Tall, Dark and Devastating: Harvard's Education

And that was if he was lucky.

P.J. ran to catch up with him. “Did you give the order to restrict my distance for this and yesterday morning’s run to only three miles?”

Harvard kept walking. “Yes, I did.”

She had to keep trotting to match the length of his stride. “Even though the rest of the team was required to go the full seven miles?”

“That’s right.”

“How dare you!”

She was nearly hopping up and down with anger, and Harvard swore and turned to face her. “I don’t have time for this.” He spoke more to himself than to her, but of course, she had no way of knowing that.

“Well, you’re going to have to make time for this.”

Damn, she was pretty. And so thoroughly passionate. But if his luck continued in its current downward spiral, he stood only a blind man’s chance in a firing range of ever getting a taste of that passion any way other than her hurling angry words—or maybe even knives—in his direction.

“I’m sorry if my very existence is an inconvenience,” she continued hotly, “but—”

“My order was standard procedure,” he told her tightly.

She wasn’t listening. “I will file a formal complaint if this coddling continues, if I am not treated completely the same as—”

“This coddling is by the book for any FInCOM agent who has received an injury sufficient to send him—or her—to the hospital.”

She blinked at him. “What did you say?”

Well, what do you know? She was listening. “According to the rule book set up for this training session, if a fink goes to the hospital, said fink gets lighter physical training until it’s determined that he—or she—is up to speed. Sorry to disappoint you, Ms. Richards, but you were treated no differently than anyone else would have been.”

The sun was setting, streaking the sky with red-orange clouds, giving the entire base a romantic, fairy-tale look. Everything was softer, warmer, bathed in diffused pink light. Back home in Hingham, it would have been the perfect kind of summer evening for a long, lazy walk to the local ice-cream stand, flirting all the way with his sister’s friends, strutting his seventeen-year-old stuff while they gazed at him adoringly.

The woman in front of him was gazing at him, but it sure as hell wasn’t adoringly. In fact, she was looking at him as if he were trying to sell her a dehumidifier in the desert. “Rule book?”

Harvard glanced in the direction of his office, wishing he was there so he could, in turn, soon go home. “No doubt one of your bosses was afraid that Alpha Squad was going to hurt you and keep on hurting you. There’s a list of ground rules for this training session.”

“I wasn’t shown any rule book.”

Harvard snorted, his patience flat-out gone. He started walking again, leaving her behind. “Yeah, you’re right, I’m making all this up.”

“You can’t blame me for being wary!” P.J. hurried to keep pace. “As far as I know, there’s never been this kind of a rule book before. Why should FInCOM start now?”

“No doubt someone heard about BUD/S Hell Week—about the sleep deprivation and strenuous endurance tests that SEALs undergo at the end of phase-one training. I bet they were afraid we’d do something similar to the finks with this counterterrorist deal. And they were right. We would have, if we could. Because in real life, terrorists don’t pay too much attention to time-out signals.”

P.J. was back to glaring at him, full power. “I’ll have you know that I find ‘fink’ to be an offensive term.”

“It’s a nickname. A single syllable versus four. Easier to say.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t like it.”

“There’s not much you do like, is there?” Including him. Maybe especially him. Harvard pushed open the door to the Quonset hut that housed Alpha Squad’s temporary offices. “My father’s going to be fine. I’m sure you were dying to know.”

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry I didn’t ask!”

His mistake was turning to look at her.

She looked stricken. She looked completely, thoroughly horrified, all her anger instantly vanished. He almost felt bad for her—and he didn’t want to feel bad for her. He didn’t want to feel bad for anyone, especially not himself.

He’d been off balance since he’d gotten that phone call from Joe Cat telling him about his father’s heart attack. His entire personal life had been turned on its side. His parents were succumbing to age and his home was no longer going to be his home.

And then here came P. J. Richards, getting in his face, making all kinds of accusations, reminding him how much easier this entire assignment would be were it not for her female presence.

“Please forgive me—I didn’t mean to be insensitive. I was rude not to have asked earlier. Is he really going to be all right?”

As Harvard gazed into P.J.’s bottomless dark eyes, he knew he was fooling himself. He hadn’t been off balance since that phone call came in about his father. Damn, he’d been off balance from the moment this tiny little woman had stepped out of the FInCOM van and into his life. He’d liked her looks and her passion right from the start, and her ability to face up to her mistakes made him like her even more.

“Yeah,” he told her. “He should be just fine in a few weeks. And his long-term prognosis is just as good, provided he stays with his diet.” He nodded at her, hoping she’d consider herself dismissed, wishing he could pull her into his arms and kiss that too-vulnerable, still-mortified look off her face. Thank God he wasn’t insane enough to try that. “If you’ll excuse me, Ms. Richards, I have a great deal of work to do.”

Harvard went inside the Quonset hut, forcing himself to shut the door tightly behind him, knowing that starting something hot and heavy with this woman was the dead last thing he should do but wanting it just the same.

Damn, he wanted it, wanted her.

He wanted to lose this unpleasant sensation he had of being adrift, to temporarily ground himself in her sweetness.

He took a deep breath and got to work.

His father was going to be fine in a few weeks, but he suspected his own recovery was going to take quite a bit longer.

P.J. had never done so much shooting in her life. They were going on day fourteen of the training, and during every single one of those days she’d spent a serious chunk of time on the firing range.

Before she’d started, she could outshoot the three other FInCOM agents, as well as some of the SEALs in Alpha Squad. And after two weeks of perfecting her skill, she was at least as good as the quiet SEAL with the thick Southern accent, the XO or executive officer of Alpha Squad, the one everyone called Blue. And he was nearly as good as Alpha Squad’s CO, Joe Cat. But, of course, nobody even came close to Harvard.

Harvard. P.J. had managed successfully to avoid him since that day she’d been so mad she’d forgotten even the most basic social graces. She still couldn’t believe she hadn’t remembered to ask him about his father’s health. Her anger was a solid excuse, except for the fact that that degree of rudeness was inexcusable.

Lord, she’d made one hell of a fool out of herself that evening.

But as much as she told herself she was avoiding any contact with Harvard out of embarrassment, that wasn’t the only reason she was avoiding him.

The man was too good at what he did. How could she not respect and admire a man like that? And added onto those heaping double scoops of respect and admiration was a heady whipped topping of powerful physical attraction. It was a recipe for total disaster, complete with a cherry on top.

She’d learned early in life that her own personal success and freedom hinged on her ability to turn away from such emotions as lust and desire. And so she was turning away. She’d done it before. She could do it again.

P.J. went into the mess hall and grabbed a tray and a turkey sandwich. It turned out the food they’d been eating right from the start wasn’t standard Uncle Sam fare. This meal had been catered by an upscale deli downtown, as per the FInCOM rule book. Such a list of rules did exist. Harvard had been right about that.

She felt his eyes following her as she stopped to pour herself a glass of iced tea.

As usual, she’d been aware of him from the moment she’d walked in. He was sitting clear across the room, his back against the far wall. He had two plates piled on his tray, both empty. He was across from the quiet SEAL called Crash, his feet on a chair, nursing a mug of coffee, watching her.

Harvard watched her all the time. He watched her during physical training. He watched her during the classroom sessions. He watched her on the firing range.