If anyone so much as thinks of approaching Niki…
That’s exactly what they’d do. Approach her, scare the shit out of her, threaten her.
No. He refused to let that happen.
Gut churning, he scooped up her discarded clothes and tossed them at her. “Get dressed.”
“Wh-what?” Sliding off the bonnet, she caught them, eyes wide. “Why?”
He shoved his cock—still goddamn rigid—back into his jeans and buttoned his fly. “Quickly.” Scanning the area once again, he strode to the Hyundai’s driver-side door, yanked it open, and slid behind the wheel.
She stood staring at him, hugging her clothes to her chest. Confusion warred with anger and pain in her expression.
Guilt gouged great chunks out of him. “Hurry up, squirt.”
Squirt. If he kept calling her by that old nickname, maybe, just maybe, he’d remember she was off-limits and to keep his hands to himself.
“What the hell is going on?”
“Now!” he said, louder, just as his phone pinged with another message from Pete.
Plan?
Disappearing for a while, he texted back, watching Niki scramble into her clothes. With Nik. Keep me posted. You know how.
Got it, Pete texted.
“Lincoln?” Niki glared at him as she dropped into the passenger seat. “If you don’t tell me what’s going on, so help me, I’ll nipple-cripple it out of you.”
“Show me your phone, squirt.”
Confusion won the war on her face as she handed him her smartphone. “Why?”
Guilt gnawing into him again, he tossed her phone out the car, threw his own after it, and slammed the door shut. “Buckle up.”
“What the—” Her eyes damn near bulged from her head. “Why did you just toss our phones out the window?”
He started the engine, threw the car into first, released the brake, and flicked her a quick look.
“I’m serious, squirt.” He flashed her a grin. “Buckle up.”
He floored the accelerator, spun the Hyundai in a tight one-eighty, and sped from the grounds of his warehouse, making sure to crush both their phones under the tyres on the way.
“Lincoln!” Niki twisted in her seat, staring through the back window for a second before spinning back to him and punching him on the shoulder. Hard. “What the hell is going on?”
“Sorry, squirt. I’ll explain later.”
“Stop calling me squirt!” She slammed her fist into his shoulder again. “Five minutes ago your tongue was in my cunt!”
His body reacted to the crude reminder. He forced his expression to remain calm. His cock…well, when it came to Nikalene, he had little control over the appendage. “Sure, squirt.”
She screamed at him. Punched his shoulder again. And then, thank God, buckled her seat belt. “Where are we going?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“And that warehouse wasn’t?”
He didn’t answer. The warehouse itself was very safe. But the fact he’d taken her there… Yeah, he’d clearly been out of the game for too long.
Idiot.
“Was that really where you lived? In a warehouse, away from where normal people live?”
“Oi. What do you mean ‘normal?’ What are you implying?
She shrugged. “Nothing about what you’re doing is normal.”
He flipped her a grin. “Thanks.”
She huffed. And then frowned. “Why did you kill our phones?”
“I’m not feeling social.”
She narrowed her eyes. “I knew you weren’t just a tattoo artist.”
Returning his attention to the road, he chuckled. “I swear, all I am is a tattoo artist.” Now.
“Who’s Snyder?”
His gut clenched. “Don’t know any Snyders.”
She snorted. “I saw his name on your phone.”
Shit. “You don’t need to worry about Snyder.” The only people who needed to worry about Pete were those deemed a direct and violent threat to Australia, or Australia’s political interests. Lincoln had quit the agency a year ago. Pete had stayed on and rose a bit higher in the ranks.
Hence his ability to slip Lincoln information otherwise unknown to the average field agent.
“Are you a criminal?”
He laughed before he could stop himself. “Depends on your definition of criminal.”
“Someone who’s broken the law.”
“In that case, no.” Some of the things he’d done in the service of keeping Australia safe were…morally dubious. But Niki didn’t need to know that.
“Who the hell are you, Lincoln? Is that even your real name, or is it Crowley?”
A cold fist closed around his heart. “Niki, I know I’m being a vague bastard right now, but you need to promise me one thing, okay?”
She frowned at him. “What?”
“Don’t call me Crowley again.” The thought of her knowing anything about that part of his life, what he’d done under that name… The cold fist turned to ice.
“Okay.”
“Thanks. But in answer to your question, yes, Lincoln is my real name. And Wells is my real surname.”
“The one you were born with?”
He nodded. “The one I was born with.”
A smile spread her lips—and for a second he forgot all about the road, and Pete’s messages, and the morally dubious shit he’d done since the age of twenty-six, when he’d joined the agency. That smile, her smile, the one he’d seen so often in his memories—part happiness, part mischief, part confident triumph—dragged him back to a time when he’d allowed himself the foolish fantasy of a life lived with her.
“Happy to meet you, Lincoln Wells. Thank you for making me come numerous times today. I look forward to returning the favour.”
His cock throbbed. Gritting his teeth, he fixed his stare back on the darkening road and its flowing traffic. “Listen, squirt, I know I kinda lost my control back there—”
She burst out laughing.
“But,” he went on, gripping the wheel until his knuckles ached, “there’ll be no ‘returning the favour,’ got it? I’m taking you somewhere safe, where you’ll tell me how you found out I wasn’t—What are you doing?”
Grinning at him, she’d leant closer and wriggled her hand down the front of his jeans, cupping his groin. “Taking matters into my own hands. Or singular. There’s no room down there for two hands. You’re freaking huge, Lincoln. Did you know?”
“Nikalene.” He grabbed her wrist, keeping his stare fixed on the road. His bloody traitorous cock, however, sprang to life in eager response to her far-from-gentle touch.
Laughing again, she tugged her hand free, settled back in her seat and rested her feet on the dashboard. “Yeah, let’s put a pin in that ‘no returning the favour’ thing until you can stop getting a hard-on when I touch you. How’s that sound?”
Chest tight, balls tighter, he swallowed. When the hell had she gotten so…so…confident?
She was always confident. And fierce and stubborn. You think you wanted her just because of the way she looked? You’ve been in love with her personality for years, mate. The body just happened to be icing on the cake.
Hell, he was in trouble.
“Don’t do that again,” he growled, staring at the road.
“Will you spank me if I do?”
Another hungry pulse of his cock. He ground his teeth. “What do you think is happening here?”
“You pretended to be dead for a year, for reasons I suspect had nothing to do with me, and I found out, and now we’re finally acting on how we’ve felt about each other for years.”
The matter-of-fact way she laid it all out stirred something close to admiration in him, despite his agitated state. In all the time he’d known her, she’d never minced words. When she had an opinion, she spoke it, acted on it.
“You’re wrong,” he said without looking at her. “The reason I pretended to be dead for a year had everything to do with you.�
�
Silence.
Throat tight, he flicked a glance at her. Maybe a dose of the harsh truth was what she needed.
She narrowed her eyes. “You’re not making any sense, Lincoln.”
A hot lump rolled through his chest and down into his gut. “I want you more than you could comprehend, Niki. That’s why I pretended to be dead.”
Chapter 5
He didn’t say another word. Just drove, stare on the road, knuckles white as he squeezed the wheel.
“What…” She stopped. Licked her dry lips. “What were you doing in Bali a year ago, Lincoln? When I was about to hit Dutton with the cricket bat?”
She’d been following the vile Australian diplomat in Bali for a week, watching him hand over street kids to perverted tourists like they were lollies.
Part of her thesis for her Masters on how power corrupts had focused on political power and the erosion of morals and ethics. She’d been studying Barnaby Dutton—one of Australia’s retired politicians who’d moved to Bali as a diplomat—and as part of her thesis, had wanted to see for herself how the man lived on Australian taxpayers’ money. When she’d discovered what he was doing over there, how he was abusing his power—and vulnerable children—sickened outrage undid her, and she’d bought a cricket bat.
Tracked his movements one night.
Planned to beat the crap out of him.
And then Lincoln had appeared from nowhere and stopped her.
“Why were you there?” she asked, throat thick. “Were you following me? Or him?”
“Him.”
A cold finger traced up her spine. “Why?”
“Because sometimes things need to be done for Australia and humanity that don’t go to vote in Parliament House. And I was one of the people who took care of those kinds of things.”
“Was?”
The muscle in his jaw bunched. “Was.”
“And when I turned up, ready to put Dutton in a hospital, you acted against orders to stop me? To protect me?”
“Give the girl a kewpie doll.”
“I don’t want a kewpie doll, Lincoln.” She studied his profile. “I think I’ve made it pretty clear what I want.”
His jaw bunched again.
He didn’t say another word. She didn’t prod him or ask any more questions.
What were the odds of him answering them?
But it made sense now. Well, some semblance of sense. Why he’d pretended to be dead, why Bebe had never told her he wasn’t. The way everything about him had changed after the call and text from whoever the hell Snyder was.
So what did “somewhere safe” mean to him? Was her life in danger now? Because she’d found out he wasn’t dead? Because she’d found him? Was he constantly checking his rearview mirror for a reason?
And why the hell did none of that change the way she felt about him?
It should. She hated secrets. Hated lies. Her parents had raised her to be open about everything; how she felt about things, about people, her opinions. And yet it seemed Lincoln was the embodiment of secrets. Why wasn’t she running in the opposite direction? Getting her arse back to Perth?
Because now she knew what he was capable of…she felt safer? What would he do if she told him about her stalker? About the creepy jerk freaking her out so much back home she was almost afraid to go outside? What would happen to that guy if she told Lincoln? Is that why she wasn’t heading back to Perth? Because she could use Lincoln’s help?
No. That’s not the reason, and you know it. You’re not running back home because, despite the secrecy and lies, you know—deep down where it counts—that Lincoln is a good guy. The guy you—
“We’re here.”
She blinked at his low statement, and then swung a look out the passenger window.
And blinked again. “Really?”
He let out a low chuckle. “You were expecting what?”
She frowned at the adorable little California bungalow situated far back from the street, behind a garden lush with acacia, grevillea, cascading lily pillies, and three large gum trees. “Not this. Is it yours?”
“Maybe.”
She cocked an eyebrow at him. “Is it always going to be this way with you now? Vague and mysterious?”
An unreadable tension fell over him for a second before he chuckled again. “Rethinking this whole thing about being happy I’m not dead yet?”
“No.”
His gaze dropped to her lips.
She licked them. Didn’t mean to, but they suddenly needed moisture.
His nostrils flared. “Goddamn it.”
She laughed at his mutter. Yeah, suck it up, Linc. After the hell you’ve put me through, it’s time you suffered. “Shall we get out?”
“No.” He returned his attention to the road. “There’s a back entrance.”
A few moments later, he pulled the rental to a halt inside a dark garage, and waited for the door to slide shut behind them before killing the engine.
“Don’t do anything,” he said, before exiting the car and disappearing into the shadows.
Do anything? Like what? Run away? Call Bebe? Call the Prime Minister?
She sighed. Holy crap, what a surreal life.
Long moments later, he appeared at the passenger side and opened her door. “’Kay, it’s all clear.”
“Of what?”
He flashed a smile at her. “Spiders.”
She rolled her eyes. And then sighed again as he pivoted on his heel and strode away. Guess he felt okay with letting her see his Danger Mouse side now.
Or maybe he’s trying to piss you off again. To stop you from “returning the favour.”
“Yeah, well, he’s going to be disappointed,” she mumbled, following after him in the dark. “That guy’s not going to know what hit him after I give him the best blow job of his life.”
“Not going to happen, squirt.” His deep voice rumbled from the darkness.
“Says you.” She frowned at him, barely making out his form.
“Says me.”
“So we’re going to ignore what happened back at the warehouse, are we?” She let out a dry, short snort. “I don’t think so.”
“That was the last time,” he said, his voice hoarse. “No more.”
“No more? Are you kidding? You can’t just do…that and then tell me ‘no more.’ No way. What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Keeping you safe.”
“From who?” She hurried after him. “Your old bosses? Or you?”
“Both.”
She stumbled at his answer, uttered in a wry throwaway tone.
He won’t hurt you. You know that.
Maybe not physically, but her heart? What were the chances Lincoln would leave her heart intact? He already destroyed it once when he’d rejected her five years ago, and again when she’d thought him dead. And still here she was, offering it to him for another go.
Was she a masochist?
No. Far from it. She was a fighter for truth. That was how her family described her growing up. A fighter for what was right. And her and Lincoln were right—and what they felt for each other was true.
She was also tenacious.
Holy crap, was she tenacious.
As Lincoln was about to find out.
She remained silent and kept her distance from him as he keyed in a code on a keypad next to a closed door. A low beep filled the air, followed by the sounds of multiple locks releasing, and then Lincoln swung the door open and warm, bright light flowed through it.
“Mi casa es su casa,” he said over his shoulder, stepping over the threshold.
The door led into a large living room decorated in furniture from what looked like the 1940s, with the jarring exception of a massive TV mounted on the wall and an entertainment/sound system underneath it. Beyond the living room was a kitchen also straight from the ’40s, except for the modern cooking appliances that were clearly state of the art.
“Okay, this is different,” sh
e murmured, trailing her fingertips over the back of a burgundy velvet armchair as she took it all in. On the walls were framed drawings of cultural icons from around the globe: the Taj Mahal, the Sydney Opera House, the Eiffel Tower, Buckingham Palace, the Ho Dynasty Citadel of Vietnam, all intricate and beautiful in their complexity and perfection.
In the corner of each one was Lincoln’s initials. So, his artistic talent wasn’t just limited to tattoos.
She walked deeper into the living room. Thick velvet drapes covered the windows, no doubt preventing anyone outside seeing in. The front door’s locking mechanism looked more complicated than the engine of her dad’s Prius, and the bank of small CCTV monitors mounted in the wall beside the door showed every angle and corner of the outside, including the footpath and the street.
Arching an eyebrow at him, she leant her hip against the armchair’s back. “Nice. Cozy.”
His lips twitched, and a devilish light glinted in his eyes. “Thanks. It’s a work in progress.”
She laughed, and then made her way into the kitchen. “So, is there food or do we have to order takeaway?”
“You hungry?”
Turning, she slid her butt up onto the counter, holding his gaze as she slowly spread her thighs a little. “Always.”
His chest rose and fell. His nostrils flared.
And then he closed the distance between them in three powerful strides, grabbed her hips and yanked her crotch against his.
*
She was his undoing. He’d known that was the case for years. He’d fought his lust for her, his desire for her. He’d fucked up his job because of her. He’d broken national security rules because of her. And despite all that, despite all the lectures he’d given himself, despite all the obstacles he’d put between them, he couldn’t resist her.
He couldn’t.
And now he’d brought her here, to the house he’d bought with cash from the original owners five years ago. The house with no paper trail connecting it to him. The house no one knew he owned except Ruckus.
One of his off-the-grid safe houses.
Crushing her lips with his, he grabbed her hips harder and ground his cock—ram-rod straight in his jeans—against the spread softness of her pussy lips. A distant part of his brain, the part not fogged by carnal need, told him she wore no underwear. He’d ripped them off her back at his warehouse. The only thing between her tight heat and his cock were two thin layers of worn denim.
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