Liam: The Lost Billionaires, Book 3

by Allison LaFleur

  After a few minutes, my movements became more sensuous. My hands drifted to the crack in her ass, around her hips to her flat belly, and up to those breasts I had been dying to feel in my hands.

  “Are you sure this is what you want?” I didn’t want Maggie to feel pressured. This was a big jump from our friendly flirtation and fleeting touches.

  She spun in the water and lifted her head, looking me straight in the eyes. “Shut up and kiss me.” She climbed into my lap, straddling me, a put her hands on my shoulders. Bending her head, she took my mouth with hers, branding me with her kiss.

  This woman totally blew my mind. Strong and confident, she didn’t need me to make her whole. She was in command of her life, but we complimented each other. We fit better than I had with any other woman. She made my relationship with Jeannie look like a high school flirtation.

  My brain short-circuited, and my need took over. “Maggie, God,” I ground out as she commandeered my mouth once again. Her tongue licked the seam of my lips before delving in. Her teeth nipped at my jawline before coming back to kiss me again.

  I was practically out of my mind with want. I had grown so hard I was afraid I was going to explode. My heart pounded, and my head spun so fast I could barely gasp out, “protection?”

  She drew back for just a moment, chest heaving “I’m clean and on birth control. You?”

  “I’m clean,” I said, nodding furiously, just wanting to feel her against me again. The separation from her physically hurt.

  And she dove in again. This time I matched her in passion, no longer a passive participant. We were two consenting adults, and I was crazy about her. I sat up and gripped her hips, rotating mine into her, my shaft rubbing against the cleft between her legs. The friction sent zips of energy spiraling through me.

  “God, Liam.” She rode me faster, her heat combining with mine until I thought we were going to combust.

  “I need you,” I gasped, gripping her hips more firmly, trying to hold her still. “I need to be inside you.”

  She rose up on her knees and I slid down her wetness until I was poised at her opening.

  “Are you sure?” I asked one more time, praying she hadn’t changed her mind.

  In response, she impaled herself on me, taking me to the hilt in one thrust. “Oh, God!” I shouted. The sounds of us coming together echoed around the bathroom.

  She started to ride me in earnest, rising and falling, sliding up and down my shaft in a steady rhythm. She threw her head back and made tiny moaning and mewling noises every time she seated herself on me. Our pelvises slammed together. Her tight channel gripped me, pulling my release closer and closer with each thrust.

  “Maggie! Jesus, MAGGIE!” I lost it, coming in waves, exploding inside her as she rode me. My vision filled with her perfect breasts, the delicate curve of her neck, her vibrant green eyes, and curly red hair in a radiant cloud around her.

  “Liam, I’m coming!” My release, which had been waning, suddenly hit me full force again as she began to spasm around me. The crest of her orgasm peaked right before my eyes. I swear I could see a light shining from her as we came together and collapsed in the cooling water.

  Maggie slumped on my chest, still connected, as I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her close. Our hearts beat in perfect rhythm.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Liam

  “What do you have for me, Ben?” I stared into the monitors with the sat phone connection crackling in my ear. While he spoke, I paged through the reams of information in government databases

  “We found a fingerprint on one of the letters.” My ears perked up at this. “We got lucky,” Ben continued. “Leo was determined to find something, and when he printed the backside of the flap of one of the envelopes the letters came in, he found a partial print.”

  “Tell him good work for me.” I wished I was back at headquarters, I felt antsy stuck here. I couldn’t really do anything productive.

  “I will, but man, there is print dust everywhere in the conference room.” Ben griped. “He could at least try and clean up.”

  I chuckled, ignoring Ben’s complaint. Leo was one of the smartest men I knew, but he was a total slob. None of his girlfriends would ever stay the night at his place. They claimed it was a nuclear disaster. “What did you find out?”

  “We ran the print through a dozen databases and contacted the local police departments for every city Maggie has been to on her tour. We finally got lucky and got a hit.” I could hear him shuffling papers in the background. “The print belonged to a guy picked up for a DUI in a small town just outside of Memphis. He spent the night in jail and then never showed up for his hearing.”

  “Who was it?” I pulled a notebook toward me, flipped it open to a clean page, and started making notes. Sketching a crude map of the U.S., I marked each city where the incidents occurred and connected them with dotted lines.

  “The arrest record was a dead end,” Ben said. “The asshole apparently uses multiple aliases. We picked up a trail in several other cities. In Baton Rouge, his prints matched a report for resisting arrest for a broken tail light. In Minneapolis, they matched a lewd conduct arrest. Each place took his prints, bonded him out, and he skipped town. We did a search, but every name was a dead end.”

  “Somebody has to have a record of him somewhere.” I dropped my pen on the desk and leaned back, digging furrows through my hair with my fingers.

  “Well, I do have some good news.” He paused.

  “Spit it out Ben. What did you find?”

  “We connected him to a sealed juvie record. We’re checking his last known address now… someplace in Alabama. I’m not real hopeful. It’s twenty years old.”

  “Where?”

  “A small town in Eastern Kentucky. Somewhere in the mountains of Apalachicola.”

  “Send out a team,” I ordered. “See what they can find. Maybe someone there will know where he’s gone. What did his juvenile record say?”

  “Turns out this guy was quite the delinquent. Public indecency, stalking, you name it, he did it. They locked him up until he was 21 for rape. He was fourteen. Then he raped a nurse on the inside.”

  “Keep digging and update me when you can.”

  “Will do, boss.”

  “Thanks, Ben. You and Leo are in charge while I’m gone. Send me what you have. It may be time to call in a favor. My contact in the FBI may be able to find something we missed.”

  “Roger that. Local law enforcement didn’t make the connection. The towns were too small to be online with AFIS for stuff that small.”

  “This guy is smart. Thanks for the info. I’ll keep Maggie here until we find him.” We ended the call, and I shut down the secure phone connection. Clicking several buttons, I went online to access Scorpion Security’s encrypted servers and downloaded Ben’s email. My mood darkened as I started reading through the files he sent.

  Maggie

  I flopped over in bed and yawned deeply. I stretched, my body deliciously exhausted. I knew Liam thought I was sleeping, but my mind was abuzz with ideas.

  Propping myself up on my elbows, I looked around for something to write with. I wanted to get the melody in my head written down before I forgot it. I slipped out from under the covers and padded naked over to the dresser where I rummaged around on top for a something, but I could only find a busted ink pen.

  I turned, hands on my hips, and looked around the room. I didn’t bother with clothes; I didn’t plan on being out of bed long. I stuck my nose out the bedroom door, looking left and right down the hallway. There was a room I hadn’t been in across the hall from mine. Maybe I can find a pencil in here.

  I hummed as I darted across the hall, turned the knob, and jiggled it a bit when the door stuck. It finally opened, and I danced inside. My good mood came to an abrupt halt when I saw where I was.

  Realization washed over me like a bucket of cold water, and I slowly backed out of the room, shutting the door quietly behind me before
Liam could catch me. I went back to bed, closed my eyes, and hid under the covers. I wanted to be a thousand miles away from everything I had just seen.

  I scrunched the blankets up around my neck and curled up in a ball, trying to make myself as small as possible. Tears welled in my eyes. Big gut wrenching sobs soaked the pillow under me and shook the bed. My chest heaved as I gasped for air, my ribs hurting from the effort. My wounded shoulder ached and burned.

  “Are you alright?” Liam blasted into the room and sat on the bed next to me. Gently, he pulled me into his arms. “What happened? Are you hurt? Is someone else here?” He looked around frantically, his outline barely visible through the tears clouding my eyes.

  “I- I-” I hiccupped, unable to get out a complete sentence.

  “Maggie, what’s wrong? Talk to me?” He tucked my head up under his chin, rocking me back and forth.

  “I—” I sniffed, wiped my running nose on his shirt, and blinked the tears out of my eyes. “It just all hit me at once. I might never get to go home.”

  “You’ll go home,” he whispered. “Just wait. My team is tracking this guy down. As soon as they catch him, you’ll go back to your life. It will be like this never happened.”

  “But, but… I could have died,” I wailed. “I could have gotten you killed!”

  “I’m pretty hard to kill, Maggie. A lot have people have tried, and a lot of people have failed.”

  I rest my head against his chest, and in his arms, my tears slowed. The hiccups came further and further apart. Liam continued to rock me, and I calmed in his soothing embrace. I drifted to sleep, lulled by his rocking and the steady thumping of his heart.

  Chapter Twenty

  Maggie

  I tossed and turned, waking myself and flopping over on my back, spread-eagle . As my mind climbed from the muddy recesses of sleep, I realized the pattering I heard was the sound of rain on the tin roof. Steady and rhythmic, the pings were broken only by the roll of thunder across the valley.

  I lay a moment, thinking about what I’d found. It was time to get up and face the day. Swinging my legs over the bed, I sank my toes into the thick bedside rug, enjoying the feel of the soft knap for a moment.

  The rain quickly cooled the mountains, and a chill crept through the cabin. When my feet touched the icy floor, I danced quickly to the dresser and pulled some clean clothes out. Then I returned to sit on the bed, pulled my thick socks on, and thought about what I had discovered yesterday.

  Should I ask Liam about it? Should I pretend I never saw it?

  Without meaning to, I had invaded his personal space. I slid my arms in the sleeves of an oversized button down, wincing as my shoulder pulled. The cold made it ache more than it had in several days. Because of my wound, I hadn’t worn a bra since arriving at the cabin, and I enjoyed the feel of the soft fabric on my unbound breasts.

  I draped a blanket around my shoulders and shuffled out to the living room, pausing for a moment in front of the big glass windows to watch the rainfall in on the lake. The giant drops washed the dirt and dust off the vegetation, turning the leaves on the trees a brighter green. Altogether, it created a fine mist that hung across the water and the valley, shadowing nature’s depth from view.

  The area around Liam’s cabin held a fresh-faced beauty. Unspoiled by man, it was harsh and raw, and I loved it. It inspired me. The music I wrote there came from a place I hadn’t been able to reach for in a long time.

  “Good morning, sleepyhead.” Liam smiled at me over his glasses as he read something on the computer screen.

  “Mmmmph.” I gave an unintelligible reply as I sleepily sank into an armchair facing the windows and pulled my legs up under me. I wrapped the blanket all around me, leaving nothing exposed but my face.

  “It’ll warm up again when the rain stops. The mountains get cold quickly… even in summer.” He turned from the computer to face me. “If the rain doesn’t stop soon, I’ll take a look at the chimney and see if it’s clear enough to build a fire in the fireplace. There should be some dry wood stacked on the back porch.”

  I nodded slowly. “A fire would be nice.”

  He pushed back from his desk, removed his glasses and set them down before coming to sit in the chair across from me. “This is why I built here.”

  I looked at him quizzically.

  “This view… this feeling. Being able to sit here, make dinner in the kitchen, or putter in the yard and see this. It makes me feel closer to a higher power.”

  I pulled the fuzzy blanket tighter around me, cutting off the stream of cold air that crept down my neck and made me shiver. “It’s so beautiful.”

  Lightning streaked across the dark sky and was followed by a particularly loud crack of thunder that started at one end of the valley and rolled across to the other.

  “That was close,” I whispered.

  “Sometimes you can sit here and watch it strike trees on the ridge across the valley.”

  The rain intensified, and I could hear the wind whistle past the cabin, an eerie, ghostly sound that sent chills up my spine.

  “You want something to drink?” He glanced over at me. “Hot chocolate? No, wait—coffee.”

  “Coffee would be lovely.” It would warm me from the inside, and I might just stop shivering.

  “I should have known. I swear, you breathe coffee.” He chuckled as he padded across the living room and started filling the French press that on the stove.

  “It’s an important part of my daily ritual.” I sniffed, tilting my nose in the air, and looked at him through narrowed eyes.

  Liam

  I stood in front of the gas stove, the French press slowly heating and filling the cabin with the aroma of fresh coffee. Maggie looked so cute curled up in that chair. I felt myself twitch at the thought of what we had been doing several hours ago.

  Coffee steaming, I poured her a cup, flavored it with her chocolate creamer, and delivered it hot and fresh to her nest of blankets. I cocked my head and listened to the thunder echo across the valley as I sat back down, my hands warming around my own ceramic mug. “I’m guessing you aren’t in the mood for a run?”

  She snorted halfway into her first sip. “Not hardly. I may not move from this chair all day.”

  The sky lit up, and lightening turned the entire room white with a CRACK! The unusually loud thunder shook the house. Blinking away the spots in my vision, I came to my feet and migrated over to look out the windows. Shit! Lightning had struck the tall pine tree next to the house, and it stood charred and smoldering a little too close for comfort.

  As I watched, the burnt top of the pine teetered and then fell. THUD! It landed on the roof of the cabin with its branches hanging over the edge, scraping the side of the house.

  “SHIT!” I shoved my coffee into Maggie’s hands and slammed out the door to check the damage.

  The acrid scent of burning filled my nostrils, and the air practically vibrated with electricity. The cold rain soaked me to the skin, plastered my hair to my forehead, and dripped off my nose. My bare feet splashed through puddles, mud oozing between my toes as I rounded the corner of the cabin to see the pine merrily burning on top of the cabin. Thank God the roof was metal, but I could see small tongues of flame licking the wood sides, the rough-hewn logs singed despite the rain.

  “Maggie!” I hollered as I dashed back to the porch, scooping up a forgotten ax sitting next to the wood pile. “Maggie!” I turned to find her standing in the doorway, eyes wide, a deer-in-the-headlights stunned expression on her face. “MAGGIE!”

  She snapped out of her daze with a shake of her head. “What happened?” she called, rushing toward me out the door.

  “Lightning dropped a tree on the house!” I ran down the steps and back out into the rain, hollering back to her over my shoulder. “I need to cut it loose before the cabin burns.”

  “WHAT?!” She gasped and grabbed the door jam.

  “Yeah!” I shook my head as I stood looking up at the roof. “Get dressed.
There are boots and raincoats in the closet. I need your help.”

  “Liam?”

  “What?” I barked, my mind already a million miles ahead, trying to figure out how to get an entire tree off the roof.

  “Do you hear that?” Her voice rose at the end.

  The crackling sounds of fire reached my ears and I swore again. “God damn it! The cabin’s on fire!”

  Maggie sucked in a deep breath. “I’m coming!” As her face paled, she whirled around, dropped the blanket from her shoulders, and dove into the closet.

  I left her there to get dressed and raced back around the cabin to the tree. It had splintered as it fell, cracking off about four feet up the stump. Burning splinters of trunk lay all around the ground, some a good six to twelve inches thick. Raising the ax high above my head, I took a breath and dropped it down on the burning timber with all my might. Smoldering embers splashed all around where the blade landed.

  Thunk! Thunk! I swung the ax, severing the tenuous connection between stump and trunk. The crackling fire grew louder and brighter, and I started swinging faster. When I finally cut all the way through, the trunk slid part way off the roof, and the chopped end landed on the ground. I threw my arms in the air, ax still in my hands, and cheered.

  “What can I do?” Maggie appeared out of the rain, shrouded in a coat several sizes too big. Her feet were practically swimming in a pair of my rubber boots while she held out a second pair to me.

  “Thanks!” I shouted, shoving my filthy feet into them. The rain was helping slow the progress of the fire, but it was no match for the hunger of the flames as they consumed the dry wood and pine sap in the tree and my cabin.

  “Help me get that ladder up against the house!” I shouted to her. “I have to get this tree off the roof!”

  Maggie and I leaned the ladder up against the house, and I quickly scaled it. Before I even reached the top, I was already swinging the ax, cutting off the nearest branches, and tossing them off the cabin down to the ground. “Drag them away from the house so they don’t catch fire!” While she followed my orders, I continued to chop at the tree like a man possessed.