faced the west, a growl rumbling deep in his throat. Dark shadows darted through the street, moving fast, a blur as they scattered to surround the large, two-story house at the end of the quiet cul-de-sac.
The dog barked a warning, but stopped abruptly when one of the shadows turned back and stared at it. The dog retreated slowly, the hair settling on its back as it once again lay down on the porch, eyes brightly watching the intruders moving around the house into position.
The light from the streetlamp didn’t quite reach to the house itself, set back as it was from the road. Trees darkened the surrounding yard even more. Shadows flitted around the yard, and swarmed up the sides of the house in complete silence like dark wraiths.
Nicolas went up the side of the house, a spider crawling up to the second story. He studied the window for some time before proceeding to the roof. Crouching on the slope he spoke into his radio. “We’ve got ourselves a real operator,” he whispered. “I found a string across the window. Use extreme caution.”
“One on the front door,” Kaden confirmed.
“And back,” Sam intoned.
“So they’re either expecting trouble or want to know if someone is nosing around. How many good citizens go to that much trouble?” Kaden asked.
“Soft probe,” Nicolas reminded. “We’re going in soft, information hunt only. We want to get in and out without being detected. If they have silent alarms on the outside, I’d say we’re going to have a little trouble inside. Be ready.”
“We’re always ready,” Gator’s soft drawling voice replied.
Nicolas silently lowered his body to the edge of the windowsill. The smartest and easiest of all alarms was a tiny bell hooked in place to tinkle a warning. If the NCIS agents had been Special Forces, they wouldn’t look to easily bypassed security systems for protection. Already, Ian was circumventing the system. It wasn’t hard with their particular psychic skills.
The house was used when three of the agents were in town. The intelligence Lily had given them was that the three agents, Neil Campbell, Martin Howard, and Todd Aikens, were all out of town. The house should be empty, but if not, and they awakened at an inconvenient time, well, Nicolas was remembering Dahlia’s sobs in her sleep, and he wasn’t feeling particularly generous or gentle.
“Two cars in the garage.” Ian’s voice was a soft whisper in his ear. “Security system is down. There was a backup, but it didn’t last long.”
The team had decided to use radios instead of telepathic communication just in case anyone in the house was like Logan Maxwell or Jesse Calhoun. They might feel the subtle flow of power or even hear what was said. The team was used to working mind to mind, but their first training had been the miniscule radios so they were accustomed to them.
“We’ve got at least one, possibly two or three inside,” Nicolas reported to the others. “Proceed with extreme caution.” Lily always supplied them with state-of-the-art equipment and the latest was an air-cooled, sealed CO2 mini laser glass cutter. It had a circular suction cup pivot and cut completely silently. The laser cutter was microcomputer controlled, with the computer built into the case of the laser assembly. A computer was necessary to prevent the laser from cutting completely through the glass and passing into the room and burning things in its path. It cut almost through, leaving the suction cup with its levered handle to pull the glass out. Lily would be happy to get the report that it worked silently and efficiently, allowing him to remove the glass without triggering the alarm set on the inside sill. He set the glass aside carefully in preparation to enter the room.