by Cindy Dees
“Good call,” she mumbled back.
“We need to look like we’re enjoying ourselves,” he murmured aloud. He raised his voice. “You do like marshmallows, don’t you, sweetheart?”
“Uhh, yes.” She answered in a similar volume. She poked a marshmallow onto the long, thin rod he handed her and held it out toward the fire. “Do you like yours brown and puffy or black and burned?”
He replied lazily, “I like mine soft and sweet on the inside, and I don’t care about the outside.”
She looked up sharply at him.
“Smile for the audience,” he directed under his breath.
She pasted on a grin and mumbled, “Can you see him, Mac?”
“Nope, but he won’t show himself if he knows what’s good for him. If I had to guess, he’s on his belly crawling up that ridge across from us.”
“I’m scared. What am I supposed to do if he attacks?”
He answered reassuringly, “Keep your voice low but don’t whisper. That way it won’t carry as far. If I tell you to get down at any point, throw yourself backward off this rock as fast as you can and stay down behind it. Okay?”
“Okay,” she murmured.
He raised his voice. “Now aren’t you glad we came out here? No parents or brothers to chaperone us for once.” He added under his breath, “Do you know anything about using a gun?”
She laughed low and sexy. Despite his tension, Mac’s gut coiled a little tighter at the sound. “I don’t know, darling,” she teased loudly.
He assumed she was answering that she didn’t know how to use a gun. Damn. He put one arm around her, pulling her close by his side. She went as stiff as a board under his touch. She felt as if she might break into a million pieces any second. Her tension had to be visible to the watcher. He reached under her hair to massage the nape of her neck. “Relax, sweetheart. We’ve got all night.”
She threw him an apologetic look. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
He popped a roasted marshmallow into his mouth and murmured around the sticky lump of sugar, “You’re doing great.” He continued sotto voce, “There’s a beeper in my pack. If something happens to me and Dutch, hit the square button on the end of it. It’s a panic button, and Uncle Sam will show up shortly to rescue you.”
She nodded as she poked another marshmallow on her makeshift stick. “Next one’s for you, honey bunny,” she added in a normal speaking voice.
“As long as you feed it to me,” he replied playfully. He murmured, “Honey bunny? Jeez, I hope Dutch didn’t hear that.”
She grinned and popped a wad of goo into his mouth. Mac slogged through the marshmallow until he could mumble, “I’ve got to get my throat radio on. I need your help.”
“Uhh, okay. What do I do?”
“I’m going to roll us on top of the horse blanket. Reach underneath it, grab the wad of wires you’ll feel, and stuff it under the front of my shirt.”
He didn’t give her time to tense up over how this maneuver was going to work. He just wrapped his arms around her and lay back, pulling her down on top of him. She felt good, stretched out across him. Correction. She felt great. Her body was slim and lissome against his, and she squirmed against him, protesting playfully, until he nearly moaned at the sensation.
He didn’t have to act when he groaned aloud, “You feel so good, baby. Even better than I remembered.”
Her eyes were pools of black, her pupils dilated in shock, when she propped herself up on his chest and stared down at him. He saw it in her eyes, too. Recognition that something was still there between them. Something hot and electric and sexual. Her hand slipped around his rib cage and under his back. He lifted infinitesimally to help her search beneath him.
“Got it,” she mumbled. “Don’t call me baby,” she added loudly.
“Why not, pumpkin?” he crooned. His voice dropped. “Now slip it between us and under my shirt.”
She pasted on a teasing smile and made a production of slipping her hands under his shirt. He growled in response and quickly reversed their positions. Susan looked startled as he towered above her.
“Your knee okay?” he bit out, low.
“Yeah,” she murmured back.
“I’m going to kiss you now, Suzie, and while we’re doing that, I need you to run the round necklace-shaped thing up my shirt to my neck.”
Her jaw dropped, no doubt in outrage at the idea of Mac Conlon kissing her again after all these years. But their lives hung on making this look good. They had to convince the guy on the ridge that this was real. He prayed she’d play along. If she blew their cover now, while he was lying on the ground, in the open, with his arms around her and his weapon a full arm’s length away, he was dead meat. And so was she.
Mac had never been so tense about kissing a woman, not even the first time he’d kissed Susan, all those years ago. But then, this was the first time that doing it wrong might get him killed. Please God, let Dutch not fail to cover their backs.
“I’m sorry, Suzie,” he murmured. Surprised, he realized he actually meant his apology. And then his mouth closed on hers.
He’d forgotten.
How could he ever have forgotten the berries-and-cream taste of her, the way she arched up into him, kissing him with her whole body, the little sound she made in the back of her throat when she was aroused. Her lips were warm and soft beneath his. They opened eagerly, beckoning him forward. He deepened the kiss, tasting marshmallow and Suzie. Her body molded to his, cushioning and cradling him in a perfect fit. Her hand crept up his chest, exploring the muscled contours there. Suddenly he was glad for all those grueling hours of exercise. Her fingers traced upward, taking his blood pressure higher, as well, his heart pumping harder and faster as her hand roamed across his skin.
Aw, hell. Dutch, my back’s all yours. And then the last remnants of rational thought drifted away like ashes on the wind, leaving only hot desire burning in his gut. He wanted her. All of her. Right here. Right now.
The cool circlet of the throat mike touched his neck, and he abruptly remembered what they were supposed to be doing. He rolled off the rock they’d been lying on, holding Suzie close. He absorbed the impact with the hard ground into his own body. She lurched against him, surprised.
“Tickle me, honey,” he murmured.
“You hate being tickled,” she murmured back.
He smiled seductively. “Just do it.”
He gritted his teeth as she complied, and he promptly wrestled her onto her back, carefully pinning her beneath him. He hoped he wasn’t hurting her knee. Their mock struggle brought them too close to the fire, so he sat up, dragging her beside him to a safer distance.
“What was all that about?” she asked under her breath.
“It covered me hooking up my mike and inserting my ear piece.”
“You did all that while you were tickling me and practically hog-tying me?”
He flashed her a genuine smile. “I’m a man of many talents.”
“Either that or you’ve got eight hands,” she retorted.
He chuckled, pulling her casually against his side. “I wish, baby.”
He sincerely hoped this act was working. Unfortunately, a single kiss wasn’t likely to hold their scout’s interest for very long. They were going to have to up the ante. Mac turned toward Suzie, shielding her from what he estimated to be the view of the watcher. The last thing he needed was for the scout to positively ID Susan Monroe and start shooting at her. Although with her hair messed up like that and her cheeks flushed the way they were, he doubted many people would recognize cool, sophisticated Susan Monroe right now. Who’d have guessed such heat lurked in her?
Suzie had grown up. She was tough, gutsy and the hottest number this side of the Rio Grande. He most definitely wanted to get to know this woman. At the moment he wanted inside her pants as bad as he wanted inside her heart. He clenched his teeth. The mission, dammit, the mission. Control came, but precariously. He closed his eyes briefly, shoving
back his guilt and the pain of her anger at him. He pushed away his sudden urge to overpower her physically and emotionally until she yielded to him once more. This was all an act. It was only an act. Yeah, right.
Susan gasped when Mac’s arms closed around her in an inescapable bear hug of steel. It felt good to be held—really held—by someone. Her world was so lonely and sterile she’d almost forgotten what human contact felt like.
But Mac had slipped right past her defenses. He’d brushed her self-protective prickliness aside and gone straight for her. It was exciting and frightening all at once. She leaned into his embrace, meeting his body with her own, cushioning his hard angles and edges with her yielding softness. Her breath stuck in her throat at the sensation. It would have been perfect except for the expression of acute pain that flickered across his face. Helpless frustration washed over her. Why did she have to be so bloody attracted to a man who obviously wanted nothing to do with her? But here she was, hoping he’d kiss her again. Hoping he’d do a lot more than that, in fact.
She was an idiot. She was neurotic and insecure to throw herself at a man who’d walked away, no run away, ten years ago and never looked back.
She was in heaven. Never had a man’s arms felt so safe and strong around her. Never had a man so completely surrounded her, sheltering her and protecting her like this. Never had another man made her insides melt into a shapeless lump of white-hot desire. She burrowed against Mac’s heat. He went as rigid as rock. It was like snuggling up to a granite boulder. He was so tense he all but vibrated. Was that good or bad? Did he want her and was he trying to hide it, or did her closeness just make him horribly uncomfortable? Should she pull away or snuggle even closer? In an agony of indecision, she did neither.
“How dangerous is the guy watching us?” she whispered into Mac’s shoulder.
“He’s not. As long as we don’t do anything to arouse his suspicions, he’s not going to try to shoot us.”
Susan lurched. “He’d kill us?” she squeaked.
“Shh,” Mac warned. “He’s not going to kill anybody. Dutch will take him out long before he gets off a shot at us. You’re a nonexpendable resource.”
“Gee, that’s comforting.”
Mac chuckled, the sound a low vibration in her ear as she snuggled against him. “It should be. If the mission is to keep you alive and get the bad guys, then that’s what we’ll do, come hell or high water. We never fail.”
“Never?”
“Never. Charlie Squad’s the best, Suz. You’re completely safe right now.”
Somehow she believed him. There was a confident ring to his words that proclaimed their truth. She laid her head in the hollow of Mac’s shoulder, beneath his ear. She couldn’t count how many times she’d rested her head in this exact spot before. It gave her a powerful sense of déjà vu to be doing it again.
“So now what do we do?” she asked.
Mac opened his mouth to answer, but instead, Dutch unwittingly answered her question. Susan’s ear was close enough to Mac’s earpiece that she also heard Dutch’s words. “Pick up the action, Mac. This guy’s getting antsy.”
Mac casually reached up to rub his throat, activating his mike while he was at it. “Roger.”
She looked up at Mac, and he met her gaze squarely. Apology shone in his lovely eyes. It hurt like a hot poker in her heart. She didn’t want him to be sorry he had to kiss her, darn it! But kiss her he did.
Her thoughts spun away like dandelion fluff as he swept her into his arms, transporting her to a place where nothing existed but the two of them. His kiss started sweetly, testing around the edges of her restraint, coaxing her to come with him further into his magical world. She had no will to resist him. Her hands slid up and into his thick, glossy hair, pulling him closer to her. Her breasts felt full and tight against his chest, her uneven breathing rubbing their peaks against him with tantalizing results.
His arm closed around her waist, pulling her higher against him, and his free hand speared into her hair, massaging her scalp and urging her ever closer. She groaned when he tore his mouth away from hers, only to sigh in ecstasy when his lips closed upon the soft spot just below her ear. His fingers twined in her hair, tugging gently, and she gladly offered him her neck to feast upon.
He accepted her wanton invitation. Her eyes closed, and she felt nothing but the fire of his mouth blazing upon her skin and an answering fire roaring inside of her. The two flames twisted and wrestled like lovers, their pagan dance entwining them in a single inferno that consumed her entirely.
Oh no, her scar. Her hands flew up to cover it, but he intercepted them. He kissed his way across the damaged flesh as if it was perfectly normal. He must be a good actor if he could act completely unaffected by the ugly scar. The thought was cold water on the flames within her.
But his kisses continued, heating her flesh anew, sending the fires inside her flaring even higher. She craved the touch of Mac’s hands on her nearly as much as she craved the feel of him beneath her own fingers. She reached for his shirt, but his hands stopped hers.
The wire. She mustn’t reveal the wire.
He rolled over, partially covering her with his body. Protecting her from the shooter.
“I don’t want to crush you, baby,” he murmured.
“Do I act like I’m in pain?” she murmured back.
A low, growling chuckle was his only reply before he covered her even more fully. His elbows supported his weight on either side of her head, and she reached up, looping her fingers around his massive biceps. She reveled in his hardness, in the size of him, in the way their bodies fit together.
“More, Mac,” she gasped. “I want more.”
He lowered his head, kissing her hungrily, and she returned his kisses just as voraciously. If she could consume him entirely, make him a part of herself and herself a part of him, she’d do it. This was a man she could lose herself in completely and revel in the experience.
Whoa. Time out. This was Mac.
The thought repeated itself in her head, a gentle sigh in the face of the wildfire between them. Yes. This was Mac, indeed. Her first love and, truth be told, her only real love.
Dutch’s voice came across Mac’s earpiece, startling Susan out of her sensual reverie. “The scout is moving away. I’m following him back to his camp.”
“Don’t be too long, Dutch,” Mac replied in a completely businesslike tone. “I’ll have us ready to move out by the time you get back.”
Susan went limp with disbelief beneath him. How could Mac talk so calmly after what they’d just been doing? She was panting like a dog on a hot summer day, and he was as cool as a cucumber. Had that sizzling embrace meant nothing to him? Had all that been an act after all? Had he just been doing his job?
She wriggled beneath him, and he rolled aside immediately. She sat up indignantly while she gathered her tattered emotional defenses. She stood up awkwardly, momentarily taller than Mac as he leaned back against the boulder, gazing at her expressionlessly. She glared down at him and let her humiliation and rage build to a smashing crescendo. It was better than sobbing like a little girl.
She snarled at him, “Don’t you get any ideas from what we just did, Mac Conlon. I was saving my neck and nothing more. You stay away from me. Got it?”
One dark eyebrow rose sardonically. “Got it.”
Chapter 6
S usan’s temper wasn’t soothed one bit when Mac stood up and towered over her. “Go pack your things so I can take down the tent.”
“Is that an order?” she challenged.
He shot a level stare at her. “Yes, it is.”
Ooh! She balled her fists. How could one man make her so mad so fast?
And then he leaned close and murmured into her ear. His voice sent sexy shivers racing up and down her spine. “Just so you know. You may have been acting in order to save your neck, but I wasn’t.”
He wasn’t acting during that hot embrace? Her jaw sagged in shock.
It
eventually dawned on her that she was just standing there staring at him like a complete idiot. She lurched into motion awkwardly, stuffing things randomly into saddlebags. Her thoughts whirled wildly. Why had he told her that? Was he actually attracted to her? A hunk like him? To a scarred, crippled wreck like her?
Susan forcibly calmed herself as she approached the horses. She didn’t need four skittish Arabs on her hands right now. She led the animals into the firelight and directed Mac while he loaded the packhorse. She tied down the load herself and set about saddling the riding horses. As she bent to lift the heavy western saddle onto her mare, Mac’s hands pushed hers aside. He hoisted the saddle easily and set it gently on the animal’s back. Susan cinched the girth just enough to hold the saddle in place. Mac helped her saddle his horse and Dutch’s, as well. A quick tightening of the cinches, and they could be on their way.
“Now what?” she asked.
Mac answered calmly, “Now we wait for Dutch to come back.”
“How long will that be?”
He shrugged. “No telling. Could be a few minutes, could be several hours. We can keep the fire going until he returns, or we can wait it out in the dark.”
The idea of sitting in the middle of a huge wilderness in pitch-blackness with a bunch of thugs out to kill her nearby didn’t sound at all appealing. It was bad enough having to be with Mac after that shockingly steamy kiss. Her insides were one giant, painfully tight knot. Surely she’d misread what he’d meant when he said he wasn’t acting. She wasn’t the beautiful, desirable girl she’d once been. Men didn’t find her attractive anymore. “I’d prefer a fire,” she managed to choke out.
Mac’s only response was to toss a couple more sticks on the cinders. He sat down beside the fire and stretched out his legs. What was he doing? Bad guys were lurking just over the next hill! “Aren’t you going to stand guard or something?” she asked incredulously.
“Dutch has things under control. He’ll call if he needs help.”
How could Mac be so bloody relaxed? There was an armed killer out there, somewhere beyond the ring of firelight. She plunked herself down in a huff on the opposite side of the fire. After a couple minutes it dawned on her that Mac was sitting serenely by the fire, peacefulness fairly radiating from him. What was up with that? Patience never had been his strong suit. Since when had he embraced this Zen ideal of calm?
