by I. T. Lucas
Then again, it was precisely where Ana wanted to be, and she wouldn’t even have to act seductive.
All she needed to do was play along.
“How many languages do you speak?”
Leon closed his eyes for a moment. “I’m fluent in eight, I can have a coherent conversation in another twenty-two, and I can understand most of the rest.”
That wasn’t humanly possible. Was he lying to impress her?
But why would he need to? She was already impressed enough.
“Even Chinese?”
“I’m not fluent in Mandarin, but I can get by, and my Cantonese is not great either. There are some other Chinese dialects that I can understand but not speak.”
The guy must be showing off because that was impossible. That was why he’d checked with her what languages she knew. She wouldn’t be able to call his bluff.
Not that she would have done it even if she could. There had been enough of that last night, and she’d almost blown her chances with him.
“That’s very impressive. How come you know so many?”
He rubbed his neck again, and she wondered whether it was a nervous tick that gave him away when he lied.
“During my time in the service, I was stationed in many places, and learning new languages comes easily to me.”
“Evidently.” Hiding her doubtful expression, Ana dipped her head and took a sip from her coffee.
“So, are you going to stay?”
“Yeah, I think I will.” She pretended nonchalance. “What time is it?”
“Five minutes after midnight. Do you need to get up early tomorrow for work?”
“I get Mondays off.”
Ana had workshops in the afternoon that she needed to attend, but she would be long gone by then. Sam had classes in the morning, but even if he didn’t, she doubted he would want her to stay and cuddle.
“Good.” He put his hands on his thighs. “Then you can sleep over.”
She looked down at her sweater and leggings. “Can I borrow a T-shirt to sleep in? I won’t be able to get comfortable with these clothes on.”
Ana was proud of herself for coming up with the excuse. Her legs were one of her best assets, and they would look awesome from under Sam’s T-shirt.
“Sure.” He rose to his feet, opened one of the dresser drawers, and pulled out a perfectly folded T-shirt. “Here you go.”
“Thanks.” Holding it, she resisted the urge to bring it to her nose for a sniff.
Even though it had been laundered, Sam’s scent might linger on the fabric.
“You can change in the bathroom.”
“Yeah. I should.” Holding the shirt, she pushed to her feet, cast Sam a tentative smile, and ducked into the bathroom.
Thankfully, the T-shirt wasn’t white, but the light gray color and the thin material did nothing to hide her stiff nipples.
From the moment she’d decided that tonight was going to be a date and not just a platonic meeting, her breasts had started to feel heavy, and her nipples ached. Perhaps it would have been a good idea to take the edge off with her own fingers before coming over, but Ana had a feeling that it wouldn’t have helped.
She couldn’t remember ever being so damn horny for a guy. It was like her hormones had lain dormant until Sam showed up, and now they were trying to compensate for all the years of inactivity in one go.
Cupping her breasts over the shirt, she barely managed to stifle the moan rising up in her throat. Those babies weren’t going anywhere, and there was no way she was going to leave the bathroom like that.
She had to put the padded bra back on.
More confident with her under armor on, Ana took ten consecutive calming deep breaths and then padded out of the bathroom.
She almost stumbled over her own feet.
Sam had changed into a pair of nylon exercise pants and a white T-shirt. Both were molded to his muscular body, leaving very little to the imagination.
Evidently, the guy didn’t own pajamas.
Did he sleep in the nude?
Wow. If Ana’s libido was on overdrive before, it had just shot up to the sky.
31
Leon
As Anastasia stepped out of the bathroom wearing his T-shirt and holding her clothes under her arm, Leon realized that inviting her to spend the night in his bed was one hell of a stupid idea.
The shirt was roomy, and it reached just above her knees, covering all her beautiful curves. But it didn’t hide her shapely legs, and the way it tented over her generous breasts made his imagination go places it shouldn’t.
The girl was temptation personified, and the way she looked at him and the strong scent of arousal she was emitting were enough to eradicate his self-control.
It wouldn’t take any effort at all to get her naked and feast on all that bounty, but Leon had to stop that runaway train before it crashed and burned.
Anastasia was off-limits, not only because she was his mission, but also because she was an immune. Even though he was tempted to bend his own rules about mixing business with pleasure, her immunity guaranteed that he couldn’t.
He wouldn’t be able thrall her to forget the venom bite.
Turning sideways to hide his erection, he lifted the comforter. “Get under the blanket before you freeze.”
She put her neatly folded bundle of clothes on the dresser, her pink boots on the floor right next to them, and then moved to the bed.
Ducking under the blanket, she pulled it up to her chin. “Thank you. I was a little cold.”
“Can’t have that.” He walked over to the light switch and flipped it off.
Anastasia sucked in a breath. “Can you leave a little light in the bathroom? I can’t see anything.”
“The idea is for you to doze off.”
He should be so lucky. With the barrage of scents she was emitting, neither of them would be able to relax enough to sleep. It was going to be a very long night.
“A little light is not going to keep me awake.”
“Are you afraid of the dark?” He turned on the light in the bathroom and left the door open just a crack. “Or is it me?”
“I’m not scared of you.”
He walked over to the bed and looked down at her. “I can sit on the chair if you are uncomfortable with me lying next to you.”
“Don’t be silly.” She lifted the comforter. “You can’t spend the night on the chair.”
As Anastasia’s scent wafted from under the blanket, Leon almost choked on his own saliva.
Dear merciful Fates, I need help.
Except, even if the Fates opened a hole in the ceiling and dropped a bucket of ice on him, it would just sizzle off his overheated body and dissipate.
“Scoot.” He motioned for her to make room.
When she did, he lay on the very edge, as far away from her as the full-sized bed allowed, but it wasn’t nearly far enough.
Her scent was driving him insane.
Closing his eyes, Leon tried to think about nasty stuff, which normally was enough to kill his arousal, but this time it wasn’t working.
“Try to sleep.” He turned his back to her so she wouldn’t accidentally brush against his erection.
“Good night, Sam.” Anastasia shifted to her side as well.
When her soft bottom touched his hard one, he jerked away.
“Sorry,” she whispered.
After a few moments, she heaved a sigh. “I can’t relax enough to fall asleep.”
“Do you want to talk?”
“About what?”
“Whatever you want.”
“I would like to talk about you. You know a lot about me, but I don’t know much about you.”
“What would you like to know?”
“Why did you leave the service?”
Because he had no longer been needed. “The unit I served in got dismantled.”
“So you were dismissed?”
He turned on his back and tucked his hands under his hea
d. “I could’ve performed other duties, but that wasn’t what I wanted to do, so I chose to leave.”
The respite from military life had been pleasant, but when the Guardians had been offered a chance to come back and fight traffickers, he’d been one of the first to sign up. Leon was a defender, that was what he’d been born to do, and civilian life hadn’t filled that need for him.
Anastasia was quiet for a moment. “Do you have a girlfriend back home?”
“I don’t.”
“Why not?”
“I haven’t found my one and only yet.”
“Ever?”
He chuckled. “By definition, there is only one who can qualify for the title, and if I had found her, I would still be with her.”
“So you’re an all or nothing kind of guy.”
“You could say so, yes.”
She shifted on her back. “How old are you?”
“Older than I look.”
“That’s not an answer.”
He really hated lying to her. “How old do you think I am?”
“You look twenty-seven or twenty-eight, but since you say that you look younger than you really are, I would guess thirty-two?”
“Good guess.”
“What if you never find your one and only? Would you settle for less?”
“I can’t.”
She shifted on her side and put her hand on his shoulder. “Looking for perfection will only make you miserable. Ms. Almost, is better than Ms. None. It’s better to compromise than to spend your life alone.”
“Look who’s talking. You joined a community that doesn’t allow one-on-one relationships because you gave up on finding your Mr. Right without ever looking for him.”
“I looked. But I couldn’t even find Mr. Almost, let alone Mr. Right.”
“You didn’t look hard enough.”
She heaved another sigh. “Maybe I’ll find him here.”
“In Safe Haven? What are the chances of that?”
“Stranger things have happened.”
It occurred to him that Anastasia might be in love with Emmett. It was common for female cult members to fall for their leader.
“Tell me the truth. Are you infatuated with Emmett Haderech?”
“No way!” She snorted. “He’s old enough to be my father.”
That was true, but the guy was impressive, and his voice had an undeniable hypnotic effect.
“He looks good for his age.”
“He does, but I know that he’s in his fifties, and that’s enough to gross me out.”
Leon stifled a groan. If she knew how old he was, it would kill her attraction to him, and he didn’t know how he felt about that.
Not that it mattered.
Nothing was going to happen between them, and he needed to keep her talking.
“Tell me about him.”
“Emmett?”
“Yes. What’s your impression of him?”
“The same as everyone else’s. I admire him greatly, but I’m not attracted to him, even though I’m probably the only woman in the community who isn’t.”
If Emmett was using compulsion to seduce the women, that would explain why Anastasia was the only one unaffected.
“Did he try anything with you?”
“No, and frankly, even though I wasn’t interested, I was a little offended. He’s been with practically every other female in the community, so why not me?”
“Perhaps he was following his own rules and was waiting for you to initiate?”
She huffed out a breath. “That still doesn’t explain why he didn’t even try to flirt with me. He was charming and polite, and very eloquent, but he was perfectly proper. I have a problem with men, and I don’t even know what it is. I’m not a great beauty, and I absolutely suck at small talk, but so do many other women who have no problem getting a date. What’s wrong with me?”
Men were probably intimidated by her, but Anastasia wouldn’t believe him if he told her that. As for Emmett, Leon wasn’t sure.
The guy was impressive enough to seduce women without resorting to compulsion, but who knew? Perhaps it was a kink of his, and he couldn’t get it up without it.
“You’re perfect. Don’t ever doubt it.”
“Then why didn’t Emmett try to seduce me?”
“I don’t know. Maybe you reminded him of his mother, his sister, or maybe an old flame that broke his heart. Or maybe he had a headache that day. How many times have you been alone with him?”
“I only had one private audience with Emmett. I had put in a request to have a television in my room to help me fall asleep, and he wanted to find out why I had trouble sleeping. I told him about the voices, and he approved the request. I can still only watch approved content, but I’m the only one in the compound with my own television.”
“What kind of content gets approved?”
“Feel-good stuff. Emmett says that exposure to media contributes to stress and depression. There is so much negativity out there.”
“The world is not all about rainbows and sunshine.”
“I know. But there is a lot more of the good stuff than you might think given what’s promoted.”
“I can’t argue with that. Happy families are not newsworthy.”
“Precisely.” Anastasia turned on her back and closed her eyes. “I don’t think this is going to work. I’m not feeling drowsy.”
No wonder.
Instead of helping her to calm down, he’d been asking her questions about her leader and talking about the state of the world.
Onegus had made a mistake when he’d chosen him for the assignment. Someone like Arwel or Yamanu would have been much better suited for the job.
They would have known what to say to Anastasia to make her relax. Most importantly, neither of them would have had to deal with a raging erection because they were both mated and would have been unaffected by Anastasia’s sex appeal.
The girl had no idea how attractive she was, and her innocence only added to the forbidden-fruit allure. She tempted his resolve with every breath she took.
He needed to focus on how young and inexperienced she was, and how an old immortal like him had no business craving her sweet innocence.
32
Anastasia
“Would you like me to sing you a lullaby?” Sam asked.
That was unexpected and a little offensive. Did he think of her as a kid?
He wasn’t that much older than her, and even if he was, that still shouldn’t have mattered.
Maybe what he had in mind was one of those naughty lullabies?
Ana should be so lucky. Unless she initiated, and not just by hinting at her interest, he wasn’t going to do anything with her.
“Do you know any?”
“I know an old Scottish one that my mother used to sing to me. Do you want to hear it?”
So it wasn’t a fun one for sure.
“Yes, please.”
“I hope that I remember all the words.”
“If it’s in Gaelic, you can make them up, and I wouldn’t know.”
As he started singing softly, Ana closed her eyes and concentrated on his voice.
It was lovely, deep and smooth, and the Scottish accent was just as delicious as the man himself.
If only he wasn’t such a damn gentleman.
She’d already made the first move by turning toward him and putting her hand on his shoulder, but it hadn’t been enough. In fact, the move had seemed to irritate him even more.
Should she just come out and say it?
Make love to me, Sam.
Damn, why was it so hard?
She was in bed with the hottest guy she’d ever met, and she was supposed to sleep?
Not if she could help it.
She’d hoped that his offer to help her translate the voices had been a ploy to get her in his bed, but apparently, he’d meant it.
It was just her damn bad luck.
For most of her adult life, Ana had been pret
ty ambivalent about sex. She hadn’t been obsessed with guys or in a rush to lose her virginity, holding out until the ripe age of twenty-three. Marvin had been her first boyfriend, and sex with him had been okay, but it hadn’t been earth-shattering by any means.
She’d had more fun with her own fingers than she’d ever had with him.
And now that she’d finally met a man who stirred her blood and awakened her sleepy lady bits, he was too damn honorable to take advantage of her, and she was too shy to tell him that she was more than okay with that.
Ana wanted Sam with every fiber of her being, but was it enough to overcome her shyness and make a bold move?
It’d better be.
As the song ended, she scooted closer and put her hand on his chest. “That was lovely. Thank you.”
He sucked in a breath. “What are you doing?”
“Getting warm.”
Were his eyes glowing? Or was the light from the bathroom somehow reflecting off the white wall and shining at his eyes?
Maybe he was wearing contacts?
“I can get you a sweater.”
She shook her head. “Your eyes are glowing.”
“They are not. It’s the contacts.” He turned away from her. “I’ll get you the sweater.”
“Sam.” She put her hand on his arm to stop him.
“What?”
“I don’t want a damn sweater.” She smoothed her hand down his chest.
He put his hand over hers. “Stop.”
“Why? Don’t you find me attractive?”
He snorted. “I find you too damn attractive, but you are off-limits.”
“Why?”
“I don’t mix business with pleasure, and I would never use sex to convince you to leave with me.”
She chuckled. “An overinflated ego, much? I haven’t been with anyone in over a year, and you are definitely the hottest guy I’ve ever met, but I’m not going to fall in love with you no matter how good you are in bed.”
“Is that a challenge?” His voice came out in a hiss.
“You’re on.”
Ana wanted to pump her fist in the air and do a victory dance, but it would have to wait for after the sex, provided that she could still move. She had a feeling that a night with Sam was going to be thoroughly exhausting, but in the best possible way.
