He blinked when he felt heat rise in his cheeks, embarrassed by his body's immediate reaction. You're supposed to be here helping out, not mentally feeling up the patrons. But he really didn't think this guy needed a soup kitchen to grab a hearty meal. Not with that body.

Christ, how hard up are you, Crosby? It hasn't been that long since you got laid. Okay, maybe it has, but how many teeth do you want to lose to copping a look?

His frustrated libido grabbed his common sense and stuffed it into a bag. Darting a guilty glance to get one last longing look at the rugged man's tanned

and weathered features, Carson physically flinched. His unguarded and needy gaze was hit full force with a dark, unwavering stare.

Sometime during Carson's inspection of bronzed muscle and long bone, Mad Lacey had wandered away leaving Military Man alone. Alone and staring straight at Carson, his dark eyes, almost black, glaring out under squinted lids.

The man's gaze followed the path Carson's had traveled, dropping down to his own groin. Then stranger's stare moved from his crotch to Carson's, slowly, pointedly crawling up Carson until their gazes met again. The expression on the man's face was controlled, measuring, without a hint of what he was thinking.

He might have been thinking how attractive Carson was. Or he might have been thinking of a dozen different ways to kill him without being caught. He was definitely military and Carson knew from his brother that any well-trained soldier could kill if he wanted to eliminate someone.

Carson didn't doubt the guy could do the job. There was a distinct element of danger to that inky, silent stare. Then the squinting eyes relaxed a tiny margin and the man's unsmiling lips parted slightly, a mere twitch that smudged the edges off the man's hard look. The sudden change whispered of physical attraction.

Carson felt a chill sweep down his back, a shudder of anticipation, while the flush of embarrassment still heated his neck and face.

It was times like these he hated his fair, usually pale complexion, starkly framed by even paler blond hair. Added to his slight but athletic build, quiet personality and geeky job, he was often invisible to hunky guys like this one. Once in a while someone noticed his eyes. Since this guy was trying to bore a hole through Carson's head with his eye-to-eye laser beam gaze, Carson guessed this one had noticed them.

Every memory Carson had of a comment about the way he looked hinged on his eyes, the swirls of white streaked through the vibrant green gave them the appearance of green turquoise. His parents had described them as bright,

intelligent and stunning. His classmates in school had called them alien, bizarre and freakish.

At twenty-six he’d finally come to accept them as natural, mother nature's own unique stamp. Women seemed to find them exotic. Most men wouldn't maintain eye contact for long, as if being attracted to his eyes made them sappy schoolgirls.

But this guy was no giggling pre-teen and he didn't seem to have any problem staring into Carson's eyes. As a matter of fact, for once Carson was the one getting uncomfortable from the prolonged moment.

The heat in his face receded but the stirring in his jeans snugged the fabric tighter. He shifted his weight, moving just enough so he could angle his hips behind the cover of the steamer. Eye contact remained unbroken. Carson felt his breath turn ragged and his heartbeat quickened, thudding against his ribs.

Now who was acting like a pre-teen?

The clock kept ticking and the guy kept staring.

Carson wanted to step back and run, hide out in the kitchen, find a nice mindless job like peeling potatoes for the next three hours where the only thing he had to think about was the ache in his bruised face and the burning of his scratched cornea. Steve 'I-don't-take-rejection-well' Fuckwad just had to be wearing a ring when he lashed out. The staring contest was making his eyes dry but he refused to be the first one to turn away. For some reason he didn't want to look submissive to this guy. One dominate jerk brushing up against his life at a time was enough.

A thick, mucous tear tickled down Carson's cheek from his injured eye. He needed to put more ointment in it. The hours went so fast between applications he had trouble keeping track of them. Eye red and weeping, Carson knew he looked like he had been crying. One more reason to dislike the abusive want-to-be boyfriend. Bastard.

Carson carefully brushed the streak of wetness off his discolored cheek. Too much pressure would make his whole face throb. Then again, maybe the tearing had a higher purpose. Maybe GI Joe would think he was just a blond twink, a sniveling weakling, and walk away, giving Carson a chance to take a deep breath.

Pain won the battle with his ego. He closed his eyes and counted to five, then blinked rapidly to clear away the gathered moisture, determined to look at something other than dark eyes and mountains of perfect muscle when he opened his eyes. He'd give the guy plenty of time to break away. He counted to five again just to be sure.

Or not.

'GI Joe' had moved but it wasn't away. Now he was so close, just a thin serving table width away, that Carson could see the gray flicks in his eyes and the light shadow of stubble on his square, rugged face. Movement caught Carson's attention and his gaze dropped to dusky pink lips; lips that were taunt, moist, inviting and, oh yeah, moving. Moving like in saying words.

“What?” Carson blinked again.

“Your eye. You seen a doctor?”

“A doctor?” The concern in the guy's voice sounded genuine but Carson shied away.

He liked looking at the guy but the last thing he needed was another control freak trying to pin him to a wall and fuck him standing up instead of saying goodnight and leaving like Carson had desperately wanted Steve to do. He might be small but he could knee a guy with the best of them. Having an Army Ranger for a big brother had its benefits. Jim had made sure Carson knew how to protect himself if he needed to.

“Yeah. It's okay.”

“Doesn't look okay.” That laser stare grew impossibly more intense. The soldier rested both meaty, tanned hands on his fatigue-covered hips, his broad shoulders loosing a degree or maybe even two of rigidness. “Cornea scratched?”

Relaxing minutely, Carson nodded. “A ring.” Studying the man's less threatening stance and sympathetic expression, he added, “How'd you know?”

“Been sucker punched a time or two.” The man walked to the end of the table. Now the guy was only two feet away. “Doesn't have to be fist metal to do damage. Gloves will do it too with enough force behind the hit.” The hard glare returned and washed over Carson again. “You don't look like the type to go looking for trouble.”

It was harder to hide Carson's physical reaction to the man with him this close. Hoping to keep attention focused away from his obviously interested crotch, Carson kept talking. “I don't, but I don't run from it when it happens either.”

When that bit of bravado was met with silence, Carson grabbed at a few conversational straws. He was not going to talk about dating disasters with this stranger. “Why don't I think you mean class rings when you say fist metal?”

“Because I don't.”

The quiet statement hung in the air, letting Carson's imagination fill in the blanks. He shrugged off a cold touch on his spine. Yep, this guy was all power, control and steely force. Walk away! Walk away! Absolutely not Carson's type.

“You get in a bar fight?” He was nothing if not persistent.

“No.”

Fed up with the questioning, suppressed anger pushed aside any attraction Carson felt. Might as well let the jerk think he was a wuss. At least the questions would stop and the guy would go away. “I don't drink.”

Sticking a serving spoon into the stuffing, Carson turned and moved away from the table toward a small alcove beside the kitchen doors. He leaned his back