The Echo of Violence

He grabbed the shower curtain and draped it over his hips. His shocked expression was priceless. But she wasn’t about to tell him the see-through curtain gave her the equivalent of X-ray vision.

“Oh, right.” She holstered her weapon and did as she was told—for once. Jess turned her back and knew he still wouldn’t be happy. “Uh, Harper?”

“Yeah?”

She stared at his reflection.

“What is it they say about mirrors…objects may appear larger than they are?”

“Ah, Jessie. Cut me some slack, will you?” he pleaded. “Can a guy have some privacy?”

Seth was tall and muscular with a lean swimmer’s body. An enticing sight. She’d always known he was beautiful. A guy with an angelic face and great eyes. And now she got a peek at his other attributes and liked what she saw. Before he kissed her a few months back, she’d always thought of him as a kid. But that kiss had changed everything. And today, that boyish image had vaporized. Harper was a man with plenty to offer.

Steam fogged the mirror. She felt the heat—and hot water had nothing to do with it.

“Yeah, s-sure,” she stammered. “I’ll be out here. We probably…sh-should talk.”

Jess rushed from the bath and closed the bedroom door behind her. She should have been mortified, yet when the reality of what happened hit home, she reacted. She burst out laughing. At first the whole incident struck her as funny, but before she saw Harper again, she had to get control. She was right. They had to talk.

What the hell would she say? That question had a sobering effect, and a bad case of nerves hit her.

In record time, Harper rushed to get dressed. She heard his loud rumblings behind the closed bedroom door while butterflies waged war in her belly. Amped on adrenaline, she paced the living room and wrung her hands as she thought about things to say. None of them worked. She felt unprepared to face him, and her time had run out.

When she turned, Seth was with her. His dark hair was damp, and he smelled like herbal soap and shampoo. He wore jeans and a pale blue Oxford shirt. His feet were bare.

And he looked…amazing.

“Hey, Jessie. How are you?” He nudged his head, real casual.

He acted as if nothing had happened. She took a deep breath. A better woman would have let him salvage his dignity, but that woman wasn’t in the room.

“For cryin’ out loud, Harper. I just saw you naked,” she stopped herself. And after a long awkward moment, she nodded. “I’m good. Thanks for asking.”

Seth blushed, and a lazy smile spread across his handsome face. Jess memorized every nuance of that expression. She wanted to remember it always.

“That wasn’t my best moment in there.” He shrugged and had trouble meeting her gaze.

“Not from where I was standing.” She grinned.

“You’re not gonna let this go, are you?”

“Would you?”

Harper finally gave in and chuckled. The sound of his laughter and the blush on his cheeks warmed her heart. It reminded her how much she missed him. And being alone with him, after going months without seeing him, had an overwhelming intimacy that was new and different. She should have felt self-conscious after what had happened, but she didn’t.

“Seth, I…” Jess had no idea where to begin. She took a tentative step forward. And he did the same. Neither of them could look away.

“I thought you and Alexa…” She struggled with what to say next. “…I thought you guys had canceled your plans for this weekend. Why are you staying here?”

“She got called out on assignment. And she talked me into staying at her place. So I canceled the hotel I booked. Why are you here?”

Alexa had set her up. And on purpose. Maintenance, my ass.

“A hotel?” She covered up her elation with a grimace. “You had a hotel room? That’s…great.”

“Not at four hundred bucks a night,” he protested. “New York is expensive, Jessie.”

“Oh, Seth, I know. I just thought you two were…” She couldn’t admit that she’d assumed they were sleeping together. Saying it aloud made her feel foolish. And worse, it revealed too much about feelings she didn’t understand.

“That we were what?” he asked.

She heard the hope in his voice as he closed the gap between them. And she found that she was holding her breath.

Images of him kissing Alexa still plagued her. Strike one. And normally, the cancellation of a hotel room would get no reaction from her, but this cancellation was significant. It meant her assumption about their physical relationship was off base, which made her strangely happy. Strike two. And the real kick in the teeth stood out more than the rest. Seeing Harper naked only made her want more. A big strike three. She had struck out on denials about her feelings for Harper, and the truth was staring her in the face with big soulful brown eyes.

Yet having feelings and acting on them were two different things. And years of abuse as a child left her feeling like she didn’t deserve love or happiness—a heavy load of baggage to carry, much less overcome. She had ended her budding relationship with Payton Archer almost a year ago, using the distance between them as the reason. Alaska and Chicago were worlds away.

Now she had thoughts of doing the same with Seth after only one kiss. He’d been the reason she had left Chicago practically overnight to put distance between them. The patterns in her life were self-destructive. And even though she saw them coming like a train wreck, she felt powerless to stop history from repeating.

“Seth, I wish…” She stared into his eyes and took a deep breath until the ring of her cell phone made her jump. Not cool. She would have ignored it, but the sound had broken the mood.

“I’m sorry.” Jess grabbed her phone and glanced down at the display. She recognized a strange series of numbers, even though there was no caller name. “I have to take this.”

She hit TALK, and said, “Beckett.”

“Jessie? This is Garrett Wheeler. I need to ask you a favor. I’m trying to locate your friend Seth Harper. Do you know where I can reach him?”

Jess looked up into Seth’s eyes before she turned her back and grimaced, holding the cell phone to her ear in silence. She felt more than a little protective of Seth, especially with someone as powerful and crafty as Garrett Wheeler trying to locate him. It was one thing to work for the man—having a clever resourceful boss had its upside for her.

With Garrett having an interest in Harper, she pictured Hannibal Lecter asking if Seth was available for dinner. Whatever her new boss had in mind, he’d have to go through her first.

“That depends. What’s this about, Garrett?”

As LaClaire maneuvered the boat closer to shore, Alexa scanned the beach and the wooded cliffs with her long-range binoculars. She had her gear on deck at her feet. And in the background, over the rumble of the boat engine, she heard her men preparing to disembark.

The beach was pristine. No footprints marred the surface of the sand. And there was no sign of civilization. On the one hand, she’d found a drop zone no one had traveled in a while, but on the flip side, this wasn’t the spot the terrorists had landed with their hostages. They’d have to find their trail and track them another way.

The winds had picked up, and the sun had lost its battle with a bank of ominous dark clouds. Every swaying tree caught her attention as she looked for signs of danger. The impending storm had triggered her uneasiness and made it worse.

“Joe’s ready to drop us off.” Kinkaid’s low voice interrupted her surveillance. She kept the binoculars working the shoreline and listened to the rest of what he had to say, “He’ll take the raft to shore and stick close until we need him for our ride out.”

“Sounds good. Let’s hit it.” She picked up her gear and turned to see Joe LaClaire at her back. He nodded, clearly wanting to have a private word with his boss, Kinkaid. She’d noticed the unspoken bond between the two men. But there was something else at play. LaClaire looked worried, and not only about the mission.

She met up with her team at the raft and took one last look over her shoulder, watching the two men at the