by Fiona Brand
He could feel Anna shivering against him, and his jaw tensed at what she'd been through. He didn't know if she'd been hurt yet, but he would find out every last detail. As much as he wanted to make de Rocheford and Seber pay personally for what they'd done, his need for revenge had to be secondary. His objective had been to get Anna back, and he had achieved that. She was now right where he wanted her – in his arms. The police would take control of the situation, and Ray would be more than happy to see to it that justice was done. As of tonight, de Rocheford had officially lost everything, including his freedom. He would never come near Anna again, never intrude on her life or threaten her. It wasn't nearly enough for Blade, but it would have to do.
When his feet touched the pebbled beach below, Blade lifted Anna from the cliff, stripped the harness from them both, and did what he'd wanted to do when he'd first found her. He jerked his lip microphone down, pulled her into his arms and kissed her, giving vent to his savage relief. Her mouth was soft and willing, her arms tight around his neck, but it wasn't enough. He wanted to pull her closer than his damn body armour allowed, grind himself against her and make the kiss last for a long, long time.
When Seber had walked in on them as they were leaving, Blade had been certain he was on his way to execute her, panicking because the police had been camped at the gate, demanding entrance. He had got to her first, but it had been too close, their timing off because they had searched the wrong house. Reluctantly, he lifted his mouth and forced himself to release her.
One by one, the men jumped down onto the beach. Carter began collecting the harnesses. Ben and West dragged the boat to the water and aimed it into the waves.
The sound of rotors beat on the air, light scythed the night, arcing across the edge of the cliffs, then receding, as the police chopper swung closer to the main house. A voice from a loudhailer commanded the men above to put down their weapons and lie on the ground.
Blade pulled Anna with him to the boat, allowing himself a cold smile as the spotlight was kept scrupulously away from the cliffs.
The heavy beat of the helicopter masked the sound of the outboard motor as it coughed to life, then settled into a low buzz as the boat moved into the choppy surf. Seconds later, they were past the mouth of the shallow cove, forging out to sea.
Waves slapped at the sides, sending spray flying, so that they were drenched within moments. The inflatable was fast, but didn't have the seaworthiness of a boat with a deeper hull. It skimmed the surface instead of cutting, and was buffeted by both waves and wind.
Blade pulled Anna between his legs, wrapping his arms around her to give her maximum body contact and cushion her against the bouncing jolt as they hit each swell. Her chilled skin worried him. She had been shut in that cold room for hours, wearing only jeans, sneakers and his shirt, and now she was getting wet. He peeled off his vest, then removed his shirt and put it on Anna, before slipping the vest back on. The extra layer wasn't enough, but it was better than nothing.
She was still too quiet, and he didn't know if it was because of whatever they had drugged her with, or if she was in shock. The unnatural calm worried Blade more than anything else since he had found her alive. Apart from the moments when she had mistaken him for one of her captors and tried to take him out, then escape, she had docilely done everything he had demanded.
It was calmer when they got away from the shore, the choppy waves subsiding into lazy swells. Thirty minutes later, the inflatable nosed into the small bay where their vehicles were parked.
Anna accepted Blade's helping hand out of the boat, her sneakers splashing in the water, because she had to clamber over the side rather than the bow. As soon as they'd surfed in on a wave, the blond guy, Carter, had leaped out and swung the nose of the boat toward the sea. She understood why, as the next wave rolled in and simply lifted the bow. If the stem had been pointing that way, the boat would have been swamped.
They had all pulled their balaclavas off now, to reveal faces savagely striped with camouflage paint and some kind of microphone attachment that curved round from their ears to their mouths. Blade made quick introductions, and she found herself shaking hands and fielding grinning comments with these strange midnight men who had rescued her.
Blade led her to where the Jeep was parked and stripped off the heavy vest he had been wearing, leaving his torso bare. He pulled out a blanket and wrapped it around her shoulders.
Within minutes, the boat had been deflated and loaded onto the back of a black truck, the motor stowed and all the climbing equipment packed away. As they worked, the men traded amiable insults, discussed the possibility that they could have done some fishing if only they had thought to pack a trolling line, and voiced disgust over the poor form of a prominent football team, which would likely plunge the whole country into a depression overnight if it didn't win next week's game.
Any sign that the men had been involved in anything other than a little night fishing had been erased. There were even rods sprouting from rod holders on the back of the truck. Anna shook her head in dazed disbelief. Except for the efficient way they had dealt with the boat and their gear, and the lethal-looking black clothing, they could have been any group of men out on a night fishing trip. But, of course, they weren't.
"You're SAS."
The cheerful banter stopped. There was a moment of considered silence, the weight of four gazes falling on her.
The reality of what had just taken place sank in. Blade could have died; they all could have died. She had noticed that nowhere, at any time, had she seen any evidence of guns. The only weapon any of them appeared to have carried was a knife.
A knife. The fishing rods looked deadlier than the knives.
"I brought you some clothes."
Anna looked blankly at Blade as he pushed a towel into her hands. He hadn't answered her question; none of them had. They had simply gone back to their tasks as if she hadn't spoken.
"You need to get changed into some dry clothes."
Or what? she thought acidly. She would catch her death?
There was a chorus of goodbyes in guy-shorthand, an invitation for Blade and Anna to drop around at McCabe's place and watch one football team cream another while they knocked back a few cold ones. The blond guy, Carter, clapped Blade on the shoulder, grinned and winked at her; then they all piled into the truck and drove away, red tail-lights winking, fishing rods clattering in their rod-holders.
Blade pulled a small canvas pack from the Jeep and extracted a pile of fresh clothing. Without asking her, he began unbuttoning the two layers of wet shirt she was wearing.
If Anna's hands hadn't felt so clumsy with cold, she would have batted his hands away. "You didn't have a gun," she said tonelessly.
He undid the last button and peeled both shirts off in one go, tossing them aside. "None of us had guns."
Her palms slammed into his chest.
He stumbled back against the Jeep, catching her hands and pulling her with him, so she ended up falling against him. It was a neat trick.
Anna glared into his lazily amused face, incensed beyond any thought of control. "You came after me armed with only a knife!"
His arms went around her, hugging her in close, so that his heat wrapped her far more effectively than the blanket had. "You got a problem with that?" he murmured.
She resisted the urge to wrap her arms around his waist, to bury her face against his shoulder. He knew he could melt her with a touch, knew it and traded on it. She tilted her chin, which brought her eyes level with his mouth. "Yeah. A big problem. They had guns."
"They didn't get to use them."
"What if something had gone wrong? What if—"
His mouth dipped, cutting her short with a soft, cajoling pressure. "There was no time for anything else, and no other way."
He briefly explained their reasoning and the involvement of the police, but if he'd thought that was going to calm her down, he was so wrong.
"You deliberately walked into a tra
p."
"No. We used Henry's trap to our advantage. We gathered information, formulated and carried out a strategy. It was a calculated risk, but it worked." His voice hardened. "They got hold of you because I slipped up. I wasn't waiting for a more conventional solution. I wanted you out of there."
Anna almost flinched at his abrupt change in tone from soft cajoling to cold command. He had made a mistake and rectified it, at the same time taking down both Seber and de Rocheford. He had done it all in one stroke, when most people would have seen each separate problem as difficult – and all three as definitely in the "too-hard" basket. Blade had taken the problem apart and found a solution, controlled all the components in the game. She knew he was trained for this, that he was obviously very, very good at it, but even so, she was still reeling from the terrible risk he had taken. A risk that he had calculated like an equation.
She had already known about this side of Blade. That streak of ruthlessness, that need for control that bordered on cold calculation, was as much a part of him as the charm and playfulness, the burning sensuality – but the abyss between the two was alarming.
She loved Blade, every exciting, irresistible, complex part of him, but right now she felt like she was walking a shaky bridge that straddled that abyss. The passionate part of him wanted her, but what happened when the cold, logical, in-control part of Blade could no longer stomach her psychic talent? The uncontrollable invasion of privacy she represented?
What happened if she did to Blade what she had unwittingly done to Henry? Would he look at her with that wintry cold in his eyes as he told her it was over?
They had shared a great deal, but they had only spent one night together. She loved him with every particle of her being, but essentially, they were strangers. Intimate strangers.
Then there was that other small detail that kept nagging at her. He didn't need her. The dreams had been all about her need, not his. She had called out, and he had answered.
She realised that the inner cold that had crept deeper with the years didn't have anything to do with de Rocheford or the way she had been hunted, it had to do with Blade. He was the only one who could warm her. He was the only one who could banish her loneliness. He was essential to her in some way she didn't quite understand, just as she didn't understand her psychic talent.
The situation reminded her of a delicate orchid she had read about once. The exotic plant required a certain rare nutrient to survive and flourish. If it didn't get that nutrient, it refused to flower, and gradually withered and died. She had reached out for what she had needed in her dreams and taken it, regardless of the cost to Blade.
She wondered how she was going to control her need.
She felt like a thief in the night. She felt like some kind of emotional vampire.
Chapter 16
Blade shook her gently. "Anna, what is it?"
His voice was rough with concern. He was still holding her close against him, his arms tight, as if he absolutely did not want to let her go. His body heat warmed her against the night chill, but no amount of winter cold even approached the subzero reality of losing him.
"What will happen to Henry?" she asked, desperate to deflect both his attention and her own fears.
Blade released her, stripped her damp bra off and began shoving her arms into another of his shirts. Automatically, Anna began rolling the dangling sleeves up.
Blade's eyes were slitted and grim as he handled the buttons. "I've had just about enough of Henry. I guess when we're married, I'll be related to the bastard. Brings to mind that saying that you can't pick your relatives."
Anna's chest contracted as if she'd just been kicked. Marriage? She studied his bent head as he went down on his haunches to pull off her sneakers, and a wave of longing swept her, so intense she was dizzy with it. She wanted to reach out and touch his hair, drown in the pure pleasure of simply being able to do so. She had dreamed of this, dreamed of Blade … wanted him so much it hurt, but she couldn't just give in and let him sweep her away. She needed to know that he could love her, all of her, first. "I haven't said I'll marry you," she said flatly.
Blade went still, then simply started on her jeans, patiently peeling them down and taking her panties with them. He wrapped her in the blanket again, then stripped off his own pants and boots, pulling on fresh jeans and a T-shirt before hustling her into the front seat of the Jeep.
He started the engine and set the heater on full blast, then handed her a thermos of coffee and a huge sandwich consisting of massive slices of bread and equally massive slices of cheese and ham. She drank and chewed, discovering she was ravenous, while he collected all their wet things and stowed them in the back. By the time Blade swung into the driver's seat, her fingers and toes were tingling with warmth, and she was feeling sleepy. Considering that she had spent most of the day asleep, she was disgusted with herself.
She did up her seat belt and folded her arms across her chest, fighting the sudden giddy delight of being alive, of them both being alive. Of finally being free of Henry.
She stared at the bright sweep of headlights picking out the winding road, the fence posts. She was free. She didn't have to run anymore. Henry and Seber would be in custody by now.
It was hard to take in, especially when she considered that if Blade hadn't found her in Ambrose Park and chosen to involve himself in all this, she would be dead.
"How many times have you saved my life?" she rasped.
"I haven't been counting." Blade flashed her a slow grin, caught her fingers and drew them to his mouth.
Oh, yes, he was arrogant and magnificent, and too damn cocky for his own good, and she knew she was going to have a hard job resisting him, if she could resist him at all. Her instincts as a child had been accurate. Blade was a knight – her knight. She just hadn't realised he was also a ruthless conqueror.
*
She must have slept. When she awoke, they were bumping along a rutted road, and as they came around a bend, she saw a house that looked like a castle keep, stone-walled and stark against a moonlit expanse of ocean. Mist rose off the surface of the water, long tendrils flowing on the night air, sinking into dips and hollows, condensing on the massive walls so that they gleamed like wet mail in the moonlight.
There was an enormous sweep of barren ground surrounding the building, which she realised wasn't old at all, but starkly modern. The bare dirt would one day be an emerald sweep of lawn. She could almost see the graceful trees and shrubs, the riotous beds of flowers, which would complement the lawn and soften the solid, uncompromising lines of the stonework.
The house stood alone and lonely, incomplete, yet compelling, a thing of fairy tales and myths, as isolated in this quiet valley as a fierce eagle in its eyrie.
Blade pulled to a stop in front of a massive door that looked like it had been constructed to withstand a siege. He opened the Jeep's glove-box and grabbed a flashlight and a set of keys.
Anna unclipped her seat belt. "Where are we?" The question seemed mundane. She felt she should have been asking, "When are we?"
"My house."
It figured, she thought, as she pushed her door open and climbed down to the gravelled drive, still holding the blanket around her shoulders. Blood will out. Blade Lombard was a reaver from way back, with a reaver's instincts. The house shouted out who and what he was loud and clear. He would take, and he would hold.
He unlocked the huge double doors, which swung inward on well-oiled hinges. Then he strode back to the Jeep, extracted his pack from the rear, locked the vehicle, then came around to take her arm.
Anna didn't protest, soaking up even this small touch with a hungry delight. She felt strangely light-headed, filled with a nervous energy. And scared. His house. Already she could feel the pull of it somewhere deep inside her. This keep of a house was so achingly like Blade, an extension of his personality. She didn't care what it was like inside; she loved it already.
Oh, yeah, she was scared. She didn't want to find mo
re things about him to love, to weave him any deeper into the very fabric of her being, because she couldn't afford to trust in the fairy tale. She had spent a lifetime dreaming, fantasizing – had even chosen to spend her leisure time creating fantasies on a page – but reality for her had always been gritty, almost too real. Only with Blade had the fantasy and reality become inextricably entwined.
The hall was massive and high ceilinged, the floor paved with what looked like flagstones and probably were.
He led her into a huge, bare room, the lounge. There was a fireplace big enough to walk into, an easel in one corner and the smell of linseed oil in the air, and a mattress on the floor piled with pillows and a sleeping bag. He showed her where the nearest bathroom was, leaving her with the torch. When she walked back into the lounge, he had a fire blazing, and candlelight flickered from several heavy candelabra.
He rose to his feet, pulling off his T-shirt in one fluid movement, letting it drop to the floor. "It'll be a little primitive until the power's hooked up. The electricians are still working on the wiring."
He took the torch from her, switched it off and put it beside the makeshift bed she knew they were going to share – for tonight, anyway. Anna eyed him uncertainly. His declaration that they were going to get married still hung between them, impossible and unresolved.
He checked out the fading bruise on her forehead, the scratch on her arm, undoing the grubby bandage and tossing it in the fire. He was quiet, restrained, and that set Anna even more on edge.
He was staring into her eyes now, his black gaze almost distant. "Do you know what you were drugged with?"
"Something on a cloth first. Ether, maybe. Then, later, sleeping pills."
"Do you feel nauseous or dizzy?"
She shook her head. What she felt was nervous and crazy. She was going to be sleeping with Blade in that bed – they were going to make love – and she didn't think she could stand to be pushed any closer to him if she was going to end up losing him.
