“Oh my God,” I whimpered. I needed him. I needed to know everything he wanted from me, all the things I couldn’t imagine yet.
I pressed my palm over my mouth and bit down, the pain steadying me even as I muffled my own cries against it. Sleep was claiming me, dragging me down in the drowsy aftermath of pleasure, and my last thought was of him, the dangerous glitter of his eyes and the feel of his arms around me.
Chapter 7
Jack
I don’t know what I expected when I heard the first cry. Tears, perhaps. I stole to the door of the bedroom, careful of the places on the floor that creaked, and my hand trembled above the latch. She needed someone. Your fiancé hiring a hit man to take you out—that wasn’t the sort of thing to go through alone, right?
There was silence and my hand clenched. She wouldn’t want me there. Why would she? I was—
And then I heard the second cry. The little moan, the way her breathing caught in her throat. There was no mistaking the sound of her pleasure.
My world turned inside out and I leaned against the wall, bracing myself as my fingers found my own arousal. I could not do this. I told myself that with every stroke, listening to the sounds of her pleasure from behind the door. I could not do this. Fucking her, yes. I could have done that.
But to get off thinking about her, about how her mouth would feel around my cock, about how it would feel to pin her on her stomach and take make her beg for every slow thrust, about how she would ride me… That was crossing a line I never crossed. Lust was physical, no more. Entanglements were nothing but dead ends.
Entanglements like wondering who she was thinking about. My mouth twisted at the thought of Adrian Witte. His hands on her, him inside her? It was all I could do not to break the door down and take her here and now, show her she was mine and not his.
I heard her come at the same time my orgasm took me. My vision went black and I was damned lucky I was propped up against the wall.
Reason returned slowly, and with it, a realization: I was well and truly fucked, and not in the good way. Fantasizing about her, giving her my bed? Letting her stay here? Not killing her? I was going soft, and it was going to get me killed. Hell, if I was the man I claimed to be, I should throw her out right now.
She wasn’t my problem, after all, and I wasn’t her keeper. If she wanted to believe her fiancé was innocent, she could go ahead and pay the consequences. I knew you couldn’t save anyone in this world from themselves.
And no matter how much I told myself that she was an innocent and that I’d saved her, I knew it was just the opposite. There was no room in this world for a man who went back on his word, especially in this business. I hadn’t saved her at all. I’d doomed us both—because Adrian Witte’s vengeance was coming, and it wouldn’t be quick.
Book 2: Betrayed
Chapter 8
Lara
The room was flooded with daylight when I woke up, lazy and contented, wrapped in a comforter and pleasantly cozy in the air-conditioning. I stretched my arms up with a little sigh, careful not to jostle Adrian. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d woken up to sunlight. Normally he preferred to sleep with the shades drawn tightly and I hauled myself awake in the darkness to get to the gym.
I was probably late. I sat bolt upright, rubbing my eyes and pushing the covers back. Crap, crap, crap. Of all the days to start off on the wrong foot, the day of the gala was probably the worst one I could have picked.
I pushed myself up—and stopped dead. This wasn’t my room. Adrian wasn’t asleep in the bed next to me. Instead of plush carpeting, there were hardwood floors. Instead of silk sheets, there was the thick comforter I had wrapped myself in so comfortably. Instead of exquisite matching furniture, a simple dresser. There were no pieces of art, no photos, nothing to tell me about—
Jack. Last night came back to me in a rush and I sat down again, heavily.
Where there should be panic, there was instead a strange sense of clarity. Someone had sent people to kill me, and they hadn’t succeeded. The idea of a car chase, of assassins being shot in the head and a getaway car squealing out of the parking garage of the apartment building, didn’t seem real. But why else would I be in a strange bed, in my nightgown, with gravel still stuck to my feet? Why else would I have slept as though my body were completely exhausted?
Why would I remember, so clearly, how it felt to have Jack carry me part of the way down the stairs, press my hands over my ears gently, bundle me into the SUV? …Why else would I remember the press of his lips against mine and the hard feel of his chest under my hands?
I felt a flush at the memory, a stab of something that should have been shame, but was, worse luck, more desire than anything else. The thought of strong arms around me and his tongue thrusting into my mouth made my lips part, and I leaned over, trying to catch my breath.
I cast a look at the door. He was out there, and I had to leave at some point, and I was suddenly very aware that I was as good as naked in this nightgown. Adrian had been right, it was too revealing. For God’s sake, the lace over my chest was practically sheer.
I pressed my hands over my breasts, determined to cover my body however necessary, and realized how ridiculous that idea was. I couldn’t spend the whole day covering my chest with my hands. With a sigh, I went to the dresser and pulled open the drawers. Clothes were neatly stacked, hardly enough of them to constitute a wardrobe, and I selected all there really was to work with: a tee-shirt and workout shorts.
I looked myself over in the mirror—unframed, propped against the wall—and gave a decisive nod. I looked ridiculous. For one thing, the workout shorts went down past my knees. Still, it was better than being almost naked, right? With my chin up, I pulled the door open and went out into the main room. I was ready for anything, I told myself.
Except, as it turned out, him. Seated at a cheap kitchen table, he looked up from his coffee, and sight of him almost stopped me dead. I wasn’t sure how early he’d gotten up, but he was clean-shaven and wearing the suit from last night—with the shirt open at the neck, of course. It was incredibly unfair, I thought, with a surge of resentment, that he should be so goddamned gorgeous if he was going to be such a jerk. The thought of his taunts last night made my jaw clench—and the thought of what I’d done made me flush.
“Something wrong?” His eyes met mine and I saw the hint of a lazy smile there. “Sleep poorly?”
Could he have heard— Oh, God…
I flushed as bright a red as I ever had in my life, but his tone was too mild for me to tell if he was making any sort of point. “Not at all.” I lifted my chin. “I’m just disappointed that all of this is real.” The words came out before I could stop them, and to my surprise, his lips quirked.
“I suppose I can see that. Coffee?”
“Um. Yes?”
“Cream?”
“No.”
He paused. “You said that pretty vehemently.”
“Fat,” I said, by way of explanation. His brow furrowed and I waved my hands. “I have a gala tonight. I can’t be—” I broke off. “I probably don’t have the gala tonight, do I?”
“Probably not,” he agreed.
The world seemed to go away, and I didn’t hear him move, but he was by my side. “Come here.”
“What are you—” My vision seemed to be spotty.
“Come on, let’s sit you down.”
I clung to him, pride lost in the roaring in my ears, and when my vision cleared, he was crouching in front of me where I sat on his IKEA couch.
“You okay?”
“No.” The word came out of me almost as a growl. “Of course I’m not okay.”
He settled back on his heels warily, but he didn’t try to argue, and that almost made me angrier.
“You just show up at my apartment. To kill me! You show up to kill me, someone hired you…” To kill me. The words were lost in the roaring and I dropped my head into my hands, rocking back and forth. “And I have to get up a
nd do things like fucking drink coffee because that’s what you do, isn’t it? What the fuck am I supposed to be doing? But it’s wrong, it’s all wrong, it’s wrong, it’s wrong, because everything’s wrong, don’t you…” I gulped back something that might have been a sob. “Don’t you see?” I asked, almost pleadingly. “What do I do? What do I even do now?
He was biting his lip, and at the worry in his eyes, I felt a rush of terror.
“You don’t even know. God, what am I supposed to do, what am I supposed to do?” The words were coming out as a cry now. “How do I even—what am I supposed to—you came to kill me.”
“Shh.” He cast a worried glance at the floor.
“I will not shush! You—”
“I’d like to remind you that I didn’t do that,” he said tersely. “However…I appreciate the complexity of the situation, believe me.”
“The complexity of the—what are you, some kind of robot?”
“All right, listen up.” He looked almost weary. He blew out a breath and took a moment to study me. “I showed up last night to kill you. You’re absolutely correct. Now, aside from the fact that the people I take out are usually mobsters, that does put me somewhat in your debt.”
“Somewhat?”
He gave an eloquent shrug, as if this were some sort of moral grey area. His melting brown eyes challenged me to argue with him, and I shut my mouth on the words. I had only known him a few hours, but I still knew how that argument was going to end. Something told me that this was a remarkably stubborn man.
“Somewhat, then,” I said with icy politeness. “Go on.”
He flashed a genuine grin. “You said you wanted my help to track down who hired me. Yes?”
I felt like this should be a trap, but I couldn’t see how it was. “Yes,” I said cautiously.
“So, that’s what you do now,” he explained patiently. “You figure out who it was.”
I sat, clenching my hands between my knees. It seemed like it should be more complicated than that. “But how do I…”
He waited.
“How do I…be?” I didn’t feel like there were words for this question, and I flushed. “I don’t know what I’m saying.”
To my profound relief, he actually seemed to know what I was talking about. “The world turned upside down and you feel like all the things you used to do before are meaningless.”
I sat up, nodding jerkily. “Yes.”
He gave a helpless shrug. “I don’t know what to tell you. You get used to it.”
“What?”
“What’re you going to do? Not eat? Not sleep? Not shower? No. There are reasons you do all of those things. The world isn’t like you thought. Maybe that’ll change you. Usually does. But the weird part is how normal it still is at the end of everything.”
I paused. Under the matter of fact words, there was something else, something almost…lyrical. “How do you know?”
But his face closed off. “Not important.” He stood up. “I’ll get you that coffee.”
I sat uncertainly, wanting to apologize, but not sure for what. “You don’t need to get me coffee. I’ll…call you later.”
“You’ll what?” He turned, coffee cup in hand.
“I’ll call you later, and we can figure out how to go about finding who hired you.”
“Where are you going in the meantime?”
“My sister’s.” I chewed my lip. It was quite literally the only option I had, which unfortunately didn’t make it a good one. At all.
“Why not stay here?” he asked, almost delicately.
I tried not to blush bright red again, and I was fairly sure I failed. “That would be completely inappropriate.”
“Why?” For the first time, humor touched his eyes, and his gaze roamed over me. “Because you kissed me last night?”
I stood up. I wasn’t quite sure what my plan was, but I wasn’t going to sit here and listen to him taunt me about last night. He didn’t even know the worst of it. I shook my head, as much at myself as at him. “That was nothing.”
“Nothing?” He raised his eyebrows at me. “Is that normally how you say thank you to people, then? What can I expect when I bring you the coffee.”
“Mr. Reed.”
“Yes?”
“I apologize for kissing you,” I said icily. There was clearly no way to pretend that it hadn’t happened. Apparently, an apology was all I had. “But now I have to—”
“If you recall, I wasn’t exactly upset about it.” His smile was lazy.
“Mr. Reed—”
“You’re the only one who’s upset here.” He cut me off cheerfully.
“Mr. Reed.”
“Yes?
I ground my teeth. “I’m leaving. I will call you later.”
He laughed. He actually laughed at me. “Oh, really? You have my phone number?”
I paused, and then put my hand out. So I hadn’t thought this through. I wasn’t going to be shamed over that, though. I lifted my chin. He was the one who’d been a jerk.
And he was still going to be one. He pulled a sharpie out of a drawer and strolled over to take my hand, pulling it close as he wrote the number on my palm. His thumb slid over the inside of my wrist and his eyes locked on mine and he saw—damn him—how my pulse started to race at his touch.
“You don’t have to go stay with your sister, you know,” he said lazily.
I snatched my hand away. “Yes, I do.”
“Why?” He grinned. “If you stay here, we can do everything you’re thinking about right now.”
At the thought of us, naked together in that bed, my lips parted and I had to swallow to regain my composure. Or, at least, I would have regained it if he hadn’t stepped closer, the heat of his body radiating against mine.
“Come on.” His voice was like velvet. “What’s the problem?”
“The problem,” I said, wrenching myself back by sheer force of will, “is that I am engaged. I am not going to cheat on my fiancé.”
“Your fiancé—”
“He didn’t.” I jabbed a finger at him. “Don’t you say it. It wasn’t Adrian. It wasn’t!”
He raised an eyebrow.
“It wasn’t,” I gritted out. “And you’re going to help me prove that.”
“No, I said I would help you find out who did it. I never agreed to prove it wasn’t Adrian.”
“It’s the same thing.” I shook my head, frustrated.
“No, it’s not. It’s not the same thing at all. And in the meantime…” His fingers tipped my chin up and his lips dipped closer to mine. “I want you, and you want me.”
“I don’t—it’s not—”
“You want me to fuck you,” he said, still smiling. When I swayed toward him, he wrapped an arm around me. “You know you do. So why the hell shouldn’t we?”
“Because I am—you are insufferable!” He was laughing at me again, and that only made me angrier. I pushed on his chest, and was almost angry at how easily he stepped back. How could he be so composed when I was so flustered? “You are, you know that? You’re being a total jerk.”
“That’s quite possible,” he agreed.
“I told you I can’t sleep with you and you’re not listening.”
“You can sleep with me,” he pointed out. “Not only that, you want to.”
“Would you stop throwing that in my face?” I wanted to punch him. “You have no sense of honor,” I told him, my voice shaking. “None. You don’t get it. And…and…guys like you never win in the end, you know that?”
I’d meant to hurt him. I’d thrown the only thing at him that I could, sure that he would only laugh at it like he’d laughed at everything else. But something slammed down behind his eyes and his laugh died.
“Oh,” he said quietly, “I’m well aware of that.”
He turned away and I looked around myself, bewildered.
“What did I—”
“You want to leave?” He tossed a look over his shoulder as he picked
up his cup and took a sip of coffee. He jerked his head at the door. “Go. Get out.”
“But I…” still need you. I shut my mouth on the words, realizing how awful they were, but the bitter twist of his mouth said he knew what I’d been about to say.
He strode over to hold the door open and waited, icy, until I walked across the room and out the door.
“Just think about one thing.” He looked down at me, jaw set. “You say your fiancé couldn’t possibly have done this. Right? Well, then maybe you should ask yourself why you aren’t running right back to him.”
I had nothing to say to that. Nothing. And as I opened my mouth on the sudden stab of doubt, the door slammed in my face.
Chapter 9
Jack
Fuck her. She could go screw herself over if she wanted, what did I care? She could run back to Adrian Witte and get killed. It was nothing to me.
It should be nothing to me. I tossed the coffee into the sink with an angry jerk of my hand and pulled a bottle of whiskey out of one of the cabinets. Fuck 8AM, too, I needed a drink right now.
I downed the shot in one gulp and slammed the mug down with a grimace.
You have no sense of honor.
Who the fuck did she think she was? What did she know of honor? How many battlefields had she seen, shut away in her penthouse apartment? How many children had she seen dead, killed for their parents’ so-called crimes? What the fuck did Lara Thomas, pampered little trophy wife, know about the world, let alone honor?
My fingers clenched around the mug and I hurled it at the wall with a curse. Why did I even care? So she was pretty. I’d slept with enough pretty women that it shouldn’t bother me. So she was as caught up in the fairytale of love just as much as everyone else. I’d seen enough of that, too; it shouldn’t surprise me. She knew nothing about me. Her words were just that: words. She distrusted the fact that she wanted me, so—
HUNTED: A Bad Boy Romance (Books 1-5) Page 4
