A Question of Intent Read online

  If he got past the raging fever, Cody thought. The damned virus was one of the more virulent he'd come up against in a long time. Frustration at his inability to cut the critter off at the source was starting to eat into him.

  Hooking his hands on his stethoscope, he shifted his gaze from the restless MP to his commander. Worry for her subordinate had etched deep grooves in Jill's forehead. Fatigue had painted purple smudges under her eyes.

  "How about you?" he asked. "How are you feeling?"

  "Me? I'm fine. A little tired maybe, but no headaches, no achy muscles or bones."

  "You look like hell."

  She looked up, both startled and amused. "Is that a personal or a professional opinion?"

  "Both."

  Taking her elbow, he steered her out of the small ward area. The corpsman on duty that night gave them a nod as they passed.

  "I know the kind of hours you've been putting in," Cody said firmly. "I also know how much the incident with Bill Thompson must have taken out of you. I'm prescribing six solid hours of sack time."

  "Six hours. I wish! Captain Westfall has rescheduled the run for the day after tomorrow. He's also changed the test track. I'm going up into the mountains tomorrow to scan the area."

  "You've got to slow down, woman. You're running on pure adrenaline."

  "Like you're not?"

  Holding open the door, he followed her outside. Their boots rang hollowly on the three metal steps leading down to the hard-packed dirt walkway.

  Her ATV was parked a few yards away. Cody escorted her to the vehicle with every intention of sending her immediately to her quarters and to bed. The quiet of the night and the realization that it had been at least eighteen hours since he'd kissed this woman sabotaged those good intentions.

  "Hey," he said as she slid into the driver's seat.

  "What?"

  Propping an elbow on the roll bar, he leaned down and brushed his knuckles along the warm skin of her throat. "I told you I'd deliver before Bill Thompson did."

  "Here? Now?"

  "You know how it is with those of us in the uniformed services," he murmured as his lips grazed hers. "Sometimes we have to take a target of opportunity."

  He kept the kiss light, easy, more companionship than passion, since that was pretty well beyond him at this point. He was dead on his feet after a killer couple of days and a trip to the CCU he didn't want to repeat anytime soon. Yet something shifted inside him at the feel of Jill's mouth soft and warm and pliant under his.

  It wasn't love. It couldn't be love. He'd only known the woman for a few weeks. Whatever it was, though, came pretty damn close. Shaken by the intensity of the feeling, Cody drew back a little and spotted the plastic toy on her dash.

  "Who's that?"

  "My pal." Jill gave the figure a flick with one finger. He bobbed and grinned back at her. "Goofy goes with me everywhere. He's seen action in Korea, Colombia, Bosnia and half the fifty states."

  "How did you two get so close?"

  She caught her lower lip between her teeth Cody saw the reluctance that flickered across her face, heard it in the small silence that spun out between them.

  "Sorry. Didn't mean to intrude," he lied.

  Nothing said she had to open up to him He felt a gnawing need to connect on more than a physical level, but obviously she didn't. Easing his elbow from the roll bar, he was prepared to go back into the clinic when she broke the silence.

  "Remember the jock I told you about? The one I tangled with in college?"

  How could he forget? His glance went to the hair curving just above her collar. The smooth cap gleamed like summer wheat lit by a harvest moon and hid the ugly scar underneath.

  "I remember," he said grimly.

  "He was too big for me, too strong. After that incident, I was determined no goon would get the best of me again."

  "So you took self-defense courses and, ultimately, became a cop."

  "Correct. I also convinced myself muscles were a serious turnoff. Ever since that incident, I've dated only gangly, awkward types. Like Goofy."

  Cody didn't rank anywhere near Arnold Schwarzenegger when it came to physique, but genetics had presented him with a big frame and a solid build. Jill must have forced herself to overcome an aversion that had been seared into her psyche when she took him into her arms and into her body. The realization hit him with almost as much force as the suspicion that he'd fallen for this woman.

  Hard.

  "You should have told me," he growled. "I would have taken things slower in Albuquerque. Given you more time to adjust to my size and weight."

  Jill tipped her head. He'd just handed her the perfect excuse to pull back, to retreat behind the old, familiar walls. All the reasons why she should do just that raced through her mind.

  "I didn't want to take things slower," she said, her gaze clear and direct. "I was every bit as hungry as you were."

  Nothing had changed. They both still had important jobs to do. The mission came first. It had to come first. Yet she couldn't deny how she felt any longer.

  "I'm still hungry," she admitted gruffly.

  "Now she tells me!"

  His theatrical groan dragged a grin from Jill. Her hands came up, grasped the lapel of his lab coat, hauled him back down until their breath mingled.

  "I've changed my mind, big guy. Or rather you changed it. I like the way we fit together."

  "So do I," he growled.

  Cody's bone-deep weariness evaporated. Suddenly companionship was the last thing on his mind. He covered her mouth with his, and there was nothing slow or easy or comfortable about this kiss.

  She hadn't lied about her hunger. It arced between them. He welcomed the heat of it, the hard, swift punch. His belly clenching, he buried his hands in her hair and tipped her head back.

  His lab coat bunched in her fists. Her mouth fused with his. She held nothing back. Nothing. Cody was within a heartbeat of dragging her out of the ATV when he realized there was no place to drag her to.

  Certainly not back into the clinic. Professional ethics and one very sick patient nixed that idea. Nor could they retreat to their quarters. She shared the larger unit with Cari and Kate. Cody and Russ McIver bunked down in one of the smaller units.

  It was a measure of how desperately he wanted this woman that he actually considered flipping down the rear seat of the Lincoln. The monumentally stupid idea wrung a groan from him. A genuine one this time.

  "If we don't stop now," he said, his heart slamming against his ribs, "Goofy here is going to get an eyeful."

  "Think so?"

  "I do." He dropped another fierce kiss on her lips and released her. "Go back to your quarters. Hit the rack. Get some sleep."

  "Oh, yeah. As if either of us will be able to shut down our systems now."

  She released his lapels and smoothed the wrinkled white cotton. Her palms slid down his chest, bumped over his uniform belt, dipped lower. Cody sucked in a swift breath and jerked away from the vehicle.

  "Go!"

  "Okay, okay. I'm out of here."

  Keying the ignition, Jill put the ATV in drive. She took a last look at Cody in the rearview mirror and felt her whole body shudder with need.

  "Oooh, boy, Goof. I've got it bad. Real bad."

  Her buddy bobbed his head in vigorous agreement.

  Chapter 12

  To Jill's surprise, she welcomed the glow of lamplight behind the blmds of the modular unit she shared with Kate and Caroline. Cody's kiss had pushed her bone-deep weariness to the back burner and left her much too keyed up to sleep. She needed to decompress.

  She parked the ATV outside the unit, thinking how much her perspective had changed in the past few weeks. The stolen hours in Cody's arms had pretty well demolished her self-imposed aversion to muscled, athletic men. Kate's irrepressible good nature and Cari' s quiet friendship had done the same to her doubts about sharing a cramped set of quarters with two other women.

  Her roommates were engaged in their
usual after-hours pursuits, she saw when she stepped inside. The petite Coast Guard officer was curled up in the unit's one comfortable chair with a thriller. Kate was on a laptop computer, playing some crazy atmospheric ionization game with a group of space nuts she'd stumbled across on the Internet. The encrypted computer shielded her identity and location, but nothing could suppress her expertise. Most nights she whacked the other players.

  "There you are," the vivacious redhead said. "We were about to send out the search-and-rescue team. How's Private Harris?"

  "Still feverish but holding his own."

  "Good." Kate cocked her head and studied Jill's face. "Either you've taken to wearing blush on your chin or you've got a nice little whisker burn going there. Wish the doc gave that kind of personal attention to all his patients."

  "I'm sure Private Harris would appreciate it," Jill retorted with a grin as she tossed her hat on the table. Unbuckling her bat belt, she wrapped the thick leather with all its accoutrements around the hol-stered Beretta, laid the bundle beside her hat and sank into the chair next to Cari's. Every bone in her body sighed in relief.

  "Lord, what a day."

  "Any late word on Bill Thompson?"

  "Cody checked with the CCU while I was at the clinic. Bill's stable, but it's not looking good that he'll ever climb back into a cockpit. Depending on the amount of damage to his heart, he may be facing a medical retirement."

  "That sucks," Kate said succinctly.

  "Big-time," Cari added, propping her paperback on her bent knee. "I couldn't imagine not pulling on a uniform every morning."

  "Neither can I," Jill agreed, "but we'll all have to hang it up sometime."

  She tipped Cari a curious glance. Although the Coast Guard officer's slight stature and slender curves gave her a youthful air, she had more time in uniform than either Jill or Kate.

  "You're past the halfway mark to retirement. Are you going to go the stretch?"

  "That's the plan."

  "What about that Navy JAG back in Washington?" Kate asked. "The one who's had calls forwarded to you at least six times since we've been on-site, not that anyone's counting. Is he in for the duration, too?"

  "He is. He's almost as gung-ho as our resident leatherneck."

  Kate snorted. "No one can be as gung-ho as Russ McIver."

  "Trust me, Jerry comes close." Sighing, the brunette riffled the pages of her book. "He thinks it's great we both have careers and share similar experiences. So do I, except I want to make room in my life for children, too."

  "And Jerry doesn't?"

  "He's got three kids by his ex-wife. He knows firsthand how difficult it is to raise a family while one parent pulls sea duty. He thinks two parents at sea would stack the odds against us."

  "He's got a point there." Kate clicked off her computer and pulled down the lid. Her green eyes held a rueful sympathy. "I've been down that road. My ex and I didn't have kids, but we had everything else working against us. Weird hours, long separations, one of us on a faster career track than the other. It takes more determination than either of us apparently possessed to make that kind of marriage work."

  "Maybe you just didn't try it with the right guy," Cari said gently.

  "Obviously." Stretching like a cat, Kate bent her arms and hooked them behind her neck. "What about you, Jillium? How do you envision things working out between you and our hunky doc? Or haven't you reached the talking-about-the-relationship stage yet?"

  Jill had given up trying to deflect Kate's natural inquisitiveness. After weeks of living almost in each other's pockets, she had few secrets left from either of these women.

  "We're not anywhere near the talking-about-things stage."

  Even Cari laughed at that one. "You may not be, but it sure looks to me like Cody's fast approaching the go, no-go point. You'd better start thinking about a game plan for when we wrap up this project and you two go your separate ways."

  "Speaking of wrapping up this project," Jill said, neatly turning the discussion, "the Air Force will have to identify a replacement for Bill Thompson pretty fast or the schedule will take another serious hit."

  "Captain Westfall's already approved Bill's replacement," Kate informed them. "He told me at supper," she added when both women turned to stare at her.

  "Who is it?"

  "Some jet jockey by the name of Dave Scott."

  "What's the skinny on him?"

  "I know nothing...yet."

  "But you will," Jill said, grinning. "By the time the poor man reports on-site, you'll have scoped out everything down to and including his shoe size."

  "Scott's going to have it tough," Cari observed. "We've got the advantage of having worked together for several weeks now. He'll have to hump to make up for lost time."

  "Hopefully he'll fit in as well as Bill did," Jill said, although the prospect of factoring a new, unknown personality into the small test cadre didn't appeal to her any more than it did to the others. Their group had jelled into a tight-knit team. A stranger would upset the balance they'd worked out over the past weeks.

  Well, they'd face that problem—if it was one— when Dave Scott arrived. Right now Jill had enough real concerns on her plate without worrying about potential ones.

  A jaw-cracking yawn told her the high from those moments with Cody outside the clinic had fizzled. She was completely and totally decompressed. Dragging herself out of her chair, she gathered her gear.

  "I've got to get some sleep. Doctor's orders."

  Cari uncurled and rose, as well. "I hope you get through the night without a call."

  "So do I!"

  Jill almost made it.

  The direct-line phone beside her bed jangled less than a half hour before the time she'd set on her digital alarm. Grimacing at the glowing green digits, she fumbled for the phone.

  "Bradshaw."

  "This is Rattler Control. Sorry to wake you, ma'am."

  "No problem." She struggled upright and hooked her tangled hair behind her ears. "What's up?"

  "We just got a call routed through the central switchboard from a Jack Conway."

  She tried to shake off the cobwebs. "Who's Jack Conway?"

  "He says he's the president and CEO of some company called Ditech."

  That snapped Jill out of her grogginess. Conway, she belatedly recalled, was also the father of Cody's dead wife.

  "What does he want?"

  "He's trying to track down Doc Richardson. Say's the doc hasn't returned his phone calls and he's worried about him. Sounded more pissed than worried, if you ask me."

  "Did you advise Dr. Richardson of the call?"

  "No, ma'am. Since Conway's not on the doc's immediate access list, I told the man I'd pass the message. That really set him off." The controller hesitated a moment. "At that point he started making what sounded a whole lot like threats to me, ma'am."

  "Threats?" Hooking her legs over the edge of the mattress, Jill sat up. "I'll take the call. Patch him through on a secure line."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  While her on-duty controller made the patch, she squinted at the clock again. Five-twenty New Mexico time. Just past seven on the East Coast, assuming that's where Conway was located.

  "Good ahead, ma'am."

  "Good morning, Mr. Conway. I understand you're trying to reach..."

  "Who the hell is this?"

  "Major Jill Bradshaw, United States Army. I'm responding to your call to Dr. Cody Richardson."

  "Why are you responding? Where is that bastard?"

  Whoa! No wonder Cody hadn't added this guy to his immediate access list.

  "Dr. Richardson is working a special project for the government at an undisclosed location. I'm responding because your call was routed through..."

  "I want to talk to him. Now!"

  "...our switchboard," Jill finished firmly. "If you'll tell me why you need to contact Dr. Richardson, I'll relay the message."

  "Listen, little girl, I don't discuss family business with anyone who isn't
family. You get my son-in-law on the line and you get him fast."

  "Family business? Does this concern Ditech?"

  "You're damned right it concerns Ditech."

  "It's my understanding Dr. Richardson put his holdings in that company in a blind trust."

  There was a short, heavy silence.

  "Who is this?" Conway asked again.

  "Major Jill Bradshaw."

  "How do you know about Cody's holdings?"

  "I had occasion to review his financial disclosure statement," she replied with purposeful vagueness.

  There was another silence while Conway digested that bit of information.

  "Then you know he retained his seat on my company's board of directors," he said after a moment.

  "Yes, Ido."

  "And you probably also know the company is facing bankruptcy."

  She returned a noncommittal answer, although her own research into the company and the artless disclosures of the young research assistant at Decker Labs had pretty well confirmed that Ditech was in dire financial straits.

  It soon became apparent Jack Conway didn't share the young assistant's assertion that Cody had single-handedly kept the company alive and breathing. Bitterness eating like acid through his voice, the man ignored his just-stated prohibition against discussing family business outside the family.

  "You tell that bastard I want his proxy vote on the new stock issue today. He killed my daughter. I'll be damned if I'll let him kill my company, too."

  Jill shot upright on the edge of the mattress. "What did you say?"

  "You heard me."

  "Mr. Conway, are you alleging Dr. Richardson caused his wife's death?"

  The hatred spewed through the phone like hot, scorching lava. "I'm not alleging anything. I'm telling you straight-out. Cody Richardson killed her. My baby. My Alicia."

  Jill's knuckles went white on the receiver. Stunned, she could only listen as Conway snarled into her ear.

  "You tell Richardson I'd better get his vote. Today!"

  "I'll tell him."

  "If Ditech goes down, I'll make damned sure he goes with it. You can tell him that, too."

  If she hadn't been struggling to absorb what she'd just heard, Jill might have winced at the crash of the receiver slamming down. The clatter barely registered on her consciousness.