The Protector Page 27

  The memory of Winston’s loyalty thawed the last trace of shock that kept Eryn composed. As she burst into tears, Ike hauled her to his chest and held her tightly.

  The clatter of an approaching helicopter forced her to collect herself.

  “Hostage Rescue,” Ike shouted, searching the sky.

  Worry punctured Eryn’s newfound contentment. “What happens now, Ike?” She kept her arms locked around him.

  “Guess it’s up to them,” he said.

  “They’re not going to charge you, are they?”

  He shrugged. “I’m not worried.”

  Just then, a familiar, black helicopter skimmed over the treetops, disturbing the fragile canopy.

  It’s over, Eryn realized. The nightmare that had begun with her failed abduction was finally over. And yet, everything felt so unsettled. What was to come of her and Ike now that she no longer needed his protection? As she met his inscrutable gaze, she begged him, “Stay with me.”

  The kiss he placed on the top of her head was her only reassurance. But she would take what she could get right now.

  The sound of a car alarm startled Eryn awake. Snatching her head off Ike’s chest, she found herself slumped against him, in the back seat of the Taurus while Jackson parked on a one-way street in downtown Washington, D.C. Winston, sitting shot gun, had steamed up the passenger window.

  “We’re here,” Ike murmured, looking ruefully at the wet spot on his T-shirt.

  “Sorry.” But her chagrin was forgotten as she recognized where she was. The Washington Field Office lorded over the corner of 4th and G Streets. They weren’t that far from her townhouse in Georgetown.

  She wondered if, once the debriefing was over, she would get to return to her old life. Was there any guarantee that one of the so-called students viewing her execution wouldn’t pick up where the terrorist had left off? Moreover, her old life seemed so far removed from the highs and lows of the past month, she wondered how she was supposed to go back, like nothing had happened.

  Jackson cracked the windows for Winston. “We’ll only be a short while,” he promised.

  Clinging to Ike with one hand, to her purse which Ringo had retrieved from the RV with the other, she crossed the busy street, hopeful of getting answers.

  Forty five minutes later, Director Blooomberg’s phone rang, interrupting the debriefing.

  Eryn met Ike’s protective gaze and managed a weak smile. Bloomberg had insisted she give a detailed recounting of the events, forcing her to relive every second of the worst day of her life. What she really wanted was to put the nightmare behind her and concentrate on the future—a future for her and Ike.

  “Go ahead and send him up,” Bloomberg said. “Your father’s here,” he announced, looking suddenly perturbed. She was reminded that Bloomberg had resisted her father’s attempts to remove her from FBI protection early on.

  “He is?” Eryn glanced at Ike, whose face was suddenly devoid of expression.

  Bloomberg pushed away from his desk, seemingly eager to wrap things up. “Miss McClellan, on behalf of the Bureau, please accept our apologies.” He rounded his desk to extend her a hand. “We’ll soon know exactly how this happened, and we’ll take every conceivable step to ensure it won’t happen again,” he said sincerely. With scant nod at Ike, he dropped her hand and headed for the door. Pulling it open, he startled back at the sight of General McClellan, his hand raised, about to knock.

  “Daddy!” Eryn dashed across the room to throw herself at her father. His thick arms crushed her close, squeezing the air right out of her.

  “Sweetheart.”

  Ike intercepted Stanley McClellan’s wet gaze as it cleared the top of Eryn’s head. The feelings reflected in the man’s blue eyes were a mirror image of his own unwieldy emotions.

  “Ike.” Gratitude softened the Commander’s blunt features as he extended a hand to him. “How the hell are you, son?”

  Joining them, Ike found himself hauled into a big group hug. He was glad his teammates weren’t around to witness this, but, damn, it felt good to know he’d earned Stanley’s forgiveness.

  Eryn drew back, her eyes watering, her nose bright pink. “You came home, Daddy!” she marveled.

  “Course I came home. Would’ve been here weeks ago if the damn insurgents would take a vacation.” His astute gaze swung between them. “So, how’s my soldier been treating you, sugar?” he asked his daughter.

  The blush that suffused her face made Ike want to melt into the carpet. She couldn’t have made it any more obvious just how he’d been treating her.

  “Fine,” she said brightly. “He taught me to shoot and to defend myself.”

  Her father chuckled as he took in Ike’s discomfiture. “I expected nothing less,” he assured him.

  Ike breathed a silent sigh of relief.

  At last, the Commander took note of the two FBI men watching their happy reunion. His embrace eased. “Well, Alan,” he said, sending Bloomberg a cool nod. “I hear you lost a good man over this case.”

  “We did,” Bloomberg acknowledged, holding himself stiffly.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Stanley murmured. “Probably should have left it to my soldier,” he added, clapping Ike on the back.

  Bloomberg flicked Ike a disdainful look and said nothing.

  “Well, enough red tape. My daughter needs to see a doctor.” He started to draw Eryn with him as he made to leave, but then he swung back abruptly. “Oh, I believe you have her dog in your car,” he said to Jackson.

  Smiling, Jackson held up his car keys and jiggled them. Glancing at Bloomberg for permission, he followed them out the door.

  “I have a driver waiting outside,” Ike overheard Stanley divulge as he escorted Eryn toward the elevator.

  “Where did you fly in? How’d you find me?”

  “Quantico. Got there right as the Hostage Rescue Team landed with a dead terrorist aboard. Special Agent Ringo told me where to look for you. He filled me in on what happened.” Pausing at the elevator, he pulled Eryn into another fervent embrace, hiding his face in her hair.

  Watching them, Ike felt his confidence waver. There wasn’t any question he was capable of loving Eryn the way her father did, completely and wholly. He might not have been shown much affection as a child, but he knew how to love. Once his commitment to the Teams was over, he knew he could give Eryn all the stability she deserved.

  But it would take time for him to make peace with the past. He couldn’t fulfill her needs when he was far across the ocean picking off terrorists so that she never had to look over her shoulder in fear again. Nor could he expect a woman so accustomed to love to go without for months on end. She’d already given more of herself to him than he deserved. Asking her to wait for him would be too much.

  Hell, he’d served his purpose. It was over between them. His heart went leaden at the thought.

  With red-rimmed eyes, Stanley looked up and intercepted Ike’s pained regard. “You did good, Ike,” he told him hoarsely. “You did real good.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “No need for the sir,” Stanley needled. “You’re a civilian now, right?”

  Ike narrowed his eyes at him.

  “Unless, of course, you’ve realized you want back in,” Stanley tacked on, raising his eyebrows.

  With a sharply drawn breath, Eryn withdrew from her father’s embrace to witness his reply.

  Ike couldn’t bring himself to look at her. Stanley had put him directly on the spot, the sonofabitch.

  And yet he’d made up his mind, already, so what was the point of concealing his decision? The sooner Eryn knew the truth, the sooner she could return to the life she used to lead. Abandoning Team Five last year had made him a deserter and a traitor to the memory of his fallen comrades. If he didn’t go back, he would always be the selfish bastard Cougar thought him to be. There was only one way to redeem himself.

  “I want back in, sir,” he acknowledged quietly.

  Chapter Twenty
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br />   Eryn attempted to cheer herself. Here she was, eating Thai takeout in her townhouse in Georgetown with the two men she loved most in the world. The luxuries of home surrounded her. But Ike’s shocking announcement that he wanted back into the military had stolen her contentment.

  Pushing aside her cup of tom yum, she asked her father, “When do you have to go back?” The thought of both men leaving at once threatened to plunge her into despair.

  “I’m not,” he answered unexpectedly. “I’ve resigned my command, honey.”

  Eryn stared at him. “You what?”

  “I’ll be working at the Pentagon,” he added, “advising the President and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. I hope you don’t mind if I stay here while I look for my own place?”

  She glanced at Ike and found him stirring his pad thai. “Of course not.” At least she wasn’t going to be utterly abandoned. “I hope you didn’t do it just for me, Daddy.”

  “No, no.” He twirled his own noodles. “I’ve given thirty years to the Marines; that’s long enough. Time to enjoy my daughter and my granddog.”

  Her gaze shifted to Ike, who wouldn’t look at her. If only he felt the way her father did.

  “You realize there’s going to be a period of readjustment,” her father added, gently.

  Thinking of the confidence it would take to walk alone again in public places, Eryn swallowed hard. She had hoped Ike would be the one to see her through the days and weeks following her ordeal. But with her father here to do it, there was nothing to keep him from rejoining the war effort right away.

  She reached for the empty food cartons, using them as an excuse to leave the table. “I’ll be right back,” she said, fleeing to the kitchen to compose herself.

  Once through the swinging door, she dropped the cartons into the trash and fanned her flushed face with her hands, hoping to dry the tears that threatened. She had promised she wouldn’t cling to Ike when the time came to go their separate ways, but...

  Her gaze came to rest on the brightly painted ceramics on the shelves that lined her galley-style kitchen. It was suddenly clear to her why her mother had chosen to live in Jordan when she could have gotten better medical treatment in the States. The thought of an ocean separating her from her husband had been too much for her, especially when she knew their time together was dwindling.

  Eryn felt the same way about Ike, and they had their entire lives still ahead of them.

  Hearing her father begin to excuse himself from the table, she snapped herself out of her anguish and hurried back into the dining room to offer him dessert. But in an obvious ploy to leave her and Ike alone together, he claimed he had a belly ache and headed for the stairs.

  Ike started clearing the table wordlessly. Eryn joined him, trailing him into the kitchen where they rinsed the plates and put away leftovers with familiarity that was nonetheless charged with underlying tension.

  “How’s the chin?” he finally asked, reaching for a dishtowel.

  “The Lidocaine’s wearing off,” she admitted. It had taken several stitches to close the cut made by the terrorist’s knife.

  He expelled such a deep sigh that she wondered if her chin was the cause of his regret or whether they were finally going to discuss the future.

  “You should rest,” he said, not bringing it up. “I’ll crash on the sofa.”

  “Ike, we need to talk,” she said.

  “Come on, Eryn. You’ve had a hell of a day already.”

  His reply was anything but encouraging. “I’m fine,” she insisted, determined to get this discussion behind them. “I want you to know that I understand why you’re going back, Ike.” She went straight to the point. “I do. You feel like you abandoned your teammates, like you turned your back on them.” She swallowed hard, determined not to try and talk him out of his decision. “I get that. I just want you to know that I’m going to wait for you—”

  “Don’t,” he said, cutting her off abruptly.

  She blinked at the harsh word. Didn’t he want to see her again? How could he walk away from what they’d shared? “Wh-what do you mean, don’t?”

  Fuck. Ike tossed the dishtowel aside. The hurt in Eryn’s eyes was killing him because now he was the cause of it. Couldn’t she see he was letting her go for her own good? Why put herself through the torment of separation, not knowing if he’d come back in one piece, depriving herself of the kind of love she deserved. “I don’t want you to wait for me,” he growled, forcing the lie through his lips.

  She made a sound that was part-laugh, part-sob. “Why not?” she cried.

  “Lots of reasons.”

  “Name them.”

  “First off, I might not make it back.”

  “You will!” She seized the edges of his open jacket and shook him. “You will, Ike! Don’t you dare say that!” But her face was white with fear.

  “Come on, Eryn.” He refused to go down the list. “I’m not what you need.” He went right to the main reason. “I’m just a sonofabitch with a crap-load of issues and really good aim. You know you can do better than me. Don’t go wasting your life on me.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do!” she snapped, showing her feisty side, which never failed to amuse him. “It’s my life. And I don’t consider you a waste!”

  Her stubbornness, however misguided, filled him with gratification. Maybe he should ask for her to wait for him. Suddenly, he just had to kiss her, to hold her, to enjoy her passionate sweetness one more time.

  He crushed his mouth to hers, and the room went into a slow spin. The friction between their dueling tongues sparked a desire fraught with desperation. He turned hard against her softness.

  “Make love to me, Ike,” she begged between his soul-sucking kisses.

  An act like that would cancel out his words. Yet the memory of her passion might just get him through the blistering heat, the cold winds, and the nerve-fraying danger to come.

  He backed her blindly against the counter, lifting her onto the edge to put her at a better height. There she coiled her legs around him, and the hem of the dress she’d put on rode the tops of her thighs. A glimpse of peach lace fueled his heart into turbo drive.

  As always, his surroundings seemed to dwindle as he lost himself in her taste, her texture. With his heart jumping like a piston, he sought the steamy cleft between her thighs. Eryn bucked, pressing eagerly against his touch as he delved beneath her panties to plumb her wetness.

  With a burning need to claim her one last time, he released the buttons of his fly and freed his erection. Pulling her hips to the edge of the counter, he edged aside her panties and drove blindly into her heat, muffling her cry of encouragement with a searing kiss.

  He thrust deeper, pulling her roughly to him. Eryn’s response was equally as fierce. Hands braced on the counter behind her, she clamped her legs around him and drove herself down his length. The only sounds in the kitchen were their ragged breaths, her muffled moans, and the moist friction between their straining bodies.

  Under the hand that cupped her right breast, Ike could feel her heart hammering. Thumbing a stiff nipple, he spurred her toward her release, praying she’d get there before he did.

  He was at the verge of incinerating in a flash of white heat, when he realized they were having unprotected sex.

  Ah, shit! But he couldn’t stop. Eryn’s grip had tightened. He could feel her tensing with rapture. If he didn’t cover her mouth right now, her father would certainly overhear.

  She cried out into his mouth, her tight walls contracting around him so sweetly that he succumbed, his knees nearly buckling at the white hot pleasure that exploded through him. He expended himself deep inside her.

  His first thought, when he could think again was, You selfish dog. How was she supposed to get on with her life if he left her pregnant?

  Disengaging, he lunged for the paper towels beside the sink, yanking off a handful and thrusting it at her. “Sorry,” he muttered, watching her slip off the counter and adjust her dres
s, her face bright pink.

  Feeling like the lowest form of scum, Ike put himself back together. He’d just misled her into thinking there was hope for them. He had to do something to open Eryn’s eyes to reality. But what?

  Just then Eryn closed the space between them. Slipping her arms around him, she lay her cheek against his chest, filling him with bottomless yearning. “Do you love me, Ike?” she whispered, gazing up. Her eyes were exquisitely blue, her lips swollen from his kisses.