The Right Touch

“Can I say I’m having morning sickness and gracefully bow out of this party we have to attend?”

Sarah laughed. “You’re so funny, Dev. Guess it goes along with your funny name.”

“And funny, gangly body.”

“Oh, stop it!”

Dev laughed with her. “Hey, that’s how I got into èpèe in the first place: I was too tall for foil. Did you ever see a good woman foil fencer over five-foot-six?”

Sarah shook her head. “Small means swift.”

“Right. And large means a bigger target who’s slower moving.” She looked down at herself. “I’m five-foot-nine and a hundred and thirty pounds. That’s why I went into èpè. All épéeists are tall and slender. Merely a matter of self-defense.” She tapped her head. “And smarts.” Foil was a light weapon compared to the épée blade. Because of the difference in styles, many men thought women couldn’t adjust to the more demanding and physical game of èpè. Dev had proved them wrong.

“You’re crazy, Dev! You always make me laugh.”

Dev’s full mouth curved into a smile as she watched her smaller friend’s delight. “Yeah, that’s what the guys at the TV station say, too.”

“Have Minicam, will travel,” Sarah agreed. And then she frowned. “You sure your wrist is healed enough? I mean, when that big guy tried to punch you out because you were the one with the camera…”

Dev looked at her right wrist. Ordinarily, the California sun would have tanned her whole arm; around her wrist the skin was white. The ace bandage had come off two days ago. Dev had spent every moment she could spare from her exhausting job as a camera operator fencing to rebuild the strained muscles. “It should hold up. Coach told me to tape it, but I don’t know. I don’t feel like losing in front of an international television audience. I need all the flexibility I can get to win.” She hadn’t told Coach Jack Gordon there were times when she experienced such excruciating pain that she dropped whatever she was carrying in her right hand. No, if Jack had known that, he would never have allowed her to come to this international meet. She was there to show the rest of the world that women were just as good in épée and sabre as any man in the sport.

Sarah frowned. “Yes, but if one of those big Russian women decides to poke you right there with the steel tip of an pe, you could really get it injured.”

“Hey, don’t worry about it.” Dev put her hand on Sarah’s bare shoulder. The cocktail-length black chemise made Sarah look smashing. Dev, on the other hand, wore a stunning strapless Victor Kosta dress of red-and-white stripes, complementing her auburn hair and blue eyes. “I’m supposed to be big sister, not you,” she teased, laughing.

“I know, I know. Devorah Hunter is our den mother on this trip.” At that moment, Sarah was distracted. Her eyes grew large as she eyed the pilots. “Oh, don’t they look gorgeous?” she breathed.

Dev gave them a practiced once-over. “No,” she drawled, amusement in her tone. “They look like they’re on the prowl.”

“Marines! Real men! Look at them!”

With a shake of her head, Dev excused herself and slid among the rest of the women fencers, making her way to the rear, resting her back against the marble wall. Mrs. Weintraub, wife of one of the officials from the American embassy, began to make introductions. Dev’s eyes sparkled with laughter as she watched the older woman pairing off pilots with fencers based on the criterion of height. Couldn’t have a short marine with a tall fencer, could we? Dev almost laughed aloud and then thought better of it. Most of the women were much younger than her; either Olympic hopefuls for 1988 or international foil fencers in their early twenties. And all short.

Her gaze roved without interest over the pilots. Most of them were short, too, and Dev wondered why, never having had much to do with the military services. The closest she got was when her television station had her and reporter Fred Tucker drive up to Edwards Air Force Base in the Mojave Desert to take pictures of Shuttle landings and astronauts waving as they disembarked from the huge white craft. Dev smiled as she saw Sarah blushing. A decidedly handsome pilot barely a head taller than her gallantly took her arm and escorted her toward the bank of elevators. Sarah was in love, Dev decided humorously, drowning in all that dashing derring-do of the fighter pilot image.

“Uh, Miss—let’s see, dear…” The wife of the embassy official gave Dev a forced smile as she walked over quickly to her. Dev straightened. She saw the woman nervously riffling through the neatly typed lists in her hands. “Oh, dear…what is your name?”

“Dev. Dev Hunter, Mrs. Weintraub,” she supplied, trying to look properly interested. Good! Maybe her name wasn’t on the list, which meant she could go back to her room in the hotel and soak her wrist. It was aching and she had no desire to dance or do anything but rest her arm for the forthcoming meet.

“Oh, dear…I just know they have your name somewhere here.”

Dev looked up. Up into dark-gray eyes that ruthlessly assessed her. She swallowed, caught in the web of his appraisal of her. He was tall. Much taller than any of the other pilots. And his lean face was closed, measured and disapproving. Her heart beat a little more quickly, a reaction that nonplussed her. Whoever he was, he was whipcord lean with squared broad shoulders that were thrown back confidently. An image flitted through her alerted mind: the expression in those almost colorless gray eyes with their huge black pupils warned that he was ready to pounce and shred his next victim. He looked like an eagle. His mouth, although well shaped, was thinned by obvious irritation. But Dev might have been more on guard if the corners of his mouth hadn’t been turned softly upward. At some point, he must have laughed a great deal. He wasn’t laughing now. No, if looks could kill, she’d be dead and so would poor Mrs. Weintraub, who was flustered by the faux pas.

Dev was far more concerned about Mrs. Weintraub’s embarrassment. She appeared to be going into cardiac arrest as she tore through the sheaf of papers in her trembling fingers. Dev reached out and touched her elegantly clad silk shoulder. “It’s quite all right, Mrs. Weintraub.”

“Well, I just know you are a fencer…I feel terrible.”

Dev risked a glance up at the marine corps officer, who was standing there as if bored to death. What was the matter with the arrogant idiot? He was just making Mrs. Weintraub that much more uncomfortable. Her blue eyes darkened when they met his gray ones. “Egotistical” flashed to mind. And then “cold.” Cold and cruelly insensitive. She disliked him intensely in those seconds. Well, she didn’t want to be here, either, but she wasn’t acting like an ass, at least.

Dev’s mouth pursed. “Look, Mrs. Weintraub, it’s all right. I honestly didn’t want to go to the party. I’m really tired with jet lag and—”

“Oh, my dear! I can’t possibly let you go back to your room just because of a silly typing omission!”

Sure you can, Dev thought, trying to look properly chastised that she had even suggested such an alternative. Then another plan formed in her mind, and she looked up, giving the stonelike officer one of her warmest and most brilliant smiles.

“Well, I’m sure the captain, uh—”

“Major,” he corrected her coolly. “Major Cal Travis.”

Dev waved her hand. “Of course! Major. Mrs. Weintraub, I’m sure Major Travis wouldn’t mind a bit if we just called it an evening.” Her eyes widened slightly in a pleading gesture as she held his insolent gaze. “Would you, Major?” she asked sweetly. God, she hated herself for such brash, sickeningly sweet, femme fatale methods. This just wasn’t like her. But at this point, Dev was willing to stoop to such a level to get out of having to go anywhere with this impudent officer!

“Whatever the lady wants,” he drawled with a slight bow.

I’ll bet, you arrogant—

“My gracious, we just can’t have that!” Mrs. Weintraub grabbed the officer by the arm and practically dragged him over. “Dev Hunter, I’d like you to meet your escort for the evening, Major Cal Travis.” She moved from between them and pushed them together. The instant Dev’s forearm came in contact with his hard, masculine body, Dev moved away as if burned.

“Now come, come! Just go up to the twenty-first floor and join the celebration.” Mrs. Weintraub grabbed Cal’s arm and led them toward the bank of elevators.

Once inside one, Dev immediately went to the opposite corner. Her heart was pounding like a snared rabbit’s, yet she met his hard eyes. “I don’t like this any more than you do.”

“Good, at least you aren’t the type to play games,” he said, looking her over as if she were a piece of furniture to be appraised. Cal saw a red stain come to her cheeks and suddenly felt contrite.

Come on, Travis, who do you think you’re talking to? She’s probably twenty-four or -five, never been out of the States before and is completely out of her element, and you’re going to put her in your sights and shoot her down.

He moved his mouth. “Sorry,” he muttered.

Dev’s wrist began to ache, and she focused on that rather than this enigmatic officer who looked just as ill at ease as she felt. Lightly touching her right wrist, she shrugged. “I didn’t want to come to this party, either.”

“Well, at least we agree on one thing.”

She felt his hand settle on her elbow, and he guided her out of the elevator. Her head snapped up, her eyes wide with confusion as she stared up at him. Prickles of pleasure radiated from his touch. For all the anger she saw and felt emanating from him, his hand was firm without being cruel. He seemed to monitor her stride in her cocktail dress and heels so that she wouldn’t have to run to keep up with his longer-legged walk.

“Drink?”

Dev winced inwardly. His voice was like a whip. If she had to stand here for an hour and put in an appearance for the team’s sake, it was going to be agony. “Make it a double scotch, will you?”

He tilted his head, a thaw in his gray eyes and, if she wasn’t imagining it, a slight hint of a smile pulling at one corner of his compressed lips. “We agree on two things. Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

Dev raised her chin, her blue eyes flaring. “Yes, sir. Or should I salute you, too?”

Some indecipherable emotion flicked across his face. “Just stand at parade ease and that will do, Ms Hunter.”

Arrogant bastard! She stood there, seething. Well, to hell with him! Dev turned smartly on her white heels, perusing the huge room that was softly lit by the chandeliers overhead. The music was soothing, but she barely heard it as she prowled the perimeter of the two hundred or so guests. The women were in their finest and most colorful plumage, while the men wore a mixture of business suits or uniforms from the various services. An impressive party, Dev decided. Aha—a balcony. Just what she wanted. Perhaps if she went out there and hid, Major Travis with his vinegar personality might not find her and would go home—where he belonged. And then she could go to her room and sleep!

The scintillating lights of Victoria Harbor were mesmerizing as Dev lounged against the wrought-iron balustrade. The sparkling reds, greens and blues from the island of Hong Kong itself danced off the rippling ebony surface so that she quickly became absorbed in the beauty of the night. A heavy cape of stars covered the shoulders of the night above her, and a soft, tangy salt breeze caressed Dev’s face. With a groan, she wriggled out of the heels, her feet already aching. She was used to wearing jogging shoes on the job and fencing shoes on the copper strip when going bouts with fellow fencers. Heels were something to be put in the darkest corner of her apartment closet and forgotten. Why women wore these tortuous, stilted monstrosities was beyond Dev. Then a silly grin split her squarish face. If she believed that, what was she doing wearing them tonight? The inconsistency of human behavior was alive and well, she decided.

After that, so engrossed did she become in the sight of Hong Kong in the distance and a junk sailing by that Dev forgot all about the party and her sourpuss escort.