Authors: Lindsay McKenna
"We made it," he mumbled. "We're alive…." A miracle in itself when he'd been so certain he was going to die. Struggling toward consciousness, he slid his hands over her shoulders.
Life and death.
How close they'd come to dying. Tears were rolling down Pepper's pale cheeks, and Jim dug his fingers into her shoulders as a fierce joy suddenly swept through him. Never had he needed someone as he needed her at this moment. His careening emotions had steamrollered his normal, controlled responses. A wild feeling thrummed through him and he pulled her down, crushing her to him as his arms slid across her back.
"You're alive, you're alive…." he rasped, burying his face in her thick, silky hair. Jim groaned as he felt her surrender to his need to embrace her. He felt her sob once more, her cheek pressed against his. The dampness of the tears, the softness of her skin dizzied him, convinced him of the fact that they weren't dead. For one powerful heartbeat out of reality, Pepper clung to him, held him as tightly as he was holding her. She was warm.
Alive.
Moving his face away from her cheek, he released her and tunneled his fingers through her hair. As she eased away, her face bare inches from his, he drowned in the splendor of her anguished, sky blue eyes. And Jim saw desire there. Desire, heat and need. The realization tore at his disintegrating control and pummeled senses. He saw Pepper's lips part. The ache to kiss her was almost his undoing. As his fingers tightened against her face, he saw her eyes flare wide with shock.
Pepper gasped and placed her hand on his heaving chest, wildly aware of his strong, cool hands framing her face. What was wrong with her? She shouldn't be embracing him! What insane fear had made her lose her perspective?
Her professionalism?
She saw the burning hunger in his eyes for her alone. Shaken badly, she pulled out of his grasp, knowing that if she didn't, she was going to lean forward those final scant inches and bury her lips against his very male mouth.
Trembling violently, she sat back, perplexed. She tried to recover from her faux pas by examining his injury, but her face was burning with mortification. What was happening to her?
As he lay there, reorienting himself, Jim realized that if Pepper hadn't saved his sorry neck, he'd be dead. What had made him reach out and embrace her like that? Chaotic feelings sheared through him. And what the hell had prevented him from cutting those second shroud lines to release the reserve chute? Ashamed, he admitted the answer he already knew: he hadn't trusted Pepper to rescue him, because she was a woman.
"Your leg," she whispered tautly, giving him a quick glance. His cheeks were flushed, his look one of utter discomfort. Swallowing hard, she murmured, "How does it feel?"
"It hurts," he grunted, avoiding her darkened eyes, seeing the shame in them. "Look
out,
I'll try to move it."
Surprised, Pepper staggered to her feet. "Can you?"
"I think so…." He grasped at any straw to lessen the tension, as if some invisible, throbbing sensation lingered palpably between them. Even if his leg was broken, it could refocus their attention on something other than their torrid, intimate embrace of moments ago. Jim sat up with difficulty, the pack he was wearing still weighing him down. Then, easing his body slightly to the right, he brought his left leg out and straightened it.
"You're lucky," Pepper said, a wobble of relief in her voice. She touched her damp cheek and wiped at the last of the tears. Inadvertently, she looked up at him. His gaze burned with an emotion that scorched her, and she looked away, shaken even further. "Brother, are you ever lucky. I thought you'd busted your femur in a compound fracture or something." She knelt at his side again. Whether she wanted to or not, she had to touch him. Resting her hands gently on his leg, she examined the length of it. Feelings she thought had died years ago swept through her as she explored his muscled limb. She felt a throbbing sensation seem to leap from him to the palm of her hand. Confused, she struggled to force the raw, newly awakened feelings aside.
Jim grimaced, fighting a hot awareness of her closeness—of her care. Her touch was galvanizing, and his skin tightened when she grazed him. Frantic to get himself back under control, he rasped, "I'm too hardheaded to break a leg. I should have had my head examined, though."
Surprised, Pepper looked up into his darkened eyes. "What do you mean?"
"You saved my neck despite my stupidity. Thanks." He held out his hand to her.
Stunned, Pepper slowly raised her own hand. Should she touch him again? Last time they'd ended in a torrid embrace. Shyly, she slid her fingers into his. There was nothing weak about his grip, and she gloried in its secure warmth. "You're welcome, Colonel Woodward," she said in a strained tone.
Jim didn't want to release her hand. He was entranced by the length and
grace
of her fingers, almost at odds with Pepper's obvious tough strength—both physically and mentally. If she hadn't had the presence of mind, as well as the experience and skill, to rescue his sorry butt from that situation, he wouldn't be here shaking her hand in a symbolic gesture of peace.
"Call me Jim," he said gruffly, reluctantly releasing her. The surprise that flared in her eyes astounded him. It was at that moment that he realized just how much of a bastard he'd been to her. Shame wound through him, and he forced himself to check out his left ankle instead of staring into Pepper's beautiful, vulnerable eyes.
Pepper watched him pull away the bloused material around his jump boot.
Call me Jim.
The husky inference in his voice had gone through her like hot sunlight on a cold winter's day. And the look in his eyes had stunned her—as if she were seeing his tough military facade melt before her eyes. The change was arresting, filled with promise. His mouth had lost its usual hard line, and his eyes had lost that icy glitter that warned her to back off. Most of all, Pepper was drawn to the tenor of his voice—strong yet decidedly gentle.
Shaken, she sat back, resting her hands tensely on her thighs as she tried to digest his change toward her. Finally, she forced herself to look around. "I have no idea where we are…Jim," she admitted hesitantly.
He glanced up as he freed his ankle from the trouser material. "Let's worry about that later. Can you help me unlace this boot? I think I've sprained my ankle."
"Sure…" He was asking for her help. Pepper didn't quite know how to take this sudden attempt at teamwork. Was he feeling grateful because she'd saved his life? Would it last? Did it have anything to do with the sudden intimacy he'd established? Her hands trembled as she tried to untie the double knot on the boot.
"I'm still shaky." She laughed with sudden shyness.
"I'm shaking inside," he admitted, watching her slim fingers work out the tightly bound knots. Her hair fell in soft waves, and he had the maddening urge to reach out and thrust his fingers through that mass again. As he remembered its softness, his hand lifted slightly, as if by its own accord. Jim jerked it back. It was an idiotic urge. An insane one, he realized, chastising himself. Pepper's mouth was slightly open, revealing her full lower lip. The color was high in her cheeks, and he could see she was shaken by the ordeal they'd survived. Or was it by his unjustified embrace—his need to feel her strong, feminine body against him and prove he really was alive?
"I could have died," he croaked, the realization starting to fully sink in.
Pepper glanced up at him. Jim's eyes were dark with the harsh reality of his words. "I know…." Her voice broke, and she avoided his sudden, sharpened gaze.
Jim's heart began an erratic pounding in his chest. Suddenly, he felt a trembling that seemed to start deep inside him and spread outward. He had a wild urge to blather almost hysterically. Fighting the feeling, he rasped, "I saw my whole life flash before my eyes." He shook his head as Pepper began unlacing the now-unknotted jump boot. "I've heard of guys seeing it, like a movie in full living color, when they thought they were going to die. But it's never happened to me…."
Swallowing against a dry throat, Pepper nodded, her heart still pounding wildly in her breast. Where Jim had gripped her shoulder, her skin still tingled in memory. "We were lucky. Hold on, I'm going to try to get this off you." She rose and positioned herself at his feet, then carefully eased the boot off his left foot. Pulling off his heavy cotton sock, she grimaced. "You're right," she said, glancing up at him, "you've got a dilly of a sprain." The skin around his ankle was already turning bluish purple and swelling. Prodding the region gently with her fingers, she felt a lot of heat coming from it.
Jim was fervently aware of Pepper's long, thin fingers moving over his swollen ankle. Miraculously, wherever she touched him, the pain momentarily ceased. "You look like you've done this kind of thing before," he observed.
Pepper gave him a slight, one-cornered smile as she finally managed to get some control over her rampant emotions.
"Too many times."
Placing his foot on the ground beside her, she slowly stood.
"On myself and other members of my team.
Sprains are pretty common in our business."
Jim held her narrowed gaze. He was seeing the professional side of Pepper now, and he admired her coolness and common sense. "If I'd worn that ankle brace as you suggested, I might not have a sprain right now," he groused.
Pepper realized what it took Jim to admit his mistake and was grateful he'd abandoned his combative attitude. "It's a learning curve," she offered hoarsely, not wanting him to feel any worse than he did already. She wasn't one to rub salt in anyone's wounds. Good leaders didn't berate their people. Instead, she would try to support his decision to wear it next time. "I'm going back up the hill for my pack. I've got a first-aid kit with me. Just lie still" was all she said.
Jim lay back on the rough ground, feeling pretty damn humbled by Pepper and her forgiving attitude. She had every right to nail him with the fact that he'd not only refused to wear the joint and ankle braces but had openly challenged her idea. Angrily, he rubbed his face. What was the matter with him? He didn't normally act like such a jerk.
Never with anyone under his command in a military situation.
And why had he reached out and grabbed her? Held her in a hot, powerful embrace that had driven him to the edge of his control? He'd come so close to molding her parted, tear-stained lips against his mouth. So close. What the hell was happening to him? Looking up, he scowled at the horizon. The sun was rising, the sky turning a pale, translucent pink and yellow.
Pepper, he decided, was her own woman—and he wasn't used to dealing with a woman with such a high confidence level. He had some thinking to do about women, he conceded. He was just beginning to grasp the full weight of their potential. Pepper was a role model, a stunning example of what could be. Perhaps that was what made her different in his eyes, and explained his unexpected attraction to her. He had no direct experience with a woman like her—at once feminine and vulnerable, yet shored up by an incredible confidence that radiated from deep within her, translating into every action she took or decision she made.
Jim knew men like that. Hell, he was like that himself. A sour smile pulled at his mouth as he made the realization. If Pepper had been a man, he would never have questioned her experience. And he would have instantly reached out for help as he plummeted from the sky. With a shake of his head, he decided that once they got out of this mess and back to
Perseus
, he needed to sit down and have a long talk with her. First he would apologize for being such a jerk, as well as for his intimate behavior toward her, which was completely out of line—as sexist in its own way as his initial lack of trust had been.
Touching his ankle, which had quickly swollen to the size of a ripe cantaloupe, he wondered how he would be able to make the jump two days from now. He'd screwed himself up by rejecting Pepper's advice. Damn. He had a lot of ground to cover with her on their return to civilization.
"We're in luck," Pepper said as she approached Jim. She held out two small kits. "I not only brought my first-aid kit, but I packed my homeopathic kit, too." She saw him look up, felt his green gaze lock onto hers. For a moment she was speechless. The undiluted warmth in his eyes caught her off guard again. Slowly kneeling at his left side, Pepper fumbled with the first-aid kit, even as she fought the clamoring desire still burning within her. Heat stabbed at her cheeks, and she knew she was blushing.
"I'm in luck you were along," Jim stated. He saw Pepper's face flame red. The blush made her even more becoming, if that was possible. Her fingers worked the lock on the kit, as an ache built inside Jim's chest, and he fought another totally inappropriate urge to reach out and kiss her. The slightly curled length of her hair, now in disarray from the dampness of the cold November morning, enhanced her natural beauty.