The woman was perfect for him.
Licking and nipping, he continued to answer her wordless demands. Not letting his hand remain idle, he caressed his way south again, running his fingers down her trembling thigh then back up until he found, ah...yeah...her slick center.
She was destroying him.
He traced her with the pad of his finger, and she moaned again and rocked into his touch. Back and forth, he outlined her lush folds while he flicked his tongue over her nipple. A second later, she cupped his face and pulled him toward her mouth for a hot, wet, wicked kiss that made him throb. But it wasn’t time. No, he was on a mission and refused to be sidetracked from hearing and watching her as he brought her to climax.
Archer stroked her with his finger, and she made a sexy sound in her throat before thrusting her tongue into his mouth as she rocked against his hand.
Fuck, she was hot. So incredibly hot. He slid his finger inside her then pulled out on a long, sure stroke. Sandy released his mouth to pant his name.
Yes...that sound... he loved hearing his name on her lips. So he did it again, and again with deliberate, careful, concentration.
“Archer,” she panted. “You need to—”
“Take care of you, I know, and I will.” He upped the pace and increased the pressure. She was so close. He could tell by the way she trembled that her orgasm was near. “Come for me, Sandy. I want to feel you...watch you...hear you,” he urged, adding a second finger, stroking her longer, faster.
“Then...don’t stop.”
No fucking chance of that. Leaning on his other arm, he watched her intently. His heart clutched at the absolute rapture covering her face—head back, eyes closed, lower lip caught between her teeth while she grasped the sheets with both hands.
God, she was a sight.
Hair wild and fanned out across his pillow, her lush body arched, breasts rippling with her movements. Never had he ever seen anything so damn beautiful. It made him even hotter, pushed his control and he nearly lost it when she gasped out his name and tightened around him as she burst.
Talking himself back from the edge, he stayed with her, bringing her down slowly before he removed his touch. She opened her eyes and gazed at him, her panting filling the space between them.
“Good m-morning...to...me...” Her satisfied smile brought him pleasure unlike any he’d known before. She lifted up to kiss him, before dropping onto her back to suck in more air.
He caressed her jaw and chuckled. “That was just one hand.”
“Not sure I could survive two,” she uttered through her smile.
He leaned down to bite the sweet spot behind her ear, making her cling to him. “Challenge accepted.”
“Good. But right now, I’m in need of something else of yours,” she said breathlessly, running her hand down his chest to his lower abs, and if she just—
Yeah. Hell, yeah. That.
She stroked his erection with one hand and cupped his balls with the other, making him groan and press closer. He wasn’t going to last long. Clenching his jaw, he reached for one of the condoms he’d set on his nightstand last night, rooting through the opened packets until he found an unopened one, then kneeled between her legs.
And still, she held on, something unintelligible sounding from her throat as her eyes devoured the part of him she fondled.
The woman was destroying him.
He sucked in a breath. “Sandy...” His voice was rough, because damn, he was barely holding the fuck on. He removed her hand, sucking in another breath—or three—while he tore the packet open and rolled on the condom.
Her hand returned to stroke and caress him, and when she sat up to lick his nipple, he hissed in another breath.
“I can’t wait to have you inside me, Archer...”
What a coincidence. He couldn’t wait to be inside the tempting woman.
She settled back on her elbows, staring up at him with so much heat in her eyes, it was a wonder he didn’t fucking disintegrate. “I need to feel you,” she whispered, spreading her legs wider.
It was his control that disintegrated. With a sound hovering between a groan and a growl, he grabbed her hips, brushed her center with his tip, and plunged into her wetness in one quick, hard thrust.
Oh, fuck...yeah.
A low moan sounded deep in her chest as she closed her eyes. “Feels so good.”
So damn good. His grip tightened to hold her still. If she moved even a hair, he was a goner. She must’ve felt the same because they remained that way for several seconds, seemingly lost in the same ecstasy. It had never felt like this with any other woman. They fit perfectly.
Surrounded by her warmth, he felt consumed, yet whole. Every damn time.
All things that should send up red flags in his head, and yet, none appeared. He didn’t care, and he wanted more.
Apparently on the same page, she lifted up to nip his chin, then his lower lip, her glorious breasts and stiff peaks grazing his chest. “Archer...” Her warm breath hit his face, and a shudder racked through her straight into him.
“I know,” he managed to reply, his lips brushing hers as he began to move. Slowly at first, but not for long. They were far beyond that pace. And Christ, she felt good. So damn good. He’d never felt anything so exquisite.
Joined in the most primal, basic of ways, he closed his eyes and wished he could remain that way...to savor her forever.
When she murmured his name again, Archer opened his eyes to find her staring at him through dark pools of desire, a bounce rippling through her breasts with each thrust. Just like earlier, she was breathtaking. His heart rocked, and son-of-a-bitch, a connection powered through him. Sandy glanced down to where they joined, and he watched, too, as he thrust into her, hard.
She trembled around him. It was too much. Nearing the edge, needing to end the sensual climb they’d started, he grabbed her hip and slid her underneath him more, changing the angle before he reached between them to brush his thumb over her center. In an instant, she climaxed, and he immediately followed, her constricting warmth milking him dry.
Spent, breathing hard, he collapsed on top of her. Christ, he couldn’t feel his bones. Doing his best, he angled his body to the side so he didn’t crush her, and worked to catch his breath.
She smiled while panting. “It’s a...good morning...now.”
He chuckled and kissed her shoulder. “Agreed. Give me a few minutes, and I’ll get breakfast started.”
She blinked up at him at him. “I’ll be happy to help...as soon as I can feel my legs.”
He could relate. He was having trouble trying to find his bones.
***
Three and a half hours later, Sandy sat in the nest with the team. It would’ve been two and a half, but she’d borrowed a shirt, and cash from Archer—after he agreed to let her pay him back—intending to stop at a store to pick up some clothes. Only, the sweetheart took her to the outlets in Atlantic City. That was dangerous, and fruitful. She smoothed her hand over the navy and white stripped sweater, loving the pattern and the feel of the soft material. She’d always been a sucker for all things nautical.
Which, apparently, included her men.
How could she not?
With a name like Sandy, it was practically ordained.
She bit back a grin at her stupid thoughts and glanced around her new temporary headquarters. She found the layout eerily similar to the one that now sat under tons of rubble in Brooklyn. Like that one, the AC base was also hidden in a seemingly abandoned building, but it wasn’t by the water. This one sat more inland. The open-concept design was the same, though, with TJ’s sanctuary to the right, and stairs to the left that led to bedrooms upstairs.
From what Archer told her, only TJ slept in the nest. Bella and Matteo owned a house on the beach just south of Atlantic City.
Her gaze skimmed over the bonefrogman who reminded her—with a deep, delicious, intensity—of certain muscles in her body she’d forgotten for years. Heat war
med her veins. Much like the man, the lover side of him was very passionate and giving. Sandy was damn glad they’d decided not to wait to give in to their chemistry. She was sore as a bugger, but it’d been so worth it.
Still silently watching him, she adored how he stood in an at-ease position, arms behind his back, watching a monitor with a live feed of the bank from cameras he and Matteo had installed the other night. A military man through-and-through. The sudden urge to rub against him and climb up his body was so strong, Sandy turned her back to him and focused on the other monitors still running facial recognition on the bald man with the eye tattoo.
“Do you think he had plastic surgery to change his facial features?” she asked no one in particular.
“It’s possible,” Archer said. “That would explain why we haven’t gotten a hit on him yet.”
Bella waived at TJ. “Dude has a program for that I bet.”
TJ nodded. “It’s true, I do. I’ll start running him through it in a minute. First, though, you’re all set, Sandy,” the computer guru said, getting up from a chair on her left. “Your hard drive is all rigged up and ready to go on this computer.” He drummed the desk. “I also took the liberty of super charging a new laptop for you. It has the latest upgrades, a great video card, not that crap it comes with, my own special security—not even God could get into this now—and I downloaded all the info from your hard drive into it.”
She sucked in a breath, her eyes widening at the gleaming laptop also sitting on the desk. “Wow...that’s so sweet of you.” She walked over to TJ and pulled him in for a hug. “You are the man. Thank you!”
After he turned beet red and sat down in the chair at his station, she ignored the stiffness in her thighs from overexertion last night and stepped over to a smirking Bella to embrace her for the second time that day.
“What this one for?” Bella asked.
“Same thing. For rescuing that hard drive from certain death last night,” she replied, releasing the woman to hug Bella’s husband again. The thought of anything happening to her neighbors...and the children... “And not just my hard drive, but the whole building. Thank you.”
Apparently, there were three booby traps they’d uncovered and removed from her apartment. Bella and TJ were currently running tests on the equipment used for the traps to try to pinpoint a manufacturer, and then possibly a suspect. None of them expected it to go anywhere, but they were following protocol just the same.
“See anything out of the ordinary on our bank feed?” Archer asked.
Matteo shook his head. “No. Nothing.”
Archer motioned to the gun on a processing table. “What about the Glock I procured yesterday?”
“As expected, the serial numbers were filed off,” Bella replied. “And the only fingerprints are yours.”
Running a hand through his hair, Archer expelled a breath. “All three did have gloves on.”
She groaned, “My freaking brain is scattered. I took photos of the men who tried to kill us at DHS yesterday. Here.” She handed her cell to TJ, who hooked it up to a cable attached to the console.
“I’ll start running them through now,” he said, clicking each photo to begin the facial recognition process.
She faced the others and grimaced. “Sorry I didn’t remember about them sooner.”
“Hey,” Archer stepped close and rubbed her arm, “I forgot about the photos, too.”
Yeah, they were kind of preoccupied last night. Warmth spread through her body at the memories. This was one of those incidents they were worried about with respect to interfering with the job. Hopefully, it wouldn’t happen again, or Sandy would nhave to put herself on an Archer time out.
“What about Rodrigo?” Bella asked, and Sandy’s chest immediately tightened.
Matteo pinched the bridge of his nose. “It doesn’t make sense.”
Archer frowned. “What part?”
“All of it,” Bella replied.
Sandy was inclined to agree. “It couldn’t be a coincidence that he was outside the Federal Reserve Bank with his cart on Monday. Then we ran into him again with his cart near DHS two days later.”
“Agreed.” He nodded. “New York City has over three thousand vendors, and that’s only counting the ones with licenses.”
“And both times you ran into the guy, there were attempts on Sandy’s life,” Bella pointed out.
Her chest squeezed tighter. The thought that the friendly vendor would try to harm her was hard for her brain to compute. But she knew, with proper motivation, a person could do things they never would’ve ordinarily considered. Perhaps he was being coerced.
Archer grimaced, his mouth drawn into a tight line. “And then he ends up dead in front of your apartment building two hours after that.”
Matteo shook his head. “Definitely not a coincidence.”
Again, Sandy was inclined to agree. “Have you been able to find anything, TJ?” she asked. “Surely, out of all the cameras in the city, one of them picked up something that would explain that outcome. Who killed Rodrigo and why?”
TJ turned to face her. “I haven’t found anything yet, but I haven’t given up. I only stopped to get your computers together.”
“Thanks. Sorry.” She gave a weak smile. “I’m just a little frustrated.”
Archer moved close to slip an arm around her shoulder, and the gesture surprised her. Not the fact that he did it, but the fact he did it in private in front of their team, not out in public while pretending to be a couple.
Did that mean they were a couple?
Her heart rocked. She liked him. A lot.
She liked having sex with him, too. A lot.
But she couldn’t think beyond that, not with this case seeming to have more questions than answers.
“We can all relate,” he said, releasing her arm, frustration lining his face. “According to the feed TJ recorded from Brooklyn last night, I think we can all agree this is the same terror group from Munich.”
She nodded with the others. The feed showed Matteo and TJ leaving. Then Bella leaving. Four minutes later, the power went out for eleven minutes before it came back on. A little while later, their SUV arrived just in time for the fireworks.
“It’s like someone pointed a device at the building,” she said. “Maybe from a safe distance so they remained undetected by TJ’s security. And that device disrupted power before this team moved in, killing the prisoners, rigging the place, retreating, then resetting the power.” The precision and efficiency scared her.
“Reminds me of a few ops I was on,” Bella muttered.
Everyone glanced at the former terrorist hunter. “Not the killing the prisoners part.” Bella shrugged. “Mostly.”
“Well, this group moves like a military team, and has top-notch equipment,” Archer said. “So, we need to up our game. Stay alert. Tighten our security.” He turned his attention to TJ. “Could they have gotten any information from your computers?”
TJ scowled and shook his head. “No way. Like I said, not even God can get through my security.”
“You’re sure?”
“Absatively.” TJ nodded. “I’ve already run diagnostics to see if any files had been accessed and it’s a big negatory, boss.”
Archer blew out a breath. “I hope you’re right.”
“So, you think it’s the rogue group from Munich that’s after Sandy, and not someone unrelated to the case,” Matteo stated, not asked. “Is it because you two were spotted doing recon on Monday? Or because DHS has her working this case?”
“I don’t know.” Archer shook his head. “Could be both.”
“Because otherwise, it makes no sense,” Matteo said.
She turned to him. “I’ve been thinking about that. Perhaps because it makes no sense...it makes perfect sense.”
Archer narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean?”
She lifted a hand and waved at the monitors that showed the bank, DHS, the Munich bombing, the outside of her apartment bui
lding, and their Brooklyn headquarters. “All of these seemingly unrelated bizarre happenings might be just that. Unrelated, bizarre happenings,” she said. “Except they do have a common thread. Me.”
TJ smirked. “Okay. Think we already knew that.”
She turned to him and quirked a brow. “True...but why me?”
“Because we must’ve stumbled onto something, or someone, on our recon Monday evening,” Archer said.
“Possibly,” she said. “But you were there, too, and they haven’t exactly targeted you.”
A smile tugged his lips. “That’s because they couldn’t find me...well, other than at headquarters, but then they did try to kill me.”
“They tried to kill us all,” Bella corrected.
“Because they’d caught a break,” she stated. “But before that, it’s possible they were targeting me to get your focus off your job of stopping this supposed attack.” She met each of their gazes one at a time. “Instead, you’re running around the city trying to keep me safe and investigate who is trying to kill me.”
Archer uttered a curse. “So...what are you saying?”
“I’m saying we need to stop doing that.” They were wasting time and manpower.
TJ’s brows shot up. “Stop keeping you safe?”
“Yes...well, no.” She shook her head.
“Good.” Archer lifted a hand to cup her face. “Because no way in hell is that going to stop.”
She smiled and turned her face until her lips brushed his palm before she drew back. “What I’m saying is, I’m safe here, so I’ll stay put, and you won’t have to worry about me anymore. I can work from my computer anywhere. So that’s what I’ll do, and you can go back to tracking down those involved in the threat to the bank.”
He nodded. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe all that chaos was to throw me off their scent. But it also means they were involved in everything that happened to you, so it’s that much more evidence we have to comb through to try to identify them.”
“Starting with those dead guys at DHS,” TJ said, pointing to one of the photos. “We have a positive ID on one. A Gregor Uscinski. Former Russian military. Dishonorable discharge.”
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