Navy Rescue. Geri Krotow

basket. To his immense relief, he could still recognize the real Gwen beneath her pallor and extreme thinness. But the shadows in her eyes worried him. What horrors had she faced?

      “Look, let’s save this conversation for later. For now, we’ll eat and celebrate that you’re back.”

      And I’ll do my best to keep my hands to myself.

      * * *

      DETECTIVE COLE RAMSEY knew this wasn’t the time to bother Anita Perez. It was the end of her workday, and her twelve-hour night shifts at Coupeville General Hospital left her tired and needing to sleep while her kids were in school. Her parents had moved in with her after her husband died, enabling her to take the graveyard shift. She had a boy and a girl, both in elementary school, two years apart.

      They were adorable, like their mother.

      Anita would be tired and in no mood to deal with the likes of him.

      Too bad.

      He’d read the island paper this morning and the news of his good friend Drew’s ex-wife, Navy Commander Gwendolyn Brett, coming back from the dead was the big headline. The feel-good ending to what everyone had assumed would be a tragic story was the kick in the pants he needed.

      It reminded him that miracles happened, even on Whidbey where he saw the worst of the community up close and personal each day.

      Ramsey balanced the paper coffee carrier that held two steaming-hot cups of local brew, and a bag of fresh cinnamon donuts. If Anita wouldn’t talk to him, he’d bribe her. When he’d conducted the investigation into her estranged husband’s murder last year he’d discovered she had a wicked sweet tooth.

      Her tall, slim figure exited the side door of the hospital and she made a beeline for her old station wagon. He pushed back the uncertainty that tightened his chest.

      “Good morning, Anita.”

      She abruptly paused and her cool blue eyes sparked recognition before her professional nurse’s mask fell back in place.

      “Ramsey.”

      They studied each other for a full minute. He’d bet his paycheck, admittedly never enough, that she felt the attraction, too.

      “Coffee?”

      Anita was at eye level with him, but only because she wore flat working shoes. In the slightest of heels, she’d be taller than him.

      He didn’t care. In fact, it turned him on.

      “Thanks.” She reluctantly took the paper cup he offered. “I have to get home, Ramsey.”

      She started walking toward her car.

      “I know you do. And this isn’t a date.” She’d declined the two other times he’d asked her.

      She had the longest stride. He almost had to jog to keep up with her.

      “Who said anything about a date?” she asked. She stopped at her car and looked up at the sky. He saw the raindrops hit her skin before he felt the splats on his sleeves.

      She sighed, looking back at him. Resignation, maybe an acceptance that they should give it a try?

      She nodded at the passenger side. “Get in.”

      Ramsey wasn’t going to argue. If a beautiful woman told him to get in her car, he did it.

      The interior smelled of sugar, coffee, her. Crumpled snack wrappers littered the back with its two booster seats. They sat in the comfortable quiet of the rainfall, the companionable silence completely different from the manner in which they’d met and their encounters until now.

      “Mmm.” The froth of her cappuccino stuck to her upper lip and he watched her tongue lick it off, her eyes closed.

      “How was your shift?”

      She sent Cole a sidelong glance, giving him a quick glimpse of arctic blue, before she returned her gaze to the windshield.

      “The usual, but not as busy. Quiet.” She sipped. “I prefer to have more to do. Not that I wish anyone ill. It’s just that when it’s quiet, I have too much time to...think.”

      “I know.” Ramsey felt the same way when his days held nothing but paperwork.

      “Yes, I suppose you do. Our jobs aren’t really that different.”

      He took a gulp of his black coffee. He hadn’t come here to talk about himself.

      “How are your kids doing?”

      “Fine.” Which meant she wasn’t going to allow him to step one inch into her life, much less her children’s. She hadn’t in the year since her husband was murdered by an overzealous senior naval officer who had stopped at nothing to secure his own career success. Why would she let him in now?

      “Eventually you have to open up to somebody, Anita.”

      “Who says I haven’t?”

      “I saw enough of you last year to see that we operate in much the same way. You’re not going to let anyone in who wasn’t already there, who doesn’t already know your story, at least that part of it. It’s too much to put on anyone else.”

      “You haven’t answered my question, Detective. For all you know, I took a lover and confided in him. But for the sake of argument, let’s say I didn’t. Why do you think I’d ever want to open up to anyone else again? To risk changing the family life I’ve built with my kids by bringing in someone new?”