THE PRINCESS AND THE P.I.

by Donna Sterling

  Their kiss slowed into long, savoring tastes. His hands slid beneath her tunic, warm and roaming, caressing her everywhere except the places covered by her scant bikini. Those places began to throb for his attention.

  He soon gave it, at least to her breasts, where his fingers splayed, rubbed and piqued her to hardness through the thin fabric of her bikini top. Pleasure flashed in quicksilver pangs that made her tremble. He filled his palms with her breasts, wedging the hardened crests between his fingers, and continued to kiss her. The elevator stopped again. "We've got to get to the condo," he rasped. She nodded in dazed agreement. His hands swept downward and curved around her bottom, lifting her. Her legs folded around his hips. His male hardness lodged solidly between their bodies, growing all the larger, straining against the fabric of his shorts. She couldn't help but move against it. Sweat beaded on his face; a groan tore from his throat, and with urgent strides, he bore her down the hall.

  She thrust her fingers into his silky black hair and kissed him.

  Distracted by the kiss, he braced her against their condo door and undulated against her. With a surprised gasp, she countered the move. He gritted his teeth and cursed. Their gazes met in heated communion. They had to get inside … lose the clothes…

  He removed one hand from where he held her—where his hard, blunt fingertips had pressed beneath the edges of her bikini bottom—and shoved the key into the lock. She didn't help matters. As he carried her inside, she engaged him in another voluptuous kiss. A tortured moan erupted from him, and he struggled to lock the door. She half expected him to stop at the sofa, or even lower her to the floor, but he persevered all the way to the bedroom.

  He tumbled her onto the bed, stood beside it and yanked off his shirt. Her fingers flew to the buttons of her netted tunic. Flinging his shirt aside, he caught her wrists and pressed them back against the pillows. "Don't take anything off," he commanded. "Let me." After a short, searing stare, he added hoarsely, "I've been wanting to do it all day."

  He turned on the bedside lamp and stripped off the rest of his clothes.

  With her heart pounding, Claire lay obediently still against the pillows, arrested by the dark, male beauty of his body as he revealed it. She remembered well his sinewy arms and torso from their day on the beach, but when he unzipped his shorts and pushed them down his powerful thighs, her breath caught almost painfully. He was huge, vibrant and glistening in the golden lamplight, his body hardened for lovemaking.

  He knelt on the bed, straddled her thighs, and reached for the buttons of her tunic. He tugged them loose, one after the other, his rugged face taut with need. Laying open the tunic, he levered his body just above hers, his forearms trapping her hands in the netting.

  A disturbing glint shone in his heated stare. "You know the hell you put me through, don't you, trying to get us inside this condo?"

  "Hell?" she whispered, not quite understanding.

  "Payback, or so I've heard—" he nudged his slightly abrasive chin down the sensitive curve of her neck "—is also hell."

  While he held her hands entangled in her tunic, he seared a tingling path to her shoulders and then to her breasts with kisses, half bites and ingenious tongue strokes that drove her slowly, steadily, into a throbbing heat. He was playing with her, it seemed … yet, not playing—edging around the small triangles of her bikini top with his tongue, flicking occasionally across their middles, making her want in a way she'd never dreamed of wanting … in a feverish, desperate way. When his lips tugged her nipples into long, hard buds through the thin cotton, she cried out at the piercing pleasure and arched high off the bed, struggling to push the fabric aside and feel his mouth on her.

  His eyes were dazed by the time he lifted his head and reached around her to unhook her top. He pulled it off of her with urgent tugs, and when he'd freed her from it, he branded her with a smoldering gaze. "Claire…" he breathed. "You're beautiful." He lowered his head to her again, expelling hot, unsteady breaths, and reverently laved first one breast, then the other.

  He forgot all about trapping her arms as he moved down to her bikini panties. He applied the same teasing tactics, though, using not only his mouth, but his fingers and thumbs, until she writhed in wild undulations, gasping and quaking with the need for his body.

  He stripped the swimsuit down her legs, then rose onto his knees between them. Gripping her hips, he pushed solidly, deeply, into her.

  The sensation momentarily stunned her. He'd stretched her with an incredible hardness; filled her to an impossible fullness. She thought she'd explode from the pleasure. As he began to move in slow gyrations, the pleasure leaped and glowed, then coursed in heated torrents throughout her body. Her mouth opened. Tears formed in her eyes. She lifted her hips to meet his thrusts.

  It could have been anger or hostility that twisted his features, made a muscle clench in his jaw, but it was need—passionate need—for her. The knowledge infused her with an uncanny power. She used that power to stoke his need.

  A fine sheen glistened on his face and on every straining muscle of his magnificent body as she matched and countered his thrusts. His gaze sought hers, and he reached for her—pulled her up from the mattress, caught her to him in a hard embrace. The move forced a deeper penetration. Pleasure nearly blinded her.

  His gaze probed deep. Soul deep. "Dance with me now, Princess." His gruff whisper inflamed her. Her fingers dug into hard muscle at his shoulders as she worked her hips. And he worked his. A ragged cry escaped her.

  Tyce captured her mouth in a frenzied kiss. Their rhythm quickened with such synchronized precision he thought he might go mad. She was more than he'd bargained for. More than he'd known existed. He'd wanted sex from her, nothing more. Not this need. Not this urgency. Not this certainty gunning through him as he kissed her, as he loved her, that she was his—only his—and he would die if she wasn't.

  She clutched him fiercely, and with a wild cry, spasmed around him in a shuddering climax. He lost himself then in the stabbing, white-hot thrall of a pleasure too keen to contain. And when they at last tumbled together to the mattress—gasping, panting, and quaking in each other's arms—he was too stunned to speak.

  A few hundred heartbeats later, when the worst of the shock had worn off, she stirred in his arms, soft and slender against him, and her whisper rasped against his ear. "Was it as bad for you as it was for me?"

  He didn't smile. He couldn't if he tried. "Yeah," he muttered, tightening his arms around her. "It was bad."

  He awoke in the morning alone on the living room sofa bed. He'd left the warmth and temptation of Claire's dewy, naked body shortly after she'd drifted off to sleep last night. It hadn't been easy, extricating himself from her long, velvet-smooth legs that had interwoven with his. Hadn't been easy, denying himself the pleasure of sleeping with her in his arms.

  But he couldn't, in all good conscience, remain another minute in her bed. He hadn't had any business being there to start with. There were too many lies between them. Big lies.

  She believed him to be her bodyguard, and to have been hired by her cousin. Even though she wouldn't be talking to John Peterson anytime soon for fear of having the call traced, she would eventually discover the deception. John had hired a man from a security company to meet her at the airport and drive her around. Tyce had sent one of his own female operatives in a curly auburn wig and sunglasses to meet the driver at the airport. He'd driven the imposter heiress to a posh hotel, where she'd promptly dismissed him. Tyce could just imagine a possible conversation between Claire and her cousin. "Dismissed my bodyguard? I did no such thing! He's with me now…"

  But she wouldn't call her cousin for a few more weeks, according to their taped conversation. And Tyce wouldn't be staying with her that long. Once he'd determined her purpose in fleeing and her planned destination, he'd be finalizing his reports and turning her protection back into her uncle's capable hands.

  The idea of turning her over to anyone bothered him a little too much. Almost
as much as his conscience bothered him. He'd deceived her … and hadn't let that deception stop him from taking her to bed. Of course, she hadn't let her lies stop her, either. She'd made love to him under an assumed identity.

  That thought also disturbed him too much. Grabbing fresh clothes from his suitcase, he strode to the bathroom for a shower. Regardless of the lies she'd told him, nothing could excuse his lapse in self-control. He had to get their relationship back on its proper footing.

  He'd already compromised his case. He'd become sexually involved with the subject of his investigation. A man's freedom hinged on his successful completion of this case—Joe's freedom. He'd jeopardized that all-important, longtime goal for one night in her bed.

  One night in her bed. There would never be another.

  Stepping under the shower spray, he tried to forget the intoxicating taste of her mouth, her body. The feel of her in his arms. The incredible rightness of being inside her. With a muttered curse, he turned the shower to cold and directed his thoughts to his immediate obligations.

  One loomed ahead of him with disturbing new dimensions: he was obligated to report her whereabouts and her activities, including those of an intimate nature, to her uncle. Edgar Richmond seemed to believe that some malevolent outside influence had spurred her outrageous behavior. He wanted to know why she'd run away, and if she was involved with someone.

  She was definitely involved with someone now.

  Shoot me, someone, Tyce silently moaned, and put me out of my misery. He finished showering, shaving and dressing in a state of mortification. The situation called for some form of damage control, but he couldn't decide on the right approach. If he resorted to following his natural inclination, he'd come clean. Tell her everything. Apologize.

  But he'd be betraying his client and failing Joe. And for what? Claire would only rush out into the world alone, upset and unprotected, and therefore, more vulnerable than ever. Just remembering her on the dance floor surrounded by hungry, salivating wolves made him reluctant to cut her adrift. I want to know what I've been missing, she'd told him.

  Had she found it?

  What if she hadn't?

  What if she had?

  Growing more confused with every question, he left the bathroom through the doorway that led to the living room, not the one that led to the bedroom. She could still be sleeping in there, tangled in the sheets—naked, willing, and compellingly beautiful. He couldn't allow himself to go anywhere near the bedroom. As he concentrated on maintaining that resolve, he walked directly into the woman he swore to avoid.

  "Oh!" she exclaimed, dropping her leather toiletry case to the living room floor and reeling from the impact of their collision. "Excuse me!"

  Tyce caught her shoulders to steady her. Her hair, tangled and matted from last night's wild interlude, felt silky beneath his hands and glimmered golden with strawberry highlights in the morning sun. The blue velour robe sashed about her slender form accentuated the blueness of her eyes—bewitching eyes, now shaded with unmistakable self-consciousness. Apparently she wasn't used to morning afters.

  "I must look a mess," she said with an awkward little laugh, her hand delving into her hair. "I haven't even—"

  "You look fine." Too fine. She looked soft, feminine and irresistibly touchable in her morning dishevelment, her face flushed with shyness. Forcing his hands away from her, he fought the urge to pull her into his arms and kiss away that shyness.

  "The other door to the bathroom was locked," she explained in a breathless rush, "so I—"

  "Sorry, I forgot to unlock it."

  "Then I saw the sofa bed pulled out," she continued, "and I was so surprised to realize you slept there that I didn't pay attention to where I—"

  "I ran into you. I should have been the one watching—"

  "But I guess I can understand why you slept out here. I mean, I'm probably not the easiest person to sleep with."

  That brought them both to a pause.

  Feeling her face blaze with embarrassment, Claire ducked her head and bent to retrieve her toiletry case. He'd left her bed to sleep in the living room. She still felt stunned and inexplicably hurt at that discovery.

  Walker swept up the toiletry case before she reached it and handed it to her. Their hands touched, their gazes met. His eyes were unreadable now. Gone were all traces of the passion that had burned there last night. But his urgent plea still echoed in her heart. Dance with me now, Princess. Never had the sound of that word thrilled her more. She'd known he'd meant it as an endearment—an oddly personalized endearment that had nothing to do with her public persona. And in the heat of their lovemaking, she'd felt an awesome connection with him, an almost spiritual sense of oneness. Could that connection have been a sex-induced delusion on her part?

  "I slept out here," he gently informed her, "to guard you. I have a job to do."

  "It's okay, you don't have to explain." Claire forced a smile and backed away toward the sanctuary of the bathroom. Why couldn't she just shut up and run? He'd obviously had his fill of her last night. "I probably hogged the whole bed. It's been so long since I've slept with anyone." Dumb thing to say! He didn't need to know that!

  "Claire—" He took a step toward her.

  She escaped into the bathroom before he could touch her again, or spout another excuse for having left her bed. Closing the bathroom door, she leaned against it, her heart thudding. She'd made a complete fool of herself.

  If only the sight of that rumpled sofa bed hadn't jarred her so. But she'd woken with a powerful craving to feel his arms around her again. She'd been surprised and disappointed to find him absent. She'd thought he might have gone to make coffee, or to freshen himself in the bathroom. It never occurred to her that he hadn't planned on returning to bed. She'd felt so sure that he'd come back to her. To claim at least one more dance.

  She'd been wrong.

  And here she was, propped against the bathroom door, mortified by her own overreaction to their lovemaking. She'd never dreamed it could rattle her this much. It hadn't been the physical things they'd done, she realized, that had shaken her so profoundly. It had been the passion flowing stronger and wilder with every kiss, every move. Afterward, an equally charged feeling had radiated between them, binding her to him in a glowing tenderness.

  Or so she'd thought. But if he'd felt it, too, why would he have slept elsewhere? Why would he have reverted back to the trusty, protective shadow, perpetually "on duty"?

  Because that's who he was—a shadow paid to protect her.

  Pulling away from the door, she set her toiletry case on the marble-topped vanity and strove for emotional control. Why should she care where Walker slept? She'd wanted to know what she'd been missing, and he'd showed her. Wild, uninhibited sex—that's what she'd been missing. She should thank him for the insight and move on.

  Move on.

  Gazing at herself in the mirror with forlorn dismay, she realized that the time had come. The story of her running away had probably hit the tabloids by now, and maybe even the mainstream press. He'd surely recognize her then. One blissful night in his arms didn't mean she could trust him to keep her whereabouts a secret. Did it?

  She wanted it to mean precisely that. She wanted to tell him her real identity and explain her need to be free, to find herself, to determine her course for the future. The answers she was seeking seemed no closer. In fact, she was more confused than before. One thing she couldn't lose sight of was that no one could be trusted. That had to include Walker.

  Surprised by the fresh pain that long-held knowledge evoked, she decided she'd better pack immediately after she'd showered and dressed. She should be thanking him for leaving her bed.

  Heaven knew she couldn't have been the one to leave it.

  While he waited for her to rejoin him, Tyce took the opportunity to send his first report to Edgar Richmond. He hooked up the modem of his notebook computer to the living room phone jack, typed in a coded message and sent it via E-mail. The report t
old her general location and assured that she was safe. He also reported that, as of yet, she'd met with no one.

  He did not mention last night's activities. As far as Tyce was concerned, their night together had been no one else's business. He also realized that he wouldn't have reported her private activities even if she'd chosen another man. Her uncle may have had a valid need to know if she was involved with a potentially dangerous crowd, or if her private affairs could in some way harm his or her future. But Tyce saw no evidence of intrigue … and he'd never been one to kiss and tell.

  When he'd finished his report and packed his computer back into his briefcase, he stepped out onto the veranda and called Fred on his cell phone. Quietly he dictated the coordinates of their location on the map in a code that only he would understand. Tyce wanted backup close at hand. Fred and a small crew of handpicked security agents would establish a mobile perimeter in the immediate vicinity to keep a lookout for anything or anyone suspicious. In a place as wildly populated with teens, tourists and college students as Panama City in the summertime, their job would be close to impossible, since "suspicious behavior" was the norm. Tyce wanted a crew in place, just the same. He wanted to take no chances with her safety.

  He'd slipped his cell phone back into his pocket and returned to the living room only moments before she emerged from the bedroom. Dressed this time in a mint-green halter top and jean shorts, her hair a shiny halo of curls, she sported another pair of large, round sunglasses.

  He rose slowly up from the sofa, struck anew by her vibrant beauty. He was also struck by his own dismay at having her eyes hidden from him again. "Where'd you get the glasses?"

  "I had an extra pair that I bought at Value Village, in my suitcase. I looked in my beach bag for the pair you lent me yesterday, but—" She bit her lip and grimaced, looking remorseful and charming. "It seems I've lost them. They weren't in there. I'll pay you for them." She dipped into her purse and came out with a handful of bills.