sexual move on her since their return to the beach house. It was as if what had happened in the hotel suite hadn't happened at all. Which was fine. Preferable. Her own idea. A place out of time.
But as they stepped onto the sand, the fresh air seemed to bring out some honesty in her. They were strolling away from their end of the cove and the beach was dotted with a sand architect here and there, building everything from a rudimentary igloo to a multilevel castle. But she and Griffin stuck to the damp sand near the shoreline so that the crash of the incoming waves muffled all the voices but their own.
She slid him a sidelong look. "You don't really need me, you know." It was her reputation that needed the work, and that thought just made her feel more guilty. It seemed only right to be truthful. "I'm serious. Before, I didn't know you had any kind of draft."
He didn't answer. His hands were in the pockets of his jeans, and the lowering sun limned his handsome profile. He looked gorgeous edged in gold.
"I'm reading what you have, and it's good," she continued. He had a knack for delivering telling details. She could taste the pasty corn-bread stuffing that came with the Mediterranean Chicken MRE, hear the rattle of gunfire across the sunbaked valley and smell the coming winter snow. The various relationships between the platoon brothers breathed on the page. "I can do the editing, which you claim to despise, catch a grammar mistake or two. But - "
"I won't do it without you, Jane."
"Griffin - "
"That's final. You told me from the first you were here to provide me with everything I need. Everything I ask for."
Had she gone that far? "I know I said - "
"So I want you working with me on the book. And answering the questions I ask."
Her relief - yes, her rep needed this job! - made it take a moment for his second sentence to sink in. "Wait. What questions?"
"You know a hell of a lot about me from reading those pages, wouldn't you say?"
"It's a memoir, after all." Early in the book he talked about his initial excitement over the assignment, the tempering trepidation once he'd been handed body armor and a combat medical pack, his keen interest in what drove the young men around him to risk their lives as they did. There'd been no mention, as yet, of the bloodshed she knew was coming. "You are telling it in first person."
"Exactly. And I find myself uncomfortable that my 'doctor' knows more about me than I know about her. So I think you should tell me about the person who is Jane. Turnabout is fair play."
She frowned at him. "You know about her. It's all there in the four letters. J-A-N-E."
"We're both aware there's more to you than that."
Not many had chosen to discover it. She couldn't recall anyone just asking about her like this, and it worried her a little. "I don't get where you're going here."
"We only have two more weeks at the cove. Two more weeks as collaborators. And I don't see how we can collaborate when it's so one-sided."
Okay, this was yet another of his moods she didn't know. He was being stubborn and unreasonable and she couldn't figure out what he wanted from her. "Griffin - "
"I'm curious. Are you really scared of the ocean, Jane?" he asked, halting to face her.
She froze, the question catching her by surprise. It made her wary again too, because, though it seemed like such a small thing to admit, her father had taught her to conceal her weaknesses. Don't be so soft, Jane, he'd say, when she was seven years old and trembling at the idea of swimming in such a big body of water. People will take advantage of your fears. Use your brain to get beyond them.
Her silence hung between them until Griffin scooped her up in his arms. "Wha - " she began, startled.
"Will you really be afraid if I wade into the surf?"
"Yes." She clung to his neck, for a moment that second-grader again. "I mean no."
His pant legs had to be wet as he strode farther into the ocean. It swirled around them, a mix of green water and white foam and golden sand. "We've got to mine the emotions, honey-pie," he said, and that ridiculous endearment told her he was attempting to be playful.