Instantly, his body tightened.
Boone wasn’t even sure why he was here, except it beat sitting around Ross’s greasy garage and watching him ogle Tara. Or hanging out at the B&B, getting lathered up over Tara prancing out of the bathroom in a towel.
The air smelled of gunpowder and gun oil. Downrange was a life-sized paper target of a human male. Tara gazed coolly along the sight of her gun. Her biceps tensed, showing off nicely toned arms. With steady precision, she fired off three rounds. Boom. Boom. Boom. She absorbed the recoil of the gun without flinching. The echo rang around the concrete bunker as each shot struck the target in the torso.
Tara turned to grin at him.
“Not bad.” Boone shrugged, trying to pretend that he wasn’t duly impressed. Who knew she possessed such skills?
“Would it kill you to say ‘well done’?”
“Might.”
“You’d rather saw off your arm than pay someone a compliment, huh?”
“You did all right.” Why couldn’t he praise her?
“Okay? Oh, my, your generosity is making me dizzy.” She set her gun on the firing bench and stepped back as was protocol at a firing range, demonstrating that she clearly knew the rules. She pressed the back of her hand to her forehead in a dramatic gesture. “I’m gonna swoon.”
To Boone’s alarm she tipped backward and for one split second he thought she really was fainting and then he realized she meant for him to catch her. Instinctively, he took a sideways step, arms wide.
She fell limply into his open embrace.
Boone stared down at her, his heart knocking crazily. How could she be so completely trusting? If he hadn’t caught her, she would have busted her butt on the cement floor. She’d gone down easy as mashed potatoes, as if she’d been utterly certain he’d be there for her.
And he had been.
She gazed up at him, winked wickedly. “Nice catch.”
He made a noise of irritation and set her on her feet.
“See how that works? You do something good, I compliment you.”
Boone just growled.
“You don’t fool me, Boone Toliver. Not one little bit. I know why you growl. You’re scared to death someone’s going to figure out what a softy you really are inside.” She reached over and patted his flat belly.
Boone froze against the onslaught of sensation her touch stirred. Ah, man. He’d fought hard against it, but somehow she’d burrowed under his skin and had gotten to him.
She grinned and damn his hide, he couldn’t stop himself from smiling back. Staying irritated with her was on par with kicking a puppy.
He thought he’d known his neighbor. He’d dismissed her as a beautiful, silly, overly friendly airhead. Boone saw that he’d done Tara a grave disservice. Sure, she was a gregarious chatterbox who could talk for hours about fashion and hairstyles, but she was so much more than that. She was warm and witty and insightful, and she sure knew how to handle a gun.
“Your turn,” she said and handed him the weapon. “You deserve to let off some steam and I can’t think of a better way to do that than blasting holes through a target and pretending it’s everything that’s bugging you.”
Except that you’re what’s bugging me. The way you make me feel is dangerous as hell.
He was overstating. No. She was not dangerous. Not at all. Because after they reached Miami, he’d never see her again.
Why did that thought sadden him? He’d be happy to get her out of his hair once and for all. She was a pest. A cheery pest, granted, but a pest nonetheless. He wouldn’t miss her. Not one bit.
“I wanna see what you’ve got. Show me you can do better.” Her eyelids lowered seductively.
Her flirtatious tone issued a challenge not entirely related to shooting guns, and he knew it. There was nothing shy or retiring about Tara. He admired her openness at the same time he longed to run away from it. She made him feel transparent. As if she could see straight through all his defenses and there was no place for him to hide.
“Bring it on,” he said.
She changed out the target, and Boone moved up to the firing line, careful with his stance, favoring his injured leg. He raised the gun. Bam. Bam. Bam. Three kill shots. Right through the heart.
“Wow,” Tara exclaimed. “That was awesome.”
He lowered the gun, shrugged.
“You’re a crack marksman.”
“I’m a soldier.”
“Were.”
“Huh?”
“You were a soldier.”
“Yeah. Go ahead. Rub it in.”
“I don’t mean to make you feel badly about yourself. It’s just that sometimes we all need a kick in the pants to help us get going again. Living in denial isn’t a healthy place to hang out.”
“And you got your degree in psychology from where?”
She stared at him for a second, a flicker of hurt moving across her face.
Damn it. He was such a jerk. He turned back to the target. Put two rounds clean through the target’s forehead.
“That’ll show ’em,” she murmured under her breath.
Okay, so it might be a little obvious to take his frustrations out on the target, but it felt good. Already, the tension was draining from his shoulders. She’d been right to suggest this outlet.
“Want another turn?” he asked.
They shot a few more rounds, then returned the rental gun and left the shooting range. Tara walked slowly up the sidewalk beside him in concession to his limp. He hated that she had to adjust to his poky pace.
“Where’d you learn to shoot like that?” he asked.
“My dad and brothers are avid hunters. My father insisted we all learn how to shoot and he was rabid about gun safety.”
“Have you ever been hunting?”
“Just skeet and targets. I’m too soft-hearted to kill animals.”
Yeah, and here I am, a soldier. But not anymore. His career was gone. He’d loved the army. Loved the structured life. Without it, he felt adrift, purposeless. That was the root of his discontent. The loss of his identity.
But hanging out with Tara was starting to teach him there were other ways of being. She took each day as it came with good humor and a sense of adventure. She made him want to change. To let go of some of the restraint that had held him together for so long and just breathe.
Boone was so busy thinking about it that he didn’t notice the fissure in the sidewalk. The toe of his shoe caught on the cracked cement. He stumbled, lurched.
Tara put out a hand, caught his elbow, and stabilized him. He regained his balance. Shame burned his face. Her chest was pressed against his arm as she held him steady.
Her nipples hardened beneath her shirt. Or was it just his wishful imagination?
“You okay?” Her breath warmed his ear.
Goose bumps spread down his neck in spite of the late-morning sun. He clenched his teeth. Knock it off, Toliver. Just stop reacting to her. Easy to say, much harder to will his body not to have a normal male response to a