Elite Ops Complete Series

by Lora Leigh

  Her hand trembled as she laid it in his. That slight tremor touched his heart in ways it shouldn’t. She was innocent of a lover’s touch, except his own. Still, she had no idea of the power of her own sexuality, or its effect on him. Would she be surprised, he wondered, to know she could make him feel weak with his need for her?

  “Ah, love.” He drew her to him, catching her hips and pulling her legs into place on each side of his legs until she was kneeling in front of him, watching him in confusion. “There.” His hand stroked up her back. “I like looking at your pretty face when I’m touching you. I can watch your eyes darken, see the heat that builds beneath your flesh. I make you hot, Risa; admit it.” His teasing grin was met with another flash of confusion in her expression.

  “You frighten me,” she whispered as he brushed her hair back from the gentle lines of her face. “I can’t control what you do to me, Micah.”

  Ah yes, control. There was no control when lusts raged out of control, and the addition of the drug that still affected her small body would make the pleasure terrifying for her. She hadn’t been able to control her body’s response to touch when she was first injected with the Whore’s Dust. It had made her beg for touch, despite the degradation she felt at the act. Control now would be uppermost in her mind.

  Controlling her response, her pleasure. She needed to learn her own body, learn the depth of the pleasure, before she learned that control wasn’t needed when it was a touch she desired with not just her body but her heart and her mind as well.

  “Kiss me.” He whispered the demand. “Take what you want, Risa.”

  He watched her eyes, watched the throb of her pulse at her neck. The thought of touching him sent a response tearing through her. He could see it, felt it in the tensing of her slender thighs alongside his.

  She was dying for this touch. He was so hungry for it, he wondered if he would survive the wait.

  RISA LICKED HER lips nervously as she stared back at Micah.

  “What do I want?” The words fell from her lips before her head had a chance to censor them.

  Her hands moved over his chest to his neck. She felt the heat of his flesh, the throb of his pulse, the thunder of his heart.

  “You want to kiss me.” His lips formed the words, drawing her gaze to their tempting lines.

  “What more do I want?” she asked, knowing she wanted so much more. “Will you touch me as I kiss you, Micah?”

  She needed to be touched. Her flesh felt tight, achy. The need to be touched was overwhelming. She ached. The ache was like a sickness, like a fever she couldn’t get rid of.

  “I’ll touch you whenever you like, Risa; you have only to ask.”

  Weakness flooded her; need exploded inside her. Her hands moved to his shoulders, gripped the hard muscle there, and her lips lowered to his.

  She had never kissed anyone, by her own instigation, her own initiation.

  Micah sat beneath her, his body tense, humming with power and promise as her lips touched his and she felt a cry welling in her throat.

  For the first time she had the chance to learn the shape of his lips against hers, the feel of them. Her lips parted, her tongue stroked over the fuller line of the lower curve, and she tasted coffee and heat. She tasted the man slowly, rather than simply the hunger that poured through her.

  Her head tilted, lips parted over his, her tongue touched the seam of his lips and she felt lost in the wonder of the sensuality that began to build slowly between them.

  Not just lust. It was so much more.

  “Touch me,” she breathed against his lips. “Please, Micah, touch me.”

  A groan rasped from his throat and his hands moved from the hard grip they had on her hips as his lips parted beneath hers, and then she didn’t know who was kissing who, who controlled and who led.

  One hand lifted to her face, his palm cupping her neck. She loved that touch. It made her feel cherished, made her feel surrounded by him. The other hand pushed beneath the loose hem of her shirt. It stroked up her back; his fingertips touched her flesh on the way back down. Electric pleasure seemed to surround her as she allowed herself to sink beneath the waves of sensation that built inside her.

  The uncharted waters of slow, building heat were exhilarating. The touch of his lips against hers as she learned the shape, the hunger, of a kiss gave her a heady confidence. The feel of his neck and shoulders beneath her touch, the feel of his heartbeat thundering in his chest, gave her courage.

  He had to enjoy her, she thought desperately. Would he kiss her with such hunger if he didn’t? Would his heart race with excitement?

  She jerked, her thoughts flying from her head as his palm cupped a breast, his thumb finding her nipple as a ragged cry tore from her throat.

  Her head jerked back, eyes opening. She should have kept them closed, because the sight of his kiss-swollen, damp lips sent a punch of reaction to her womb.

  “Micah. Tell me what to do,” she gasped, her hands clenching his biceps now. “Tell me what to do.”

  “What you’re doing,” he groaned. “Let me touch you, Risa. Just feel good for me, love. Just let it feel good. This is all, just touch. Just touch, baby. Nothing more.”

  Just touch. She could handle just touch, maybe.

  “Here. Let’s take this off for you.” The hem of her shirt rose.

  Risa lifted her arms, eager to be rid of the confining material as he stripped it from her.

  “Damn. Look how pretty.”

  Both hands cupped her breasts, framing the violet lace of the half bra that framed her flesh and lifted the swollen mounds to him.

  Risa ran her hands over his shoulders, pushed them beneath the edges of his shirt, and rasped over his flesh with her nails.

  It wasn’t enough. As his lips moved over her neck, angling too slowly to the rise of her breasts, she tugged at his shirt. Her fingers fumbled with the buttons; she was certain one might have popped off.

  She wasn’t watching for the building arcs of dark intensity inside her now. It was just touch, he had promised her. She didn’t have to worry about being thrown into a maelstrom that might tear her soul from her body.

  Just touch was safe.

  Her breathing was harsh, heavy. The thunder of her heartbeat echoed in her ears as hunger settled heavily between her thighs.

  Her clit was tormented. Inside, her pussy throbbed and ached; her juices slid from her, preparing her, begging for touch as she pulled at the open edges of his shirt.

  He released her long enough to tear it off and throw it aside. Once the material dropped from his hands, he was touching her again.

  His lips were on her breasts; his tongue stroked over her distended nipples as they rose beneath the lace cups of her bra. His groan echoed around her, but his flesh was there for her touch.

  Touch. He promised her touch.

  She felt her hair across her shoulder, stroking her, feathering against her flesh as his fingers lowered the lace covering her breasts and his mouth captured a tight nipple in the wet, heated confines.

  She jerked, arched. Flares of explosive pleasure tore along the nerve endings from her nipple to her pussy. Her juices were hotter, coating her pussy now, electrifying her clit.

  It was just touch. Touch alone would swamp her in the dark abyss that threatened at the reaches of her mind.

  “Yes, love.” His whisper was a dark croon to her senses. “Let me touch you. Taste you. You’re sweet, Risa. As sweet as sunshine.”

  A moan gathered in her throat, a trailing little cry as she felt the closure of her pants release, the zipper rasping down.

  Then he was touching her there. Touch, just touch. His fingers circled her clit, rubbed against it. His teeth rasped over her nipple, sending a surge of painful pleasure to attack her system.

  She moved against his fingers, lost in the building sensations. She wasn’t frightened. There were no waves of darkness. The darkness was already there. It eased around her, slowly, washed her in warmth. It wasn’t
dizzying. It wasn’t frightening.

  She was barely aware of the cries falling from her lips. Her hips writhed against his fingers as he continued to rub around her clit, against it. He didn’t go lower. He didn’t invade the spasming, desperate clench of her pussy. He didn’t penetrate it, didn’t touch it.

  His lips suckled at her breasts; his fingers rubbed at her clit. He stroked and she swore she might have screamed out his name.

  One arm wrapped around her hips, but he didn’t restrain her; he didn’t hold her in place. He let her move. His fingers followed. Bright pinpoints of light began to flare behind her closed eyes. Flames began to race over her body, and before she could control the darkness, it rose in a sudden wash of light and color and exploded through her system with an ecstasy she couldn’t imagine.

  She screamed his name. She arched, bucked in his grip, and then flowed with the next eruption of pleasure as his fingers finally eased. But he didn’t move. His palm cupped her mound, the pad pressing into her flexing clit as she rubbed against him, taking the last remaining pulses of sensation as she rubbed against him with jerky abandon.

  She finally collapsed against his chest, her breathing ragged as shudders continued to race through her body. Her nails eased their grip on his bare shoulders; her thighs melted; then each muscle in her body followed suit. She was limp against him, torn by the knowledge that such pleasure could exist from touch alone.

  “Precious Risa.” He kissed her forehead, pulled her hair back from her cheek, and kissed there as well.

  He touched her with gentleness, though she could feel the tension in his body and sensed his lust raging through him.

  “You didn’t,” she whispered, knowing he hadn’t found his release. “Again.”

  “Shh. My time will come,” he told her, his voice raspy as he kissed the lobe of her ear. “This was for you, love. And trust me, feeling your pleasure race through you more than makes up for any discomfort I may feel.”

  His hand still cupped her, but his palm rasped against the ultrasensitive bud of her clit, but only when she wanted it to rasp.

  Risa kept her face buried in his neck as the final shudders eased through her.

  She had never known that touch alone could be so destructive. She couldn’t have imagined that such pleasure could exist. This was what she had fought the night he had taken her? How insane could she have been?

  “Do you know,” he whispered at her ear then, “a man who understands true pleasure understands that his woman’s pleasure is tied directly to his own? It’s a very hollow release, Risa, for a man who understands that, when his lover has not found her pleasure as well. But it is a pleasure untold simply to see and to feel his lover’s release, whether he gains his or not.”

  She burrowed closer to him, feeling a blush heating her skin. “Your accent is slipping again,” she said weakly.

  He chuckled at her ear. “So it is. You’ll have to forgive me. I’m still immersed in my lover’s pleasure.”

  She almost laughed. A smile did curve her lips, because she could still sense his own unrelieved need.

  “Does it hurt?” she asked then.

  “Does what hurt?” His hand eased from her, only to pull her closer, to allow her to feel the hard ridge of his cock rising beneath his jeans. “This? After several days in your presence, I’m becoming quite familiar with the situation.”

  Risa lifted her head and stared back at him. There was amusement in his black eyes, in the shape of his lips. He wasn’t angry, but he was still very much aroused.

  “I could try.” She swallowed tightly. “That wasn’t fair to you. We could go to the bedroom.”

  She didn’t quite know how to handle this situation. She had just come on his fingers, had known an explosive release that left her weak and almost sated in his arms. There was an awareness, though, that something was missing. That she had managed once again to cheat not just herself but him also. She just wondered if she would survive knowing what she was cheating herself out of.

  “Risa, love, the time that we come together again will arrive soon enough.” He fixed the little latch to her slacks and drew the zipper up before easing the cups of her bra back over her breasts. “Come now.” He lifted her from his lap and set her back on her feet. “Let’s see about getting you into those butt-snugging jeans I bought you, and one of your pretty tops to go over your new lacy panties. I must admit, I’d find great pleasure in that today.”

  After the climax he had just given her, balking at that seemed a little childish. Besides, she’d wondered how the jeans and snug tops would look. She’d never worn clothes designed to cover and yet show off her body. She had always been self-conscious, too afraid to want to draw attention to herself, as a teenager. And after the kidnapping and her confinement in the private institution Jansen had placed her in, Risa had been terrified of wearing clothes that would reveal any part of her body.

  Until the night she met Micah.

  What had made her so determined to draw his attention? she wondered as she pulled her shirt on. She’d bought clothes designed to draw attention, to tempt a man. And, she knew now, not just any man, but the man her friends had spoken so highly of.

  “I’ll wear the clothes.” She lifted her shoulders almost defensively at the thought of wearing them. “But I’m not used to wearing clothes like that.”

  “You should get used to it,” he told her. “You should learn what you like, and make certain you have it. A few days at the mall, trying on whatever catches your eye, looking for what pleases you as a woman, you would have no trouble, Risa, filling your closet with clothing that would please you. A beautiful woman should always have clothing that makes her feel confident and in charge.”

  She almost laughed bitterly at that. “Yeah, I’m just real confident and in charge, with a hit man watching for me and a damned date rape drug messing with my arousal.”

  The pleasure of moments before was fading now and the familiar anger taking its place. She was tired of the anger. She was tired of the building frustration and the lack of control in her own life. Every step, every breath, seemed measured to guard against this new threat.

  Wasn’t it enough, she wondered, that she had had to survive what Jansen Clay, a man who should have wanted to protect her, had done to her? No, he’d compounded it by locking her in an asylum and keeping her in a drug-shadowed existence for nearly two years. If it hadn’t been for the kindnesses of the staff there, God knew she would have given up in the first months.

  She had learned later that two of the orderlies, a husband and wife, had made it their personal mission to see that she was looked after and wasn’t abused. But they hadn’t been able to keep Jansen Clay from visiting, and they had never seen the other man who she was aware had arrived with her father several times.

  Those times were remembered because of the pain, rage, and horrifying arousal that had sped through her system after she was injected with something during those visits.

  She had later learned she had been injected with a drug similar to the Whore’s Dust.

  She paused and turned to Micah.

  “He was at the clinic,” she said, frowning, aware that the memory was hovering just out of reach.

  It was the hands. She had always noticed his hands. Large, blunt, as soft as silk.

  “Who was at the clinic?” Micah’s voice was soft now, distant, as though he didn’t want to intrude on whatever she was remembering.

  She lifted her gaze to his. “The man that raped me in the cargo plane. He was at the clinic. He came with Jansen several times. The doctors would almost let me slip out of the sedated haze they kept me in. They did it because the man that came with Jansen always injected me with that drug. It wasn’t Jansen that did it. It was him.”

  As she stared at Micah, a hazy memory whispered through her.

  “His hands hurt,” she said. “I thought he’d break my arm when he held it down. Then he would shove the needle in and force the drug inside me, as though he
had to do it quickly. It hurt.”

  “The attempts they made to duplicate the Whore’s Dust,” Micah said. “They used it on you several times.”

  She nodded slowly. “It wasn’t like Whore’s Dust, though.” She lifted her head and stared back at him miserably. “It was worse, Micah. What he had was worse than the Whore’s Dust. It didn’t go away as easy. The pain of it seemed to last forever. Long after they left. It seemed like it was never-ending.” She shook her head and shut her eyes quickly as she swung away from him.

  “Don’t fight the memories, Risa.” His hands caught her shoulders when she would have run from him. “You were not at fault for what they did to you. You have no shame in this. It is entirely theirs. You can’t fight the memories, because they’re your only defense.”

  Her defense against a killer.

  Her breathing hitched as the memory receded faster than it had flowed into her. The knowledge remained, though. The knowledge that whoever had raped her hadn’t been content to destroy her that way. For some reason, he had wanted to torture her further. He’d wanted to watch her pain.

  He had hated her.

  CHAPTER 11

  RISA WORE THE jeans with a long-sleeved dark blue silk blouse and the leather jacket Micah had forced on her at the mall. On her feet she wore thick cotton socks and the white leather sneakers.

  She had to admit that below the neck she didn’t look too bad. She’d tried to do something about above the neck. She’d styled her expertly highlighted hair around her face and used makeup sparingly, hoping she wouldn’t feel like an over-made-up clown.

  “Beautiful,” Micah announced as she reentered the living room, his black eyes frankly admiring as they went over her. “Risa, my love, I’m doomed to walk around in a haze of arousal whenever you’re near.”

  She flushed, told herself he certainly didn’t mean it, but she glanced this time. And yes, he was still aroused. His expression was wry as he shrugged on his own leather jacket, covering the proof of arousal that strained at his jeans.

  “We could have gone to bed,” she whispered, still a bit embarrassed at the fact that he hadn’t released.