by Nikki Logan
His lips thinned. “Just concentrate on staying alive in here. Leave fantasies of escape where they belong. In your head.”
She turned her glare to the bowl on the mattress. She twisted sideways toward it and managed, after a struggle, to pick up the spoon with her bound hands. But loading it with food and getting it to her mouth turned out to be almost impossible. She spilled most of her first attempts onto the mattress already stained with god-knew-what. Every different angle caused the tight cable-tie to slice further into her already tender wrists.
Alpha stood and walked over to the bed. Taking the spoon from her stew-sticky fingers he placed it back in the bowl. “I can feed you,” he offered, “or cut the ties so you can do it yourself, but you have to behave. Your choice.”
Clare raised her bound wrists by way of answer. It was galling enough to have to accept food from this man. She would not be spoon fed.
“At the first sign of trouble, they go back on.” Reaching to the back of his belt, he loosened a knife from its sheath and deftly cut through the plastic binding her wrists. His hands were softer than they looked and they brushed her tender skin above the binds. Her eyes filled, welling just short of spilling over as the release of pressure sent a wave of pain and blood thrumming into the welts on her skin.
Frowning, he turned her wrists over to reveal their lacerated undersides. Contrite gray eyes rose. “I didn’t realize the ties were so tight. You should have said.”
“Right. It’s my fault.” She flexed the circulation back into tingling fingers.
Regret turned to flint. “Eat your breakfast.”
He moved the chair in front of the door and sat heavily, a human road-block. She picked up the bowl. It was tinned stew, not very inspiring, but it was hot and it filled the void in her belly. She thought of her dogs, wondering if they’d been given food and water yet, but one glance at Alpha’s unyielding expression and she thought better than to ask again. For a second she considered not eating, but would any of them really care if she wasted away in this filthy room on a hunger strike?
Besides, she needed sustenance for what she had in mind.
“Why were you in the truck?” he asked as she shoveled spoon after spoon of food into her mouth. “Have you got a death wish?”
Not answering was an option, but it occurred to Clare that he was handing her a golden opportunity to build some kind of rapport. It would be harder to kill someone you’d had a conversation with, right? She quelled a stomach lurch at the thought.
“It’s my job. I work for a conservation organization—”
“WildLyfe. I know,” he said.
Of course you do. Armed men didn’t just stumble upon the transporter while out strolling. She measured her words. “They’ll be looking for me.”
“They’ll never find you.”
The food turned to paste in her mouth and she flat out exhausted the defiant courage she’d managed to scrape up from somewhere until now. “Please,” she appealed to him, her voice urgent and low. “I will pay you anything… Double what they’re paying you. Whatever it takes. Just let me go.”
Demeaning herself seemed to make him as uncomfortable as it did her. He couldn’t hold her eyes. “The wildlife industry must be looking up if you can afford to make that kind of promise.”
She had no intention of following it through—she had nothing to follow through with—but she had to try. “My boss will find the money. He could make you rich.”
God, she hoped that were true. Artie Lyfe knew all kinds of cashed up people. One of them would surely give her a loan to save her life.
Surely.
He glanced down at his faded jeans and battered boots and Clare forced her eyes not to linger on the hard thighs beneath the worn denim.
“Do I strike you as a man interested in wealth?” he said.
What else was trafficking about if not money? “Then what will it take?”
Her voice cracked on those words and he turned his frown to the window, leaving her staring at his defined profile. His dark blond hair hadn’t seen scissors in a while, but the shaggy length broke up a broad, smooth forehead. Those startling gray eyes were set back under a strong brow, but he needed more sleep judging by the puffiness beneath them. Two days of growth defined an unyielding jaw but didn’t quite disguise a scar beneath his full lower lip. He smelled clean after his own wash and his damp hair was oddly reassuring. It was stupid to draw comfort from that, as if a bad guy got any better just for being well groomed and nice looking.
Okay, good looking.
She fought her appraisal. She had no business appreciating anything about this man. Unless it was how good he looked being led away in handcuffs by the Zambian police.
Without warning, his gaze returned, locking on hers. He reached into his pocket and pulled out her watch, glancing at it briefly.
Hope warred with a sudden pang of anguish. “Can I have it back?”
“No.”
She bit back her emotions. The he-man thing was starting to grate. Maybe time-deprivation was supposed to keep her off balance but she refused to give in to his torment. “Fine. Keep it.”
“Interesting. It’s taken you—” he consulted her watch “—fifteen hours to pout. That’s pretty impressive under the circumstances.”
She tightened her jaw to keep the sting of tears from rising. “I just want my watch back.”
“Got an appointment to keep?”
She pushed at her near empty bowl, desolate. She wasn’t about to tell him that it was the only thing of her mother’s she owned.
After a moment, something landed with a soft plop on the mattress beside her. Stunned, she reached out a tentative hand, and then snatched the watch close to her heart, holding it tight. Its second hand ticked against her palm as she worked to mask her joy—and confusion.
Why had he returned it?
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“You’re welcome.”
Between heartbeats, the mood in the room turned from cautious hostility to something else. Something warmer. Less guarded. Static awareness saturated the vacant space, crackling between them. Her body tuned itself to Alpha’s subtle fragrance. Her breaths came more quickly. He shifted to study something—too intently—outside the window in the featureless compound. It was the he-man version of a squirm.
He feels it too.
Clare’s heart stalled, her mind suddenly in a whirl of planning. As excited as if she’d just uncovered a crate of weapons to get her the hell out of here.
Because she had.
Herself—she was the weapon. He may not want her money or her empty promises but she had something he might value.
Could she do it? Get him on her side, convince him to help her? Appeal to whatever slim, decent part of him still existed? So much was at stake… She thought of her dogs, withering away outside in the airless transporter.
No, she couldn’t.
But…yes, she would. She had to.
Not a seduction. Just offer him enough of herself that he’d form an attachment. Some kind of bond with her. If she and her dogs were to survive, she needed to be valuable to someone…for something he couldn’t get elsewhere. And, if she had to choose, this man was surely the safest of the lot.
She only had two assets that might mean anything to these poachers—her medical training and her body. Somehow she couldn’t see her veterinary qualifications getting her home.
The trouble was Alpha was smart. She’d have to be subtle.
Clare stood decisively. “Can I use the bathroom?”
She held out her wrists for him to bind, forcing herself to put something enigmatic into her innocent gaze.
His face clouded with suspicion but he didn’t reach for the cable-tie. “That might be a bit challenging where you’re going, don’t you think?”
Heat rushed up her throat. Great. Stumbled at the first hurdle.
Pressing her folded clothes against her chest, she moved into the hallway, risking a qu
ick look sideways where Boots, Jo and Zimbabwe were seated at the table. Their low conversation broke off as they took in her ill-fitting T-shirt and her unconcealed bare legs. Their eyes rose higher.
Boots leered. Jo looked suspicious. Zimbabwe just looked…dangerous.
Timing her movements carefully, Clare stepped to the left and slowed her pace a fraction so Alpha’s body shielded her from view. It was a subtle piece of behavior she knew from the dog world between subordinate and dominant pack members. It spoke biological volumes.
I’m submitting to your protection.
More importantly, You are now responsible for me.
As if she’d scripted it, Alpha’s hand half-rose at her back, before dropping as though scorched. She was certain it had been an unconscious gesture as she walked, half-clothed, past the room full of predators. Rivals.
She smiled as she entered the bathroom.
He didn’t stand a chance.
…
For such a brief bathroom stop, her unwilling guardian had built up quite a head of steam. By the time Clare emerged, fully dressed, Alpha’s pulse was pounding visibly at the back of his clenched jaw. His eyes spat like fat in a pan. There were no instinctive protective gestures as he took her arm in a vice-like grip and dragged her down the hall—although he once again used his body to shield her from view as they passed by the kitchen.
“Rule number three,” he ground out in a furious whisper, thrusting her into the room and slamming the door behind them both. “Playing us off against each other definitely qualifies as a breach.”
She’d not been subtle enough, obviously. She concentrated on playing to his ego instead. “You wouldn’t let anything happen—”
“Spare me the flirtation,” he snarled, then dropped his voice, low and urgent. “I am no friend to those men. Aligning yourself with me is like a red flag to them. They’d like nothing better than to cut you to pieces just to piss me off.” He pushed her to the wall and she slammed hard against it. He stalked toward her. “Whatever game you think you’re playing, if they get so much as a whiff of compassion from me they’ll grab it and use it against both of us.”
Her pulse sped and she forced herself to take deep breaths to keep from passing out. Compassion…? He was furious at the game she had attempted to play, but he’d just admitted to caring what happened to her.
This was huge.
She took her chance, clutching the front of his shirt. “Let me go, then. I can’t be used against you if I’m not here. I have no clue what it is you’re all doing and no clue where we are. Drive me out and dump me near a village—”
“I can’t. That would jeopardize everything.” His words were half-snarl but she got the sense that it wasn’t all at her. He may have seen straight through her poor effort at tempting him but she could see through him a little, too. A decent heart beat beneath her trembling fingers. She could sense it in everything he did, despite his rough manner.
“Then I’ll have to stick with you, won’t I?” she said. “At this point, you are my best chance of survival, which is all I’m interested in. Mine and the dogs.’” She regarded him levelly. “I’ll do whatever it takes to secure that.”
“Whatever it takes?” He shuffled closer, his voice dangerously low. A warning. “Really?”
She lifted her chin and fired off her steeliest glare. He looked unimpressed. He tipped his head down closer to hers.
“Just so I’m clear…” His whisper tickled her neck hairs to attention. “Regardless of what I say, you’re going to create the illusion you’re my property, in the hope I’ll protect you? Me, one of the men who kidnapped you?”
She swallowed a sudden rush of uncertainty. “If necessary.”
He stood less than an inch away from her, chest heaving, his lips close to touching hers. Her senses swam with his proximity and she struggled in vain against the current of his surging energy. A powerful masculine energy that threatened to break through her need to hold herself aloof.
“So, I’m damned no matter what I do. Tell me why I should hesitate to take what you’re so generously offering?” he asked, one eyebrow raised.
Her mouth turned to ash as she finally saw the danger she had created for herself.
“Congratulations.” His large frame pressed her small body to the wall, his lips coming dangerously close. “You’ve just created a scenario in which I have absolutely no motivation to treat you well. Was that what you had in mind with this plan of yours? How far would you have gone to play it out?”
Oh God—
Her knees deserted her along with her courage, her skin roaring to a fierce heat, but his body crushing hers to the wall kept her upright. She shook her head, dislodging a nervous tear that fell to where their mouths nearly met. With a low growl he closed the gap, tasted the tiny droplet where it slid to a halt on her upper lip, his mouth lingering there a moment. She could feel the barely leashed strength of his grip on her.
It was a half-kiss designed to send a message. Angry and mean and intended to scare her.
Her heart thundered.
Yet, his low words against her parted lips were intimate…and oddly gentle. “I know you’re frightened. I know you’re desperate and, for some reason, more worried about the survival of those bloody dogs than you are of yourself.” He moved his mouth round close to her ear. “But know this, Clare. I am by far the most civilized man in this house, and given how badly I want to lock this door, rip those clothes off you, and not come out for a week—”
She stifled a gasp.
“—that should give you an indication of the sort of danger you’re inviting if you open the door to the others like you just did for me. Have I made myself clear?”
A single word struggled past the lump in her throat. “Crystal.”
“If it’s survival you want, then you need to fight and kick and scream at every one of us, and that includes me.” He pushed away from her and grabbed the chair with one powerful hand. “In fact, right now, I would say most especially me.”
He stalked from the room, slamming and locking the door behind him.
Clare staggered to the bed, humiliation setting in her chest like concrete. Worse than being physically vulnerable yesterday was being emotionally exposed, as she was now. Who was she kidding—did she actually imagine her feminine wiles would be enough to manipulate criminals of their caliber? These were experienced, ruthless men she was dealing with, and they were already operating well outside of the law. What were a few more crimes to them? Sex appeal was far from her strong suit—as she’d been painfully reminded by one man in her past—did she really need another reminder from the likes of Alpha? He had gone hard with his lesson—in every sense of the word—showing her the very real consequences of her actions and proving beyond question that she wasn’t equipped for any strategy involving seduction.
Yet, for whatever reason, he was genuinely trying to protect her.
And by doing so, he’d just made himself a tiny bit less dangerous.
She could use that.
She took a steadying breath. Her basic plan would remain unchanged…but she’d have to let Alpha’s protective instincts emerge naturally rather than forcing them. She needed him sympathetic to her cause, not angry and resistant. No matter what he said, whatever this thing was brewing between them—it was still her best chance of survival.
At least until she could set her plan in motion.
What she never would have expected was her own physical reaction to him. The stomach-lurching temptation of his nearness. The perfect fit of her body against his. The way his scent robbed her of strength. She couldn’t honestly chalk up the tight thrum low in her belly to fear or embarrassment.
It was unexpected, unwanted, and unacceptable. But so, so exciting.
And almost certainly a nasty case of the Stockholms.
And yet… Perhaps he’d felt it too, because he’d made two major errors, and she figured him for a man who rarely made a mistake.
First
, he had left her hands unbound.
Second…he had called her Clare.
…
Mother of God, was the woman insane?
Could she really think to take on any one of them and win?
Simon paced the perimeter of the compound fence, walking off his tension. He was well used to letting his violent streak off its leash with the dirtbags he had to work with. That was the language they spoke and the currency they traded. But to do it to a woman—a terrified and desperate woman—and to turn it sexual…
He clenched and unclenched his fists in anger. At himself.
Maybe he’d been spending too much time undercover.
He’d left her shattered, but he needed to know she wouldn’t try that idiotic stunt with one of the others. He knew damn well she never intended to follow through, but they wouldn’t hesitate to take what she so naively offered, and much more. And then his hand would be forced. Two years of work would splash down that same hole they were all crapping in.
Lord knew he wanted to call her bluff—badly. The still uncomfortable swelling in his jeans was evidence enough of his desire. It had been some time since he’d last slept with a woman, and wrangling with this one had proved disturbingly stimulating. The feel of her tense body sliding against his, the fire in her eyes…
He groaned softly.
The predator in him clashed with his innate instinct to protect. It was a heady mix.
But a man knew when he was being played. He hadn’t missed the way her eyes lit up when he produced the Leatherman knife from his belt earlier. His hand unconsciously strayed to his waistband to ensure it was still there, relaxing when he found it. Even if she managed to get away from them, where did she hope to go, anyway?
If—no, when—she left this house, it would be on his terms, not hers. And he’d make bloody well sure it wouldn’t be on the terms of Corby, Sergeant, and the others. He’d worked with the scum long enough to know what her fate would be if they got their way.
Or, God forbid, they just got bored.
The only thing keeping her safe right now was the thread of suspicion they all had about who had really sent him to secure delivery of the shipment. How high up his connections went. The moment their pissed-off threshold sank lower than their survival-threshold… Keeping her alive wasn’t going to be easy if she kept taking matters into her own hands.
