by Lynne Silver
Heated Match
Lynne Silver
Book one in the Coded for Love series.
A lead byline and a cover story—that’s what journalist Loren Stanton wants most. Until she meets genetically enhanced soldier Adam Blacker. Team leader of a top-secret covert ops group, Adam never wanted to search for his genetic match, but whenever he gets close to Loren, things turn hot quickly, making him forget every reason he had for retaining his bachelor status. After a scorching night together, neither doubts they’re connected at a DNA-deep level, although both fear the high stakes of what it means to be together.
Loren gives Adam two weeks to prove he’s bred for more than war. He must convince her that he’s also coded for love.
Heated Match
Lynne Silver
Dedication
For Matt, who told me to write a book and then made it possible.
Acknowledgments
To the Muses who keep me from muddling along. And to the best editor, Grace B., who kept calm even as she fixed eight bazillion misspelled words.
June 14, 2013 Beltsville, MD
Furor continues on the once quiet government land a few miles outside the nation’s capital. At a press conference held yesterday evening, spokesman Peter Shepard confirmed the existence of a top-secret program formed in conjunction with The National Institute of Health to breed genetically enhanced soldiers. According to Shepard, “The Program for DNA Manipulation and Eradication of Disease was founded in 1958 in an effort to wipe out genetic diseases in the world. While the scientists failed in their original endeavor, their research led to the development of DNA mapping and pairing.”
The process of mapping and pairing led to the creation of stronger, smarter humans. Shepard confirmed that multiple generations of these “super soldiers” have been living and operating on the Beltsville campus since the early sixties, although he did not confirm the rumors that he is one of these original enhanced soldiers. Nor did he confirm that different government branches, including the CIA, routinely use these soldiers in classified military operations.
The press conference was interrupted by protestors including evangelical Christian groups who are calling for the immediate termination of the Program. Several members of Congress and the Senate also expressed their concern over the secrecy and lack of knowledge regarding this major scientific and military development. A hearing regarding the future of these enhanced soldiers is scheduled for the fall.
Chapter One
“Your knight in shining armor is here. The toasts are about to begin, and you’re all the way back here without a glass of champagne?” Adam held out a delicate glass of bubbly to the woman standing so far in the back of the hotel ballroom, she may as well have phoned in her attendance. Tonight’s bodyguard duty dictated he investigate any anomaly, and the sexy blonde hovering near the door instead of gulping down free champagne and sushi definitely constituted further security questions. He’d had to dodge several flirtatious smiles and dance invitations from other females on the way here, but he was a man on a mission.
His boss, Shepard’s, parting words rang in his brain. Don’t mess this up, Blacker. This is our first job since we went public. Any screw-up will be fodder for the upcoming hearings. Shep had nothing to worry about. It couldn’t be that hard to keep an eye on the party. He’d done far harder jobs and had a near perfect record of getting his job done.
Only now that he was back here in his party-guest guise smiling down at the lady in question and offering expensive Moët, he couldn’t seem to move his feet more than a few inches away from her. He shifted and crossed his arms over his waist, trying to hide the sudden erection that popped up as if he were repeating seventh grade.
It had nothing to do with her long, honey-blonde curls or the way she filled out her little black dress, though those details were certainly nice. Every other woman in Ambassador Johannes Christenson’s party glittered from too much makeup and jewels. This woman shined all on her own without the fancy trappings. She held something more elusive that had Adam panting and staring at her. It was her scent or her skin…or something.
“How about a dance then?” he asked when she refused the champagne. Well hell, what allowed those words to pop out of his mouth? It certainly got the woman’s attention.
Her gaze traveled slowly up and down his front. “Back here? Or do we need to head down to the dance floor?”
He shrugged. “Here works,” he said and ignored his partner’s glare boring a hole in the back of his tuxedo, reminding him he was slacking in his guard-dog duties and possibly giving credence to Shep’s warning. But honestly, who hired undercover security for a baby’s first birthday? For that matter, what nutters invited two hundred people to a black-tie first birthday party? Adam didn’t know squat about babies, and had no plans of learning. Ever. But he was pretty sure the birthday boy would prefer to be home in his crib instead of dolled up in a one-piece baby tux, sleeping in his nanny’s arms.
He wasn’t going to question it though. Shep said to be here, and he knew better than to challenge his commander’s authority. Before they’d been exposed, the idea of doing bodyguard duty for a civilian would have been laughed out of the room, but for some reason, Shep had accepted this gig for Ambassador Christenson’s party. So here he was, offering champagne and a dance to a gorgeous party guest and keeping an eye on the well-dressed guest of honor.
“No champagne, but I will dance.” She looked surprised that she’d accepted. “I mean, thanks for the offer, but I’m working. I’m a journalist reporting on the party so no, I mean I can’t.”
“Come on. Take a minute to dance.” Adam practically scooped her off her feet in eagerness and ignored the raised hair on the back of his neck at the word journalist. The very last thing he needed tonight was scrutiny from a journalist, but his warning radar disintegrated as she stepped close. He swept the woman into his arms, whirling her toward a hidden shadowy corner of the room, all the while keeping an eye on the crowded dance floor. At first she stiffened at his refusal to accept her refusal, but gradually she loosened up and swayed along with him.
He pulled her tighter against his body, giving in to his urge to inhale her scent. She didn’t protest and stepped even closer. Adam sucked in a breath and struggled to keep the conversation light, rocked by his completely unprofessional behavior. He was insane to lower his guard and dance with this woman. He was the team leader for Christ’s sake and a damn good one. He’d never messed up a job before, but now that he had her in his arms, he couldn’t let go.
“A reporter, huh? Where can I read your work?” His body was glued to her personal space and couldn’t—wouldn’t—move unless yanked away by physical force.
A sweet blush stained her cheeks as she brushed her fingertips along his neck. “I work for The Post. Though we’ll see how long that lasts thanks to the latest budget cuts.” She muttered the last bit under her breath, but he still picked it up thanks to his above-average hearing.
A sudden buzzing in Adam’s ear distracted him from the perfect shadow of cleavage her dress revealed. “What the hell are you doing?” Chase hissed into his ear comm. “Your back is to the room, and you’re…dancing.”
He forced himself to swivel around enough to catch Chase’s attention and give him a curt nod then turned back to ogle his blonde.
Damn it. In the half second he’d turned his attention away, the tall, luscious reporter had unwound her arms from his neck and fled the room. Was it something he’d said? It took him a minute to get his head back in the game and stop staring at her retreating back. It was best for his own sanity she’d left, but his feet, along with another pressing part of his anatomy, itched to go after her. He couldn’t. Damn duty called.
Chase’s insistent dia
tribe in his ear forced him to turn around and head back to the crowd surrounding the ambassador and his child. The farther away he moved from the woman’s spot, the more his body and mind shook off the lingering arousal. Sure, she was appealing in a way no woman had been for a long while, but tonight was not the time. He had work to do.
“Chase, is all clear from your position?” he murmured under his breath as he swept up a glass from a tray dotted with champagne flutes to maintain the pretense he was like any other party guest.
“Looking good, Blacker.”
He glanced slightly to his right. Chase also stood in perfect position to observe the room and the baby they were hired to protect. Chase’s voice buzzed again in the hidden earpiece. The clamor of cocktail conversations and metal clashes emanating from the open kitchen doors made it difficult to hear.
“Were you enjoying your dance with my sister?”
“Your sister?” Adam managed to maintain his near-silent tone, though he wanted to shout. Man, talk about a small world. Of all places for Chase’s sister to show up. “Are you sure that was your sister? How did you even know it was her? I thought you’d never met her.”
His partner, also dressed as a party attendee, stood in the fray of the frenzied, toasting crowd drinking ever more alcohol. “It’s definitely my sister, Loren.”
The hot reporter was Chase’s sister. The idea blew his mind. “Does she know you, or even know about you?” This was a shit time for Q and A, but he wanted to know about the woman.
“I looked her up last year and followed her to work. I wanted to see my half sister, even if I couldn’t introduce myself,” Chase said. “She doesn’t know I exist.”
“Did you know she’s a reporter?”
Chase’s sudden curse made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end.
“Gotta go. Black-haired male to my right is packing heat,” Chase said in a rush.
Adam snapped back to attention and watched his partner step into the path of a potential enemy. He was on a job and had nearly blown the whole thing after one sighting of a beautiful woman. Chase’s sister. Loren Stanton. Damn. Even as he put down the glass and removed his ubiquitous, untraceable Tomahawk dagger from his jacket, he envisioned Loren’s dark-blonde curls and delectable body in the silky sheath that caressed her curves.
The mental image alone was enough to revive his flagging erection and he struggled to refocus his attention on the job at hand. Across the room, Chase threw himself forward as if he’d been jostled by the crowd and tilted the burgundy contents of his wineglass onto the white dress shirt of the party guest next to him. Perfect timing. The idiot’s fingers had been reaching for his tiny almost-concealed weapon. Ambassador Christensen stood a few feet away shaking hands, blithely unaware of the threat.
Chase pulled off a Mr. Bean impersonation of a bumbling fool, pulling a linen handkerchief from his pocket and vigorously rubbing at the spreading stain. “My apologies, sir.” Chase’s voice carried over the din of the crowd. “You should go change. Please charge the dry cleaning bill to me. Here let me help.”
Chase propelled the fuming, dripping guest along toward him. Adam stood ready to grab the guy and get him out of the party before any guest realized something was wrong. He slowed his breathing, his knifelike vision homed in on the dripping target. His stomach squeezed into a balled fist. Icy sweat soaked his shirt. All noise from the party drained away and all guests faded into two-dimensional figures on a surreal painting. Time slowed to the tick, tick, tick of his heartbeat then sped up. Ten years of experience had not dulled the nervous anticipation of a close-range maneuver. He hoped it never dulled, because the minute that drug of anticipation stopped working you joined the walking dead. Adam had seen it in the eyes of his comrades doing the job too long.
Chase’s voice rang in his ear. “Three…two…one…you’re on.” He walked the man forcibly toward Adam, who grabbed him and took over Chase’s position, while Chase stayed in the party.
*
Loren Stanton made it halfway to the lobby before she spun on a precarious heel and marched back toward the ballroom on a mission. A hot man danced with her and what had she done? Like an idiot, she’d left, not just left, but run. The moment the man had stepped into her personal space, her visceral reaction shocked the hell out of her. She’d never been that aroused in her life with just a single touch. Her physical reaction to him frightened her, and she didn’t know how she’d found the inner strength to pull away when all she’d really wanted was to stay pressed up against the man.
In her normal world, if a guy sported a hard-on while dancing with her, he’d best have the good sense to take a step back. Instead, she’d wanted to rub up against him like a cat or dance him against the ballroom wall and explore his package further. What was in the champagne they’d been serving? Liquid pheromones?
It was an amateur move on her part to flee instead of making a bold move on the only man to interest her in a long while. Not only had she left without his name and number, but she’d left without much of a news story. What was she going to say to her supervisor tomorrow? Sorry, but I had to leave. I had a sudden appointment with my vibrator? Yeah, that wouldn’t go over well, and she’d never get the opportunity to get back on the serious news desk. Covering the DC social scene was fine for some, but she wanted the hard-hitting news stories, which meant she had to go back to get a story and the guy’s number. Thanks to the recent budget cuts affecting nearly every newspaper in the country, she’d kept her paycheck by agreeing to cover DC’s social scene instead of reporting on meatier stories as she desperately wanted.
She quickened her pace back into the ballroom, thinking of the mysterious man. Awareness of him had bubbled and fizzed up inside her as he’d held out the glass to her. Just looking up into a man’s eyes caused excitement. Because of her height, most men looked her straight in the eye. It was a joy to stare at his broad shoulders, which appeared strong enough to hold up any one of the columns posted around the room. Men wearing tuxedoes filled the ballroom. None carried off the penguin suit with the grace and elegance he did, as if he were born in black-and-white superfine wool.
She took a deep breath and ran a hand down her hair to smooth her unruly curls. She threw open the double doors of the ballroom and got hit with a wave of sound. The din of conversation had increased to ever-frenzied levels. She looked to where she’d last spotted the man. He stood with his back to her near a pile of dirty plates stacked on a tray. She smiled, tamping down the sudden rapid pounding of her heart and realized she was actually breathless as though she’d sprinted back to the ballroom. When she was roughly ten feet away he turned to the side and walked up to another party guest wearing a shirt stained with a deep-red splotch that looked like blood. He wrapped his left arm around the other man’s shoulders, and the pair strolled out onto the balcony of the ballroom.
Oh man, she’d read the whole thing wrong. Her sexy man batted for the other team, and her crazy reaction was totally one-sided. She waited a moment, hoping he’d return to the party, but he seemed to have disappeared. Perhaps she should double-check the balcony, just in case. She was probably going to regret this, but what was life without a little risk?
She hurried to the open doors and out into the sticky DC night, pausing on the balcony. The humidity enveloped her like a vat of boiling water. She glanced around, her excellent night vision quickly adjusting to the dark. The bulbous Capitol Dome glowed off to the left. No signs of the man and his partner that way. Where could they have gone? Somewhere more private?
Well that was a bust. It would be almost too embarrassing to find him at this point anyway. She’d have to explain why she was skulking around on the unlit balcony. She headed back into the air-conditioned ballroom and exited to the front of the hotel to catch a taxi home. Surely she’d seen enough of the event to send in a decent news story. Really, what was there to say? Spoiled kid turns one and parents throw a ridiculous over-the-top party instead of buying some balloons and baking
some cupcakes.
*
“Adam!”
Adam paused in his pursuit to listen to Chase’s yell coming through his earpiece. He was far enough away from the hotel that the reception crackled. “What?”
“Get your ass back here now.”
It was hard to tell over the static, but easygoing Chase sounded panicked.
“Negative. I’m still in pursuit of the suspect with the gun.” The idiot had jumped over the balcony and disappeared. It had been the darndest thing. He’d sat on the railing, swung his legs over and leapt the nearly twenty feet to the ground. Adam assessed the height and the limping quarry then ran for the stairs. His enhanced speed would make it cake to catch a regular human, but in the seconds it had taken him to head down the stairs, the dude had disappeared into the maze of downtown alleys. That was twice in one night people had escaped him, first Chase’s half sister and now this.
“Forget him. You need to get back here. Now,” Chase said.
Adam froze and turned on his heel back to the hotel. “What happened?”
“The kid…Christenson’s baby…he’s gone.”
*
“You fucked up, boys.”
Adam met Commander Shepard’s gaze eye to eye. He wanted to stare at his feet like a teenager, but Shep was right. They’d messed up badly, and now Christenson’s baby was going to pay for their mistake. The wrath they’d faced from Ambassador Christenson and his wife was nothing compared to Shep’s disappointment.
“Get in my office. Now.” After endless hours getting grilled by the local police and the FBI, Adam and Chase had finally made it back to their home base in suburban Maryland.
He shuffled into the commander’s office where he parked his ass in a folding chair and nodded to his father, William Blacker, who sat next to Shep’s formidable desk. The room reeked of cigar smoke, reminding Adam it was Thursday poker night for the old soldiers, where they relived the glorious Cold War days and jonesed about better days to come post 9-11.
