"Brown, Dale - Warrior Class" - читать интересную книгу автора (Brown Dale)

edge lights, step lights, and the parking lot lights several dozen yards away. Both Dev and Annie wore bathrobes, and carried plastic cups of Chardonnay to the spa. The hot, dry desert air cooled quickly after sunset, and there was a breeze blowing, so it felt much cooler now. "Man, I've been in the hot sun all day, but I'm ready for the hot tub," Dev was saying. He turned on the bubble pumps, set his wine down on the concrete deck, shed the robe, revealing his black Nike bathing suit underneath, then sat on the edge of the spa and let his feet dangle in to test the water. "Perfect," he said. He took a sip of wine. "I'm glad you could-2'
He stopped and gulped. Annie took off her borrowed bathrobe-revealing only her birthday suit. Her breasts were indeed small, but larger than they appeared beneath her dress, and incredibly firm. Her shoulders and arms were not just welltoned-they were ripped, as were her stomach and thigh muscles, lean, taut, and striated. She watched him closely as she eased into the warm bubbly water with a confident, satisfied smile on her face.
."I-I hung a bathing suit on the doorknob for you," he reminded her.
11 1 know. I saw it. Thank you," she said. "That was a very considerate thing to do. You don't mind I didn't use it, do you, Dev?"
"Are you kid ... I mean, no, not at all, Heels." She leaned back, her elbows back on the edge of the spa with her breasts tantalizingly obscured within the bubbles on the water's surface, and sipped her wine. He felt like a dork now, with a bathing suit on, so after he got into the hot tub, he slipped it off and placed it on the edge of the tub.
After several long moments, he stopped trying to get a look at her breasts and relaxed. As always, his attention drifted up to the sky. The nearby buildings and the lights from the parking lot washed out most of the sky, but he could still see a few stars shimmering overhead. "Finally starting to see the summertime constellations," he said. "That's Vega, in the constellation Lyra. You can just start to see the head of Scorpio down over the building."
"Must be a navigator thing, having to learn all the stars and constellations," Annie said.
"They still taught celestial navigation in nav school when I went through," Dev said, "although they phased it out shortly after I left. They taught us how to use a sextant, do a precomp--figure out what the star positions are supposed to beshoot the stars, sun, and moon, and plot a celestial, pressure,
and speed line of position. Get two good star shots with a small bubble and a steady autopilot, add in a good pressure LOP and a true airspeed line from a good air data system, and a good nav could plot your position within five to ten miles."
"Five to ten miles?" Annie exclaimed.
"I know-ridiculous, huh?" Deverill agreed. "The absolute worst inertial nav system back then could keep you within a mile or two with an update every thirty minutes. Nowadays, the worst INS gets you within a quarter-mile with one update, and GPS can get us within six feet. But it was pretty amazing to think that navs throughout history fought wars across the oceans with little more than a star to guide them. It's a lost art. 11
"Show me what you're looking at," Annie said. She picked up her cup of wine and waded over to him, turned around, and sat beside him, then leaned back against his chest. It both shocked and pleased him at the same time. The damned bubbles still obscured her breasts. He put his left arm around her shoulder and across her neck, clasping her right shoulder, and he could feel her nipples against his arm. Stars, Dev, he shouted at himself, think of stars now, celestial navigation, precomps, star tables, air almanacs ...
"Now, what were you looking at?" she murmured. Her head was tilted back against him, the back of her head in the water, but she wasn't looking at the stars.
"I was trying to look at you," he said softly, and he bent down to kiss her lips. A bolt of electricity shot through his body, the physiological responder he was trying hard to distract sprang to life, and he kissed her deeper, harder. She returned the kiss, then took his hand from her shoulder and placed it on her breast. "God, Annie, you are so sexy." She said nothing, but her right hand drifted down to his stomach, then his thigh, and








then to his fully attentive and waiting member. She stroked him a couple times. He moaned with pleasure ... and then realized she had stopped. "Annie, please. . . "
"I can't, Dev," she whispered. She reluctantly twisted away from him, moved away from him-not to the other side of the spa out of reach, but definitely apart from him-and laid her head back on the edge of the spa and covered her face. "I'm sorry, Dev. It is not you, believe me ... believe me."
"Then what is it?" But he knew the answer the second he asked the question: "Luger. You're in love with him or something."
"Or something," she said. "I wanted to, but ... I don't want this to turn into a retribution thing."
"You mean, sleeping with me just to get back at Luger." Annie nodded. "I'm sorry, Dev. I mean, you're greatlooking, and you got a great bod, and you got the.eyes, and the butt .... 91
"Wow. Women really talk like that about guys?"
"Only certain guys," she said, with a smile. He liked her wann, honest smile. He'd never thought of her as a friend before, only as a colleague and maybe a future conquests but now he was talking to her like a friend, and he enjoyed it. He still wanted to see her underneath him or on top of him, but it wasn't an urgent need anymore.
"So what's the story with you two?"
"What's to tell?" she replied. "I fell for him, I thought he fell for me. But he's got his work, and that's pretty much his whole life right now."
"You said 'right now' like you don't really believe it." She looked at Dev, angry that he'd said it-and angry that he was right. "Listen, Annie, if you say women talk about men like I know men talk about women, then men and women are more alike than they are different, right?" Annie said nothing. "So the only thing you can be certain about is that you can't change a guy. Dave Luger will be the same as long as he wants to be, as long as whatever he gets out of work is more important or more pleasurable than what he gets from other people. It sucks, but that's the way it is."
"So what do I do about it?"
"Annie, everybody does the same thing," Deverill said earnestly. "You're here in this hot tub for the same reason that Colonel Luger is there in the lab-because whatever you're looking for here, whatever you hoped to find
here, is better than waiting alone in your apartment for a man who will probably never come."
"If I want to be here, then why do I feel so bad about it?" "Because you have feelings," he replied. "You care about him. You care about what he might think. But you have to trust yourself. Trust your feelings." He paused, regarding her thoughtfully, then asked softly, "You love him, don't you?" "Yes.,,
"You probably haven't slept with him, but you love him anyway." She was going to say something angry at him, but she couldn't-because, dammit, he was right. "Maybe it's the real thing, then," he went on. "Maybe you feel guilty because you don't really want to be here."
"I should follow my feelings, then."
"Absolutely." She rubbed her eyes, then hid them. It seemed as if she was embarrassed to be sitting there with him, afraid she was showing how stupid and naive she was. He drained his wine, then reached for his bathrobe, preparing to leave. "Shall we?"
"Yes." But instead of leaving, Annie put her hand on his arm, firmly, forbidding him to move. She moved close to him, her face a little fearful but excited at the same time, and she reached under the surface of the bubbling water and found him. Despite their very serious, very nonsexual discussion, it sprang instantly back to life like the trouper it was.
"Annie?" "You said follow my instincts," she said. She crouched. above him, still holding him, then kissed him warmly, deeply, as she maneuvered herself onto him. "I'm following my instincts. This ... is ... where I want to be, right ... now."