Free Breakpoint by Joann Ross

of the sedan. He was larger than he looked, with that lean, rangy runner’s body. Julianne felt oddly crowded.
    “I just realized why they chose you to be my partner.”
    “Why?”
    “For your charm.”
    “Wow.” Twin dimples winked in his darkly tanned cheeks as he grinned. “Talk about playing your cards close to your chest.” His wicked brown eyes skimmed down to the front of the starched blouse she’d worn with a slim, knee-length khaki skirt that had once been part of her uniform. “The other four times we’ve met up, I would’ve bet dollars to Krispy Kremes that you figured me to have about as much charm as a western rattler.”
    “Betting is against Navy regs.”
    “Yeah. Like sailors never gamble,” he scoffed.
    “Putting that aside, just because I’m immune to it doesn’t mean I can’t recognize an admirable weapon in your manly arsenal,” she said coolly as the driver pulled away from the dock. “According to everyone who was in that bunker after the helo crashed on the mountain, you were, in large part, responsible for keeping the mood up. Especially during that time the young Marine was dying.”
    His eyes, which had been glinting with laughter, shadowed. The dual dimples disappeared as his jaw tightened.
    “That was a rough time.”
    “But you managed to lighten things with your so-called rules for speed dating and tricks for juggling women around the globe.”
    “Ouch.” Amazingly, that dart appeared to hit home, because he actually flinched. “I don’t know what you were told, but I want to go on record, right here and now, as saying that rumors of my womanizing have been greatly exaggerated.”
    “You may be surprised to hear this, but I don’t care one way or the other.” Since she had no intention of being one of those juggled women. “My point was that you made an ugly situation better.”
    Julianne decided that since it would be hovering between them, interfering with their mission, she might as well get things out on the table. “And I made it worse.”
    “Short of everyone else dying out on that mountain, I can’t think of much more that could’ve made the day worse. And no offense, LT, while I’ll give you props for being one helluva lawyer, even you didn’t have the power to affect anything from the time that helo took off. Though I will admit that you damn sure took any fun out of surviving.”
    “I don’t want to beat a dead horse by arguing over details again,” she said. God. Of all the partners in all the world, she had to end up with this one? “Since it’s behind us.” And she’d lost. “But I am sincerely sorry that your mission went so wrong. Of course I regret the loss of a single life.”
    Turning her gaze to sailors walking across the street, their black armbands signifying they were shore patrol, she took a breath to steady her nerves, which always got tangled whenever she thought back on that investigation. “I also regret I had a duty to perform.”
    “A duty that, in your eyes, was to use those SEALs to set an example.”
    She wasn’t going to try to deny it.
    “I understand that Spec Ops—especially when they’ve gone black—operate under different rules. That they have to be able to improvise on the spot and they’re allowed more lenience when it comes to regulations than other troops.
    “But there’s a very thin line between effective Special Operations and loose cannons. The military—the country—can’t risk arming the latter.”
    To her surprise, he smiled just a bit at that. “Were you always a white hat/black hat kind of person? Or did you develop that at the academy?”
    Again, she wasn’t surprised he knew she’d attended Annapolis. “Something wrong with appreciating order?” she asked as they paused again at the gate leaving the base.
    “Nothing at all. The problem is that a helluva lot of the world doesn’t share your belief system. Which means that sometimes rules have to be bent, and you have to have people