A Question of Intent. Merline Lovelace

      The curt reply suggested the subject was off-limits. Cody ignored the warning. “Knife or broken glass?”

      “Neither.”

      She flicked him an annoyed glance, saw he wasn’t going to go away, and shrugged.

      “The cut was made by the jagged edge of an aluminum beer can. The jock I was out with had been demonstrating his intellectual prowess by ripping them in half with his teeth. I tripped, fell on one, and walked away with a permanent reminder of the consequences of consorting with idiots.”

      “You’re lucky you walked away at all. Another inch to the right and you would have severed your carotid artery.”

      “So I’ve been told.”

      There was more to the story than that, but the glint in her brown eyes said that was all Cody would get. Today, anyway. He’d find out the rest of the tale sometime in the very near future, he promised himself as he plugged in the eartips of his stethoscope.

      Jill left the clinic more rattled than she wanted to admit. What was it about the man that set off her silent alarms? It wasn’t just her usual conditioned response to big, too-handsome types. Or her still-unanswered questions about why he’d stopped to contemplate the night sky. This guy got to her in a way no man had in longer than she wanted to remember.

      She’d had to force herself not to react when he’d leaned over her to press the stethoscope amplifier to her back. She’d also done her damnedest to ignore his unique blend of aftershave and antiseptic, but the scent seemed to follow her when she walked out into the slowly purpling dusk.

      After two weeks she was still getting acclimated to New Mexico’s spectacular sunsets. With reds and pinks and blues pinwheeling across the sky, she reviewed her plans for the evening. She’d hit the northeast sector, she decided. Run the perimeter where it cut across the southern tip of the Guadalupe Mountains.

      First, though, she would chow down. The fluttery feeling in her stomach probably had nothing to do with the doc and everything to do with the fact she’d gobbled a honey-oat bar and three cups of coffee for breakfast and been too busy for lunch.

      The scent of sizzling steak drew her to the dining facility. With the arrival of two additional cooks, the kitchen was now in full operational mode. After two weeks of prepackaged meals supplemented by their one cook’s valiant attempts to set up the kitchen and serve at least one hot entree, Jill was ready for a full-course dinner.

      As during the earlier in-brief, the dining facility buzzed with the lively conversation of people getting to know one another. A quick glance told Jill members of the individual services had pretty much clumped together. Natural, she supposed for the first night. Once the test project swung into full gear, the service lines would break down and they’d meld into a team. Hopefully!

      To aid the process she opted not to join her military cops and took her tray to a table of Air Force blue-suiters instead. In quick order she met a range instrumentation technician, a vehicle maintenance specialist and a computer systems analyst. The motor pool sergeant talked the universal language of transmissions and drive shafts, but the instrumentation expert and the analyst soon lost Jill in the technical dust. She left the dining facility knowing at least three of the test cadre a little better.

      When she returned to her quarters just after 10:00 p.m., she got to know her roommates, as well.

      Kate Hargrave had obviously just returned from a run or a workout in the site’s small gym. A sweat-band held back her sweat-dampened hair. Tight biker shorts clung to her trim thighs, and her gray jersey top sported damp patches. She’d abandoned a pair of well-used running shoes and was busy applying a coat of cherry-colored polish to her toenails.

      Caroline Dunn lounged in the one comfortable chair in the unit, a paperback novel propped in front of her nose. Like Kate, the brunette had changed out of her uniform and wore a stretchy lycra halter with elastic-waist shorts. Lowering the book, she sent the newcomer a warm smile.

      “There you are. Kate and I were about to give up on you.”

      Jill barely suppressed a groan. After running a long stretch of perimeter and checking on two patrols, sand had seeped into every pore. All she wanted was to hit the shower and the sack.

      “We didn’t get a chance to talk much at the in-brief,” the Coast Guard officer said, laying her book across her bare midriff. “Since we’ll be sharing a head and a living space smaller than the ward room on my first patrol boat, I thought it might make the next couple of months easier if we confessed to any weird habits or personal preferences right up-front.”

      Not a bad idea, Jill thought, giving the coastie full marks. With all her years aboard ship, Dunn had probably raised the art of sharing cramped quarters to its highest level.

      “Sounds good to me,” she said. “Just let me shed my gear and grab something cold to drink.”

      “I brought in a few emergency supplies,” Kate Hargrave put in, waving the polish brush toward the half-size refrigerator in the galley. “We have soft drinks, instant iced tea, a rather nice chilled Riesling, and beer.”

      A nice chilled Riesling, huh? Maybe this roommate business wouldn’t be such a pain, after all.

      Retreating to her bedroom, Jill shed her beret and heavy web belt. Ingrained habit had her extracting the .9mm Beretta from its holster and checking to see the safety was on before ejecting its magazine. A quick tug on the slide confirmed no round was chambered. Returning the weapon to its holster, she stripped off her boots and BDUs.

      She was twenty pounds lighter and a good deal cooler when she returned to the living area in gray sweat shorts and an oversize red T-shirt with a grinning Goofy on the front. Placing her eBook on the counter that served as both desk and dining table, she poured some wine into a blue plastic cup and plopped down on one of the counter stools.

      “Since this was my idea,” Lieutenant Dunn said with a lazy stretch, “I’ll start. I prefer Cari to Caroline and will warn you right up-front I’m addicted to gory police procedurals and international thrillers. Reach for one of my Tom Clancy’s or Robert Ludlum’s before I’ve finished it and you’ll lose an arm.”

      If that was the worst of her roommates’ idiosyncrasies, Jill figured they’d all make it through the next few months in one piece. She took a sip of her wine, savoring its light, fruity bouquet, while Cari turned the floor over to the next in line.

      “Kate? How about you?”

      “I’m easy.” The weather scientist decorated another toe with a streak of cherry red. “Nothing very much bothers me—with the distinct exception of poaching on another woman’s territory. Comes from being cast in the classic cheated-on wife role.”

      Cari winced. “Ouch.”

      “Yeah, ouch.” Kate wiggled her foot to check out the paint job. “Don’t take me wrong. My husband and I didn’t have what you’d call the perfect marriage. I had pretty much decided to break it off. What got to me was that I was too busy—and too stupid—to realize he’d already made the same decision. Only he’d made it in the bed of a nineteen-year-old bim-bette. Now that hurt,” she admitted with a wry chuckle.

      “I’ll bet.”

      “Which is why I’m real careful to watch where I step. So what’s with you and the doc, roomie? Do you two have something going?”

      Jill sputtered into the plastic cup, sending a spray of fruity bubbles up her nose. She sneezed them out and shot the other woman a quick frown.

      “You’re kidding, right?”

      “Nope. I got the scoop on that tussle Cody mentioned. Sounds like the two of you had some fun out in the desert last night.”

      Cody, was it? Lieutenant Commander Hargrave didn’t waste any time. It also sounded as though the rumor mill was already up and working. Nothing like a small, isolated site to bare every wart and wrinkle.