by Lori Ryan
“You’re sure you’re all right with this?” Sam looked at Logan as they stood waiting for the hostess to show them to their table.
“Absolutely,” he said with another smile for her, and her heart kicked because she believed him.
It felt good to realize he was getting better. If anyone deserved it, he did.
And she still believed him an hour and a half later when they left the restaurant with his arm around her waist and her head tucked against his shoulder. He hadn’t seemed to panic once the entire meal and she felt like a princess the whole time.
Sam had never really had the experience of feeling like a princess. She’d always been bigger than her friends and sisters. Guys tended to want to be her friend, not her lover. Logan didn’t make her feel that way at all. She felt desirable and sexy with him.
“You are my sexy princess,” he whispered in her ear as he tugged her into his arms in front of the passenger door to his car.
“Damn,” she said, looking up at him.
His laugh was deep and easy and it hit her straight in the heart, just like it always did.
“Yes, that was out loud,” he said, dropping a kiss to her nose. His look went from amused to heated in a heartbeat as he looked at her, and then his hands cupped her face and he leaned in and kissed her.
Her body tingled as his hands swept down her cheeks and his fingers laced in her hair to pull her closer and deepen his kiss. His tongue tangled with hers and his lips moved over hers with just enough pressure to make her want more.
But he froze and stopped, long before she wanted him to. Sam could feel his body tighten, not with the need and heat of a moment ago, but with something else. A soldier’s guard.
He kept his hands where they were and dipped his head next to her ear, whispering close.
“Do you feel that?”
Sam nodded. She’d wondered if he would notice the sensation of someone watching them. It unsettled her to know that he did because it meant it wasn’t just the fact that she knew her purse and coat carried the listening devices Chad and Logan had asked her not to remove yet.
They were still trying to track where the devices were transmitting to and she’d been chalking the eerie feeling that overcame her from time to time up to the bugs, and nothing more.
“Have you felt it before?” He skimmed his mouth across hers as he asked the question, but the feeling was different. Right now, he was in cover mode, using the kiss to cover their conversation from prying eyes. They still spoke at a whisper and she hoped it was enough to prevent whoever was listening through her purse and coat from hearing.
She nodded again. His eyes flared, angry for a moment before he reached behind him to open the passenger door of the car. He opened it, deposited her inside and then scanned the area as he walked around to the driver’s side before getting in.
Logan didn’t ask before he rifled around in her purse, pulling out the jamming device and clicking it on, before growling at her through clenched teeth.
“You mean to tell me you’ve felt eyes on you before tonight and you didn’t think to tell me? Or Chad? Or any freaking one? What the hell, Sam?”
She shrugged, but it was a weak shrug because what she really wanted to do was crawl under the seat to escape the dangerous glint in his eye.
“I thought it was just because of the bugs I knew I was carrying around. It seemed to make sense at the time.”
He must have realized he was scaring her because he took a few deep, purposeful breaths and when he looked back at her, his gaze had softened. He shoved the car in gear and pulled out of the parking lot.
“Let’s get you out of here,” he said.
Sam was quiet for a bit before deciding to break the strained silence in the car. She really had been happy about where their evening had been going, but she also couldn’t ignore the reality of what was happening now. For whatever reason, someone was watching her.
“Could you see anyone back there?” She wanted to turn and look behind them but fought the urge.
“No. Nothing. But, I know that feeling. It’s not something we can ignore.”
He pulled the car into her parking lot and pulled it right up in front of the door rather than over in one of the guest parking spots.
“Wait.” His tone was brusque and no-nonsense, and even though she bristled under the command, she followed it. She wasn’t an idiot. If Logan thought she was in trouble, she needed to listen to him.
She watched nervously as Logan stood outside the car, his body placed strategically near her door as he scanned the area. He opened the door and reached a hand in.
“Keys.”
She handed the keys to the house to him and watched as he went to unlock the door, then returned to escort her from the car to the door. Inside the door, she punched in her alarm code for the alarm Zach had installed, locking the door behind them and resetting the alarm to active.
Then they went through the same routine they’d gone through when he’d cleared her home for her after the bugs initially showed up. It seemed that now he knew there was more of a threat, he’d gone into full-blown protection mode.
Maybe that shouldn’t have sent an erotic thrill through her, but it did.
When he finished his search of the house, he returned to Sam and tugged her into the living room to the couch, pulling her down to sit next to him.
“You doing okay?” He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, eyes boring into hers.
“Yeah, I’m okay.”
She didn’t know why she was, to be honest. She just felt safe when she was with him. Like nothing could get through him to get to her. It might not be precisely true, but it was how she felt.
“I’m going to call Zach and have him send someone over to watch the house while I run home and grab my things.”
“Grab your things?” she asked. Her heart rate seemed to jump a few beats per minute when she realized what he meant. He planned to stay with her. Here. In her house.
He must have realized she’d made the connection. “Is that all right? If not, I could see if one of Zach’s guys could stay in your guest room.”
Sam laughed. She had to admire him for trying to get that out without growling. She could see the tension in his jawline. She reached out and ran her finger over the small tick that had begun just below his right eyebrow.
“Take it easy, big guy. I’d rather have you here with me than any of them.”
He growled at her then, and swooped in to take her mouth with his, stealing the laughter, and taking her breath with it. She leaned into him and moaned.
When he pulled away and let her catch her breath, she felt the heat of his gaze and her whole body was achy and needy again. He had that effect on her so quickly it frightened her a bit, but she shoved away any thought of hesitating with him. She wanted this. Wanted him.
“I’m not going to stay in the guest room, Samantha,” he said as his teeth nipped her bottom lip and she moaned again for him. Her arms came up to wrap around his neck and she all but crawled in his lap at that point, kissing him back with all the frustration she’d built up waiting for him. God, how she wanted this with him.
When she’d first spotted Logan at Jesse and Zach’s wedding, she never thought, in a million years, she’d be here with him. That he’d want her this way.
She had no doubts now. He’d shown her how much he wanted her. If she’d had any doubts left, the erection pressing into her bottom as he tugged her fully onto his lap put any doubts to rest.
It also caused her to press her thighs together as the sweet ache between her legs increased to maddening proportions and she felt herself go wet and swollen for him.
He ground his erection into her bottom and she pressed against him, nipping at his neck. God, she wanted this—him—so badly. She thought she’d explode if he didn’t touch her soon.
As if reading her mind, his hand found her breast and his thumb grazed over her nipple. The roughness of his touch through the fabric of
her top was tantalizing and all she could think was more. She wanted more.
Logan pulled away from her and rested his forehead against hers as they both worked to regulate their breathing.
“Remember where we were. I’ve got to get in touch with Zach and get a plan in place. When I get back—” He simply grinned and left the promise out there.
Samantha’s answer was somewhere halfway between an mmmmmm sound like she might make if she were eating a cookie, and an um hmmm sound made to indicate agreement. She was absolutely in agreement.
Logan grinned the full-blown devilish grin she knew was genuine, but didn’t see as often as she’d like, and then pulled out his cell phone. He dialed and leaned in to kiss her briefly while he waited for someone to answer the phone.
“The faster I get someone over here and get back and forth to my place, the faster we can continue where we left off,” he said.
Sam wondered briefly if she should go with him to his house, but he would have someone come to stay with her. She’d be safe. Not to mention, he hadn’t exactly offered. She would stay here and shower, change, and climb into bed to wait for him. The wait might kill her, but she wouldn’t press him to go with him if he wasn’t offering.
“Hey,” he said into the phone, his voice suddenly all business and no longer the sultry bedroom voice he’d been using to croon the panties right off her body.
She assumed he was talking to Zach, who owned a personal protection company and was familiar with what had happened with the bugs. He’d been the one to install her new security system.
“What’s up?” Sam heard Zach’s muffled response on the other end of the line.
“I’m pretty sure Samantha and I were being watched when we left a restaurant half an hour ago. I think whoever is bugging her might have upped their game.”
“What makes you say that?” Zach asked.
“Gut feeling. Sam got it, too and apparently she’s felt that way before tonight.” Logan spared a glare toward Sam, who responded by sticking her tongue out at him. He cracked what looked like a reluctant grin before returning his focus to Zach.
“I’m going to run back to my house and grab some stuff to stay over here with her. Do you have anyone you can send over to watch the house while I’m gone? Maybe even set up a protection detail on her for a few days until we figure out who this is and what they want.”
“You bet. Jeff Carson should be available. I’ll send him that way or let you know if he isn’t free, but he should be. You’ll wait for him to arrive?”
“Yup. And I’ll touch base with you tomorrow to come up with a plan moving forward.”
“You got it. Talk to you tomorrow.”
Logan closed the phone and turned toward Sam, drawing her back into his arms.
“We’ve got some time to kill until his guy gets here,” he said with a leering smile. His teasing turned to heated passion when she ran her hands up his chest and pulled his head in for a kiss. Then, he took over.
Head spinning, Sam tried to capture and remember every sensation, everything she felt during this moment. It seemed as though Logan had given up trying to fight what they were feeling and she wanted to experience everything.
But soon her body felt too much for her overly analytical mind to keep up with and she had to let herself simply sink into the pleasure of being with him. She wasn’t used to that at all.
Samantha had lost her virginity quite purposefully in a very planned, organized encounter. She and her best friend, Johnny Dornan, had decided to experiment sexually together when they were seventeen. They met at the lake where her family spent summers growing up, and had both been science geeks.
They’d been friends for over five years, spending several weeks each summer together in a small town in Maine. They were comfortable with each other, but that didn’t mean the experience wasn’t a bit too scientific and a little light on passion.
Hidden away in one of the unused boathouses, they’d tried everything they could think of in the name of learning how to be “sexually competent,” as they put it. Positions, oral sex, mutual masturbation. They’d had a lot of fun and the experience was one Samantha had always thought of as extremely freeing.
She’d had orgasms with Johnny. Not at first, of course, but once they got the hang of it. And she’d been with a couple of other men since then. Most were quite enjoyable encounters.
But it was nothing compared to what Logan was doing to her body now. She felt as though every nerve ending was on fire and burning up for him. For his touch, his caress, his heat.
His teeth grazed over her neck on his way down to kiss her collarbone and she gasped at the sheer power of the arousal coursing through her. Her hands grasped his shoulders and she tried to hold him to her, but she didn’t have to.
He buried his head against her and nipped, licked, and suckled his way down the top of her breasts, to the dip of her cleavage and she vaguely wondered when he’d undone the buttons of her shirt.
Then, he was lifting one breast up over the cup of her bra and his mouth closed in over the nipple and she was lost. There was something so erotic and dirty, in a good way, about his lifting her out of her clothes to taste her, rather than peeling them off. As though he couldn’t wait to get his mouth on her, couldn’t wait to have more of her. She felt the same way about him and she threaded her fingers in his hair and held him to her.
They were both panting when Logan stopped and held her face in his hands, meeting her eyes. The fierce passion and fire in his eyes was enough to make her crave—no need—more of him. But the man of steel was apparently back in charge. His breath might be coming in pants, but his head was clear enough to slow them down.
“If we don’t stop now, I won’t be able to hold back any longer, Sam. Much as I’d love to haul you upstairs and strip you down and play with this body all night long, Zach’s guy is going to interrupt us any minute. I gotta tell you, I can’t have any interruptions when I get you naked. I need time to learn every inch of your body, to make you scream and shake and come ‘til you think you might black out. Then, I need to bury myself to the hilt in you and not come up for days, Sam.”
She stopped breathing. No one had ever talked to her that way. He spoke as though he needed her like he needed food or water, and that was a turn on, in itself.
She suspected dirty talk also turned her on and couldn’t wait for more of that. More of him. She whimpered her need, and he let out a raspy huff of laughter, only for the sound of the doorbell to cut it off.
Logan lowered his forehead to hers. “I’ll be back soon. I want to pick up some cameras to set up in case we get any visitors, and a few more weapons. I only have my Glock with me. I promise, as soon as I get us set up to take care of you here, I’m gonna make good on all those promises.”
Sam nodded as Logan’s cell phone buzzed.
“Yeah?” Logan answered while taking the stairs two at a time to answer the door.
“Yup. Six three, dark hair, scar over his eye. Got it. Talk to you tomorrow.”
Sam heard the door open and voices as Logan and another man made their way up the stairs.
The other man was as tall as Logan, but leaner. He looked to be in top shape, though, and had the same look Logan had, as though he were utterly confident in his ability to take on any threat. A jagged scar marked one of his eyebrows, but it added to his edgy look rather than detracting from it.
“Sam, this is Jeff Carson. He works for Zach. He’s going to be outside tonight and then one of the other guys will take over in the morning.”
Sam reached her hand out and shook Jeff’s outstretched one.
“Ma’am,” Jeff said with a nod and what Sam assumed he thought was a smile. It wasn’t. But she didn’t get a creepy vibe from him. Just the feeling that he was someone used to working and not socializing. She was fine with that.
Logan turned to Jeff. “I’m going to run over to my place. It’s only a few minutes away so I’ll be back in a half hour, forty-fiv
e minutes, tops.”
Jeff nodded.
“Sam, would you like Jeff to wait in here with you or watch from outside?” Logan asked.
Sam didn’t feel overly anxious about things yet. She had a feeling this was still related to Sutton Capital and someone wanting intel on her work. She didn’t think whoever this was would be breaking down her door to harm her.
She had panic alarms in three places in her town house. She would feel perfectly safe with Jeff parked outside her town house until Logan returned. Since he was a total stranger to her, she liked the idea of him being outside better.
“I think outside is fine. I’ll be okay in here until you get back. I’ll probably just get in bed and read.” She smiled cheekily at Logan and saw the sharpness in his eyes as his glance hit her. Her mention of bed had had the desired effect.
“Fine,” Jeff said, with a nod.
Logan went to the desk in the corner of Sam’s living room and picked up the extra receiving unit for the panic alarms Zach had given her and tossed it to Jeff.
“She’s got a panic alarm on each floor. Hooked into police and to me.”
Jeff nodded and turned silently toward the stairs that led back downstairs.
Logan spun Sam’s head into a tizzy with one of his craze-inducing kisses before walking out the door with her promise to lock up and set the alarm behind him.
Chapter 13
Yoshi listened as one of the men he’d hired to watch Samantha Page delivered news he didn’t want to hear. “I think we’ve been made. There’ve been some intermittent outages on the bugs. Some of it could be normal interference. No bug is foolproof, but I’m fairly sure Stone just spotted us. He looks like he’s rallying more protection for her. They’ve got a man outside her house. Stone just left, but if you’re gonna want us to act, now is probably the best time.”
“Hold on,” Yoshi said, then held the phone away from his mouth and relayed the information he’d just been given to Diya.
