She couldn't get her face to go into a smile. She was too afraid, the blood now pulsing in her ears, her hands unsteady at her sides.

He just looked at her.

"Is it too late?" she asked. "Tonight, I mean."

"No."

"I needed to talk to you some more. Would that be all right?"

"Everything's all right, Tara. You can do whatever you want. You want to come in?" Stepping back away from the door, he gave her room to pass and then closed the door quietly behind her as she kept walking through his living room, stopping by the counter that delineated the kitchen and turning back to face him. Her shoulders rose and fell.

From over by the door, he said, "I can't guarantee talking too well. I've been having some trouble sleeping, so I'm a little doped up. Plus I've had a couple of drinks. I'm drinking too much. I need to stop."

"Are you in such pain?"

He managed a small shrug. "Sometimes, but that's not it really." He took a second to continue. "I know that whatever they say, I'm not all the way back. Maybe I'll never be. To tell you the truth, it freaks me out sometimes. When I'm alone mostly. But I don't want to have anybody feel like they have to be with me all the time either."

"Your mom?"

"For one example, yeah. Anybody, really. But it's"-he shrugged again-"it's just what I'm doing now, Tara. Holding on. Getting better, I hope. Getting over what happened."

Evan still stood by the door, making no effort to close the space between them. She felt the distance tugging at her, causing a pain of its own, and took a step toward him, then another.

"But that's all just me," Evan said. "What did you want to talk about?"

"Ron. I never…I wanted to tell you that it was never like it was with us. It was just a completely different thing."

"Was? Past tense?"

She let out a heavy breath. "Yes. After what you told me today."

"Okay. And how was it with us that was so different?"

Tara put her hands together at her waist. She deserved that question. And he deserved the real answer. "Because we connected, Evan. So basically."

He nodded. "I know."

"I don't think that ever goes away."

"No. Me neither."

She looked across the living room into his eyes. "Why are you staying over there? It's almost like you're afraid of me."

"I am. As much as I need to be."

"How much is that?"

"That depends on how much being done with Ron means you're back with me."

She waited another few seconds and then closed the space between them. Looking up at him again, now the smell of him so close. "Does it hurt you to touch the scar?" she asked.

"It's just a scar." But he inclined his head so that she could see it. Almost a perfect circle, slightly indented.

Slowly, she reached out her hand and brought it up to his head. As soon as she touched it, she felt something give in her legs. As she traced the shape of the scar, tears sprang into her eyes and she made no effort to stop them. Evan brought his head down, leaning into her.

Bringing her other hand up into his hair, she cradled his head in both her hands.

Holding on to her, his arms behind her, he went to his knees in front of her, his face first pressed to one side against her thigh. But then, her hands on his head now directing him, she turned him to be up against her, his hands gripping her from behind, pulling her into him, while she pressed herself against him. She pulled him gently away for an instant, only long enough to let her step out of her clothes, and then brought him back to where he'd been.

Beyond any time, then, she was on the floor with her legs around his neck, until the surge of blood and heat she'd only known with him took her and then there was the taste of her on his mouth and his own cry as everything between them came back and came again and left them both flung out on the floor, wasted and sated, and connected in every part.

15

THE RELEVANT PORTION of the e-mail from Jack Allstrong that had put Nolan on the road had read: "When the CPA hands over the government to the Iraqis, Uncle Sam is going to be shipping over $2.4 billion-that's right, billion-in shrink-wrapped 100s. That's twenty-eight tons of greenbacks, Ron, almost all of it earmarked for infrastructure and rebuilding, which means us. My standing directive to you is to recruit as many qualified personnel as you can find. Starting now."

Now Nolan was just getting back home from a productive couple of days. Frequenting the bars around some of California's military bases-Pendleton, Ord, Travis-he'd recruited four men for Allstrong's ongoing and growing operations in Iraq. Though Allstrong's security work was dangerous and demanding, ex-officers who were bored or broke or both in civilian life often jumped at the chance to resurrect their careers, their self-esteem, and their bank accounts, and to once again utilize the special skills that had served them well in the military.