His Soldier Under Siege. Regan Black

said it yourself,” he pressed. “Kevin just needs time to recover. No one’s attacking him.” He leaned close. “From where I’m standing, it looks like you need me more than he does right now.”

      “Fine.”

      Relieved it hadn’t required more of an argument, he followed her to the employee area for her floor, waiting outside the door. She returned within a minute or two, a tote over her shoulder and a jacket zipped up to cover the marks on her neck. It only sent more questions rolling through his mind, but he held them all back for a later time. She was clearly irritable and he didn’t want to stress her voice any more than necessary.

      “I wish you’d let a doctor look you over.”

      She glared at him and shook her head. Her phone chimed with an alert and she checked the smartwatch on her wrist. The glare turned into a fierce scowl.

      Whatever the message was didn’t improve her mood. “Problem?”

      “My brother,” she replied with a dismissive shrug. “He’s mad I refused a formal protective detail.”

      “More of that long story?”

      “Yes,” she replied with a grimace.

      At the security desk, a base police officer took their detailed statements of the incident in the stairwell. Though she refused medical evaluation, they swabbed her throat for any possible DNA from her attacker and took several pictures of the marks left behind. Before they left, the officer assisting them pulled up the video from the nearest cameras and promised to try to track down the soldier who had attacked her.

      On the surface Grace Ann appeared satisfied, but Derek’s gut instinct told him there was something more going on. On their private trips, he’d learned to read her pretty well. The tension was there in the way she kept nipping at her lip and working her thumb over her index finger. Those little habits would fade during their time together, only to resurface when she had to head home.

      Maybe the two of them should have been sharing more than superficial, steamy outdoor getaways these last couple of years. He’d kept secrets for both of them. Didn’t she know she could trust him with anything?

      “What next?” he asked.

      “I’m going home,” she said. “Hot tea and an ice pack.”

      Whether he blamed it on the traumas past or present, he couldn’t bear the idea of her heading home alone. What happened if the anonymous soldier returned? “Let me help. At least until you’re settled.” He intended to stick close until he got the whole story out of her.

      She shook her head. “That’s overkill.”

      “Maybe I could use a friend,” he suggested. He’d been running on fumes before witnessing her attack. Time outside the hospital with her would be a welcome change of scenery.

      “Uh-huh.” She rolled those big brown eyes and he could tell she was close to giving in. “You’d do better with a friend who isn’t in trouble.”

      What kind of trouble? He’d been around the unit long enough to know that time and again she put others ahead of herself. It had been obvious from their first introduction when she’d left her meal unfinished to take over in the serving line so another soldier could eat with his parents. “Probably,” he said. “But you’re right here.”

      “Convenient.” Her lips twitched into a shadow of a smile. “For both of us.”

      Pouncing on the opportunity, he convinced her to let him drive her home. They took the base shuttle to his car and she programmed her address into his navigation app. During the short drive to her house, she sipped on a water bottle she’d pulled from her tote, staring at the neighborhood passing by.

      He appreciated the silence as his thoughts were swirling with doubts and nerves about this move. Since agreeing to explore the potential of their first kiss, they’d deliberately avoided crossing the line between neutral-territory casual hookups and personal space.

      Living in separate cities, about an hour away from each other, helped. Although they’d agreed dating other people was okay and that either one of them could bow out gracefully if a date took a serious turn, here they were. He hadn’t dated anyone else in over a year. So he kept circling back to her, and her to him, every few months for a long weekend of hiking or rafting or some other outdoor adventure. It was the perfect solution.

      No one else captivated him the way Grace Ann did and few had shared his interests with the same intensity. Unique, confident and strong, she was practical with an unexpected side of whimsy that cropped up at the oddest times. Despite the inherent risks of her career choice, she lived life large. He admired that, though he couldn’t cope with it day-to-day over the long-term. On the rare occasions when he pictured his future wife, she didn’t wear camouflage or follow orders to assist in a crisis overseas.

      Pulling into the last driveway on her block, he studied the clean lines of the redbrick house on the corner lot with a one-car garage and a cherry tree in the front yard. He wondered if she had help with the well-kept lawn. As long as they had been together, he should know if she enjoyed yard work.

      “Nice place,” he said.

      “Thanks. I’ll get the garage door so you can pull in.” She opened the door and slid out of the passenger seat, tote slung over her shoulder.

      She punched a code into a keypad beside the door and a moment later the garage door rolled up. He put the car in Drive, but she didn’t move. He couldn’t pull in without hitting her and the garage interior was too dim for him to see beyond her. Turning off the engine, he climbed out of the car and walked up to stand beside her.

      Shards of glass were scattered across the cement floor. His gaze followed the glinting trail to a broken window in the back corner. He reached for his cell phone, but he’d left it in the car. “Call the police,” he said quietly.

      “No.” She swallowed. “It was just wind.” She dropped her tote bag to the floor. “I didn’t get the tree branches trimmed back when I should have.”

      He hadn’t heard anything about damaging winds, having been indoors for the majority of the past two days. “You sure?”

      “What else?” Moving forward with stilted motions that bore no resemblance to what he remembered as the fluid, energetic woman he’d gone kayaking with a few weeks ago, she walked over to the wall-mounted pegboard and pulled down a broom.

      “Hold up.” Derek stepped into her path, noticed her eyes had glazed over and her knuckles were white where she gripped the broom handle. With a gentle shake of her shoulders, he broke through the strange haze. “Grace Ann, you need to call the police. Now, honey.”

      A shiver rippled through her and her big brown eyes brimmed with tears. She blinked rapidly before they could spill over. “Why? I can’t tell them anything.”

      Derek had never before felt this drive, this need to rescue a woman. Being there for Kevin had been his primary focus and he studiously avoided drama and troubling entanglements. Whatever Grace Ann was facing, he was determined to help.

      “I’ll make the call,” he said. “We’ll report this as a possible break-in.” Thank goodness he’d insisted on bringing her home. “Take a look around,” he said, using her phone to look up the nonemergency number for the local police department. “Is anything missing?”

      She was so obviously overwhelmed he wanted to cuddle her close and assure her it was just another lousy moment in a bad day. His mind on the attacker who’d escaped, he couldn’t help wondering if both instances were related. Briefly, he considered closing the garage door and taking her to a hotel. Preferably a hotel on the other side of the country.

      Instead, he called the police department, gave her address and explained what they’d found. While she looked around, Derek took stock as well. There were a few items of value, but nothing other than the window seemed to be disturbed or vandalized. He glanced to the