by Tami Lund
“I know this case is personal to you,” Quinn remarked. “But it’s weird—it seems personal to her, too. I would swear she is hitting on me because she thinks I’m yours.”
Kyra barked out a humorless laugh. “She’s hitting on you because you’re … you’re—”
When she did not finish the sentence, he arched that dark brow again. “Yes?”
“Attractive,” she finished lamely.
He looked surprised by her assessment. But surprise quickly morphed into predatory, and suddenly he stalked across the short distance between them until she was leaning back against the edge of the table, her palms flat on the surface, holding her up. Her breath went choppy. He was a scant two inches away, and she had to curl her fingers against the wood to keep from reaching out and pulling him closer.
“If I’m so damn attractive, why won’t you fuck me again?” he asked, his voice pitched low.
She swallowed. Her heart rate quickened. For a moment, she couldn’t recall why. Then she shook her head.
“We can’t,” she whispered. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
Her temper flared, thank God. She gave him a small push, and he backed up enough to allow her to slip out from between him and the table. She stumbled across the room and pressed her hand against the wall. She knew she looked like an idiot, bumbling around like this, knew it looked like exactly what it was, that he affected her, but she couldn’t think about that right now.
“I can’t separate it,” she finally admitted. “I can’t have sex with you and then walk away and not feel something. I’m not wired like that.”
He appeared to be bowled over by her honest answer. So much so that he actually staggered backward and dropped hard into the chair he’d vacated a few minutes prior. They remained like that for several silent heartbeats, until Quinn finally said, “Shit.”
He shook his head. “Shit, Kyra. I’m going to need another bottle of Jack.”
She fled the room.
• • •
He let her go. What the hell else was he supposed to do? Say, yeah, I’m having a hard time separating it too? He’d frigging told her about the day his mother died, for Christ’s sake. If that wasn’t personal, what the hell was?
But she was right. Neither one of them had any business whatsoever playing house quite that thoroughly, no matter how fucking awesome it was. This was a case, and their job was to solve it, period. All the other bullshit didn’t matter.
Besides, what the hell did he think would happen when the case was closed? Dating her was such a ludicrous idea, he almost laughed out loud. Quinn Daniels hadn’t dated a woman in his entire adult life. He wasn’t even sure he knew how.
Not to mention, they’d already gone way beyond dating at this point. Hell, they were living together. They went grocery shopping together. They were sleeping in the same bed, he pissed with the door open, his toothbrush was parked next to hers in the little ceramic holder on the bathroom counter.
Oh, and they worked together. Even if he honestly considered the idea of giving dating a try, did he really think it would work? How would they act when they were at the bureau? He had a feeling Kyra would not be able to handle the ribbing that would undoubtedly ensue.
“I can’t separate it,” she’d said. He knew she was right. And that alone was enough justification. It wouldn’t work. He needed to stay the hell away from her, because otherwise, she would end up hurt, and it would be his fault. He’d already killed his mother, and he was barely hanging on to the edge of sanity as a result. Hurting Kyra would, without a single doubt, send him flying headfirst over that edge.
Damn it all to hell. Sometimes it really sucked being the good guy. His psychopath father wouldn’t have let something as insignificant as Kyra’s feelings get to him.
Angrily, Quinn stabbed his finger onto one of the keys of his laptop, then punched in the security code because it had gone to sleep. When the screen flashed on, he saw that he had a handful of new emails, including the one he’d been waiting for—the one containing information about the license plate number of the car parked in Whitney Bianca’s driveway.
It was a rental. Listed under the name of Keith Oshard. It took only a handful of minutes to learn that Keith Oshard was a field agent from the Dallas regional office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Chapter Eight
Kyra was curled up in the window seat again. She knew he was home because she heard the slam of the door, indicating he’d closed it. Where had he been all afternoon and evening—no, wait. She wasn’t supposed to care. Still, she couldn’t help but wonder if he’d acted on his earlier idea of reacting to Whitney when she hit on him.
Lord, please don’t let that be it.
He wasn’t Kyra’s, not technically, and frankly he could do whatever the hell he wanted, but she was not sure if she could handle it if he actually hooked up with Whitney White-slash-Bianca.
She listened to his footfalls as he climbed the stairs. Funny how she knew it was him, not because there was no one else living in the house, but because she recognized his walk. Like they really were married. She was anticipating that first glimpse when he reached the top of the stairs, so she deliberately turned away and tried to focus on the computer screen.
And turned right back to the door, just as he stepped into view.
Their gazes met across the short expanse of space. His looked faintly accusatory. She furrowed her brow, confused. She hadn’t seen him all day. How could she have pissed him off now?
He walked into the room, dropped his computer bag onto the floor next to the door, stepped over to the bed, and dropped like a stone onto the edge.
“Tell me about Keith Oshard.”
Her entire body jerked as her heart rate suddenly zoomed into the stratosphere. “H-how do you know that name?”
Quinn tapped his temple. “I’m a smart little agent. Sometimes. Sometimes I’m also a fucking idiot, but generally that’s not associated with the job. In this case, I’m not sure, since the job and everything else are all mixed up here.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked in alarm. He wasn’t making sense.
“Tell me about Keith Oshard,” he demanded again.
She swallowed. “He—he’s another field agent. In Dallas. He’s, ah …”
“Your boyfriend?” Quinn sneered. “Or fuck buddy? Which one? Does it matter? You were fucking him, and he blew your goddamn case.” He pushed off the bed, as if he needed to move.
She closed her laptop. “Yes, he blew my case,” she said, enunciating each word.
“Why didn’t you tell the director?” Quinn shot back. “Covering his ass?”
Her own temper flared. Why the hell was he so pissed off about this? It wasn’t like it happened to him.
“I told my director. He didn’t believe me.”
“That’s bullshit. Nico would have believed you.”
“Yeah, well, Nico wasn’t my director back then.” She leaped off the window seat, feeling just as agitated as he looked. When pacing around the room didn’t help, she turned and strode out into the hall. Quinn chased after her.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he demanded as he followed her down the stairs. “I’m not done talking to you.”
“I need to hit something. And I doubt you want it to be you.” She grabbed the basement door and jerked it open. Quinn followed her down the stairs.
“Actually, that sounds fucking perfect,” he retorted as he snatched up the gloves he’d left hanging on a peg on the wall.
She pulled on her own gloves and ran through a series of stretches. As they squared off on the mat, she said, “Why the hell are you so worked up? It wasn’t your case that got blown.”
He took a swing. She dodged out of the way. He took another, a sloppy one, and she twisted around and caught him in the kidney. He grunted and charged at her, catching her around the waist and throwing her to the floor. She struggled to get out from underneath him,
her progress impeded by the boxing gloves.
“Get off me,” she growled as she struggled.
Apparently, in Quinn’s world, get off me translated as kiss me, because that’s exactly what he did. And in Kyra’s world, his kisses were wholly irresistible, so she kissed him back—hard. She wrapped her arms around his waist and flipped him over so that he was on his back and she straddled his legs. She tossed the gloves aside, grabbed the hem of his shirt, and jerked it over his head.
He threw his own gloves off and reciprocated. “If you get to see mine, I get to see yours,” he taunted as he reached up and unclasped her bra. With her still straddling his hips, he sat up, cupped her breast with one hand, and latched his lips onto the other.
She moaned, and let her head loll to the side, her eyes closed, her mind tuning out everything except the immediate sensations of pleasure Quinn created with his mouth, his hands, his body. She reached down and stroked him through his jeans, and he hissed.
“Goddamn it, Kyra.” He pushed her back against the mat again and grabbed her sweatpants, pulling them off in one swipe. The lacy panties were next, until she was laying there completely naked, her chest heaving, staring up at him, anticipation etched into every inch of her body.
He unsnapped his jeans and shoved them far enough down over his hips to free his erection, then he was on top of her, pushing into her, clinging to her, his face buried in her hair. She wrapped her arms around his back and held him tightly as her insides twisted and twisted until she arched her hips off the mat and exploded with her orgasm, almost at the exact same time as he thrust one last time and stiffened as he poured himself into her.
• • •
He had no idea how much time passed before she finally moved underneath him and he reluctantly rolled to the side so she could sit up. The earlier tension was gone, but he could tell it was replaced by something else.
He pulled his jeans over his hips and ran his hand through his hair. “I guess I should apologize for that.”
She pulled on her sweatpants and retrieved her shirt. “If you apologize, then I have to, too, since I was just as active a participant.”
“Yeah, you were pretty damn active,” he admitted as he shook his head. “Christ, I’m never going to be able to get into the boxing ring again without developing a hard-on.”
A laugh burst out of her mouth, which he took as a good sign. Until another thought struck him.
“Shit. We didn’t use protection.”
Her face screwed up, then her eyes rolled skyward and she appeared to be mentally calculating.
“We’re okay,” she finally said. “I’m not at that point in my cycle. I’m not ovulating right now. Although, if we do it again, we should try to keep our heads long enough to be safe.”
“I’ll start carrying condoms with me everywhere.” He cocked his head, studied her for a moment. “Do you want kids? I mean, is that part of your life plan?”
She pulled two bottles of water out of the mini fridge and handed him one. “It used to be,” she said after taking a swig.
He’d never actually considered the idea of kids. Or even a wife. But a few days playing house with Kyra Sanders made him wonder, is it possible?
“Look, Kyra …” He started to suggest they try to figure this thing out, see where it went. Say it was okay that she couldn’t separate things, because he couldn’t either.
“I was dating Keith. Secretly, because our director frowned upon interoffice romance.” Her words came out of nowhere, shattering the strangely comfortable feeling he’d been experiencing, and reminding him of why he’d been so angry in the first place.
He had very nearly launched his laptop at the wall when he learned that she had been screwing the guy who was currently visiting their perp, all the way up here in Michigan. That sure seemed like a damned important piece of the case, in his opinion.
“I thought I was in love with him,” she said quietly as she sank onto the bench parked against the wall. “I was caught up in the whole deal, playing house, looking at engagement rings, imagining what our kids would look like. I had a secret stash of wedding magazines.” She shook her head at her own folly. “Yes, kids were very much part of my life plan, back then.”
Quinn had the urge to climb up onto the bench and put his arm around her, but he held back. She seemed to need the space, and he still wasn’t entirely clear on how things went down in Dallas a year ago. If it turned out Kyra did something illegal, it would change the dynamics of their relationship. There was no gray area for Quinn Daniels.
“He knew all about the case I had against Whitney because I was so excited about it. I talked about it constantly. It was pretty damn big, a lot of money involved, and I was almost singlehandedly solving it. Heady stuff.”
“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I get it.”
She threw him a surprised look before continuing. “It took me a little while to catch on to the affair. The signs were small, but after a while, I couldn’t deny that something was going on, that Keith was cheating on me. The number of condoms in the box was too few. His excuses for where he spent his time when he wasn’t at work were too thin. I mean, we weren’t technically living together, but we practically spent every night together, and we worked in the same office. It was pretty damn obvious when he had large blocks of time that were unaccounted for.”
Quinn gave her the space she needed to gather her thoughts.
“I finally confronted him. He tried to deny it at first, but I refused to let it go. So he eventually admitted that he was having an affair with another woman.” She stood up, wrapped her arms around her midsection, and moved to stand in front of the wall of mirrors, staring at herself.
“He said he couldn’t help it. She was ‘smoking hot,’ he said. Way different from me. All glamorous and sexy and … and … and everything I wasn’t,” she finished on a whisper.
The look in her eyes was haunted. Quinn was on his feet, standing behind her, wrapping her in his arms, before he even realized what he was doing. He turned her away from the mirror and hugged her to him, holding her tightly so she could not twist away.
“Keith Oshard’s an idiot,” he said. “Anybody can see that you are way hotter than Whitney Bianca.”
She clung to his shirt, laughed into his shoulder. “Thanks, but you’re just saying that because you’re still under the influence of the endorphins we just created.”
“Good point,” he said. He scooped her into his arms and headed toward the stairs. “I think they’re wearing off, though. We should probably do it again.”
She laughed again. He liked that sound. And he marveled that he was the one to cause it.
Chapter Nine
They discussed the case over breakfast the next morning. Quinn grilled her about her relationship with Keith, which she suspected was partially for personal reasons. She finally walked over and perched in his lap.
“Are you jealous of a relationship I had more than a year ago?”
He smoothed his hand over her ass. “Nope. Just making sure there isn’t any residual emotional bullshit going on, that’s all. When you’re having an orgasm in bed with me, I want it to be me you’re thinking about.”
She laughed. “Trust me, I don’t exactly have a choice in the matter. You can be awfully all-consuming, Quinn Daniels.”
He ran one hand up her back to her neck and then pressed, pushing her toward him so he could kiss her. “Good to know,” he murmured against her lips. “Want to go upstairs and get consumed again?”
“Good God. I’m not sure I can keep up with you.”
He lifted her backside and repositioned her so she straddled his lap. “You underestimate yourself, Sanders. And it’s your fault I’m like this, you know. If you weren’t so damn—” Whatever he’d meant to say was interrupted by a knock on the back door.
He turned his head and leaned back in his chair so he could see through the kitchen into the patio room. “It’s Bianca.”
“I really dislik
e that woman,” she muttered as she climbed off his lap.
He gave her ass a playful swat. “Just think how sweet it’ll feel when you slap those cuffs on her wrists.”
She led him into the sunroom to greet their guest and then wished she hadn’t. She did not need to see the image of Whitney Bianca, dressed in what Kyra figured were supposed to be workout clothes. Her bleached blond hair was pulled back into a lacquered ponytail, and her face was fully made up, all the way down to the bright red lipstick. She wore a pair of Spandex shorts that could barely pass for panties and a sports bra that hardly had enough material to hold up her girls. The running shoes on her feet looked brand spanking new.
Whitney’s smile was for Quinn alone. “Did I see you jogging past my house yesterday?” she asked him in a coy, flirtatious voice.
He shrugged in that indifferent way of his. “Yeah, probably.”
Whitney struck a pose. “I jog too,” she announced. “Are you interested in a jogging partner?”
Quinn turned around and looked at Kyra. If he accepted Whitney’s offer, she would cut him off for a week. He must have seen it on her face because he politely declined the invitation.
That toothy smile faltered, and Whitney’s gaze shifted to focus on Kyra for the first time. Then she reaffixed the smile. “Some other time, then?” she said with fake cheer. When Quinn did not respond and the silence moved into uncomfortable territory, she excused herself and left.
Kyra watched her walk across the back lawn to her own house, while Quinn turned his back on the scene and said, “You need to get over your personal issues with that woman. Our best bet for closing this case quickly is for me to let her think she’s seducing me. You and I both know it.”
“How can you say that, after what I told you last night?”
“I’m not Keith Oshard,” he said, stabbing his thumb at his own chest. “You can’t assume the worst in people just because one guy fucked you over.”
