The Marine and Me Read online

  “Well, luckily I’m not afraid of heights.” Just sexy Marines.

  The renegade thought flashed through her mind. She kept finding things they had in common, like the bit of trivia he’d just shared with her. Now she didn’t feel so dumb about her earlier comments regarding Wisconsin cheese. But it did scare her a bit to realize how much she enjoyed his company.

  “Come on.” He linked her hand with his. “Let’s go.”

  He wasn’t really talkative during their hike, which was a good thing. Then he couldn’t tell how breathless Chloe was.

  It wasn’t that she was that badly out of shape. She wasn’t. She walked three miles several times a week with a group from her neighborhood. The Wannabe Walkers were a dozen strong, and included a diverse group of men and women from young moms to senior citizens.

  But her walks with them didn’t resemble this one with Steve at all. For one thing, they didn’t hold hands. And even if they had, she wouldn’t have been faced with the unexpected dilemma of enjoying it so much she didn’t want to break off the contact.

  “I see the perfect place for our lunch…” He led her to a perch on top of one of the bluffs with a beautiful view. The rocks reared up above the surrounding land while the lake sparkled below in the sunlight. Natural rock formations created a table for them to spread out their feast of apples, cheese, crackers and sausage.

  “This is better than settling for some dull picnic table, isn’t it?” Steve said.

  Was that what she’d been doing with her life lately? Chloe wondered. Settling? Accepting the dullness instead of striking out on a new, exciting path that might end with a great view.

  Or it could end with you falling right off the bluff, her conservative inner voice noted.

  Face it, she’d never been one to take risks. Not since her parents had died. They hadn’t been big risk takers either, but Janis had never let her forget that their last risk had taken their lives. “If they hadn’t decided to charter that private plane for their anniversary trip, they’d still be alive today.” And I wouldn’t be stuck with you, was unspoken but always there in Janis’s sharp voice.

  No one could have been sorrier than Chloe that her parents were no longer with her. She still missed them.

  “Are you ready?” Steve’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

  “Ready?”

  “To eat.” While she’d been lost in memories, he’d sliced the apples with his Swiss Army knife.

  When Steve offered her a piece of the juicy fruit, it occurred to her that this was a role reversal from the Garden of Eden. Steve was the one leading her into temptation.

  She was at a fork in the road of her life. She could either stay on the well-worn dull path or she could continue to explore new territory. Resist or accept? She reached out and took the apple he offered.

  “So you’ve never been up here before?” Steve asked.

  She shook her head.

  “It’s a popular place for people living in Chicago to visit.”

  “I haven’t always lived in Chicago.”

  “No?”

  She shook her head. “My parents lived there but after their death I went to live with Janis. My mom’s older sister.”

  “The aunt you said you weren’t close to.”

  “She didn’t want me calling her aunt.”

  “Why not?”

  “She told me she didn’t feel like anyone’s aunt so I should call her Janis.” Chloe paused to take a bite of apple. “I’d never actually met her before living with her. She wasn’t that close to my mom, but she was her only living relative. Anyway, Janis lived near MIT in Massachusetts. I went to live with her when I was eight.”

  “That must have been tough.”

  “When I turned twelve, Janis sent me off to boarding school until I turned eighteen. I really only lived with her for four years, from the age of eight to twelve.” But those four years had made a huge impression.

  “How did you like boarding school?”

  “How did you like boot camp?” she retorted.

  “Boot camp is meant to tear you down in order to build you up again.”

  “Sounds like boarding school. They were great at the tearing down part, not so good at the building up. I survived by escaping into books. The school did have a wonderful library and a nice librarian. I read everything I could get my hands on. The books would transport me from my dismal surroundings to Regency England or Napoleonic France. I could solve a cozy mystery along with Miss Marple or find adventure with the Three Musketeers.”

  “You like history?”

  “I like reading. History, biographies, psychology, home decorating, all kinds of things. Opening a book is like opening a portal into another world.” She paused, belatedly realizing how much of herself she’d just revealed. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hog the conversation that way.”

  “You weren’t. I was interested.”

  “Your turn now. Tell me about yourself. What’s it like having a twin?”

  “We’re not identical twins.” Steve cut two more apples.

  “I know. Your grandmother has shown me pictures.”

  He flashed her a grin. “Then you know that I’m the good-looking one in my family.”

  “All five Kozlowski brothers seemed good-looking from their photographs.”

  He airily waved her words away. “Those were touched-up photos.”

  She tried hard not to laugh. “Oh really?”

  He nodded solemnly. “In reality, they don’t look anything like those photographs.”

  “So you’re even better looking than your twin?”

  “Tommy is okay, I guess. Plenty of females seem to think so. Not as many as admire me, of course.”

  “Of course. What about your older brothers?”

  “They’re all married,” Steve said.

  She gave him a quizzical look. “You say that as if warning me off them.”

  “That’s not what I meant. I meant that Tom and I are the only two remaining Kozlowski bachelors.”

  “Are you and you brother stationed together?”

  Steve shook his head, his expression turning serious. “No, he’s in the Middle East right now.”

  “Do you worry about him?”

  “He knows how to take care of himself.”

  “You still haven’t said what it’s like having a twin.”

  “It’s no big deal. Seems normal to me. It’s all I’ve ever known.”

  “Do you have any kind of special connection?”

  Steve did, but he wasn’t about to admit that. It sounded too weird. There was that time when they were kids and Tommy’s appendix had ruptured. Steve had felt the pain, too. Or then there was the time they’d both come down with chicken pox at exactly the same moment.

  A more recent occurrence was the fact that they’d both purchased the same model Harley without consulting one another beforehand. Stuff like that.

  “I can’t imagine what it would be like to have a sibling,” Chloe was saying as she reached for another cracker and slice of cheese. “Let alone one who’s a twin. It must be nice not to feel so alone.”

  “Were you lonely at boarding school?”

  “I never really fit in there. I didn’t seem to fit in anywhere until I went to college. Then I was one of those geeky, nerdy types. Always had a book in my hand, and several more in my backpack.”

  “Well you aren’t geeky or nerdy now. What did you think of your first time?”

  She almost choked, wondering if he was asking her if she was a virgin. “My…first…time?”

  He reached around her to pat her on the back as he had in her kitchen the other day. Then he handed her the bottle of water. She took several sips before nodding to indicate she’d recovered.

  “Your first time on a Harley? Why? What did you think I was asking you?”

  She wasn’t about to answer that question. The truth was that she was still a virgin. It wasn’t something she broadcast to anyone. But she’d been telli
ng the truth about being a nerd even in college. She’d had male friends, but had never wanted to have sex with any of them. They hadn’t seemed to want to have sex with her either.

  Maybe the bottom line was that she was an old-fashioned girl, wanting to wait until she found a man she loved enough to marry, to spend the rest of her life with, before she shared that intimacy with him.

  Her thoughts returned to the present, belatedly answering his question. “My first ride on a Harley was quite memorable.”

  “In what way?”

  Chloe wasn’t about to tell Steve how being so close to him had just about made her go up in hormone-induced flames. Instead she said, “It’s different than riding in a car.”

  “I should think so. The helmet gets in the way of the real experience, when it’s just you, the sky, and the road. The experience is all around you. But I’ve seen what happens when you don’t wear a helmet. Not a pretty picture.”

  “So you can be cautious,” Chloe noted.

  “Affirmative.”

  “That’s a step toward your goal then, of learning to be more cautious. Being a Marine, it’s probably natural that your inclination is that of a risk taker.”

  “Marines are risk technicians. We know the risks and are able to manage them because of training and knowledge.”

  “That sounds sensible.”

  “Yeah, that’s me. Just a regular sensible kind of guy. Why that face?” he demanded. “You don’t believe me?”

  “Not really.”

  “Why not?”

  “Where should I begin? There are so many reasons. A sensible guy wouldn’t have whisked me off to Wisconsin for the day.”

  “It seemed like a sensible plan of action to me.”

  “That’s the point. You have your own way of looking at things, of doing things.”

  “I should hope so. I’ve had years of training. I’m expected to lead men who consider themselves to be as tough as nails. Which means I have to be able to do everything they can do and more. That’s why I’m a captain in the United States Marine Corps.”

  “So you can boss other people around?”

  “It’s called ordering, not bossing, and no that’s not the reason. As you know, my dad was a Marine as are all my brothers so I’m following in a time-honored tradition. You said you like history. Well, the Marine Corps is the most history-conscious of all the services. On November 10th, 1775, the Continental Congress passed a resolution establishing the Continental Marines and marked the birth date of the United States Marine Corps. November 10th is a birth date that is still celebrated by the Marine Corps to this day. This proud heritage is part of the Marine Corps culture that I admire.”

  “Honor, courage, commitment.” She smiled. “I’ve done a bit of research myself. After all, that is what I do for a living as a reference librarian.”

  “Our jobs really do have certain similarities, you know.”

  “Really?”

  “Absolutely. We’re both used to maintaining order and control. And we’re both into problem solving.”

  “I never thought of it that way.”

  “I’m a lean, mean fighting machine. You’re a lean, mean reading-and-research machine. You know, I’m surprised no one’s developed an action figure for librarians yet.”

  Chloe laughed. “Actually someone has. There’s a site on the Internet that has them. Has them shhing everyone. Which is a stereotypical cliché, of course.”

  He nodded solemnly. “I’ve never once heard you shhing me.”

  “Of course not.”

  “Or told me, ‘Silence please.’ Or ‘Quiet please.’ Or told me to put a sock in it.”

  “Right.”

  “Although you’ve said it with a look,” Steve added.

  “What are you talking about?” she demanded.

  “That look you have. Actually you have several. One is like this.” He tried to demonstrate. “Then you can ratchet it up a notch with the explosive one.” His expression became more dramatic as he wrinkled his forehead and narrowed his eyes. “Now that differs from what we Marines use for discipline. We have our war faces.” He wiped all expression from his face, which hardened him.

  “I’m impressed.”

  He ruined the effect by grinning. “Good.”

  But as the day went on, Chloe wondered if it really was good to be impressed by him. Then she reminded herself that she was supposed to be living in the moment and not overthinking everything. It was during one of these internal conversations that her attention drifted from the path in front of her, making her stumble over a slightly protruding rock.

  She felt herself falling forward before Steve caught her.

  Their surroundings fell away as Chloe found herself in the circle of his arms. Being this close to him, she noticed the tiny lines at the corners of his green eyes, his well-shaped eyebrows and the dark fringe of his surprisingly long eyelashes. He was a man of many facets, strong yet capable of gentleness, considerate yet demanding.

  And he had a way of making her feel terribly young and inexperienced at times like this. He projected tons of confidence in his relationship with the world, and with the women in his world. That sureness showed in the way he carried himself, the way he moved with a certainty and a pride that was second nature to him. He seemed to have the ability to adapt himself, whatever his surroundings. On the back of a Harley, hiking atop a ridge in Wisconsin, eating kolachkis in his grandmother’s kitchen.

  She wondered if the Marine Corps had provided him with that powerful presence or if it was part of his inherent nature. She suspected it was a combination of both things.

  “Are you okay?”

  She nodded, noting that even his voice was powerful with a deepness that rumbled in his chest. Why hadn’t she noticed that before? Maybe because she hadn’t been standing so close to him that she could practically feel him speak.

  Time to return to the real world and her own two feet. They were a team, not a couple. She moved away. “Yes, I’m fine. Thanks. Sorry for being so clumsy.”

  “No problem.”

  Right. No problem. Because this was teamwork, the two of them working together without getting bogged down in any of that romantic stuff.

  During the ride home, Chloe was distracted by the spectacular sunset that glowed above them as they traveled down the road. The world felt all sky, from horizon to horizon.

  It had been a perfect day. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had this much fun. Maybe she’d never had this much fun before. Happiness glowed within her.

  Darkness had fallen by the time Steve pulled the Harley into her driveway. Her porch light cast enough illumination for them to see.

  She got off the bike and swayed a bit, trying to regain her land legs after riding for so long.

  “Steady there.” Steve placed his hands on her shoulders.

  Chloe placed her hands on his chest.

  Slow and easy, he pulled her closer. She went.

  The look he gave her made it clear that he was giving her a choice. Stay or step away.

  Her decision came from the heart. There was no logical basis for her actions. She was being driven by forces beyond her control. The ride on the Harley had led up to this moment. Everything, every touch, every look, every moment had been building to this one.

  Cupping her chin with one hand, Steve lifted her face to his. He lowered his head while gently brushing his thumb just once across her lower lip.

  Chloe still had time to pull back from the edge, but she was too tempted to stop now. She closed her eyes, anticipation making her heart race.

  What if it wasn’t as she imagined? What if she bumped her nose against his? What if there was no magic? What if, what if…

  The panic came too late and was erased the instant his lips covered hers.

  Steve was wrong. His Harley wasn’t sweet. His kiss was.

  Chapter Six

  The Marine sure knew how to kiss. He started out slowly, inviting her to share her secret
s with him. He didn’t inundate her, didn’t capture her with anything but the sheer pleasure of his mouth brushing back and forth across hers.

  There was no bossiness here, only a seductive request to participate. The zing-zing she’d felt the very first night she’d met him was amplified a hundredfold. There was no rush to increase the passion. Instead every second was drawn out and filled with anticipation and appreciation.

  When Steve finally coaxed her lips to part, she was more than ready. The first touch of his tongue took things to a new level. Now his kiss became both dangerous and exhilarating. Passion drove her closer, steering her into a headlong collision between restraint and recklessness.

  What was she doing? What was going on here? Had he simply kissed her good-night to be polite? Had she misunderstood and melted in his arms like a love-starved bookworm? She was teetering on the edge of something she hadn’t anticipated.

  She stepped away from the precipice. She stepped away from him. Steve let her go without complaint.

  Even though Chloe wanted to run inside to the comfort of her house and her books, she forced herself to stay and smile at him. “I had fun today.” She was so thankful that her voice sounded cheerful and not desperate.

  “I’m glad.”

  As Chloe made her dignified exit, she was aware of Steve watching her, but she was even more aware that this had been one of the best days of her life. She just wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.

  “We’re going out for lunch,” Lynn told her the minute Chloe stepped foot into the library on Monday morning.

  “We are?”

  “Yes, we are. So that you can tell me everything that happened on Saturday night. I tried calling you several times yesterday but I only got your machine.”

  “I’m sorry, I was out all day.”

  “All day?”

  “Yes. We went up to Wisconsin for the day and by the time we got home, it was too late to call you.”

  “We?”

  Chloe nodded.

  “As in Steve and you?” Lynn asked.

  Chloe nodded again.

  “We are definitely having lunch.”

  Chloe had a hard time concentrating throughout the busy morning. Her thoughts kept straying to her day with Steve and that kiss they’d shared last night. It took more effort than usual to focus on her work, but she managed to do so whenever a patron came to the reference desk for assistance or whenever she answered a phone call.