Target Engaged Read online

  He remained shadowed, his face buried in her hair.

  All that showed was the new woman exposed in the mirror for everyone to see, everyone including Carla herself.

  A woman Carla didn’t recognize.

  Chapter 13

  “No way in hell!”

  The four guys stood around in the ship’s ready room wearing little more than Speedos; they also wore wristwatches. Carla admitted that they looked damn good that way. Four men at the prime of their lives and their training, so impossibly fit and handsome, parading around the room most of the way to naked. Kyle stood out, of course, even discounting her personal bias.

  But there were limits!

  “I am not wearing a goddamn bikini in front of you jokers.”

  “Ba-kaw! Buck buck ba-kaw!” Chad started doing a chicken dance around in circles. Duane picked it up and Richie blushed—either on her behalf or because he too wanted to see her dressed…undressed that way.

  Only Kyle was standing there with that goddamn, patient half smile of his.

  “They’re going to drop us a dozen kilometers off the beach in Aruba. We’re going to arrive on the beach with the morning snorkelers and week-old entry stamps in our Spanish passports. Then we’re going to peel off our wet suits. What are you going to be wearing?”

  “When James Bond crawled out of scuba gear, he didn’t have to wear a goddamn bikini!”

  “No,” Richie acknowledged.

  “Thank God someone’s on my side.” Carla sat down on a bench and crossed her arms solidly over her T-shirt and sports bra. Which she’d be keeping firmly in place, thank you very much.

  “He did climb out of a semisubmersible alligator wearing a full suit, tie, and dress shoes. I guess it was a dry-suit alligator, though it certainly didn’t look it in the film.”

  “Thanks, Richie.” So much for having someone useful on her side.

  “No one on the boat has a one-piece.” Kyle kept his voice level. “We asked around.”

  “I’m not wearing one of those either. Wait! You’ve been discussing my body with everyone on the whole goddamn ship?”

  “Nope, just the women.” Chad offered a leer and then did another chicken-dance circle, actually making a tune out of his chicken noises.

  When he passed too close to her bench, Carla kicked him hard in the shin. That sent him hopping off in a new direction making a different kind of noise. She still had her combat boots on.

  “Okay, Anderson. So what are you going to wear instead?”

  “A goddamn cast-iron suit!” She clambered to her feet and snatched the impossibly tiny bag that Kyle had tried to hand to her at the beginning of the conversation.

  Then she struck him in the solar plexus. He’d been ready for her, so her fist merely bounced off his rock-hard gut.

  “What was that for?”

  “For thinking this is in any way funny.”

  “I find it”—he hesitated and bit his lower lip for a moment—“intriguing. You’ll be far more appropriately clothed than you were crossing the General’s compound two nights ago with your shirt open to your navel.”

  “Two nights ago,” Carla managed between gritted teeth, “I was a soldier. Now I’m just going to be a girl on show.”

  “You’re going to be a woman who will look beautiful.”

  “Aw shucks, Mr. Soldier Man. I feel so much better now.”

  She stalked off to change.

  * * *

  Duane and Chad had finished prepping the drop bag and were double-checking it by the time Carla came back.

  Kyle had seen her naked many times: indoors, outdoors, daylight, starlight, firelight, just hours ago reflected in a mirror. That he’d somehow had the power to cause Sergeant Carla Anderson to come apart like that still awed him. It was as if she’d transformed within the circle of his arms. He couldn’t wait to try it again.

  But the woman who walked back into the ready room was a revelation despite her grim expression.

  “Aw, spoilsport!” Chad called out when he noticed that Carla had indeed changed, but then pulled on a white, large-sized, V-neck T-shirt over the swimsuit.

  “Can it, Reaper.” Kyle gave it just enough heat so that the guys would know that while they’d had their fun, they were done now. And using Chad’s Unit nickname would remind them all that this was a mission, not a fashion show.

  Though what Kyle noticed was how the T-shirt hem teased and enticed. Her legs looked longer, and it almost suggested the lack of bikini bottoms entirely, though he occasionally caught quick flashes of bright yellow to prove they were indeed there.

  He did his honest best to keep his expression neutral.

  Her arched eyebrow told him he’d done a lousy job of it.

  “Thanks, Carla,” he managed to choke out and turned to pull on the neoprene shorts and jacket of his wet suit because there were some things that a Speedo was never going to hide.

  * * *

  Two hours before dawn, there was negligible boat traffic off the west coast of Aruba, which Carla appreciated. Being run down by a coastal freighter while swimming to shore wasn’t really her idea of a good time.

  They had just jumped out of Chief Warrant Maloney’s helicopter as it hovered a single meter above the waves; the swim should be a straightforward task. They covered the first ten kilometers rapidly using DPVs. The small diver propulsion vehicles had very quiet electric motors to drive the small propeller, a leash that hooked to the front of a simple waist harness to tow them along, and two handles for steering.

  When they could see the coast as a shimmer of resort lights on the horizon, they disconnected the DPVs, opened the devices’ small flotation bladders to the sea, and let them sink out of sight along with the harnesses.

  The last five kilometers was a snorkel-and-fin job, made pesky by the big rollers of the open ocean, but not problematic.

  Dawn found them a couple hundred meters offshore. The soft morning light—simple pinks shifting gold, orange, then yellow—shone through the crystalline water down to the coral reefs. Carla wished she had time to stop and watch, or, better yet, was wearing tanks so that she could go down and enjoy the spectacle.

  The only tank diving she’d ever done had been for Delta training. They’d started in a swimming pool and then rapidly moved into the most turgid, dark, and brutally rough water they could find. Puget Sound was deep, muddy, deathly cold, and rife with rip currents.

  The Aruban sea life’s changing of the guard on the coral reef a dozen meters below her was a dance visible through crystal-clear water. Nighttime fish were seeking their hideaways, and the daytime species began nosing their way out of theirs. Angel, sun, grouper, and a hundred others she didn’t recognize, exotically attired in oranges, blues, and yellow stripes. A two-meter sand shark lazed along the bottom, moving in a languid fashion meant to fool other fish into thinking he was harmless. A great ray—as wide as Ms. Shark was long—flapped its wings as it rose out of the sand and sent her scooting off in a new direction.

  When they hit the lifeless sandy bottom of the surf zone, it was a rude and abrupt shock.

  A quick glance showed Carla that she was in among several early-morning snorkelers, none of them her team. A family of four paddled happily past her. A couple swam along holding hands. By the way they did it, you could just tell that they were newlyweds. Better them than me.

  Carla kept paddling for shore. Marriage had worked out so well for Mom and Dad. He’d been a useless drunk long before Mom’s National Guard unit went to war. Mom had been shocked by her abrupt deployment. It was supposed to be a weekend a month and some extra time if there was a sudden disaster. There had been one, and it was called Afghanistan. After her one-year deployment was over, she’d returned a better, happier person. She’d wanted to go back and the only way was to go full Army.

  Carla could still remember the c
onversation.

  Clay had been seventeen and already working two jobs to eke out a helicopter license at the local airfield. He was shooting for the 101st Airborne on his eighteenth birthday, Carla had just turned fourteen and was already spending as much of her time as she could hiking in the mountains.

  There had been no need to comment about their home life. Dad wasn’t a part of this family meeting.

  “It’s up to you, honey. Clay will be gone soon. You still have four years to go. If I sign up, you’ll be mostly on your own for at least two years.” With Dad the sullen drunk the unspoken part of the conversation.

  “Mom…” Carla hadn’t wanted her to go, but she knew what her mom needed to survive. “You have to go. I’ll be fine.”

  A year later Clay was indeed flying with the 101st, Carla had managed to find a small place of her own, and Mom had come home in a wooden box. Dad had refused to go to the funeral in DC, even refused the delivery of the flag.

  Carla had only been home by chance.

  Shoving her father into bed to sleep off yet another night, then sitting on the couch to watch the dawn, she’d fallen asleep. She’d woken to her father fighting with the poor lieutenant who’d been trying to deliver the folded flag. She’d taken it herself.

  Now she had two flags, Mom’s and Clay’s. She wondered who they would go to when her own flag, folded down to a triangle, joined the other two. Her father wouldn’t be sober enough to care.

  “Cheerful thoughts for a beautiful morning,” Carla muttered to herself as her knees grounded on the soft sand. She flipped over to sit on her butt as she slid up her mask, spit out the snorkel, and removed her fins. The sun was well up, and while the resort beach wasn’t crowded, it was active. Perfect.

  Per plan, they’d come ashore in the land of the well-tended. The resort itself was made of ornate towers surrounded by lush plantings dotted with sharp-peaked giant umbrella shapes made of darkest thatch. The resorts weren’t crowded together here like the photos of Waikiki, but spread along the shining sand in stately array.

  Richie and Kyle were already ashore. Chad and Duane were just arriving a hundred meters down the beach.

  Carla stood and, before even wading ashore, rapidly shed her neoprene in the warm morning air that would soon be trying to bake out their brains.

  * * *

  “Oh. My. God!” Richie’s voice had Kyle turning.

  Kyle couldn’t have said it better. His mouth, dry with salt water, was suddenly parched past speech.

  “Ursula Andress in Dr. No.” Richie’s deep immersion in Bond films made the point perfectly.

  Carla Anderson, rising from the surf, didn’t brag Ursula’s impressive build or blond locks. But she most certainly boasted that same centerfold wet look, advertising exactly why you should come snorkeling in Aruba.

  Her long hair, black from its soaking, glittered wetly in the morning sun. Her white T-shirt had become wholly transparent when wet, each place it clung merely emphasizing the incredible fitness of the woman within. The lemon-yellow bikini, merely a suggestion beneath the T-shirt when dry in the ready room, now shone through brightly. There was far too little of it for a woman of Carla’s form, and Kyle blessed the lack of every single millimeter. Her dusky skin glowed with fitness and sunshine.

  She strode up the beach until she was standing right in front of them. “What?”

  Kyle could only shake his head.

  Chad, never at a loss for words, joined them. “Damn, Anderson. I knew that Kyle was an asshole lucky far beyond what he deserves, but I had no idea how far beyond.”

  Duane had arrived beside Chad and merely nodded his agreement, silent for once.

  Carla’s brow knit for a moment, then she looked down at herself and cursed. She dumped her swim gear to the sand and tried pulling the T-shirt away from her body. She wrung out the bit in front of her belly. When she let it go, it wrapped back around her body with a nearly audible slap.

  Another guy stopped to stare until his newlywed wife shoved him along on his way.

  “Is this a Sports Illustrated photo shoot? Could you introduce us to the director or whoever?” A pair of shapely bleach blonds, severely straining the scant material of their swimsuit tops, stopped and asked. Then they looked at the steam pouring out of Carla’s ears and scooted on their way. Normally Kyle would have at least watched how the two of them walked off. All four of the guys would. Not with Carla Anderson standing in front of them; they weren’t even in the same league as the reality of the soldier woman standing before them.

  “If…” Carla took a deep breath, which caused several truly amazing shifts in her anatomy.

  “Lucky” didn’t begin to cover how Kyle was feeling at the moment. “Awed” came much closer. How was it that a woman like her was with him? He just couldn’t make the pieces connect.

  “If,” she started again, “you assholes keep looking at me that way, you’re going to end up being the laughingstocks of this beach while I demonstrate just how much I really know about hand-to-hand combat. I will start handing out personal, customized lessons in five, four, three…”

  She wasn’t looking at the others, though of course she’d be tracking them in her peripheral vision. She was glaring directly at him.

  He got the message, but he couldn’t do anything about it. “You’re gorgeous,” he managed to breathe out.

  She rolled her eyes. “You are all such guys.” She bent to gather her swim gear, not kneeling, but thoughtlessly bending right over at the waist, and then began walking up the beach.

  None of them could do more than stare, and Kyle couldn’t begrudge them one bit of it.

  “Oh my God.” This time Richie managed no more than a whisper.

  Carla walking away from him in her leathers had been a treat.

  But this was…

  They followed as soon as they were able to move.

  * * *

  Carla hit the first stall off the beach that sold women’s clothes. Aruba was Dutch. The beach was lined with orderly resort hotels. Their lobbies in turn would be lined with frigidly air-conditioned shops that catered to the ridiculously wealthy. She’d be even more uncomfortable there than she was crossing the beach so close to naked that guys were having trouble walking past her.

  She was surprised that the heat rising from her anger didn’t simply bake the T-shirt dry. Of all the goddamn jerks. Okay, she could understand the others, kind of. In their world, women either belonged in khaki or were something found in stateside bars.

  But, damn it! She’d thought Kyle was better than that.

  Since when did stunned puppy-dog eyes have any part in her world?

  He said she was gorgeous.

  He was full of shit!

  Though there was no denying the heat between them. She liked that he wanted her…when they weren’t in the middle of a mission!

  Man but he was making her nuts.

  So, she avoided the resorts and worked her way back into the areas inland from the beach. They still catered to the tourists, but they did it without the ostentation and Gucci labels.

  Despite Aruba having been a Dutch colony for centuries, a Latin feel pervaded the air. There was a mix of small shops, restaurants, and cheaper hotels without their own beach front. There were also dozens, maybe hundreds of stalls, carts, and even blankets rolled out on the sidewalks. It was too carefully quaint, testifying to just how much of their economy was based on tourism, but that didn’t concern her at the moment. There was still a sleepy feel, as it was only shortly past sunrise, but most of the locals were already in place to garner every dollar they could.

  She was hailed in Dutch, English (which she pretended not to know), German (which she really didn’t), then Spanish. She hoped to God she could find something in the stall that wouldn’t plaster the word “Aruba!” or worse, “I heart Aruba!” across her chest.


  Carla bought a floppy straw sunhat, big sunglasses, sandals, and the most covering sundress that the woman had, which wasn’t saying much. It was a wraparound in a bright floral pattern whose yellows were far too reminiscent of the despised bikini. It plunged down between her breasts and stopped short of mid-thigh, but it was better than the T-shirt and bikini that had earned her so much attention, including a small band of ardent followers, in just the two blocks she’d stalked from the beach.

  She’d left it to the boys to clear out any of her sudden fans. If it was left up to her, she’d probably end up in jail on a murder-one charge. Actually, no probably about it.

  At least her guys had gotten their shit back together by the time she was done shopping. Two had hit a couple stalls and come back with shorts and touristy T-shirts—Duane had actually fallen for the “I heart Aruba!” trap, which did look pretty good stretched across his muscles—while two others stood guard on the stall she’d entered. The old Arawak proprietor with her wrinkle-buried eyes and matronly bosom had clucked her tongue knowingly when Carla had eyed the rear exit of the stall as a potential means of escape.

  A grimace, a couple dozen euros from her waterproof money belt, and she rejoined the guys. They dumped their swim gear at the back of a still-closed rental stall. The guy would simply assume that someone had accidentally returned their gear to the wrong place, and he’d quietly add it to his inventory when none of the other vendors squawked.

  * * *

  Kyle had been first shift to guard the stall where Carla had shopped. Had tried not to imagine what was happening while the matrona was holding up a nearly sheer swatch of cloth as a temporary dressing room.

  When the other guys came back, he’d gone and bought clothes for himself. Creating even that small amount of distance from Carla was a relief.

  He couldn’t afford to get stupid about her or it would damage the team. It would fall apart if he was worrying about her rather than his own role in this. Well, that certainly sounded like his problem, not hers. And Dad had taught him how to deal with such things. He would pound the problem aside, find his center, and stay focused on Carla’s capabilities as a soldier, which were awesome. He’d still place her as number one on his list of who he’d want guarding his back.