Hard to Protect (Black Ops Heroes)

by Black, Incy

  “You don’t get to tell me what to wear,” she yelled into the night, the echo of her voice bouncing against the surrounding shipping containers.

  Resenting that the words had snuck out of their own volition, she scrubbed at her mouth furiously. Then, shaking her head, she stomped back into the shipping container.

  And stumbled over the bucket Berwick had kicked out of place. Teeth grinding, she booted it aside and reached up to extinguish the queasy light.

  Only to hesitate, her arm stuck in mid-air.

  No way would Berwick have just walked away. The wily bastard had to be out there. Waiting. Not trusting. Watching.

  From what she’d overheard whispered with open admiration—male and female—he had a libido fierce enough to awaken Mount Vesuvius.

  Dare she?

  Since the night her parents had been murdered, Rhys had been adamant that she guard against acting on raw instinct—which he did not trust. Head before heart was one of his many mantras. And somehow, because pleasing Rhys and winning his approval had been her holy grail, throughout their orphaned childhood years into shared adulthood, she’d allowed his relentless conditioning to change her. Convince her that wild and free and spontaneous was bad. Rigid self-control—ice—was best.

  Trouble was, deep down inside she was tempestuous. Quick to laugh, open to exhilaration, her temper easy to spark. Rhys had taught her to mute her emotions.

  But for her brother, to protect him, she could afford to unleash a little of the suppressed wild in her, surely? She’d still be in control, sound reason guiding her actions.

  Besides, why should she be the only one struggling to resist this weird attraction that seemed to have flared between Berwick and herself?

  Why shouldn’t Berwick endure a dose of unsatisfied lust?

  Leaving no room for a change of mind, she stepped into the shallow, yellow spotlight cast by the greasy bulb. She’d need a melody to play inside her head. Nine Inch Nails’s “Closer” seemed apt.

  Hips swinging to the beat, she edged down the zipper of her jacket. The lapels parted. Shit. No T-shirt, because she hadn’t planned to ride tonight, and no bra, because the cut-out back of her dress hadn’t permitted one. Oh, well, less to remove.

  Hips still swaying, she teasingly freed one shoulder, then the other. Leather landed at her feet in a heavy huff. She kicked her jacket aside, and breasts thrust forward, caressed her naked skin upward from hip to arched throat, then snaked her arms higher until she was at full lingering stretch.

  Lowering her hands, she pulled free the pins holding her French knot in place and shook loose the heavy, waist-length fall.

  Still gyrating, she tucked forward from the waist and lashed the floor with her hair before easing into a slow and suggestive 360-degree downward grind, all too aware of the tight pull of leather across her behind. Take that, Special Agent Berwick.

  Unfurling upright, hips still in motion, she threw back her head and traced a line from her breasts to the V of her groin. Unsnapping the studs on her leather pants, she hooked her thumbs into the waistband and eased down the skin-tight hide… Past her hip bones, over the high curve of her butt cheeks—

  A bark of laughter broke from the darkness—Berwick!

  The music in her head stuttered and died. The bastard, not trusting her, had hung around to spy on her next move. And worse, he found it amusing.

  Locked mid-strip, a fierce blush gripped her from the inside and scorched its way out. Reaching up, she yanked the light-chain. It broke and coiled at her feet like a hissing viper.

  The abrupt darkness was welcome; the light-headedness, the nausea swilling her stomach wasn’t. Hauling up her pants, she leaned forward, her hands locked to her knees for support, as she tried to remember how to breathe. What the hell had she been thinking? She’d put taunting Berwick ahead of protecting Rhys.

  What, was she out of her ever loving, damned mind?

  If Berwick had been suspicious of her before, his inner warning system had to be a shrieking banshee by now. If the fates were kind, he’d hit his head on something out there in the dark and get amnesia. But given her sorry relationship with luck? Fat chance.

  And, she had to face dinner with him tomorrow night…

  Fuckityfuckfuckshit-fuck.

  God, he’d poke and he’d twist and he’d torture her with pseudo-innocent jibes. He’d smirk. He’d tease. He’d likely die trying not to laugh.

  And she’d have to suck it up. Pretend like hell she didn’t care.

  For Rhys. Who’d never asked anything of her other than that she keep her shit together long enough for him to “fix things.” Who’d drilled and drilled and drilled into her the importance of never again losing control. A lesson she’d aced up until now.

  Damn Berwick. Damn him for making her forget who she was supposed to be.

  Stumbling to the far corner of the shipping container, she dropped to all fours, her fingertips searching the dark for her discarded dress. The cashmere, when she found it, felt like sandpaper against her skin as it dropped into place.

  Hands to her hips, head hanging down, she shifted through “what next” and her possible options with the adeptness of a professional card dealer. She might have stuffed up that idiotic strip tease, but the rationale behind it of playing Will to her—and therefore Rhys’s—advantage wasn’t completely insane.

  If the Service was happy to use her to get to her brother, she’d use them right back. For information she could feed to Rhys—should he make contact.

  Starting with Will Berwick—in her bed. Not her preferred choice, and probably downright reckless given the threat it posed to her sanity—what with Berwick’s aptitude for triggering the harebrained erratic in her. But if that’s what it took to protect Rhys, she’d do it.

  Stripped naked. Spent. Who knew what useful alerts Berwick might share? Her past lovers had turned into right chatterboxes once replete. And she, after all, was the expert when it came to getting into someone’s head. Not him.

  Chapter Four

  A burger from a food truck parked beneath the arches of one of London’s less attractive bridges—Berwick’s idea of a dinner date, damn him—didn’t exactly lend itself to seduction. How the hell was a woman supposed to entice with a bit of suggestive food sex when her only prop was a stuffed bun the size of a small cartwheel?

  “What? These are the best bloody burgers in Europe,” he defended, sucking a smudge of ketchup from his thumb and then his forefinger.

  Pressing her thighs together, she looked away fast. Christ, she was the one who was supposed to do the tempting. “This is hardly the kind of venue I imagined when you invited me to dinner, Berwick. Had much success with this strategy?”

  “Relax, sweetheart, and drop the frosty sarcasm. This is supposed to be fun. And it’s Will.”

  Every exhale of her breath broke loose as a puff of gray mist into the night chill. She was a listener, not a talker, awkward in social situations, ever conscious of people’s stares, which were rarely surreptitious. It was hardly her fault that the ugly stick had bypassed her. How often had she wished it had struck her twice?

  Damn, but it was cold. She hoped Berwick moved tonight’s charade along fast, because this was about as much fun as plunging into the waters of the River Thames flowing behind him.

  “Okay, Will.”

  “What? That’s it? Nothing else to contribute?”

  This night was supposed to end with him in her bed. How to open a conversation and start flirting—fast? “Umm… What are you thinking?”

  For some reason, he found her effort to start a conversation hilarious. Half of London must have heard his laugh. “Filtering out the X-rated stuff, I’m thinking how lucky I am kicking back under the stars with a beautiful woman, and hoping like hell she’ll agree to do this again… Though admittedly, somewhere warmer.”

  “You can have your jacket back if you’re cold,” she offered, hoping to God he’d say no.

  He reached across the wooden pic
nic table to stop her shrugging free his heavy black pea jacket. His hand clutched the neck lapels together, the pad of his thumb rested in the small hollow at the base of her throat. “Relax, Doc. I’m fine. But please tell me that hint of blue outlining your lips is the latest tint by Chanel.”

  Despite the cold, her blood tingled hot. Why did he have to be all teasing smiles and wicked grins? Why did he have to be so damned…charming. “My lips are just fine,” she said, chancing a smile.

  “You’re right. They are fine. Fine enough to make a man beg to have them wrapped around his—”

  Her eyes widened. Jesus, was he going to announce it to the world? His voice was sure loud enough.

  “Own,” he finished. Then, leaning forward, he whispered. “Bet you thought I was going to say cock.”

  She blinked, a surge of heat warming her from the inside out. She was hardly a novice when it came to graphic language. Between Rhys and the type of clients she counseled—hardened military men and women—she’d picked up a few choice expressions and was comfortable using them to punctuate when cross. She just wished she could erase the image Berwick had planted in her head. She also wished her nipples would stop making a menace of themselves.

  Reading his job-done expression, she narrowed her eyes. The teasing smiles and wicked grins she could stand, but she took back the thought that he was charming.

  Berwick was no monk, that was for damn sure. His bedpost must have suffered death by a thousand cuts, the number of notches he had reputedly been able to score into it.

  A bleak thought. Nerve-racking, too. Getting Berwick into bed would be one thing. Keeping him there, quite another. Berwick didn’t do longevity. Per gossip, forty-eight hours was his limit. And as tight-lipped as that man was about anything important or useful, she’d need longer than that to coax a begrudging “good morning” from him.

  Not to mention she was more skilled at discouraging men from her bed than enticing them.

  His hand still held the lapels of his coat. “Hey, where’d you just disappear to?” he asked, tugging gently.

  “Umm… Nowhere important.” She’d need chest compressions if his knuckles didn’t quit brushing her neck.

  Berwick withdrew his hand and picked up a French fry. “So tell me about yourself, Doc.”

  She’d rather not. “There’s nothing to tell. What you see is what you get.” She shredded a corner of her paper napkin, caught him watching, and set it aside.

  “You’re not very good at this dating lark, are you, Doc?”

  She didn’t need his criticism; she was perfectly aware her flirting skills sucked. “How very observant of you, Berwick.”

  What did he expect? She’d had Rhys for a mentor. His sage refrain: Men have one goal—to get your knickers off.

  “So, are you shy, bored with my company, or just too damn cold to engage?”

  Damn her drifting mind. “Sorry? Oh, none of the above,” she flustered. “Although, you wouldn’t be the first man to find me cold.”

  “I was referring to the weather, Doc,” Berwick corrected dryly. “And I think I’ll go with shy. How about I endure a session of Twenty Questions to break the ice?”

  She noted how, arms spread wide, his elbows locked, he gripped the edge of the wooden table hard enough his knuckles glowed, and she laughed. This would be different. Umpteen counseling sessions, and never once had he shared anything remotely personal.

  “Good to see you’re having fun, Doc. Okay, you take the first shot,” he invited.

  Her skin immediately tightened. “First shot?”

  “Yup. This is a two-way match. You ask a question. I ask a question. Honor of the game, we both answer honestly.”

  Christ, he’d ask about Rhys. “What if I don’t want to play?”

  “Then you’ll disappoint me because the last thing I had you down for is a coward. And you’re already playing. That was your first question. My turn—”

  Fine. Screw the bit about not lying, though. She’d protect Rhys to the death. It wouldn’t be the first time.

  “So what was his name, the guy who hurt you?”

  Her lips kicked into the tightest of smiles. It would kill her to share, but she was in no position to look a gift horse in the mouth. She’d go for the sympathy vote. He’d circle the table, shuffle in beside her, and put his arm around her. A perfect opportunity for Campaign Nuzzle to commence, with her bed not a twenty-minute fast walk away. “Cymion Gray… And, judging by your expression, I see you’ve heard of him.”

  Who hadn’t? The man reigned supreme in the annuals of public horror. One of the country’s worst killing sprees. A quiet suburban street. Seven families slaughtered. Mothers, fathers. Brothers and sisters. Silenced forever in the dead of the night.

  Holding back the bile cattle-prodding her throat, she set her nibbled burger aside and reached for her fizzy water. Dumb move, bringing that monster into play.

  “Jesus, you can’t have been more than a child. How old were you? How the hell did you survive the run-in with Gray?”

  Her grip on the green glass bottle tightened to shatter-point. “Nine. And, if I understand the rules of this game correctly, you don’t get to ask two questions in a row.”

  “True, moving on.”

  What? Her Cymion Gray nugget was supposed to trigger his compassion.

  She leaned across the table. “You don’t want the gory details, Berwick? How I watched my brother take that monster down?”

  His mouth full from sucking back beer, he held up two fingers to indicate he considered that her second question, and then swallowed. “No. My turn. Aside from biking, what else do you do in your spare time?”

  The man had the sensitivity of a brick. “I volunteer to be on call 24/7,” she said dully, making a point of tapping the cell phone resting on the table beside her. Not her personal phone, the one given to her by the Service so she’d be available to receive a call from an agent in crisis, day or night. One day it must surely ring. Except that those in the Intelligence community never called for support. They waited for a psychotic episode to hit, by which time it was too late. Example: Cymion Gray.

  “You do realize no agent in their right mind would trust anyone in your position enough to call? That to ask for help could cost them their career? Why’d you bother?”

  She’d lost count of the number of times she’d asked herself that very question, but that didn’t give him the right to rub in her complete redundancy. “That’s three questions back to back.”

  “Yes, and you’re not very good at this, Doc. I haven’t revealed a damn thing about me yet.”

  No good at dating. No good at stupid games. She couldn’t wait for his next opinion. “One badly dented bucket in a shipping container not ten miles from here tells me you’ve got a fearsome temper. You want to watch that; you may need help.”

  He dipped his head. “Touché, Doc.”

  His grin told her he’d never heard such tosh. Another strike against her. Must be the bubbles from the fizzy water making her nose and eyes prick.

  “So what terrifies you?” he asked, pinching one of her fries.

  “People in denial who don’t know when to ask for help.”

  He jabbed the fry into a dollop of ketchup. “Because they might disintegrate and go on the rampage? I think you’ll find Cymion Gray’s issues went slightly beyond a stressful day at the office,” he dismissed, disappearing the fat potato stick into his mouth.

  “Issues that should have been picked up,” she snapped before she could stop herself. She couldn’t do much about the bead of sweat trickling her spine, but she rubbed the damp from her palms with a paper napkin, dropping it quickly when she realized her fingers broadcast a telltale tremble. She’d thought she could talk about Gray, use him to manipulate Will, without breaking.

  She’d been wrong.

  His hand covered hers. Strong. Steady as a rock. “Silly game. Let’s abandon it and walk along the river bank, instead.”

  “Sorry, I’m not a
fan of the dark. Who knows what menace it harbors?”

  “Cymion Gray’s been dead for twenty years, Angel,” he pointed out gently.

  Snatching back her hand, she thrust it between her tightly clenched knees and, God alone knows why, shared the truth. “To you and everyone else maybe, but not to me.”

  “You have to let him go, sweetheart.”

  “I can’t,” she told the table surface bleakly.

  Her chest wouldn’t stop with the fast mini press-ups. Little gray clouds puffed from her mouth in rapid succession. “I need a moment,” she said hoarsely, stumbling to her feet. She would not allow this night to finish on a crash and burn. She just needed a few minutes in private to rally.

  …

  He watched Angel—a woman he’d just emotionally eviscerated—walk to the lip of the river, its waters thick and black in the dark.

  He was a pig. Someone should string him up by his balls and stick a red-hot poker up his arse. Once he rescued her from the hell she was traveling, he’d see her safely home, then he was backing the fuck away from this assignment. Before it destroyed what little legitimacy he had left.

  That horrific tidbit about Cymion Gray—why the hell had that not been in her file?

  Probably because the Service had done its best to disassociate from an agent gone rogue. Gray, his tour undercover in Beirut at an end, had returned to the UK and gone on a shooting spree, taking out damn near an entire suburban street of affluent families. No one knew why, but his presumed psychotic break had seen the introduction of mandatory counseling for any agent exposed to events likely to trigger post-traumatic shock.

  And the reason Will had been required to attend psych sessions with Angel, after his own near-lethal injury in the line of duty.

  Nine years old—what horrors had Angel witnessed the night Gray ran amok? What kind of counseling had she received afterward? First thing tomorrow, he’d track down any now-retired officers who’d attended the scene that night and get the details. Angel’s and Rhys’s names and association with Gray might have been redacted from all incident reports because they’d been minors at the time, but you couldn’t erase memories or cull speech with the same ease and efficiency.