Soldier In Charge. Jennifer Labrecque

The Knight of Swords.

      “I’m screwed,” Eden said.

      “I guess it depends on your perspective.” Patti grabbed the interpretation book that came with the cards and started flipping through it. “Let’s make sure we get this absolutely right.” She stopped. “Here we are. The Knight of Swords is bold and enthusiastic, but also imaginative and clever like his Queen. He’s a great champion of good causes and inspires others by his idealism and dedication to any cause he adopts. He is decisive and, while others dither over a course of action, he will just plunge headlong into it, generally winning the day. He is a symbol of creative upheaval, usually leading to success.” Patti smirked. “Yeah, if you were looking to turn the assignment down, you’re definitely screwed.”

      “Okay. I’ll shoot the calendar.” It looked as if Eden would be spending a couple of days exactly where she didn’t want to be—an Army base.

      Tarot cards or no, however, she would not be having hot, sweaty sex with anyone. There was impulsiveness and then there was insanity. And she wasn’t crazy yet.

      LIEUTENANT COLONEL MITCH DUGAN, 82nd Airborne paratrooper, Special Forces, threw himself into the trench at a dead run. Thwump. He hit the hard ground and immediately began to wriggle on his belly beneath the razor-sharp barbed wire, as the bullets whizzed just above him. Faster. Lives depended on it. His and his men’s. Failure was not an option.

      He came to the end of the barbed-wire trench, maneuvered himself free and in one powerful motion pushed to his feet. Without pause, he sprinted in a zigzag pattern toward the sand-bag-rimmed bunker fifteen meters away. Putting on a final burst of speed, he finished the last five meters—shoulder rolling into the hole in the ground that provided his only protection. Thirty seconds later Captain Eli Murdoch dove into the hole, as well. Without a word, each man performed a quick, thorough visual scan of the surrounding area. Mitch nodded brusquely. Murdoch acknowledged it with his own nod.

      “Alpha Company, clear,” Murdoch, as detachment leader, reported the area safe. “Repeat, Alpha Company clear.”

      “Alpha Company, clear,” the training instructor, Jenners, called back.

      Mitch and Murdoch climbed out of the bunker, as did the rest of the twelve-man squad from the surrounding bunkers on the training ground. The “bullets” whizzing overhead had been simulated but Mitch never, ever, allowed himself to think of them as anything other than live fire and he’d cautioned the men to think the same. It kept them sharp, fast and careful.

      Jenners approached Murdoch. “Damn fine job, Captain. Your squad set a new record today. If I’m ever in trouble, I know who I want sent in to haul my ass out of hot water.”

      Eli nodded. “We’ll take care of you.”

      Mitch looked at the men who were just as dirty and sweaty as he was. As an evaluator, he’d challenged each of them to push harder, to set a new standard and rise to it. They had. Mitch had had his doubts about Staff Sergeant Tolbert, the team’s Assistant Weapons NCO. Even though Tolbert had passed the rigorous training, Mitch wasn’t sure the guy was willing to give the one hundred and ten percent required in a special forces unit. But even Tolbert had pulled out the stops. “Nice job. I’ll see you all at 1300.”

      He waited until the men had cleared the training area to head toward the showers. Eli Murdoch walked with him. “Tolbert came through,” Murdoch said, inadvertently echoing Mitch’s earlier assessment.

      “He’s shaping up and falling in line.”

      Mitch had been totally unsurprised to find Murdoch assigned as a squad leader at Fort Bragg after he and Murdoch had earned their jump wings at Fort Benning back in June. Murdoch was the closest thing to a friend Mitch had ever allowed himself. They’d met six years earlier when they were both wet-behind-the-ears junior officers, fresh out of ROTC.

      Murdoch and his wife, Tara, were good people. Mitch had even wound up buying a brick ranch-style home on the same street as Tara and Eli in the historic Haymount area of Fayetteville.

      “By the way—” Oh, hell, he knew what was coming when Murdoch started out with by the way. “Tara wants to know if you’ll join us for dinner on Saturday night.”

      Crossing the last of the dirt training field, Mitch cut to the chase. “Are any of her single friends going to be there?”

      Murdoch shrugged and offered a smart-ass grin. “She didn’t say.”

      “Your wife has more single friends than Louisiana has mosquitoes, and that’s saying something.” Unfortunately, Tara seemed hell-bent on introducing him to each and every one of them. Even Tara’s homemade meat loaf and mashed potatoes wasn’t worth another attempted hookup.

      “I swear I didn’t know Dizzy Donna was going to be there last week.” Murdoch threw his hands up in mock surrender. “That chick is a walking, talking nightmare.”

      Eli wouldn’t get any argument from Mitch on that front. “Man, she’s gotta stop worrying about my love life. And she might want to reconsider some of the crazies she calls friends.”

      “I know. I know. But it’s a chick thing. Tara thinks you’re great so you’re the first person she thinks of when one of her girlfriends is looking for Mr. Right. If I didn’t know she was crazy about me, it might piss me off.” Murdoch offered an arrogant grin that said he wasn’t remotely concerned about his wife’s affections.

      “Right.” Murdoch and his wife, still newlyweds, were damn near embarrassingly in love. “Dizzy Donna. It fits.” Mitch didn’t require his dates to be Mensa candidates but all that woman could talk about was her favorite band.

      Murdoch smirked. “She thinks you’re gay.”

      “What the fu—?” Mitch threw back his head and laughed. “She thinks I’m gay?”

      “That’s what she told Tara. She said she’d called you three times and you hadn’t returned her calls. Therefore, you must be gay.”

      “I guess it didn’t occur to her that I just wasn’t interested. I thought if I ignored her, she’d get the message.” He chuckled again. That was one way to get rid of her, he supposed. “Whatever. As long as she quits calling me. And it was more like three times a day.”

      “Ouch.” Murdoch winced.

      “Hey, I’m cool with letting her think I’m gay if it means she’ll stop harassing me. She’s definitely not my type.”

      Murdoch groaned. “Why’d you have to say that? Now Tara’s going to want to know what your type is.”

      They walked into the gym building.

      “Murdoch, how’s she going to know about this part of our conversation if you don’t tell her?” Mitch grinned. “Just keep your mouth shut.” A tall order for Murdoch.

      “In a perfect world, it would work that way, but Tara’s got a way of…”

      Actually, Mitch had seen Tara Murdoch in action. She did have a way. She’d make a helluva interrogator. “Fine. My idea of the perfect woman?” He thought about what constituted the ideal female. “Tall, thin, blond. Quiet. Athletic. Practical and organized. Someone who feels the same way I do about the military.” Yep. That pretty much covered it.

      They walked into the locker room. “Just for the record, while we’re on the subject, do you ever just settle for maybe five out of eight on the requirement list?”

      “What’s the point of having a requirement list if you’re going to settle?”

      “Maybe compromise is a better word.”

      Mitch shrugged and pulled his T-shirt over his head. “Compromise. Settle. Same difference. And the answer is no. Why have standards if you don’t stick to them?” He sat on the bench and began to unlace his boots.

      How many times had his dad sworn he was going to keep a job this time, only