I Belong to You

by Lisa Renee Jones

  Royce passes the photo to Luke, who looks at it and sets it down. “When was this taken?”

  “A few days ago, in Texas. And now that Corey claims Ava is here, we have to assume the man in the photo is here as well. And Wright is not a man to be taken lightly.” I hand a file to Royce. “His detailed history is inside, but I’ll summarize. Killed his own mercenary team. Hired assassin. Coldblooded killer. Like I said: He costs money.”

  “Ricco—and now Ryan, it seems—fit that profile,” Royce says.

  “Once Ricco found out Ava killed Rebecca, he would have had Ava killed. I can’t believe he’s behind this while she’s still alive.”

  “Or,” Blake says, “Ava seduced Wright and she’s pulling his strings.”

  I considered that,” I reply, “but my hunter says Wright is missing an emotional chip. He’d fuck her and slice her throat in the same ten minutes.”

  “Then we get Ryan off the streets,” Luke says, “and we get him to call off Wright.”

  “Houston, we have a serious problem,” Jacob says, holding up the photo. “Remember I told you that Crystal had an incident with a man on the street?” He holds up the picture. “She said he had a big scar on his cheek—like Wright.”

  My blood runs cold and I dial Crystal. “I need you in the conference room immediately.” I end the call and glance around the room. “She will be protected. You know Ava and Wright are in town. We can’t be sure Ryan will confess or call Wright off, especially if he was prepaid to do something. Find them.”

  Luke shifts in his chair. “If there’s anything the Walker men understand, it’s protecting our women. We’ll protect her.”

  “Yes,” Royce agrees. “We’ll do whatever it takes to keep her safe.”

  “Can we talk to this ‘hunter’ ourselves to speed this process up?” Blake asks. “If he’s got connections we don’t, we need to be working with him.”

  “Right now,” I reply, “I find dividing my resources creates peace of mind. I need you to do what you do, and he’ll keep doing what he does. If he gets a lead, I’ll pass it on.”

  A knock sounds on the door and Crystal enters, pausing as everyone turns their eyes on her. “Why do I know this is bad news?” she asks, shutting the door behind her.

  I stand up and motion for her to join me. The mask of indifference I wear like a second skin doesn’t fool her; the instant my eyes meet hers, she pales and closes the distance between us. “What’s happened?”

  “We need you to look at a photo and see if it’s familiar.” I indicate my chair.

  Her brow furrows but she sits, and I kneel beside her and open the folder to a large picture of Wright.

  She stares down at it for a moment. “Who is this?” she asks me.

  “Do you know him?”

  “Yes.” She glances at Jacob and back at me. “He’s the man I saw outside Riptide when I was with Jacob.”

  Twenty-one

  Crystal . . .

  I turn over the photo of the man with the scar, and shiver. There’s something about him that spooks me, and I don’t get spooked. “Who is he?” I repeat.

  “Everyone out,” Mark orders, pushing to his feet.

  The entire room is standing in a blink, making tracks for the door, but Royce lingers. “I’ll call you after that situation is handled.”

  Mark gives him a nod. “The sooner, the better.”

  “Agreed.”

  By the time he’s followed the rest of the men into the hallway and shut the door, I’m on my feet, too.

  “Tell me what’s going on.”

  “The man in the photo is a high-dollar mercenary who’s traveling with Ava. We don’t think he’s working for her. We think he was hired by someone with deep pockets.”

  “What exactly does a mercenary do? Did he help her escape?”

  “This one is a high-paid assassin. Killing people is what he excels at, and someone with a lot of money obviously contracted him.”

  I lean against the conference table. “Oh God. He was in my face, standing right here.” I hold my hand an inch from my face. “Right here, Mark.”

  I welcome the way his big body frames mine, his hands on my shoulders, steadying me. “Ryan is being arrested on money laundering charges, and we think he’s behind this. That gets him off the street.”

  “It doesn’t get that monster off the street, or Ava.”

  Mark cups my cheeks. “I need you to go to Paris until we catch this guy.”

  “I’m not going to Paris.” I pull his hands from my face and try to push away from him, but he doesn’t budge. “Don’t do this now, Mark. This is one of those rare times I can feel trapped very easily.”

  He instantly steps back and I dart away.

  “I’ve been fine through all of this. Completely fine, but what if that man comes after my family? I have to warn them. I have to go see my father today.”

  “We’ll go see him together.”

  “No, we won’t. He’ll hate you before you ever have the chance to defend yourself. I need to see him myself. I need to call him and figure out when we can meet.” I press my hand to my forehead. “I don’t even want to go to his house tomorrow night. That’s going to bring attention to my family, but he’s going to insist.” I shake my head. “I can’t go see him. That’s not safe. I have to call him.”

  “If I could turn back time and make this go differently, I would.”

  The rough quality of his voice stills me, and I meet his eyes. “I know. This isn’t your fault.” I wrap my arms around him, inhaling that wonderful, masculine scent of him that somehow soothes my frazzled nerves. “I just can’t lose my family.” I step back and draw in a calming breath. “I need to make the call here. I have two employees in my office going over paperwork.”

  He kisses my forehead. “I’ll shut the door on my way out.”

  I walk to the opposite end of the long table, where a phone sits, and dial my father’s cell number.

  He answers in two rings. “Well, hello, honey. Since my caller ID says you’re calling me from work, I assume you haven’t decided to slow down.”

  “I’ll take time off when you take time off.”

  “That’s not the answer I wanted to hear.”

  “I have a huge auction next weekend.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  I frown at the phone. “What makes you say something is wrong?”

  “I know you. It’s in your voice.”

  I dive right in. “You know that the woman who killed Rebecca is on the run, but now it seems she’s teamed up with some sort of mercenary. He . . . I had a brush with him a few days ago. Outside the gallery. He came right up to me and smiled, and then just walked away. I didn’t know who he was then, but—”

  “You’re quitting. Right now. We’ll get you out of the country.”

  “You’d clearly get along well with Mark. He wants to send me to Paris.”

  “That SOB is why you’re in trouble. He’s not sending you anywhere.”

  “This isn’t his fault, Dad. You know that. You’re being protective and I appreciate that, but—”

  “You’re quitting, Crystal.”

  “No, I’m not. It solves nothing. Dad, I’m in love with Mark, and if the plan is to hurt him, I’ll still be a target anywhere I go.”

  He’s silent for several heavy beats. “You love him.”

  I think of the way he sat down on the floor with me, the way he tried to get me to read Rebecca’s journals to bare all to me, and my answer is easy. “Yes. I love him.”

  “You’ve never said that about a man before.”

  “I’ve never felt it before.” Then I laugh. “And he can pay his own bills.”

  He doesn’t laugh. “I want to meet him. Bring him tomorrow night.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t come. I don’t want to bring attention to you.”

  “You’re coming, and you’re bringing Mark Compton. I have plenty of security. I’m going to send someone over to you.”

  �
�I have security people all around me, Dad. Mark won’t let me breathe without someone supervising.”

  “Who’s handling the security procedures?”

  “Walker Security.”

  “I’ve heard of Walker. I’ll be checking them out quite thoroughly.”

  We chat for a few more minutes and end the call. I was wrong when I said Mark and I were two bulls after the same red flag. He and my father have become the two bulls, and I’m the red flag.

  I exit the conference room to find Mark leaning against the wall, and I walk over to him. “He wants us to come tomorrow night. It’s not going to be an easy meeting.”

  He wraps his arm around me and holds me close. “I can handle it. Royce called. They used Ryan’s credit card to track him to his hotel.”

  “Can they legally do that?”

  “I really don’t care. He was at the Omni hotel, a few blocks from here.”

  “Where you were staying before you moved in with me?”

  “He knew it was my place of choice. Royce pulled strings to pick him up for questioning about Corey. They’ll build the case for the money laundering while he’s there.”

  “Good. No word on Ava or the mercenary?”

  “Wright is his name, and no. No word on either of them, but we have a lot of people working on this. Now that Ryan is being arrested, we suspect the police will be brought in on the entire plot.”

  “Which is what?”

  “Hurting me. And I can only assume that’s because I applied pressure to expose Ryan as being involved in Rebecca’s death. I think we should go home and stay in tonight. I’m telling my father I need to stay away from NYU until this is over.” He strokes my hair. “Ryan’s in custody. They’re going to make him talk.”

  His voice is strong and confident, but I sense his unease. I know he’s worried there’s a whole lot more trouble headed our way.

  * * *

  Much later in the evening, Mark and I have eaten the sandwiches we picked up on the way to the apartment and managed to end up naked in the bedroom, where he is tender and loving and . . . vanilla.

  By the time we’re headed to vanilla event number three, my fear is confirmed. Because of who he decided I was last night, he can’t be himself, and we can’t be the us that we were becoming. Frustrated, even hurt by the way the past is invading my future, I shove him to his back and straddle him. “I wish I’d never told you about my claustrophobia. Stop treating me like I’m breakable.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  I let out a growl. “You don’t wear naïveté any better than you do vanilla. Either fuck me like Mr. Compton, or don’t fuck me at all.” I climb off him and scramble across the bed, barely managing to escape his reach.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” he calls out as I dart away.

  “To take a bubble bath. It’s what we delicate girls do.” I try to slam the bathroom door but he’s there in a blink, catching it before it shuts. “This is why I don’t tell people I’m claustrophobic, or that I was a foster kid, Mark. They feel sorry for me, or like you, they think I’m fragile.”

  “You think that I think you’re fragile?” He sets me on the bathroom counter. “You want to be pushed, I’ll happily push you, sweetheart. I was just letting your pretty pink backside recover.” He steps back and leans on the wall, his shaft thick, his eyes hot with challenge. “Touch yourself. I want to see you make yourself come.”

  My bravado fades instantly and I feel the blood leave my face. Mark closes the gap between us, grasping the counter on either side of my hips. “Remember what I said, Ms. Smith. I say. You do.”

  “Yes, but I’ve never . . . Not for someone else.”

  “Because delicate girls never do.”

  Before I can make a smart remark, he takes my hand and presses it between my thighs, using my fingers to explore the swollen, slick seam of my body. The effect is pure erotic thrill, proof that his skills at seduction and control are revved to full throttle. And he’s not done.

  Claiming my free hand, he molds it to my breast, kneading and stroking my nipple. The double assault of pleasure has me on sensory overload, and my lashes lower with the impact. “No,” he orders roughly. “Eyes open. I want to see you, and you to see me.”

  My eyes snap open, and he wastes no time pushing for another reaction. He, we, stroke deeper into the slick heat of my sex, pressing two of my fingers inside my body. I gasp, and not just from the nerve endings we awaken. From the intensely intimate experience of touching myself with him. But even more so, it’s the possessive demand in his eyes that says if he wants to own me, he can and will. Pleasure blossoms, thick and sweet, a burn in my belly, a tingling sensation in my nipples. Inhibitions fade, and when his hands leave my hands, settling on my knees, I continue to touch myself, letting him watch. Letting myself go where I would go if I were alone. And I like the tension in his body, the hunger in his expression, that says maybe, just maybe, I own him, too. He leans in and kisses my neck, trailing his lips downward, until he’s licking my fingers where they cover my breast, his teeth scraping the nipple. It pushes me over the edge and into orgasm with barely a warning; I stiffen as my body clenches and spills over into spasms.

  Mark doesn’t give me time to revel in the sensations, lifting me and setting me on the floor, then turning me to face the mirror. A few strokes of his fingers between my thighs follow, quickly replaced by the hard drive of his cock stretching me, pleasing me. The thick pulse of his shaft presses to the deepest parts of my sex, creating a fierce physical need. Everything about him makes me need. And need more.

  My head drops forward and his fingers instantly twine into my hair, pulling my head up. “Look at me,” he tells me, thrusting harder, deeper, as if punishing me, the movement an erotic tug on my scalp. I can hear my own panting, the raspy, urgent whimpers I make. And that mirror is a window to his need, his passion and demand. Seeing this, knowing I’ve created it, sends me over the edge. Without warning, no chance to delay and savor our shared pleasure, my sex spasms and my eyes close. But this time, Mark doesn’t seem to notice. As I am lost in my release his hands leave my hair, bracing against my hips for a fierce, final thrust.

  I’m in the aftermath of the desire-filled escape that he so easily creates, my knees weak. I’m about to collapse when Mark catches me, steadying me. Once I’m steady he pulls out of me, leaving me gasping with the suddenness of the action. The sticky, wet proof of our intimacy is instant, and I grab the towel on the sink.

  Mark’s eyes meet mine in the mirror. “Still feel delicate?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Are you sure? Because—”

  “I’m sure.” I turn in his arms and wrap mine around his neck. “I need to know you can handle my past, and not do what you did tonight.”

  “I can handle anything you need me to handle.”

  My past simmers on my tongue, but I contain it, still uncertain of its release after the reserve he showed tonight.

  He is a Master. It’s still a part of him, no matter how he’s softened.

  Twenty-two

  Crystal . . .

  Sunday morning begins with Mark receiving a million phone calls. I hop into the shower to get ready for my spa day with Dana. By the time he heads to the bathroom, I’ve showered and dressed in dark navy jeans, a “Pink” brand T-shirt, and pink Keds.

  I’m in the kitchen, coffee cup in hand and wondering about Wright, when Mark walks in and proves he does faded jeans and a navy blue Ralph Lauren shirt as sexily as he does suits. “I’m coming with you to my parents’ house,” he announces.

  I crinkle my nose. “You want to be at our spa day? You realize it’s hair color and nails and other girly stuff, right?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it,” he confirms, walking to the cabinet for a cup.

  I watch as he fills it. “You were on the phone a long time.”

  “I wanted to get everything out of the way before we’re with my mother. To summarize: Wright
is already on the FBI’s wanted list, but they’ve now issued a bulletin that he’s potentially been spotted with Ava, who is also on the list.”

  I inhale and let it out. “But no news on where they’re at.”

  He gives a grim shake of his head. “No news.”

  I nod, and hyperfocus on refilling my cup to keep my mind from going crazy, thinking about how Wright scares me. “What about that detective who tried to ambush you at NYU? Has he backed off, now that Wright is in the picture?”

  “My attorney is in Long Island dealing with him, but no. He thinks I created the story to get attention off me.”

  I set my cup down, indignant for him. “He can’t be serious.”

  “I wish he wasn’t.”

  “So now what?”

  “Royce wants to talk to your father’s security people.”

  I feel the blood drain from my face. “Why?”

  “He’s just trying to make sure everyone is on the same page and safe. Can you call your father and arrange it?”

  I grab my phone from the counter. “Yes.” The knot in my stomach seems to be growing by the second. This hired professional killer, who has me, and the people I love, on his radar, terrifies me.

  * * *

  Hours after arriving at his parents’ place, I’ve managed to set everything aside and laugh with Dana and Mark. Dana’s hair is colored, mine is cut, and both of us have manicures. By the time the stylist has left, Dana is smiling but worn-out. With plenty of time left before our evening dinner with my family, Mark and I settle on either side of Dana on the bed to watch television. When she flips the channel to the movie Message in a Bottle, Mark grumbles, but he endures. It’s charming, sweet, and sexy, and I wonder how he managed to keep this part of him alive, when he’d wrapped himself in hard control for so many years.

  It’s a good day that’s made even better when Asher, the tattooed employee of Walker Security I’d met a couple of days before, drops by to let us know he’s located the press leak in the building. Turns out it’s the mailman, who has been “dealt with.” We cling to the small piece of good news as if it’s a big breakthrough.