by Tara Janzen
The floor!
Geezus. He couldn't even find the toilet. Then he spotted it in the corner. The tank was covered with a beaded scarf and set with an artistic display of fat candles and fresh flowers.
He wanted to tell her right then and there that her grandfather was never going to come home, because a man couldn't live in a bathroom like this. A man needed clean surfaces. A man wanted his bathroom to smell like nothing. Hers smelled like a combination cinnamon pastry shop and flower stall, with a side of fruit salad.
“I can't find my cherry lip gloss,” she said.
No shit, he thought.
“Don't ever tell my sister I let you in here,” she went on, sorting through a silver box full of lipstick tubes and tiny containers. “She doesn't like the guys I work with to come in here and see her underwear, but she's always hand-washing everything.”
Hand-washing. Right. Kid gave the bras another look, then slanted a glance at Nikki's chest, confirming what she'd said. No way were those her bras. The cups were full-size, and she was definitely half-pint.
She didn't have to worry. The last thing he was likely to do was tell Regan McKinney that he'd stood in her bathroom ogling her underwear. But, criminy, she had a lot of it, every color imaginable and then some, every piece made of lace and silk, a whole lot of it sheer, as in see-through.
Oh, man, Quinn. You're a goner, he thought, beginning to get an idea of what might be taking the captain so long.
Turning back to Nikki, he took hold of her arm and started hustling her out of the bathroom. “Take the whole box,” he said. “We're outta here.”
“But . . . but I don't have— What's that?” She balked, pulling back, and he nearly upended her down the stairs.
“What?” He looked back. She was staring at the gun in his other hand, the one he'd locked and loaded while he was waiting for her to get her things. “It's a shotgun.” Specifically, it was a pistol-gripped Mossberg 12-gauge Cruiser 500 shotgun, but he really didn't think she wanted to know all that.
Or maybe she did. The expression on her face was pretty much a mystery to him.
“What's wrong with your other gun? The one under your shirt?”
O-kay, he thought, wondering what in the world she was really talking about.
“Nothing,” he said. “Every single firearm I own is in perfect working order.” He could A-1 guarantee it, but she was still staring at the Mossberg like it might spontaneously explode.
He gave the gun a quick glance.
“I think I've changed my mind about—”
“No, you haven't,” he interrupted, all of a sudden getting the picture. As long as everything had been on her terms and on her turf, she'd been fine with the Marine invasion. But the tables had turned now, and he was in charge—and instead of having a discreet pistol tucked under his shirt like a television cop, he was carrying a much bigger gun that looked exactly like what it was: a serious, close-quarters, get-the-fuck-out-of-my-way man-killer.
“Yes, I have, and I'm not—”
If there was one thing Kid was not in the mood to hear, it was what she wasn't going to do.
“Look,” he interrupted her again. “I am here for one reason, to keep you alive—and if there's only one thing you can count on tonight, it's that I'm damn well going to do it. If it will make you feel better, you can call your sister as soon as we're in the car, but this is a done deal.”
His ultimatum delivered, he had a powerful urge to do the caveman thing, just pick her up, throw her over his shoulder, and clear out. It was the quickest way he could think of to get her out of the house—and to get his hand on her butt.
Shit. He had to stop thinking like that.
He'd always considered himself one of the best, one of the very best, but the whole “girl” thing with her was making him stupid. Maybe if he just kissed her, he could get on with the job.
He looked at her mouth—and instantly knew that was just another shit-for-brains idea. One kiss was not going to be enough.
“Come on,” he said, dragging her along behind him. At the front door, he killed all the lights and waited for his eyes to adjust.
“I thought we were in a hurry,” she whispered, standing next to him. She was still holding on to her little box of doodads and had a cloth purse thrown over her shoulder.
“We are,” he said, scanning the yard and the street, and remembering what he'd thought about hiding a platoon in the shrubbery. “When I say go, we're heading straight for the car.” He didn't see anything, and the clock was ticking in his head.
Five minutes.
Shit.
He scanned the area one last time, then made his move.
“Go.” They slipped outside, and he kept pace with her, searching the area as they ran, looking for targets. When they made the Porsche, he stood by the passenger door until she was inside.
He'd loaded his personal gear during the interminable five-minute bathroom break Nikki had taken, so once he dropped into the driver's seat, they were good to go.
Or so he thought.
“Oh, geez.” She let out a short gasp and turned in her seat. “What's that?”
He'd unzipped his duffel bag between them and pulled the stock of his M40 up and out, readying it for an easy grab. The whole operation had taken him about three seconds—just long enough, apparently, to freak her out.
“My sniper rifle,” he answered. He turned Nadine's key and fired up her engine. Glancing over his shoulder, he reversed out of the driveway.
“Just how in the hell many guns do you have?” she asked incredulously.
He met her gaze for one piercing moment.
“Enough.” It was a guarantee.
Jamming the Porsche into first gear, he took off, and a block from the house, he turned onto a cross street. He hit his lights just before he merged into the Friday night traffic. Finally, thank God, they were outta there.
As a last precaution, he checked the safety on the pistol-gripped Mossberg and eased it into a scabbard behind the passenger seat. If he needed it, he wouldn't have to reach far to get it.
CHAPTER
15
STEELE STREET didn't look anything like Regan had imagined. She'd expected a car lot full of cars, some of which they probably couldn't sell on their best day, the ones that looked like Jeanette. But there were no cars. There wasn't even a car lot.
Steele Street was an iron door in a dark alley in a bad part of town, with no sign, except for the numbers 738 above the door, and an ancient freight elevator that crawled up the side of the old brick building like a vertical catwalk, its steel beams exposed. Quinn had driven Jeanette right into the elevator cage and onto the lift platform, after keying in a code. The gears ground and the cables groaned as the lift started up and began hauling the car to the seventh floor. Quinn was still inside the Camaro, talking to Skeeter via the laptop, but Regan had gotten out and was watching the night skyline of Denver come into view against the mountains as the freight cage rose higher and higher.
While they'd still been in the woods, trying to find their clothes, Hawkins had called. Quinn was to ditch Jeanette and not go to the McKinney house; Roper was on the prowl.
Nikki had called shortly after—very shortly after—and told Regan she was on her way to the Southern Cross Hotel with a perfect specimen of male pulchritude and no paints, thank you very much. Oh, and by the way, did Regan know he was a walking arsenal?
Other than her expected distaste about the guns, Nikki sounded to be in good shape, which Regan found very reassuring. The part about male pulchritude was a bit unnerving. Yes, Kid Chaos had been relatively good-looking and—the clincher—in very good physical condition.
Regan just hoped Kid had enough sense to keep his clothes on. Being painted by Nikki was never what most of her first-time models thought it was going to be. Nicole Alana McKinney put those boys through the wringer. She was demanding and pushy, and operated strictly by her own rules, which was certainly what had gotten her where sh
e was in her career, on the verge of her first major show. Regan had never condoned naked men as an appropriate subject matter, especially when Nikki had first started at the ripe young age of sixteen. If Regan could have convinced her little sister to paint flowers, landscapes, or just about anything else instead, she would have. God knows, she'd tried.
The freight elevator screeched and shuddered over a particularly rough spot, and she braced her hand on Jeanette's rear spoiler. From through the car windows, she could hear Quinn still talking to Skeeter. His voice was deep and sure, and just hearing it made her feel all funny inside.
She must be out of her ever-loving mind. In fact, she was sure of it. She felt awkward, and uncertain, and yet still connected to Quinn, this man she'd all but absorbed through her pores on the hood of his car.
Oh, geez, it sounded worse every time she thought about it.
Maybe she'd just snapped from the pressure and completely lost her mind. It happened. Her friend Suzie had just snapped one day and run off with a bronc rider she'd met in a cowboy bar, leaving a perfectly good lawyer boyfriend in the dust. Five months later, Suzie and the cowboy were still on the professional rodeo circuit, living out of the back of his pickup truck and a string of cheap motel rooms, and by all accounts, still madly in love.
The last two weeks of searching for and worrying about Wilson had been difficult for Regan, extremely distressing, and the whole day today had just been one disaster after another. She could have snapped just like Suzie had snapped.
But despite the boots, Quinn was no cowboy, and if she'd just snapped, maybe she should have just snapped years ago. One hour on the hood of Quinn's Camaro had been a more emotionally involving, sexually intimate experience than the whole six years she'd spent in Scott's bed. God, she'd been so clueless. She'd had no idea what she'd really been missing. She'd thought the world had stopped while they'd been making love on that mountaintop, outside, naked, and completely lost to decency and decorum.
It had stopped for her, and she still wasn't ready for it to start back up. But it had, beginning with Hawkins's phone call.
She was a jumble of emotions, riding up the old elevator. Her sexual state had rather suddenly and unexpectedly gone from a coma into overdrive, with a man who was practically a stranger even if she had been nursing a crush on him for close to fifteen years, a situation she wasn't even close to sorting out on such short notice. Meanwhile, in a few minutes, she'd finally have Wilson back. She needed to be careful not to throttle him before she had a chance to cry all over him.
“It's about fifteen minutes of elevator ride to the top,” Quinn said, coming around the side of Jeanette.
She'd heard him get out of the car, heard the door shut, but still felt a rush run through her when he came and stood next to her.
“I can't believe you'd drive a hundred and twenty miles an hour to get from Cisco to Denver, and then spend fifteen minutes to get from the street to the seventh floor,” she said, grateful that she didn't sound half as breathless as she felt. He wreaked havoc on her. There was no doubt about it.
He grinned. “There's another elevator on the other side of the building. It'll get you there in sixty seconds flat, but . . .” His voice trailed off as he moved in closer and wrapped his arms around her, drawing her into his embrace. “But once we get to the seventh floor, we'll have company.”
His mouth came down on hers, softly and gently, as he sucked on her lips and slipped his tongue in her mouth. Then he opened his mouth wider and lightly grazed her with his teeth.
“I've been wanting to do that since we got back in the car.” His voice was rough with emotion, his words searing her heart.
She knew exactly what he meant. She'd wanted to kiss him again, too, be close to him again . . . have him inside her again.
“I really want to take you upstairs, lock all the doors, and throw away the keys.” His hands moved over her back underneath the T-shirt she was wearing, his WEATHERPROOF T-shirt. The only other thing she had on was her skirt. Her panties had been lost, and her bra had been, well . . . eaten, just enough that wearing it felt slightly more indecent than just going without.
“I'd like that.” She met his gaze, and what she saw made her feel like she was on the edge of a precipice. His hands slid down her torso, his thumbs grazing the sides of her breasts, and Regan felt it starting all over again. A deep thrill coursed through her body and settled between her legs—and he knew it. She could see it in the smoldering green depths of his eyes.
A guy could die from this, Quinn thought, taken aback by what he saw reflected in her gaze—a hunger as deep as his own—just up and die from making love to her and forgetting to eat or sleep until there was nothing left of him.
“Are you okay? From before?” he asked, bringing one hand up and tunneling it through her hair. Whatever had been holding her ponytail in place, they'd lost it, and her hair was all down around her shoulders, windblown and falling through his fingers, soft and silky. She was wearing his shirt and a skirt and nothing else. Once he'd gotten her out of her clothes, she hadn't been nearly so careful about them.
He liked that. He liked it a lot.
“Yes.” A wash of color stained her cheeks. “Are you?”
He grinned at that.
“Yeah. I'm fine.” He loved the way she blushed.
Fourteen minutes max, he thought, wondering if he could make it good for her in fourteen minutes. Sometimes slow was good. Sometimes fast was even better. But knowing exactly what she didn't have on under her skirt was enough to derail his decision-making process straight into the “fast is better” column. Fast was certainly better than letting her go and doing without. Way better than that.
Fourteen minutes. It wasn't much, but it was enough, if a woman was willing—and she looked very willing, her lips softly parted, her gaze drifting from his mouth, to his chest, and back to his eyes, telegraphing the simple fact that she wasn't going anywhere without him.
He reached for his belt buckle and saw her eyes widen slightly, then darken, heard the little catch in her breath.
That was it, that little catch. She did it every time they crossed the invisible threshold from maybe into definitely, and it was like lighting tinder into flame. Every cell in his body responded to that little catch in her breath. It was amazing. Profound. Absolutely irresistible. If she was going to catch her breath, he was going to take her all the way and back again.
With his other hand, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his last condom. Sticking it between his teeth, he tore the top off the package and held it up between them. Despite her willingness, he wasn't sure what she'd do with his offer.
A shy, slightly embarrassed smile curved her lips as she took it out of his hand. “Thank you, for . . . um, opening it,” she said so very politely, not quite meeting his gaze.
He laughed—thank you—looked once at the wall, then leaned down to kiss her and went back to undoing his pants. Her response was to melt into his arms and kiss him back, a real soul kiss, as if there were no way on earth for her to get enough of him, either.
The elevator, he'd noted, was just sliding past the large white numeral 2 painted onto the wall.
“We've got five floors to make this happen, sweetheart,” he told her between kisses, his voice growing rougher as the kisses got wetter and deeper and a little more frantic. Finally, his pants were open and he was free.
“Five floors, honey. Come on,” he urged, lifting her against the Camaro and leaning into her, holding her while she took care of him. She was sweet and gentle, rolling the prophylactic down on him, kind of tucking him into it, and she absolutely set him on fire.
When she was finally finished, and he was sweating bullets, he pushed up inside her, and, oh, God, she felt good. So good, her legs wrapping around him, holding him tight against her.
Sliding one hand up through her hair, he tilted her head back, baring her throat for the track of his tongue up to her mouth. He ran his nose down the side of hers,
loving the softness of her skin, the feel of her breath against his cheek, and he reminded himself to breathe with her.
She started to move down on him, and he pressed deeper up into her, giving her more of himself. It was an exquisite sensation, entering a woman, always, every time he'd ever done it, but with Regan . . . God, making love to her was incredible.
He stopped after his first few thrusts, just stopped and held himself still, dropping his head on her shoulder and trying to catch his breath. He needed a minute just to hold her, just to fill her up and fill himself with her scent and her softness. She was wrapped in his arms. He was buried deep between her thighs, and he still didn't feel close enough to her. Whatever he was after with her, whatever it was going to take, he was afraid it might drive him crazy before he got it.
“Quinn,” she gasped his name, and it was like a benediction. He loved hearing her say his name when he was inside her.
Lifting his head, he met and held her gaze. She was so lush, her skin so smooth. As he watched, a sigh shuddered through her and her lashes drifted closed.
Bands of light and shadows slid down across her face as the elevator rose higher and higher, the bars on the freight cage bisecting the light from the street lamps. Her cheeks were flushed, her mouth free from lipstick, but still ripe and full, and softly pink.
He knew what she tasted like now, and it was better than he'd imagined. A man would never, could never, get his mouth on anything softer or more gut-wrenchingly addictive than a woman. He'd never felt the truth of it more than with Regan McKinney. Next time, he promised himself, they were going to do this in a bed, and he was going to taste the rest of her.
Oh, yeah. Just the thought of having her with his tongue and mouth was enough to shoot his temperature up a couple of degrees and make his next thrust a foregone conclusion.
“Quinn,” she whispered his name again in a soft, shuddering sigh, moving against him, needing more.
