He shrugged. “I have a sense about things.”
“Like a sixth sense?” she teased and then thought better of it. Um… This wasn’t about to get really weird, was it?
He laughed. “I don’t see dead people if that’s what you mean. It’s just like a gut reaction. I immediately know whether something is the right move or not. Or rather, most of the time I do.”
His voice got quiet, tripping over the emphasis on “most,” and it sank into her with little barbs. He’d never been anything other than cheerful and upbeat. “That sounds like a story.”
“Eh. Yeah. Maybe. There was an ambush.”
Like an ambush, ambush? As in bad guys with guns who hid behind buildings and shot people as they moved unsuspectingly into range? Suddenly the brutality of his job made her ashamed of the fact that she’d painted him with a sunshine-and-roses brush. If he generally had a smile on his face, it was not because his life had less crappiness than other people’s. Smiling was a choice.
And that was absolutely his sexiest quality.
He fell silent for so long that she started to wonder if she was supposed to hug him or ask what happened or some other fill-in-the-blank that a captain of the clueless squad like her would never be able to figure out.
“It could have gone badly,” he murmured before she could decide. “Fortunately, my team is the best in the business. No thanks to me.”
“So you were supposed to warn them?” There was no way he’d fallen down on the job, not when he had badass flowing from his marrow.
“In a way. I’m the guy they depend on to find out about stuff like that. And I didn’t, not that time.” The statement had a finality to it, as if it had happened and he’d moved on. But nothing was that easy, especially not for someone so capable.
“I’m sorry.”
“Enough about that,” he said lightly. “I’m on vacation. You’re on vacation. No more work talk.”
“Can you really shut it down so easily?” she asked instead of letting him change the subject. If this was something that was weighing on him, a fireside chat might be just what he needed. “It must have been hard to feel like you screwed up. You don’t give the impression you screw up much.”
“Yeah, it’s not my favorite flavor.”
She had to smile at that. “But you know what? You were right about this. About convincing me to stay in the race. This is the best time I’ve ever had. So maybe you just needed to regroup and you’ll go back to your team with everything all fixed up the way you want it.”
“That was the plan.”
Rolling in his arms, she glanced at him, and his eyes were so beautiful in the firelight she got lost in them for a moment. “I’m part of your regroup plan? That’s something else I’ve never done before.”
It put a little glow inside her to have helped facilitate that.
He grinned. “It’s a new one for me too, but I’m digging it so far.”
The fire burned down to embers, and they covered as many topics as they could think of: best Christmas present ever received, favorite books, movies, candy, a rundown of their hopes, dreams—generally speaking, it was the most she’d ever revealed to another person in her life, let alone in one night. She couldn’t fathom what it meant that he was giving her exactly what she’d asked for. Maybe a lot of guys would have done the tit-for-tat thing—conversation in exchange for sex. But she didn’t think that was his motivation.
What was? A better question might be… what did she want it to be?
At some point, they fell asleep in each other’s arms, and she awoke to a sunrise that rivaled what she imagined heaven might look like. It tossed so many colors into the sky that she couldn’t count them all. The beauty caught in her throat.
She didn’t reach for her camera. Fitz still held her and she didn’t want to move. Ever.
He must not have felt the same way. He sat bolt upright all at once, the sheet sliding down his torso in a fast reveal that put some heat into the morning.
“Look.” He pointed. “It’s a cruise ship.”
A… what? She blinked. Sure enough, there was a ship not too far from the island, chugging away toward the horizon. But it was too late to build a signal fire or yell or somehow get the attention of the crew.
“Stay here,” he said. “I’m going to swim out to the boat to grab my phone and see if I can get cell service.”
Since he didn’t bother to put clothes on, it was absolutely her pleasure to sit there and watch him run out into the surf, then dive like an Olympian into the shallows to swim the remaining few yards. Gracefully, he swung into the boat via the ladder at the rear, and even from a distance, he was magnificent.