"Is that the best reason the SEALs or military can come up with for preventing women from serving on the front?"

"That and the fact that women haven't proven yet what they can do in the most dire situations."

No more than she'd expected. "Like I said, I welcome the opportunity."

After Nicole stuffed her paperwork in her backpack and slung it over her shoulder, she headed out toward the back exit and the parking lot, only to encounter Trond coming out the doorway of the training room, where he must have showered and changed clothes.

When opportunity knocks, winners have to be ready, she quoted one of her motivational tapes. At the same time, she groaned inwardly, Am I really going to do this? Oh God!

You're on your own, a voice in her head said.

Before she had a chance for second thoughts (or third or fourth), Nicole dropped her backpack to the floor.

She stared at him.

He stared at her.

Is he gay?

He doesn't look gay.

Hah! What does gay look like?

Yeah, but he doesn't act gay, either.

Her gaydar was silent as she wavered between Is he? or Isn't he?

"God help me!" she prayed, figuring she would need all the help she could get to pull this off.

"God's busy," Trond said with a laugh that sent a shiver down her spine. "He sent me."

That was it! Those teasing words sealed Trond's fate. At least, she hoped. Grabbing his hand, she pulled him into a utility closet. Ordinarily, she wouldn't have had the superior strength to make him do anything he didn't want to, but he was too shocked to react swiftly. Or maybe-in fact, more likely-he just wanted to see what crazy thing she would do next. In fact, he was becoming as suspicious of her as she was of him.

"What? Huh? Hey, what's going on?"

"Let just see how gay you are, bozo." Her words were gritted out as she dropped her grasp on him and locked the door behind them. At the sound of the click, Trond's eyes went wide, suspecting her intent.

There was a light on the ceiling that was becoming dimmer, one of those automatic turn-offs to conserve energy for when a door was shut. She could still see now, though.

Trond looked upward and said the oddest thing: "C'mon, Mike. Another friggin' test? I'm not a saint, y'know."

"I never thought you were a saint. Who's Mike?"

He just looked at her.

For the first time in her life, she understood what was meant by smoldering eyes. In fact, his blue eyes were so hot they appeared to be turning silver. And while he held a hand over his mouth at first, a seeming gesture of disbelief, she could swear his incisor teeth were longer than usual.

Hey, she was in disbelief, too.

That was the last logical thought to enter her head because in a motion so swift she surprised even herself, she shoved him back against the wall, raised herself up on her tiptoes, and grabbed his two ears to tug him downward.

"Gotcha!" she said against his mouth, and nipped his bottom lip.

"Nicole! Have you lost your mind?"

"Probably." She traced a fingertip along his jawline, and was inordinately pleased when he shivered. But wait. Maybe it was a shiver of distaste.

"I could sue you for sexual harassment."

Yep, distaste. Oh well, she was in it to win it. "Go for it, big boy."

"What do you hope to accomplish by . . . Holy crap . . . Did you just rub your breasts against me?"

It was dark in the closet by now, but she could feel his chest shaking against her breasts, which she had indeed rubbed back and forth across him. He was probably shaking with laughter. She didn't care. He wouldn't be laughing for long.

"This is so not a good idea." He spread his legs to give himself better support against her assault, but she used that advantage to press her hips against his belly.

He said some sharp words under his breath, probably Norwegian expletives.

"For a gay guy, you're awfully quick on the trigger," she remarked, undulating against his trigger.

She could hear him gasp. "See, that's the thing about triggers," he said, chuckling as he attempted to remove her arms from around his waist. "They're blind in the dark." He put his hands on her hips in an attempt to move her away.

She reached for his hands, but instead grabbed something else.

He didn't say anything, but the gurgling noise that came out of his mouth said it all.

"Oops!" Nicole didn't know a lot about homosexual men, but, whoo-boy, if he wasn't interested in women, she'd like to know how he'd be with a man.

She had her arms wrapped around his shoulders by now, and she proceeded to kiss him senseless. Or herself senseless. Or both of them senseless, for heaven's sake!

No soft butterfly kisses.

No sweet licks.

No soft murmurs against his mouth.

This was total, ravenous hunger unleashed.

She surprised herself.

And she sure as hell surprised Trond.

Ten.

Sliding down the slippery slope of sin . . .

Trond was caught in a whirlwind of sexual ecstasy.

Every cell in his body was aroused and sensitive to the lightest touch-and, holy clouds!-Nicole was hot damn, sure-as-sin touching him! Everywhere. Even her breath against his neck was like a feather sweeping the veins of an overhardened cock. And, yes, a woman had indulged him with that fantasy one time. I wonder if . . . no, no, no! No wondering!

She pried his mouth open with her tongue and deep kissed him. He could swear she was tickling his tonsils.

And his tonsils liked it.

His knees, on the other hand, almost gave way.

In a desperate attempt to say something gay, the first time he came up for a breath, he told her in a falsetto voice, "I can taste your excitement. It's like honey with a hint of clove."

"I can taste your excitement, too," the saucy wench countered, "like mint with a dollop of male pheromones." She was smiling against his lips. Smile kisses. "You are incredible," she said.

Wow! Gayness seems to have advantages.

"You have not experienced my incredible yet." He gave her a smile kiss in return, discovering something new in the sex arts: A little humor added spice to lust play.

Maybe a little bit of fooling around wouldn't hurt, the lackwit side of his brain decided.

It was dark.

Maybe she wouldn't notice how excited he was.

He could let her do all the work.

Maybe she'd think he wasn't straight enough to initiate anything.

Who was he kidding?

It felt too good to stop.

Not yet.

Just a little longer.

But then she thrust her tongue inside his mouth again, and he reflexively thrust his enthusiasm against her cleft. Enthusiasm, what a tame Viking word for the rock-hard erection he'd grown! And grown. And was still growing.

Did any man and woman ever fit together better than this? He doubted it. Their alignment, wet mouth to wet mouth, chest to breasts, cock to cleft, was pure perfection.

Something amazing and wonderful was happening here, unlike anything he'd ever experienced before. It was lust, of course, but more than that. He who had over the years faced demons and battle-honed warriors, even lions in the Roman Colosseum, found himself trembling. Surely, a sinner such as he did not merit pleasure of this magnitude.

Uh-oh! Is this yet another vangel test? he wondered, not for the first time. A vangel sex test?

Hah! Being a Mensa when it came to that kind of body sport, he would pass with flying colors.

Of course, that was not the outcome Mike would want from such a test. No, this was not a test. Trond preferred to think that what was happening between him and Nicole had come about naturally. Man to woman, even if he was not a hu-man.

Aaarrgh! I am supposed to be gay. What would a gay man do in this situation?

Not pant like a warhorse and tingle from his scalp to his toenails, that is for sure.

Her legs had somehow become wrapped around his waist, he noted, even in their dark space. When had that happened? And her hands were inside his shorts, cupping his bare behind. When had that happened?

Steeling himself with resolve, he reached up and pulled the cord on the light fixture. It would last for only a few moments. Time enough to say what he must. "This has to stop, Nicole. I know what you're trying to prove, but this has gone far enough. Whoa! What are you doing now? Oh no! Wait!" Then, after a telling pause, "God above!" He wasn't sure if his inadvertent exclamation was a prayer or an expletive.

She had crossed her arms and lifted her T-shirt up and over her head, taking her sports undergarment with it. She was bare from the waist up, with her legs still wrapped around his hips.

He put his hands on her bottom . . . just to hold her up, or so he told himself. He turned so that her back was to the wall, for more balance, or so he told himself. And then he proceeded to look. And look. What harm could there be in mere looking?

Her beauty stunned him. Her arms and shoulders carried the muscles of a military woman. Her skin was the color of winter wheat, sun-kissed to a golden hue. And her breasts . . . ah, her breasts were pure splendor. Full. The size of halved oranges, with pink tips that begged for his attention by blooming before his eyes into hard pebbles.

"Take off your shirt," she demanded in a sex-husky voice.

By the runes! She will be the death of me yet. "I can't," he said.

"Can't, or won't?" she accused. "I want to feel you, skin to skin, dammit."

Can a man faint from sex talk? "I cannot have sex with you, Nicole. Nothing personal. Believe me, if I could have sex with any woman, you would be my first choice." Of the moment anyway. "So, let's just call an end to this, and . . . aaarrgh!"

As the light went out, she shoved his T-shirt up far enough that she could brush his chest hairs back and forth across her breasts, bringing the nipples to even harder points.

Once he was able to speak above a whimper, he said, "All this you would do just to prove a point?"

He couldn't see her face, of course, but he just knew she was blushing. "To tell you the truth, it started out that way," she admitted, "but now . . ."

When she didn't continue, he prodded, "But now . . . ?"

"Now I just want you."

Her admission had to be a blow to her pride. He could respect that. He was a Viking. He knew about pride.

But, really, it was the worst thing she could have said! Or the best.

He was going to surrender, he knew that now, consequences be damned. But before he had a chance to say so, she arched her neck, causing her breasts to present themselves even more for his sex play, and her belly to press against him, then undulate in a rhythm he knew good and well.

Even though it was dark again inside the closet, he closed his eyes for a moment, fearing his eyeballs would be rolling back in their sockets. Then he took over the master role in this game as old as time. He needed no light to find his way.

He took her breasts into his mouth, licking and biting at the nipples, playing the tips like a fiddle string with his tongue. "You like that, do you, sweetling? Some women do not."

"How would you know, Mr. Gay Man?"

"I've heard. Anyhow, some women-"