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the bottle looked like before heading off to the Exchange. Kicking himself for his lack of foresight, he turned and raked the store for a sales associate.
    The familiar sight of his commander's square head incited a prick of resentment. Here it was twenty hundred hours on a Friday night and he was still subjected to Max's presence. It didn't matter that the man was standing clear on the other side of the open shopping space, in the electronics section. Brant could feel him sucking the energy out of the room, like a tornado sweeping up everything in its path.
    He was about to walk out of the Exchange and come back the next day when he spied the top of Rebecca's head. Her lustrous hair reflected the sheen of the halogen lights as she coursed the next aisle over from Max, a disinterested look on her sweet face.
    Brant's pulse immediately accelerated. His desire to leave the store evaporated as he watched her distance herself from her husband. Maybe it was wishful thinking on Brant's part, but from all the previous conversations they had ever had, she didn't seem to enjoy her husband's company.
    He thought of what he'd learned about Emile Victor DuPonte. Should he tell Rebecca what he'd discovered so she could protect herself? Definitely not here. But the desire to speak with her overruled his common sense, which was warning him to keep his distance. He found himself moving stealthily in her direction, trying to catch her eye without Max seeing him.
    Max waved a hand in the air, summoning over a sales person, and Brant seized the opportunity to step into her line of sight. The pleasure that lit up her face when she noticed him made his stomach cartwheel. She was so pretty with those dimples in her cheeks.
    Tipping his head toward the racks of greeting cards, he signified she should try to get away. Then he backed toward that area himself and waited on pins and needles for her to join him.
    * * *
    Rebecca racked her brain for a reason to browse the card aisle. Her mother's upcoming birthday provided her an instant excuse. "Um, Max," she called, wresting his attention from the sales person. "I'll be over there picking out a card for my mother."
    Preoccupied with choosing a new laptop, Max waved her away.
    Rebecca cruised with outward calm toward the greeting cards, aware that butterflies flitted inside her as she hunted for Bronco's sun-kissed head. Like most SEALs, he wore his hair on the long side, letting it curl against his muscle-corded neck and the tops of his ears. Sometimes, he let his facial hair grow out into a burnished goatee that made him devastatingly attractive—not that she would ever tell him that, as there were plenty of women who already did.
    She found him behind the magazine section, at the very end of the card aisle where he could dart around a corner if he needed to. His eyes—as blue as the Montana sky's he'd described from his childhood—swung in her direction, and the smile that bloomed from the region of her heart found its way to her face. What was it about this man that lifted the stress right off her shoulders?
    "Hey," she said, her voice made breathy by the intrigue. "What brings you here?"
    He gestured toward the liquor at the back of the store. "Buying a bottle of wine for a friend."
    "Ah." A female friend, no doubt . She fought to keep her smile in place but knew that it wavered.
    "You met Hack at the party—the new guy? The wine's for him. He did me a favor."
    "Oh, nice." She pictured the dark-eyed addition to the Teams and her happiness returned. "I've heard he's a genius with computers. Max should have asked him to fix his Dell. It's been in the shop with a virus for a week now and he's given up ever getting it back, so we're shopping for a replacement."
    The words tumbled out of her mouth like a rushing river. She snapped her teeth together to stem the flow. There was simply so much that she wanted to tell Bronco, and their encounters were inevitably few and far between. She didn't want to