by Cindy Dees
He pressed his fingers against her lips. “I already told you the sex was perfect. You’re perfect. There’s nothing wrong with you. It’s me. I’m the problem. I suck at relationships. I don’t do...this.”
She spoke against his fingertips. “You don’t have sex? You’re pretty good at it for someone who doesn’t do—”
His fingers tightened against her mouth. “Enough already,” he growled. “Give me a minute to try to get the words right. I don’t talk about this sort of thing often.”
She backed off, frustrated but trying to be patient for his sake.
“My life, my job...hell, I suppose my personality...none of them are set up to include relationships. I have colleagues who are friends. When I get some downtime I occasionally hook up with a woman. But the real stuff—love and commitment and promises—I don’t have time for all of that.”
A sharp knife slid home in her heart, and she felt herself beginning to bleed out emotionally. She rolled away from him, onto her back, to stare up at the ceiling. God, she’d been an idiot not to tell him to stop when he’d given her a chance to. He’d known this moment was coming.
His voice floated out of the darkness from beside her. “But then you happened. This outrageous sex happened. I’m not the only one feeling some sort of...connection...between us, am I?”
“No,” she answered in a quavering voice.
“Exactly. And now I don’t know what to do about you.”
He said that like she was a horrible and unwelcome complication in his life. The knife in her heart twisted, shredding more of the organ’s fragile wall. The pace of the emotional bleeding increased. She was dying. Yet again, a man was rejecting her. Leaving her. First her father. Then her brother. And now Ashe.
Chapter 7
Ashe felt Hank withdrawing from him as surely as if she’d gotten up out of the bed and walked away. God, he was terrible at this emotion stuff. He propped himself up on an elbow to stare down at her.
“Listen to me, Hank. I’m not bailing on you. I’m trying to tell you that I think I need to do the whole relationship thing with you. Or try, at least.”
“What?” She sounded as blank as her expression looked. Wow. She thought he wasn’t relationship material, either.
“I can’t promise to be any good at it. In fact, I can pretty much promise to screw it up royally. But there’s something about you...you’re different. Special. I’d be a damned fool to walk away from you.”
A frowned puckered her brow. “Thanks—I think,” she said hesitantly.
An ugly sensation skittered down his spine. It was bigger than apprehension. Bigger than doubt. But he couldn’t name it. Didn’t she feel it, too? Was he the only one feeling a crazy connection between them, like they’d known each other forever and were two halves of the same whole?
Fear. That was the thing crawling along his spine. He went into crisis mode, clamping down on the sensation as unproductive, setting aside and closing it in a little box in a corner of his mind. Now, to deal with the crisis that had provoked it.
He threw her own words back at her. “What’s wrong, Hank? Talk to me.”
“I’m not sure anything is wrong.” She laughed a little. Ruefully. “I just didn’t expect you to be as scared of a relationship as I am. I guess we kind of are a perfect fit for one another, after all. We can be terrified together.”
How did she do that? She’d known he was feeling fear almost before he did. He scowled down at her. “I don’t do fear, dammit.”
“Right. You’re a highly trained Special Forces operative who can take on any threat...except a scrawny female who couldn’t even put a dent in you if she tried,” she teased lightly.
He had to grin at that. The tension of the moment broken, he gathered her against his side, her head resting on his shoulder. “I can show you some moves that would hurt a guy of my size and strength. You should probably know how to defend yourself from the jerks in the club, anyway.”
“After you staked your claim on me the way you did earlier, I can’t imagine any of the regulars will bother me,” she reminded him. “And besides, Vitaly loaned me to you for your exclusive use. He won’t let anyone mess with me.”
“Huh. He and I agree on one thing, then.”
“Well, yeah, but for totally different reasons.”
He shrugged beneath her. “I’ll take it. I’d hate to have to kill some scumbag and blow the whole operation.”
“Don’t do anything rash on my account!” she exclaimed. “That place needs to be shut down for good and those girls rescued.”
“The Who Do Voodoo is going down, regardless.” He shrugged again. “But as for not doing rash things to protect you, that’s not how I roll. You’re mine now. And I protect my own.”
“You do realize that sounds a little creepy and stalkerish, right?”
He dropped a kiss into her hair. “Look, I’m not trying to be a wacko control freak by making it clear to the people around me that you’re my personal possession.” Clearing his throat, he admitted, “Truth is, Hank, I don’t actually see women that way at all. It’s purely a safety thing for you. I’m merely making the rules of engagement with my enemy known. Mess with you—” he stroked her jaw lightly “—and you’re messing with me.”
She snuggled a little closer to him.
“My deal with Vitaly for you was just part of my cover story. That, and to give you some protection when you’re in the club from now on. You’re free to walk away from me anytime you want. I won’t stop you.”
“Really?” she asked, a slight hitch in her voice.
“Hey, don’t get me wrong. I’ll try to convince you to stay. But I would never force you to do anything against your will.”
“And that’s where you and Vitaly are different,” she said quietly.
He sighed in relief. She got it. Thank goodness. Sometimes he forgot how different he was from most men, how weird most civilians would think he was if they actually knew how he thought and functioned.
“If you ever don’t understand why I say or do something, promise me you’ll ask me about it before you just walk away, Hank. I’ll do my damnedest to explain myself.”
It was her turn to press her fingertips to his mouth. “It’s okay. We’ll figure this out together. I’m not going to scream and run for cover just yet.”
Easy for her to say now, in the afterglow of their lovemaking. But foreboding filled him at how she would react the first time she saw him do his job for real. He could harm—or kill—without blinking an eye. It wasn’t that he was a monster. But in his world, sometimes people were in need of erasing. And sometimes he was the man called to do the job.
* * *
Hank woke up with a jolt. Light streamed in through the window. Too much light for her bedroom over the rug shop—
Not the rug shop. A hotel. A suite with...oh, Lord...Ashe’s bed. She turned her head to look for him, and he was lying on his side facing her, his big body curled protectively toward her. The moment she moved, his eyes popped open, instantly alert. The man really was a warrior at heart. And apparently he slept as lightly as a feather.
“Good morning,” he murmured.
She smiled at him sleepily. “‘Morning. How’d you sleep?”
He grinned broadly. “Better than I have in months. You?”
She’d slept surprisingly well considering how much stress she’d been under and how worried she’d been when the power went out last night. Apparently, mind-blowing sex was good for a person’s rest. Go figure. “I slept very well, thank you.”
His voice was deep and smooth as he murmured, “You’re welcome.” He reached out with a hand to brush her hair back from her face. “In case I haven’t told you today, you take my breath away.”
“We’ve been awake ten seconds.”
“I’m running nine seconds slow on the uptake, then.”
Warmth unfurled in her tummy. For a guy who thought he sucked at relationships, he was doing pretty well so far.
“It’s Sunday, so the Voodoo is closed. It’s my day off.”
“Excellent. You can come to brunch with me and meet my aunt Eloise.”
“The owner of this place?” Alarm burst through her like an exploding firework. The only clothes she had with her were the trashy fake-leather miniskirt, skimpy tank top and red lace bra she’d worn to work last night at the Voodoo. No way was she meeting the owner of this elegant establishment wearing haute slut couture.
“She’s awesome. You’ll love her. And she’s going to be fascinated by any female who can capture my attention.”
Eloise wanted to meet the woman good enough in the sack to impress her nephew? Somehow, Hank doubted that.
Ashe rolled out of the far side of the bed in a quick, agile move, and Hank enjoyed the view as he strolled into the bathroom, naked and unconcerned. Why was it men were so uninhibited about their bodies? She would have given anything not to worry about how she looked.
He called out of the bathroom, “I’m going to take a shower. Feel free to join me if you want. Auntie El can wait a little while longer for breakfast.”
She smiled ruefully. While she would love to join him and discover what athletic endeavors were possible with a man of his strength in a shower, making her escape while he was out of sight was more imperative. She was not having brunch with his aunt, and that was all there was to it. It would be disrespectful in the extreme to force any decent woman to dine with some chick dressed like a ho.
Hank jumped up, hurried to her bedroom, threw on her clothes, and slipped out of the suite as quickly and quietly as she could. The water in the shower was still running as she closed the hallway door behind her.
Afraid to wait around for the elevator, she raced down the stairs, all but running through the lobby to the street. A taxi was just dropping off someone at the hotel, and she was able to jump in the backseat and take off in under a minute. The driver looked at her askance when she gave him the address of her apartment. He must think she was the luckiest streetwalker in town to have landed a client this far uptown when she lived that far downtown. Traffic was light on a Sunday morning, and he dropped her off at her place in under a half hour.
It felt weird to step into the squalor of her apartment after the grandeur of the Hotel Fontenac. The dirty walls, threadbare carpet and worn-out furniture in her place looked more depressing than ever. It was all part of her cover, though. Until she found Max, she was a waitress in a strip club who couldn’t afford a nicer place.
She took a quick shower and dressed in white jeans and her mint-green brushed-silk oxford shirt. It was the kind of shirt she wouldn’t be ashamed to meet Aunt Eloise in. She was just heading to her refrigerator to see if the milk was still good when pounding erupted at her front door. She jolted, alarmed.
“Hank! Are you in there? Let me in.”
Ashe. And he sounded pissed. She winced and reluctantly unlocked the door.
He loomed in the doorway looking more ravaged than she expected. “Really?” he said without preamble. “You couldn’t talk to me before you just took off?”
“I didn’t want to meet your aunt looking like a streetwalker.”
He frowned. “You don’t look like a streetwalker.”
“All I had to wear was my waitress uniform. It was bad enough walking through the lobby wearing that getup. I bloody well wasn’t having lunch in the formal dining room with your aunt in those rags!”
“You could have told me.”
“You’re a man. You wouldn’t have listened to—”
He cut her off sharply. “Back up. Inside your apartment. Now.”
Startled, she took several steps backward. He followed her aggressively, closing the door behind her and crowding her away from the window with his body. “What on earth?”
“Close the curtain over the sink without standing in front of the window,” he ordered her tersely. “I’ll get the bedroom curtains.”
“What’s going on?”
He shook his head in the negative and didn’t answer her. He emerged from her bedroom and commenced prowling along the back wall of her apartment, staring at it like he was looking for something. “What are you—?”
He turned fast, grabbed her by the shoulders and yanked her up hard against him, growling, “I didn’t give you permission to leave my place.”
She stared up at him, shocked. The expression in his eyes was completely at odds with his angry tone of voice. He looked at her almost pleadingly. What the heck?
“I don’t understand...”
“What is there to understand? Vitaly gave you to me. You’re mine. I say what you do. Where you go.”
He let go of her, leaving her staring at him in complete confusion as he moved over to her kitchen drawers and commenced rummaging in them. What was wrong with him? He was acting like a crazy man.
He found a sticky pad and a pencil and brought them over to her. He tore off a note and scribbled on it quickly and showed it to her. Your place is bugged.
She stared down at the words but they refused to compute. Snipers? Bugs? Her? None of it made sense.
He wrote another note. Warehouse space behind your back wall?
She nodded in the affirmative.
We need to break through the wall. Can’t go out the door.
Ahh. He was looking for another way out of here. She moved over to the television cabinet perched against the back wall of the living space and gestured for him to help her move it. He frowned but crossed over beside her. The unit squeaked as they slid it to one side, revealing a door. It led downstairs into the back office of the rug store. The owner had no doubt used the stairway to slip up for visits to his mistress.
Ashe examined the nails holding the door shut and pantomimed using a hammer to pry them out. She nodded and moved over to the kitchen drawer to bring him a hammer.
He took it from her, and then perplexed her by taking off his belt and doubling it over. Speaking loudly and clearly, he declared, “I’m going to have to teach you a lesson, aren’t I?”
She frowned, lost.
He slapped the belt against his thigh, and it cracked loudly. She jumped, startled by the noise.
He growled, “You’ll howl before I’m done with you.”
Oh. She was supposed to make noise to cover up whatever he was about to do. Got it. He handed her the belt. She slapped her thigh with the leather strap and cried out in fake pain. Ashe pried out the first nail in time with her shout.
She waited for him to position the hammer at the next nail. He nodded, and she repeated the slapping-howling maneuver. There were a dozen nails in the door, and she was having to restrain giggles between her piteous cries by the time the door was freed. Ashe tested the doorknob, and it was locked.
He moved close to her, lifting the belt gently out of her hand. He kissed her temple lightly, breathing against her skin, “Go pack a few things in a bag you can carry easily while I pick this lock. It’ll take me two or three minutes.”
She stepped back and smiled up at him. Then she sobbed theatrically, “You’re a beast. I hate you.”
He called after her as she retreated into the bedroom, “I don’t care. You’re still mine to do whatever I want with.”
She mouthed “I dare you” and then disappeared into the bedroom. She heard him chuckling in the living room as she tossed clothes and toiletries into a duffel bag.
When she stepped back out into the main room, Ashe had the door open and was pointing a small flashlight down a dark staircase. Of course he happened to have a flashlight stowed on his person. He was just that kind of man.
Ashe gestured her over to him and lifted the bag out of her hands. He tossed it over his shoulder as she passed by him, and they started down the steps with him leading the way. She pulled the door shut quietly and locked it before following the narrow beam of bright light into the bowels of the warehouse below.
She held the flashlight for Ash
e as he picked the lock at the lower end of the staircase. Eventually they stepped out into a messy office with piles of paper everywhere. The rug merchant was apparently not much of a believer in using the filing cabinets lining the walls of the tight space.
Ashe picked up the receiver of the old rotary phone on the desk and dialed a number. “Hey, Catfish, it’s Hollywood. What are the odds you can get your hands on a clean vehicle and bring it over to that rug shop I had you check out night before last?”
Ahh. Ashe was talking to the cop. Bastien Something. The police officer replied, but she couldn’t make out the words. Ashe replied drolly, “A van. The creepy kind with no windows that kids are taught not to get into.”
She heard tinny laughter, and then Ashe hung up. He turned to face her. “He’ll be here in an hour. Until then, we’re sitting tight and seeing if this place has an exit out the back way.”
“It does. Loading dock’s at the back of the building,” she supplied.
“Perfect.”
“Care to tell me what the hell all that stuff upstairs was about?” she demanded. “Why did you hustle me out of there like that?”
“When you were standing in the doorway, a laser dot pinged on your throat.”
“A what?” Foreboding formed a knot low in her stomach.
“Laser dot. As in a little red light from a laser sight. It shone on you for just a second. Right here.” He reached out and touched the base of her throat with his fingertip. “Snipers use them to measure the distance to their target.”
“You’re telling me a sniper just pointed a gun at me?” she cried. “That’s nuts!”
“I’m telling you someone with a sniper’s scope was looking at you through it and measured how far away you were from him or her. Whether or not it was attached to a rifle, I couldn’t say.”
She opened her mouth to declare him mistaken, but he forestalled her with, “This is my work, Hank. I’m not wrong. I know what I saw.”
She studied him closely. He didn’t look crazy.
“But who?” she finally asked. “Why? And a sniper? What would someone like that want with me? I’m nobody. Is someone trying to send you a message?”
