Fallen Dom

by Lexxi James

  “Turn around,” he said. “Slide off your pants. Slowly.”

  His instructions were precise, and her compliance was instant. Turning from him, she inched the fabric down her hips, letting her pajama bottoms pool at her feet. She felt the curves of her ass peek from below the flannel shirt. She swore she could feel the heat of his gaze on it.

  “Stay there,” he said low.

  She sucked in a shuddering breath, holding it as she waited.

  “Breathe, kitten.”

  Her exhale came out with a giggle. Being around Jake was the only time in her life she’d needed a constant reminder to simply breathe.

  The tinkling and swooshing noises of the cappuccino maker filled the air, along with the heavenly scent of java. There she stood, bare-assed, breathing, and filled with so much anticipation, she could burst at any moment.

  “Now, the top,” he said, still working the machine.

  She unbuttoned the flannel and dropped it to the floor. The whirring of the frother slowed. She waited patiently through the sweet torture.

  He didn’t touch her, but the heat of his body radiated. He was so close, she could practically taste him.

  “Do you like the way this feels? Waiting? Wondering what’s coming next?”

  “Yes.” Her reply was instantaneous.

  “Then make it last. Satisfying you is now my job. Your sweet hands and the showerhead are off-limits. Let me give you what you need.” From the base of her neck, his finger traced her spine, forcing a tender cry from her throat. “And you’ll tell me anything and everything you want. Share your fantasies. I want to know you, kitten. Discover you. Understand?”

  She could only nod.

  “Turn around, Kathryn.”

  Her nude body slowly pivoted back to him.

  Oh.

  My.

  God.

  Capturing her gasp in her hands, she drank in the buck-naked body of Jake Russo. Technically, she’d seen his body before. But not like this.

  Her thirsty gaze drank in his bold and beautiful flesh, taking a candy-land journey over his ripped and rugged body. She paid little attention to the scars she knew were from bullets. Her sights were set on the lick-worthy destination of his jutted howitzer, targeting her without mercy. She took an extra-long blink, closing her eyes to remind herself sternly, His eyes are up there!

  She opened them to find her mug of coffee held before her face, froth still intact.

  “I’ll take care of your clothes. Take as much or as little time as you want in the shower, and be ready to be thoroughly dazzled by my cooking.”

  His sugary-sweet smile sipped again from his own mug as his eyes peered over the rim, twinkling with dirty delight.

  Cupping her mug with both hands, she sashayed away.

  Gliding her feet along the floor was less for sex appeal and more as part of a silent prayer that she’d be able to make it across the room and up the stairs without toppling over or spilling a steaming-hot drop.

  Sixteen

  The shower stripped away Kathryn’s angst from before she arrived, but couldn’t wash away all her emotions. Despite the extra second her hand spent bathing the source of her throbbing desire, her tawdry little fingers tore away, refusing to finish the job.

  They know who’s in charge.

  Refocusing her interests, she was back to the same question nagging at her from the night before. Why was someone targeting her? Toying with her? Trying to scare her?

  She worked the shampoo into her hair. Forgetting about her still tender bump, she winced. Taking a deep breath, she resumed working the suds to a lather.

  Damn asshole. You can’t scare me. Just piss me off.

  In her prior life, she’d deployed in a battle rhythm of six months on, six months off for years. Her travel destinations included some of the most dangerous terrorist hot spots in the world.

  Danger never deterred her. The senseless loss of losing one life after the other did. But she’d be damned to have survived multiple combat deployments just to be killed in her own home by a psychopath.

  Whoever clubbed her might not have wanted her dead, but only because they didn’t know who they were dealing with. Kathryn was ready for a fight—to tackle the bastards head on.

  No more playing around. At least, not with a jackass who fights dirty.

  Recharged and ready to work, she rinsed off. Catching herself taking a little too long with the showerhead, she shut off the water and cracked a smile.

  I need to save the playing around for my dirty Dom.

  Strolling downstairs in jeans, a soft blue T-shirt, and a fuzzy oversized sweater, she breathed in the aroma of bacon and eggs, which whipped her into a whole new level of submission.

  Hot guy.

  Sizzling bacon.

  McMansion on a hill.

  Just slap my ass and call me kitten.

  She headed into the kitchen to find it empty.

  “Out here,” Jake called, his chipper tone ringing through.

  She followed his voice to a sunroom flooded with soft natural light, the result of floor-to-ceiling windows on three sides. The room overlooked the woodland terrain, a backdrop of mountains and trees with a small, winding trail that traveled next to a brook. Tall grasses waved with the breeze, and a variety of wildflowers burst throughout the landscape in clusters of purple, orange, and gold.

  Kathryn squealed at the sight of a red fox making its way across the wilderness that Jake called a back yard.

  He gestured to the redwood chair next to him at a glass-topped table. “Here, this is a great seat to take it all in.”

  Her butt hit the chair as she noticed the spread. The round table overflowed with enough food for a party of eight, and she smiled at him. “I hope you’re not challenging me to an eating competition, because I am hungry. And competitive.”

  He beamed back with a charming, devilish double-dare of a grin. “Tempting, but in all fairness, I’d need to work up your appetite more before an undertaking like that.”

  Deal.

  Kathryn grabbed a biscuit, but only picked at it as her mind took a turn toward work. “Look, I can’t even begin to tell you how much I lo—”

  His wide eyes met hers, stopping her mid-sentence—as if she was about to unleash the L-word.

  “Uh . . . how much I love this. All of it. Everything you’ve done for me.”

  “A but is coming. Hand it over.” He lowered the toast he held, forgoing a bite to give her his full attention.

  “But something serious is going down, and I need to get to work. I really need to find out what’s happening. As much as I’d like to spend the day—”

  The chimes of the doorbell made Jake pop to his feet. He lifted a piece of bacon just shy of her mouth. She looked up, her lips automatically opening to take the bacon in her teeth.

  “Hold that thought?” he asked, waiting for her nod before snatching a few strips for himself, chomping on them as he left the room.

  Within minutes, she heard footsteps drawing near with the rumble of several male voices, one of which she recognized.

  Surprised, she stood up as they entered. “Mr. Wolff?” She extended her hand, eager to shake that of her boss.

  He took her hand in both of his. “Seriously, Kathryn? It’s been three years. When are you going to start calling me Zach?”

  “Not anytime soon,” she told him as two other men strolled into the room.

  They all sat down. Her boss, and everyone else, passed the blueberry muffins and poured orange juice, making themselves so much at home, this couldn’t be the first time.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  Zach took a sip of orange juice and set down his glass. “Let’s just say that Jake and I team up every now and again. Remember the Hartford case last year? And the crazy tip that turned the tides and helped us close the case?”

  Her yes lifted out like a curious question. Jake raised his hand like a schoolboy, along with an irresistible eyebrow.

&
nbsp; “You got us that break?” Kathryn asked, beyond shocked as he handed her a plate of pastries. Perplexed, she took the fattest chocolate chip muffin calling her name and then passed the plate along.

  That investigation had stymied her for months, leading her down one messy, winding, dead-end path after another, as people in power tried to shut her down.

  The case had crossed five states, stumping everyone, including the Feds. But out of the blue, they’d caught a break—a trail of cyber footprints giftwrapped and hand-delivered to their doorstep. The evidence pointed straight to a corrupt politician. Without the tip, they’d still be scratching their heads over the tangled web.

  “Kathryn,” Jake said, “it wasn’t just me. Let me introduce you to some of my team, John Briscoe and Ben Edwards.”

  The two men waved at her across the pile of food, and Jake continued.

  “I brought everyone together because your instincts were right. I checked your laptop. It’s loaded with spyware and a keylogger. They’d wait until you logged in, then follow you around your system and record your every step. Not the highest technology on the market, but no cake walk for an amateur.”

  Ben cut in. “We'd like you to access your existing file. Run through your standard movements, but we’ll partition you off. Make sure you don’t go anywhere sensitive. We’ll guide you, because we’re laying a trap to see what this is really about.”

  “I can do that, but . . .” Kathryn threw a worried glance at Zach.

  “Speak your mind,” her boss told her. “In this group, we’ve got no secrets.”

  Jake coughed to cover a chuckle. She lightly kicked him under the table, then caught the look in his eyes. Dark, but playful. Apparently, she’d committed an act that was worthy of punishment. Finally. She smothered her excitement. In front of her boss, she kept her game face steady.

  “There is a case I’ve been working on lately, but I’m not sure I want to dig into it if someone’s tracking my online footsteps.”

  Jake jumped in. “Can you walk us through what you’ve got? We can probably tailor a snare that would work perfectly without compromising your case.”

  Seventeen

  Jake noticed everything about Kathryn. Her determination. Her sweetness. But he worried about her hesitation.

  She trusts us. So, why is she struggling?

  With a reassuring press to her shoulder, he asked, “What do you need?”

  The tight line of her mouth relaxed. “I . . . uh . . . do you all mind if I pace? It comes from years of being on my feet as a nurse. I do my best processing on the move.”

  No one seemed terribly concerned with the request. She smiled her thanks to Jake and stood, making slow strides back and forth across the length of the room.

  Before him, she transformed. Certain. Determined. Hardly the kitten begging for what he might bestow. This was the side of Kathryn Chase the world knew. The woman who had saved his life.

  I could watch her all day.

  As she continued to pace, his thoughts flashed to the memory of her bare skin. Her gorgeous body was branded on his mind.

  With every turn, the morning light pouring through the floor-to-ceiling windows reflected off her hair in strange and fascinating ways. It cast an almost strawberry-blonde coloring with one turn, then looked distinctly honey blond at the next. It perfectly mirrored the contrasts in her character, and the inseparable differences that defined her to the core.

  Wearing barely a trace of makeup, she was exposed. The other men at the table couldn’t take their eyes off the unmasked woman, but they’d never know the real her.

  The one who was his.

  “Anyway,” she said, working the puzzle aloud, “there are these three life insurance cases I’ve been checking for fraud. Different states. Different time frames. No connection whatsoever, except for three seemingly unrelated pieces. First, each case involved a service member who died in combat. Sadly, that’s not surprising in and of itself. Service members are put in hazardous situations . . . it goes hand in hand with being military. Second, all the service members were men, which again, is not surprising. Female populations in all branches of the military are less than twenty percent, except for the Air Force. So, that all three cases had male insureds may just be a result of probability. Finally, and the most disturbing piece of the puzzle, is that all of the service members were significantly overinsured.”

  Jake sat back in his chair. “What’s the significance of being overinsured?”

  Kathryn shared an unsettled glance with Zach, who answered for her.

  “Statistically speaking, overinsured people die quicker.”

  Silence settled in, seeming to weigh on them all.

  “But again,” Kathryn said, “in and of itself, maybe that’s not surprising. When service members deploy, they may want to take extra precautions. You know, just in case. All I really had was, well, a hunch. My research was starting to gain momentum when I was robbed. So, I’m at square one and a half. My laptop is monitored. My notepad’s in my car. It’ll take me days to recreate everything I have.”

  “Well,” her boss said with a small grin, “if you could try to call me Zach every once in a while, I might have a little something awesome for you. I’ll get your new laptop. It’s in the car.”

  “Thank you, Zach,” she said with an extra helping of sweetness, and he left the room.

  Ben set down his coffee to ask a question. “Kathryn, did you talk about the cases with anyone? Anyone at all?”

  Jake nodded to himself, suppressing his smile. Ben is the best. Waiting until Zach left before tossing her a hard-hitting question without throwing her under the bus. That man’s getting a bonus.

  But as she’d confided to Jake, Kathryn was adamant that this, like her other investigations, was completely under wraps.

  Ben followed his question with another standard query. “What about someone you might have needed information from?”

  Her eyes widened, and she nodded slowly. “Yes. There were a few, actually. I try to stay vague with my questions, and normally I keep from mentioning my company, but I have to disclose my identity when dealing with anyone official. Or with the military.”

  Jake watched, frowning as her brows knitted. After everything she’d been through, this was the first time he’d really seen her worried.

  She glanced around the table with a slightly sheepish look. “I contacted three separate UMOs.”

  “What’s a UMO?” Ben asked as Zach returned with the laptop.

  Zach jumped in to answer that one. “That’s a Unit Movement Officer, the poor SOB who decides who’s going on what deployment. A UMO will manage everything from who, when, how long . . . all that good stuff. Why?”

  Jake took Kathryn’s hand and squeezed. “Give us the names of the people you reached out to. We’ll see who might have been in the area.”

  Kathryn stayed cautious. “But that still doesn’t exactly connect the dots. I mean, so people are getting big insurance policies just before they deploy? That’s not a crime. And somehow, a UMO, or more than one, are involved. It’s not just hard to believe they’d somehow be tied together, but there’s also a question of motive. Why? They’re not the beneficiary.”

  “Well,” Jake said, “the first step happens to be our specialty. Our boss, Mark Donovan, built Excelsior/Centurion to be the best of the best at what we affectionately call step one.”

  Jake glanced at his teammates, and they chanted in unison, “Follow the money.”

  Eighteen

  Jake’s home became an operations center, with the team expanding when three more men arrived. Everyone made themselves at home. Even her.

  At the end of each day, Jake’s kisses sent quakes straight to her core. But not much more happened than that. Was he giving her space to recover? Or keeping the focus on work?

  He can’t possibly think I’m holding on to that ridiculous hard limit. Perhaps a casual sub-to-Dom talk is in order when he has time for a break.

  Kathr
yn worked casually from the kitchen bar. No matter how dedicated these guys were, two destinations were inevitable: the bathroom and the kitchen.

  Camping outside the bathroom might get her slapped with an ad hoc restraining order. But the kitchen was fair game. And one of her favorite places in any house.

  The social butterfly side of her got the rare privilege of chatting it up with some of the finest minds in information technology. These guys were goofy and funny, bashful and brilliant. Lucky for her, a few of the guys seemed just as starved as she was for the day-to-day human contact that was missing in the isolated world of teleworking.

  I miss this. Being part of a team.

  The only man she hadn’t seen so far had been Jake. Most days he’d have taken a few breaks by now. But the lack of Russo sightings piqued her curiosity. Her legs were begging for a stretch, and no better time than the present.

  Moseying throughout the various offices and rooms on the first floor came up Jake-less. She skipped up the stairs, finding him in the hall, dressed down more than usual in sweatpants, a T-shirt, and running shoes.

  “Heading to the gym?” she asked.

  He swept his hand around the small of her back, pulling her in for a warm kiss. “Just want to get a quick run before the sun goes down. I need to clear my head.”

  His subtle thumb strokes along her spine were enticement enough for her body to press against him harder. Her eyes closed as another kiss descended on her lips.

  “Hey,” he murmured against her mouth, “do you run?”

  Kathryn was a decent endurance runner. But as their feet pounded along the dirt trail that wrapped through the woods on his property, she could hear the obvious difference in their steps. “You don’t have to do that,” she panted out as she wiped sweat from her brow.

  “Do what?” he said with a chuckle.

  “It’s like you’re a cheetah pacing itself with a gimpy zebra. Seriously, I’d love to see you take off.”