by KaLyn Cooper
Daniel and Katlin took different sides of the sweeping staircase since their suites were on opposite ends of the building. As he walked down the hall, he remembered Grace mentioning that Nita wasn’t feeling well. Deciding to check on her, he lightly knocked. When she didn’t answer, he became more concerned. He’d slept for twenty-four straight hours when fighting off the effects of Ebola, even with the magical shot. She was going to need to be hydrated. If she were sick to her stomach, Kira could give her some medicine.
His rational seemed logical, but he just wanted to see her. Glancing down the hall, his sister had already disappeared into her room and no one else was around when he silently slid into her room on bare feet.
She lay on her side facing away from him, her beautiful brown curls contrasting against the yellow sheets and pillowcase. He wanted to check to see if she had a temperature, so he quietly stepped next to the bed.
She rolled over on a sigh and called out his name.
Good. She knows I’m here. He ran his fingers through her soft curls, raking them away from her face. “I’m right here, Angel.”
He slowly rubbed his thumb over her cheek. She didn’t feel either hot or cold and didn’t seem to be sweating. Maybe she was just tired.
Then she moaned.
He leaned down to place a chaste kiss on her forehead, but at the last minute she lifted her face to meet his lips. She took the kiss deeper, and he let her. When she opened her mouth and their tongues danced and twisted. He ran his tongue over hers, and she explored his mouth until all he could taste was her. Holding her head in both hands, he tilted it the way he wanted for better access. Heated passion ignited like a match thrown on a gasoline-soaked bonfire. His desire for this woman exploded in a way he’d never experienced before.
Daniel had wanted women, and had women hundreds of times, but with Nita it was already different. Before, sex had always been…sex. Nothing more than a physical release. An opportunity to make his body, and the woman’s, feel wonderful for a short time. An opportunity to forget the world around them, focusing completely on the momentary ecstasy they could bring to each other.
It had never meant anything emotional to him or his lover.
But Nita meant something to him. He couldn’t define what that was, nor wanted to, as the taste of her flowed through his veins leaving tiny deposits in his heart. He needed more. He wanted to tangle their bodies the way their tongues thrust and retreated. His hands itched to explore every inch of her body the way he’d discovered every nook and crevice of her mouth.
Tearing his lips from hers he started a journey from the corner of her mouth kissing his way down her jaw to suck her earlobe.
“Oh, Daniel. More.” Her whispered demand was permission for him to keep going.
But he wasn’t sure he should.
Needing breath and wanting to at least slow things down, if not stop completely, he kissed her tenderly before he tore his mouth away from hers. As he gave them both some distance, he wondered what the hell he was doing. Well, he knew what he was doing and was damn good at it, but he questioned the sanity of seducing one of his sister’s friends. Nita was also his friend, and he wanted to kiss his friend. In truth, he wanted to do a lot more than kiss her.
This wasn’t a good idea. His son was asleep across the hall and his daughter was in the care of his sister’s friends less than thirty feet away. Admittedly, they were all behind closed doors, and they were all adults, but…
“I…I should…” He dragged in a ragged breath and took a step back. “I should probably go.”
“Stay.” Nita’s husky voice was like a caress of fingers along his shaft.
Daniel didn’t move. “I just came in to check on you. Grace said you weren’t feeling well.”
“I was just a little tired.” She shifted over, making room for him on the bed. “We’ve been putting in some really long hours getting the lab set up and finally running tests. I haven’t really been sleeping well at night.”
“Me either,” he admitted before he thought better of it.
He glanced toward the unlocked the door and reassured himself that no one would enter Nita’s room without knocking. Fuck. He hadn’t cared about someone catching him mid-stroke since he was in college. They were all adults. Did he really give a shit if someone knew that he and Nita were attracted to each other?
No. He paused as he stared at the woman in the bed.
He didn’t care about his reputation, but he cared about hers. What would her friends think of her, allowing their team leader’s brother to fuck her? Of course they would treat her differently, perhaps even despise her. Hurting her was the last thing he wanted for Nita.
“Stay with me.” The need in her voice was his affirmation but he still had to ask.
“Are you sure?” He left their next step up to her.
“I’m sure I want you in my bed.” She raised an eyebrow. There was no doubt in those determined hazel eyes of hers.
Nita lifted the blankets, inviting him to crawl in. As he slid between the sheets, he reached for her. His hand found bare skin at her waist. He ran his hand up her back, then all the way down her spine, and over her perfectly rounded ass.
She was naked.
He couldn’t believe it. He threw back the covers and slowly dragged his gaze the length of the most gorgeous body he’d ever seen. Her olive skin was different from his over-tanned, almost leather-colored body, at least the parts that had been exposed to the tropical sun far too often. His ass, on the other hand, was as white as the day he was born.
“Christ, Nita. You’re beautiful.” He cupped her breasts in both hands before bending his head and taking one of those dark nipples into his mouth. As he had with her tongue, he circled and toyed with it, then finally filled his mouth and sucked hard. When her back arched, forcing him to take more in his hand and mouth, he tucked away the fact that she enjoyed the way he taunted her breasts. He wondered what other erogenous zones she had waiting for him to discover.
He switched sides so as to give each breast equal treatment before he kissed his way over her flat stomach to her navel. He circled her innie with his tongue and thrust the tip hard against the indentation, then lightly pinched her nipples.
Her hips rose eight inches off the bed. Oh, yeah, she liked that.
Placing open-mouthed kisses all over her belly, he made his way to the neatly trimmed dark curly hair just above her sex. He could smell her arousal. His cock throbbed with the need to be sheathed inside her and feel her walls pulse with her release.
But she had to come first. He would always put her needs before his own.
With his thumbs, he spread her lips revealing her engorged clit to him. He kissed her most sensitive spot and she gasped. Then he licked from her opening to just below her clit and circled the bud.
She called his name just above a whisper. He wasn’t sure if it was a plea, a warning, or a threat.
“Right here, angel.” And he repeated the move. Then again and again.
“Please,” she called.
He grinned and nipped her clit. “I’m still here.” Looking up her quivering body, into her eyes, he taunted, “Do you want me to stop?”
“Fuck, no.” She growled. “I want you inside me.”
Obliging her, he slid two fingers into her slick, wet channel and sucked on her clit. Pumping them in and out, her body tightened around him, especially the muscles that gripped and released around his fingers.
He raised his head enough to see her hands fisted in the sheets at her sides. Her chest rose and fell as though she’d been sprinting. She was stunning. “I want to taste you as you come. Let yourself go, angel.”
He watched her expression as he blew a stream of cool air over her heated sex. Her eyes widened in surprise just before he took her clit into his mouth and licked the underside. At the same time, he added another finger and shoved them inside her as far as he could.
She shuddered and shattered, drenching his mouth in her release. Mov
ing quickly up her body, he took her mouth with a vicious kiss, silencing her scream. Rubbing her clit with his thumb and working his fingers in and out, he helped her ride out the orgasm until she grabbed his hand.
“Enough,” she whispered between pants. “No more, please.”
Using the pad of his thumb, he circled her clit. It immediately hardened. “Oh, I think you could be encouraged to go again.”
She curled into him and regained her breath. When she finally looked up at him, her smile was pure satisfaction. “You’re damn good at that. I don’t think I’ve ever come that hard before.” She licked her lips. “I can taste myself.” Her eyes turned devious. “Turnabout is fair play.”
She stroked the length of his cock.
The door across the hall opened with a bang.
“Mith Nita. I’m awake. I’m done with my nap.” Simon’s voice cut through Daniel’s sex-fogged brain.
The patter of three-year-old little boy on the hall tile was his next warning.
“Mith Nita. Can we now go for a boat ride?”
Daniel leaped out of the bed a second before his son burst though the bedroom door. Blue eyes met his. “Hi, Daddy. You want to come on a boat ride with me and Mith Nita? She can drive a boat.”
His son didn’t think it was strange that his father was standing in Nita’s bedroom.
He dared a glance at the woman he could still taste and realized that she’d pulled the covers up to her chin and kept her head on the pillow.
“I think Nita is tired from all her recent activity.” He put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “Let’s let her sleep a little longer while we see if Rosita has a snack for us.”
“I like nack, ‘pecially the kind from Mith Rothita.” He looked up at Daniel. “And you ‘posed to call them Mith Nita and Mith Rothita. Aunt Katlin told me that.”
Daniel laughed as he turned his son toward the door. Their mother had taught Daniel and Katlin to add Miss and Mister to the first name of adults as a show of respect. Leave it to his sister to teach his kid manners. Simon’s own mother sure as hell didn’t.
“Son, why don’t you go down stairs and find Ro— Miss Rosita. I’ll be right there. I want to check on your sister first.”
“Okay, Daddy.” The boy took off.
Daniel strode to the bed. “I’m sorry.” He ran the back of his knuckles down the side of her cheek.
Astonishment fell over her face like a dark veil. “I’m not. I don’t regret anything we did.”
Fuck. She misunderstood. He ran his fingers into her soft hair and bent over, his lips an inch from hers. “I’m sorry my son interrupted us.” He grinned. “I haven’t even got started on everything I want to do to you, for you, and with you.”
He closed his eyes to everything in the outside world and laid his lips on hers. Forcing himself to make it brief, he stood and turned before he opened his eyes. He couldn’t look back as he left the room. If he did, he’d want to run back and crawl in that bed with her and finish everything they started and never leave until he’d run down his grocery list of ways he wanted to make love to her.
And he loved her…as a friend…with benefits.
He turned toward his suite to check on his precious baby Bella.
Chapter 12
Nita sat at the dining room table, the large flat screen filled with boxes. In the upper left, a virologist from the CDC was ordering equipment to be sent to the clean room in Costa Rica. In the center at the top was the Chief of Internal Medicine at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. He and Nita were currently working out estimated numbers of viable patients, best practices for treatment, and medications needed.
She glanced at the poor guy on the lower left who kept growing the list on the lower right. Tom Callahan had tasked him with the duty to find, buy, rent, or obtain by other means, everything she needed. Then, the Director of Logistics for the CIA had to get it to her immediately.
“Dr. Banks, I’d like to send down more researchers. Can your clean room handle more people?” the CDC doctor asked.
“It’s small,” Nita admitted, almost ready to turn down his offer. Then she remembered just how tired the team she’d rescued out of Nicaragua was becoming. Working against the clock, each researcher had pushed themselves to their physical limits. “But I think if we worked around the clock, changing shifts every six hours so everyone could eat and rest, we’d be able to expand the number of tests which should logically result in finding a cure faster. Please send fifteen more people.”
“You have accommodations for that many more or do I need to send tents?”
Nita had to withhold her laugh. With the resort’s location so close to the Nicaraguan border and the coup that had made worldwide news within hours, dozens of tourists had canceled their reservations at the resort next door. Fortunately, they’d been able to keep a lid on the Ebola epidemic.
When General Cortez closed the Nicaraguan borders, he told the international press that it was so his new government could assure tourists’ safety. It wasn’t a lie…exactly. There had been rumors about the former presidential guard reorganizing and mounting an attempt to free the president from his imprisonment.
The EMP had effectively silenced any communication from the old capital of Managua. The general had casually mentioned that many people were suffering from a midsummer influenza. It happened every year about this time according to his press secretary. Spin doctoring at its best.
If the world had any idea of the size of the Ebola epidemic Nicaragua was facing, tourism from the Mexican Yucatán Peninsula, north to Southern California, and south to the Panama Canal, would cease to exist. Most of those countries depended on the billions of dollars generated by foreigners adorning their ancient cities and spending their modern money. The entire Central American monetary system could collapse.
Nita got everyone on the screen to agree to the priority ranking of the list before she sent them back to work and shut down the videoconference.
How the hell had she become in charge of containing an epidemic? With the weight of the daunting job ahead, Nita folded her arms on the table and rested her head. Too many thoughts. Too much responsibility. Too much depended on every one of her decisions.
She needed a drink. Just one. She had to keep her thoughts clear.
“Mith Nita.” A small hand lightly patted her shoulder as the sweet voice cut through her heavy thoughts. “Mith Nita, Mith Rothita told me to bring this to you.”
She rolled her head to the side to look into the innocent face. She saw that he was holding a tall glass filled with ice and a thick orangeish-pink liquid. Sitting up, she took the glass from Simon, recognizing it as one of the fruity cocktails Katlin had created during the month they’d been sequestered in the compound while waiting for USSOCOM teams to eliminate a terrorist who had put a contract out on the Ladies of Black Swan. Nita couldn’t remember what Katlin had named it, but one sip assured that the rum-laden punch truly packed a punch.
“You thick, Mith Nita?” Simon asked openly. “I put my head down when I don’t feel good too.”
Nita smiled and realized how wonderful she felt all the way to her soul. “Well, Simon, I am thick,” she readily admitted. She’d never been thin or skinny. “I like to think of myself as solid and compact.” Then added, “But I’m not sick.” She emphasized the s.
“Good.” Simon crawled right up in her lap as though the fact she wasn’t sick gave him permission to do so. He threw his good arm around her neck and turned to look into her eyes.
Oh, Christ. Those eyes, so much like his father’s, threw her momentarily. She’d forgotten, just for a second, this adorable little boy was Daniel’s son. She wasn’t sure how long it would take her to get used to the fact that he had children and never told anyone, not even his sister.
His lie of omission hurt. She considered Daniel a friend, a good friend, yet he hadn’t trusted her enough to tell her about his children. She wondered, not for the first time, if their mother hadn’t di
ed would he have left them to their life in Nicaragua? Would he ever have discovered how abusive their mother had been?
Nita didn’t exactly believe in predetermined destiny, but she was sure that God would never have left those children without Daniel in their life. She also believed, deep in her soul, that these children had been brought to her for a reason. Since discovering the abuse Simon had endured, his reason for being there had been revealed.
She glanced up the stairs as though she could see into Daniel’s suite. Was it her destiny to help baby Bella?
With a ding, an e-mail from the CIA logistician popped up on her computer. When she reached for the keys, Simon started to get down. “It’s okay,” she reassured him. “Stay right there. This will only take a minute. Yes,” she said with a satisfied smile. The top priority items had been secured and would be on a plane headed to them tonight along with several of the next level items. She dashed off a quick thank you and closed her computer.
After a sip of her much-needed drink, Nita focused on the child in her lap. “We have an hour before supper. Want to go for a swim?”
Simon’s entire face lit up with excitement. Then his shoulders dropped on a huff as he stared down at his sling in disappointment. “Can’t.”
“Sure you can. Hop down,” she ordered. Taking his good hand, they headed toward the kitchen. “I’m pretty sure Rosita has dealt with broken bones before. I’ll bet she has a plastic bag of some kind we can wrap around your cast that will help keep it waterproof.
Ten minutes later, they were both headed upstairs to their rooms to change into bathing suits.
“Can Daddy come, too?” Simon practically begged.
Nita didn’t care one way or the other. “He’s pretty busy right now, you can go ask. Knock quietly so you don’t wake baby Bella if she’s sleeping.”
Without letting go of her hand, Simon dragged her to the door of Daniel’s suite. “You knock. He won’t get mad at you.”
Concerned, Nita kneeled to look the boy face-to-face. “Has your daddy ever gotten mad at you and hurt you?”
