Judgment in Death

"Well, you're just floating there like flotsam. Or maybe it's jetsam. I never know which is which."

"I've heard, in some circles, this is called relaxing. But…" His arm sneaked under the water, then around her. "Since you have all this energy to spare."

"Hey." She laughed a little as their legs tangled. "We're way over our heads here."

"Just the way I like it." His mouth came to hers, wet and teasing. His arm drew her close against him.

And they went under.

Warm, clear water, with the sun dancing on the surface. His mouth soft on hers, his body firm. For both of them, she let herself go, sliding deeper into the liquid blue. Sliding deeper into the kiss. When they surfaced, she filled her lungs and pressed her cheek against his.

They let the water rock them, a steady, undulating rhythm that reflected the mood. Here, with light strokes over wet skin, was the tenderness they'd both needed. The brush of his lips on her shoulder made her smile and let her float on sensation as easily as she floated in the sea.

She turned her face to his, found his mouth again, and drugged herself on the taste of him.

They drifted lazily toward shore, rising up on the waves, sinking again, clinging together, drawing apart only far enough to touch.

When she felt sand beneath her feet, she stood in the waist-high water and watched his face as he traced his fingertips over her.

"I love the look of you, darling Eve. The way you look under my hands."

Her breasts, small and firm, cupped neatly in his palms, seemed to heat as he captured them. Water sparkled over her skin, tiny diamonds that turned to tears and melted back into the blue.

"Give yourself to me." His fingers trailed down her torso, over her hips. "Go under for me." And slid into her.

She let out her breath on a sigh, caught it again on a moan. Pleasure, languid, liquid, lapped at her senses. The sun dazzled her eyes until all she could see was blue. He dazzled her body until all she could feel was bliss.

Even as that pleasure swamped her, as her knees buckled from the thrill of it, the wave crashed over them, stealing her breath and sweeping them closer to shore.

He rolled in it with her, felt her release crest, her body tremble while the water sucked them down, tossed them free again. She was locked around him-trust, need, invitation-everything he wanted as they lay tangled together in the surf.

He took her mouth again, still patient, though the need had begun to throb through him like a restless heart. He skimmed his lips down her throat, her shoulders, her breasts, while her hands stroked, aroused, urged.

The water streamed over them, receded, and to its constant, endless beat, he filled her, moved with her. Dreamily, with that pulse matching his own, he watched her head arch back as the crest took her again.

"Roarke." Her voice was husky with passion, her breath already quickening again. "Give yourself to me. Go under for me."

Love swamped him; more than need, it gushed through him, took his air, his heart, his thoughts. And with his eyes on hers, still and always on hers, he let himself drown.

– =O=-***-=O=-

The hour had to end. But she wouldn't feel guilty for taking it. Dry, dressed, standing in her office, she fully intended to brief Roarke and scan his readout of the security system at Purgatory.

Feeney would take a closer look at it, she thought, and coordinate with Roarke on that end. She'd station herself in Control, where she could oversee the club, monitor the moves, supervise all members of the team.

And be ready for any move Ricker might make.

"He knew my father."

She blurted it out without realizing it was there, weighing on the center of her mind.

Roarke, about to explain the readout on-screen, turned, stared at her. She didn't have to say a name, didn't have to say anything. He knew by her face.

"You're sure of it?"

"I had a flashback last night… this morning," she corrected, feeling ridiculously unsteady. "Something tripped it, I guess, in the data I was studying, and I was back, just back."

"Sit down and tell me."

"I can't sit."

"All right. Just tell me."

"I was in bed. In my room. I had a room. I don't think I always had one-I know I didn't always. But I think there was some money to spare. I think it was Ricker's money. It was dark, and I was listening because he was drinking in the next room, and I was praying he would keep drinking. He was talking to somebody about a deal. I didn't understand. I didn't care. Because as long as he kept talking, kept drinking, he wouldn't come in. It was Ricker. He called him by name."

It was hard. She hadn't expected it to be so hard to say it all, when the image of it was still so brutally clear in her mind. "Ricker was telling him what would happen if he screwed up the deal. Illegals, I think. It doesn't matter. I recognized his voice. I mean, having the flashback, I remembered. I don't know if I'd ever heard it before that night. I don't remember."

"Did you see him? Did he see you?"

"No, but he knew about me. My father said something about me when he was trying to get more money for the deal. So, he knew, and after he left, my father came in. He was mad. Scared and mad. He knocked me around a little, then he told me to pack. We were going to head south, he said. He had money, and I think the illegals, or some of them. I don't remember any more, except it was in New York. I'm sure we were in New York. And I think, I think we ended up in Dallas. After the money ran out, we were in Dallas. There wasn't any more money because we just had that horrible room, and hardly any food, and he didn't have enough to get drunk enough in Dallas. God."

"Eve." He was beside her now, his hands ru

"I am. I will. It spooked me, that's all."

"I know." He gathered her in for a moment. And realized on the heels of the flashback she'd been called to The Tower.

Ambushed.

"I'm sorry." He turned her lips into her hair.

"It's a circle, a circle. Link to link. Ricker to my father, my father to me. Ricker to you. You to me. I don't believe in stuff like that. But here I am."

"They won't touch you through me." He tipped her head back. "They'll never get through me to hurt you."

"That's not what I meant."

"I know, but it's a fact all the same. We'll break the circle. We'll do that together. I'm more inclined to believe in such things as fate."

"Only when your Irish comes out." She managed a smile but moved away. "Could he know about me? Could he have co

"I can't tell you."

"If he'd tried to track my father, could he have found out who I am? Is it possible to dig up the data on me from before?"

"Eve, you're asking me to speculate-"

"Could you?" she interrupted, facing him again. "If you wanted the information, could you find it?"

She didn't want comfort, he knew, but facts. "Given the time, yes. But I have considerably more to work with than he would."

"But he could? He has the capabilities? Particularly if he'd begun to track my father when he was double-crossed."

"It's possible. I don't believe he'd have wasted his time keeping track of an eight-year-old girl who was sucked into the system."

"But he knew, when I went to see him, that I had been in the system. He knew where I'd been found, and in what condition."

"Because he researched Lieutenant Eve Dallas. Not because he'd been keeping tabs on a young, abused girl."

"Yes, you're probably right. It hardly matters, anyway." She paused by her desk, lifted a small carved box he'd given her for odds and ends. "You could find the data?"

"Yes, I could find it, if that's what you want."

"No." She set the box down again. "It's not what I want. What I want is here. There's nothing back there I need to know. I shouldn't have let it get to me the way it did. I didn't realize it had."