She swallowed hard, took a drink of her now-watery margarita. She thought about lying. About insisting that of course they were friends. They were only friends. Had only ever been friends.
But she didn’t want to do that. Didn’t want to lie or hide anymore. Not when the clock was ticking on their time together.
“I don’t know,” she admitted.
His nod was slow, but when he spoke, it wasn’t about what was between them.
“I think all the work I’ve been doing the past couple years messed with my head,” he said.
“Go on.”
He drew in a breath, shook his head. “I’m not sure we’re doing any good out there.”
She wasn’t surprised by the statement. Didn’t she sometimes feel the same way? Didn’t they all? It went with the territory. They tried, but they were limited by laws and statutes, by mistakes that were sometimes made because when it came right down to it, they were only human.
She could have reassured him. Could have insisted they did make a difference. Could have given him the same pep talk she gave herself when she started to doubt the work they did.
But that’s not what he needed from her, and it would be a disservice to their friendship, or whatever it was that was between them.
“I know what you mean,” she finally said.
He looked surprised. “You do?”
“Of course. I mean, we worked for nine months on the Kalashnik raid, and it all went to hell in seconds. Who knows if we’ll get another chance at him.”
“So why do we do it?”
She thought about it, wanting to be honest. To give him the answer he deserved. “What’s the alternative?” she finally asked. “Do nothing?”
He opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it again. “I don’t know.”
She took a breath, then another drink of her margarita. “What will you do now?” She tried to keep her voice steady. Tried not to betray her fear that they had wasted too much time. That he would leave her behind and whatever was between them would be a question she would never get to answer.
He turned his glass between his fingers. “I might have some work in La Jolla actually.”
“La Jolla?” La Jolla was nearly two hours south of L.A. So it was true. He was leaving. “What kind of work?”
He took a bite of his food and she had the feeling he was stalling. She wondered if he had a woman there. If this was the moment he would tell her he was engaged or moving in with some beach bunny who smelled like coconut and wore frosted lip gloss.
He wiped his mouth with his napkin, and her eyes lingered there, wondering what it would be like to feel his lips on hers.
“Research, private investigation, that kind of thing,” he said. “Something to pay the bills until I figure out a long-term plan.”
She studied him, trying to shake the feeling that he wasn’t telling her the whole story. Maybe there was a beach bunny and he just didn’t want to hurt her feelings.
“So you’ll be moving?” she asked, trying to keep the disappointment from her voice.
“Not officially,” he said. “I think I have a place I can crash when I’m there until I figure it out. But I’ll keep my place here for now.”
“That’s good.”
A slow smile crept to his lips. “Are you saying you’d miss me, Nora?”
It wasn’t the only time he’d used her first name, but there was something different in it now. Something intimate. It made her feel like he was really seeing her. Like maybe he’d been seeing her all along.
Now or never.
Everything you need to know is right in front of you.
She met his eyes. “Yes.”
He reached across the table, his fingers sliding between her own, his skin warm and dry. Time seemed to stop, the movements of everyone around them slowing to a snail’s pace. She had to work to keep breathing. Had to remember to take in the breath, let it out again.
He looked around for their waiter, then lifted a hand for the check before returning his eyes to hers. “Let’s get out of here.”
9
They parked the car on the street and headed for Nora’s building. She was on her way to the stairs when he grabbed her hand. It was instinctual, his desire to keep her with him elemental.
“Let’s walk.”
It wasn’t the voice he would use with a coworker. Not the courteous suggestion he would have issued asking if she wanted to grab lunch or if she had the files from a case they were working together.
This was something else. He heard it in his own voice.
Felt it in his bones.
She nodded, let him lead her to the little walk street leading to the beach. It was dark, the street lamps casting orbs of light onto the concrete. The water was all sound from the street. The crash of the waves breaking, the gentle rush of water onto the sand filling his ears even as it hid in the darkness beyond the beach.
Or was that the rush of blood in his veins? The pounding of his heart and the need that flooded his body at the softness of her skin against his?
It was hard to tell.
She was so lovely, both delicate and strong, although she wouldn’t like anyone to think she was fragile. That was something he knew about her, something he admired; she valued strength. In herself and others. It stood in contrast to the porcelain skin, the fine features that might have belonged to a Scandinavian princess, the curves that somehow managed to convey her strength while also making him want to take her to bed. To feel her strong thighs wrapped around him while he drove into her.
He shifted a little while he walked, trying to tamp down the hard-on that had been taunting him most of the night. It hadn’t been easy watching her across the candlelit table, seeing her in the dress that was so different from the stuff she wore to work, knowing he was just a few tiny buttons away from her naked skin.
The biggest barrier between them had fallen, but there would be others and he had to resist the urge to barrel into the window of opportunity.
She deserved better than that.
Besides, he’d promised himself he would be smart. That he would wait until after his meeting tomorrow before deciding what to do about Nora.
It had made a lot more sense when he’d been alone. Now that she was walking next to him, her hair lifting in the ocean breeze, her body only inches from his, he didn’t give a damn about anything but her and the possibilities that were momentarily wide open between them.
He stopped at the end of the walk street and pulled off his jacket, stepping behind her and setting the blazer gently on her shoulders. His face was so close to her hair that he smelled her shampoo. It was earthy, musky. It made him want to run his fingers through her hair, see it falling across her bare shoulders.
“Thank you.” Her voice was low and a little ragged.
His cock lurched to attention again and he stepped away, took her hand and led her across the Strand.
“Shoes off?” he asked when they stepped onto the sand.
She nodded, and they stopped at the knee wall. She was trying to balance on one foot when he knelt at her feet.
He placed a hand on one of her shapely calves. “Hold onto me and lift.”
The command was full of innuendo and he had a flash of her body, naked under his, her hands on his back as she lifted her hips to meet him.
She placed her hands on his shoulders and lifted her leg, let him slip off the heel. When she set her bare foot into the sand, the pale pink polish on her toenails shimmered in the light from the street lamps.
Nora Murphy, he thought. Not just one of the guys after all.
It didn’t surprise him — but it did make him wonder what else she was hiding.
He removed the second shoe. “Good?” he asked.
She nodded, and he had to force himself to his feet. Had to force himself not to slide his hands up her bare calves. To bury his face in the mound between her legs.
Goddamn it.
He got to his fe
et with difficulty, thankful for the darkness illuminated occasionally by the street lights, hoping she couldn’t see his arousal.
He took her hand and they made their way toward the water. It was the first silence between them that had ever been uncomfortable. They’d been alone more times then he could count, but there had always been work: cases and evidence and coworkers and office politics to fill the void.
They didn’t have that as a fallback now, and euphoria warred with uncertainty inside him. He felt liberated.
Free.
But another part of his mind screamed danger.
They passed through the light and into the darkness near the water, then turned toward Manhattan Beach. She squealed a little when the water rushed up over her feet.
The sound of her laughter was somehow both childish and sexy. “Cold?”
She looked up at him with a smile and her expression was transformed. Maybe it was just the water, the visceral shock of the cold, but her face looked naked, the mask she wore at work folded up and set aside.
“Aren’t you going to take off your shoes?” she asked.
He lifted his hand, holding her heels. “Then I won’t be able to hold your hand.”
She laughed. “I can carry my own shoes!”
“I’m good,” he said.
“Don’t you want to put your feet in?” she asked.
He looked down at her, his smile spreading all the way from his heart up to his lips. “Truthfully?”
She nodded.
“I’d rather hold your hand.” He hesitated, holding her gaze as years of unspoken feelings fought to make themselves known. “I think I’ve been waiting years to hold your hand.”
“I’ve been waiting, too.”
He dropped her shoes in the sand and lifted his hands to her face. There was a distant voice urging him to be careful. To take it slow. To wait and see what came of his meeting in La Jolla tomorrow.
But that voice was no match for the one telling him he was finally home.
“Nora…” He slipped his hands into the hair at the back of her head, savored the feel of the silken strands between his fingers. “Do you know what it’s like to be so close to something so beautiful and have to pretend it’s nothing?”
She nodded, bit her lower lip. “Yes,” she said. “I do.”
There was a split second when the waves were silent, the wind still. There was only her. Only her face in his hands, her eyes a pool of blue fire, her lips full and parted. Waiting.
For him.
Then his mouth was on hers, his lips sinking into the pillowy softness of her. He held still at first, wanting to remember the arch of her neck in his hands, the exhale of her breath breathing life into his long-dead soul. A moment later she opened to him and there was no room for coherent thought. There was only the exploration of her satiny mouth as her tongue parried with his, every moment a burst of new sensation.
Not because he hadn’t been with many women. On the contrary; he’d kissed more women than he could count.
But not like this. Never like this.
His body flooded with desire so powerful it swarmed his mind like a shot of pure adrenaline. He was on fire for her, barely able to drag the breath in and out of his lungs as his cock strained against his pants.
But it wasn’t just that he wanted to fuck her senseless. It was a feeling of completion, like the perfect click of a final puzzle piece. It was one he hadn’t known he’d been missing, but now that she was here in his arms, he knew the picture of his life would never have been complete without her.
He angled her head and took their kiss deeper, sweeping her mouth slowly, relishing every inch of sweet warmth. She tasted like wine and strawberries, like the sea and the wind.
Her arms came around him and he pulled her closer, pressing her against his body, her exquisite softness molding to the hard planes of his body, filling all the empty places he hadn't known existed.
He meant to take it easy. To take it slow. Both admirable notions that were thrown to the wind when she sighed into his mouth, pressed closer against him, her breasts crushed against his chest.
Then there was no more caution. Only his hands on her body, mapping the fullness of her breasts, the taper of her waist, the swell of her hips, painfully close under the thin fabric of her dress. He was aching to strip her bare. To learn her body in the moonlight and make her his.
“Braden…” she gasped, pulling away, then coming back in to kiss him again. “Can we…”
He pulled back, looked into her eyes.
“Can we take this slow?” she asked.
He held her face between his hands. “We can do anything you want, Nora.”
Her smile was so pure and so true it almost brought him to his knees. “It’s not that I don’t want to…” She laughed, the hidden meaning in it setting his blood on fire all over again. “I want to.”
He looked into her eyes. “Looking at you is all I need.”
“You’ve been looking at me a long time, Kane. You’re not sick of me yet?”
“I’m just getting started.” It came out more intense than he’d intended, all his pent-up feelings spilling over into his words.
“Sounds intriguing,” she said.
“I’m nothing if not intriguing.” He tucked a piece of hair behind her ear, bent his head, kissed her softly. “Now let’s get you home before my ungentlemanly instincts take over again.”
He took her hand and felt like he was holding the moon.
10
Nora was sitting at her desk, replaying the night before in every glorious detail, when Kowalski stopped in front of her.
“Alvarez wants you.”
She looked up. “Now?”
“Yep. You and Shields.”
“What’s up?” she asked.
“Don’t ask me,” Kowalski said. “I’m just the messenger.”
She got up and headed for Alvarez’s office. Walking past Braden’s desk took her back to their moment on the beach, the feel of his hands holding her face like it was something precious, his lips every bit as intoxicating as she’d imagined they would be, his body hard and…
“You know what this is about?”
She looked up to find Mike walking next to her and forced herself to tamp down the flush spreading through her body at the memory of the man who had dominated her thoughts since they parted at her door twelve hours before.
“Not a clue,” she said. “You?”
“Nope.”
They reached Alvarez’s door at the same time. Shields waited as she passed through the doorway.
“Murphy, Shields, shut the door.” Alvarez stood behind his desk, the L.A. skyline smudged with smog through the window behind him.
Mike closed the door.
“Sit,” Alvarez commanded.
He was slender and calculating, not at all her type, but it was disconcerting to see him in what looked like a custom suit after years of seeing him in jeans and Tac gear. Nora had to admit that he looked sharp.
They sat in the chairs across from his desk.
“I have a new case for you,” he said.
“What about Kalashnik?” Nora asked.
He waved off the question. “It’s in the tank after yesterday.”
“It’s not salvageable?” she asked. “I mean, I know it didn’t go down the way it was supposed to, but we still have the customs records and — ”
He held up a hand to stop her. “It’s done. For now at least.”
She nodded, breathing through her frustration. It’s not like it was the first time a case had been sidelined.
“What’s up?” Shields asked.
“We’ve got a string of crimes in San Diego County,” he said, pulling a file from his desk. “Mostly thefts, a few B-and-Es, couple cyber attacks that look related.”
“Shouldn’t that go to the San Diego field office?” Nora asked.
“They’re understaffed,” Alvarez said. “And a couple of the crimes were just over the
line in our territory. It was kicked over the fence to us.”
“Still doesn’t sound like our jurisdiction,” Nora said. Thefts and break-ins were usually the dominion of local police, and Cyber Crimes had its own unit.
“You’ll understand when you look at the file,” Alvarez said, “but the short version is that the crimes are purposeful and highly coordinated.”
“Aren’t all crimes purposeful?” Mike asked.
Alvarez scowled at him. “Don’t be a smartass.”
Nora cringed. Alvarez had only recently been promoted to SAC. Of course, he’d outranked them before that, but not enough to make it weird. Now it was a little weird. Alvarez was obviously looking to prove himself. Challenging his authority was the wrong move. Then again, it wouldn’t be the first time Mike’s ego was a detriment.
“The file will clear things up,” Alvarez said. “We need to find out who these guys are and what they’re doing. It was all fun and games until last month when a guard was shot at the First National in San Diego. He survived, but they’re getting a little big for their britches, pulling some crazy shit.”
“Like what?” Nora asked, taking the file as he held it out.
“Like ditching a getaway car for a new one while in motion.”
“Wait a minute,” Mike said. “They got into a new getaway car while the old one was moving? What did they do with the first one?”
“Let it run off the road,” Alvarez said. “Up a curb and into a Jiffy Lube.”
“Didn’t we get a plate on the new car?” Nora asked. “If law enforcement was in pursuit at the time — ?”
“It wasn’t,” Alvarez said. “Witnesses saw it. The car had no plates, which means they probably ditched that one later, too.”
“If no one was in pursuit, why bother with the stunt?” Mike asked. “Might as well just pull into a quiet alley and switch cars.”
“Because they’re crazy,” Alvarez said. “They’ve pulled all kinds of shit — led a pursuit with the Coast Guard off Huntington and disappeared with dive gear, even base jumped off One America after they robbed a nearby jewelry store and were chased onto the roof.”
Rogue Love (Kings of Corruption Book 1) Page 4
