by Lisa Childs
“No,” he conceded.
“No matter what else you’ve done, you couldn’t let me get hurt.”
“But you did get hurt,” he reminded her, lifting his hand to her cheek, his gloved fingers sliding gently over the swollen flesh.
She shivered at the sensation of leather against her skin. But what affected her more than the material was that it was his hand—his big, powerful hand—inside the glove. “I would have been killed,” she said, “if not for you. I owe you my life.”
“I don’t want your gratitude.”
Maybe it was the adrenaline coursing through her blood. Maybe it was the thrill of having cheated death. Maybe it was just that she was grateful to him. But she wanted him more than she could remember wanting any other man.
She couldn’t even see his face but for the line of his strong jaw, his intense dark eyes and his lips. She reached for him again, lifting her hands to his broad shoulders, sliding them around to the back of his neck so that she could pull down his head to hers.
Rising up on tiptoe, her body pressed tightly against his, she only just reached his chin. She slid her lips across it until he bent lower and covered her mouth with his.
Her pulse quickened, racing more than it had when she’d been in danger. It wasn’t adrenaline; it was desire that rushed through her. His mouth devoured her, as if he’d been as hungry for her kiss as she’d been for his. His lips, soft and hard, parted hers.
She gasped at the smooth glide of his tongue across her bottom lip. Her fingers slipped into his hair, the dark strands so silky and thick that they concealed the straps that held the mask to his face. All she had to do to discover his identity was tug on them.
Chapter Nine
Fighting free of the desire gripping him, he reached up and caught her hands, manacling them in one of his. What the hell had he been thinking?
“I wasn’t reaching for the mask,” she said, her voice soft with a sincerity he dare not trust.
He knew women lied. He had grown up listening to his mother tell lies…to him, to the men she’d conned, but even more to herself. Then his ex…
He couldn’t even think about the lies she had told him, how she’d just been after his money. She’d played him like Jillian Drake tried to play him now—for her exclusive. He could not trust her. And he sure as hell shouldn’t be kissing her.
“I swear,” she persisted, “I was just touching your hair. It’s so soft…like your lips.” She rose up on tiptoe again and slid her mouth across his, tasting and teasing him. She was so damn sweet. Her tongue touched the tip of his. She tasted like candy—something sweet but tart, too.
“Jillian…” he murmured against her mouth. He needed to warn her that her efforts were futile; he wasn’t about to reveal his secrets to her.
But her tongue flitted into his mouth, and desire coursed through him so powerfully that his body shook from the overwhelming force of his need for her. Lifting her in his arms, he knelt on the edge of the bed and lowered her to the mattress. He needed to pull away, to leave her alone. But she clung to him, arching her sexy body into his. Her breasts pushed against his chest.
His control stretched to the breaking point. But he couldn’t let go. He could not make love with her no matter how much his body ached with desire for hers. He released her hands, which she eased between them, trailing her fingers down his chest, her nails dragging across the thin fabric of his shirt.
He pulled back from the sweetness of her mouth and shook his head, trying to clear it of the passion clouding his judgment. He was not the fool she thought him; she could not seduce him into revealing his secret.
He intended to hold her underground until his plan culminated, but even after it was all over, he still couldn’t let her learn the truth. She was too good a reporter and his story too unique for her to not want to divulge it. His was the kind of story that would make her career; it would be picked up nationally. And he’d have no privacy. No escape.
He couldn’t escape her now. As he tried to pull away, she wrapped her arms around his waist, clutching at his back to hold him to her. He groaned at the sensation of her soft body pressed tight to his.
She tensed, her green eyes wide with concern. “I’m sorry. You’re hurt. I forgot about the other night. The explosion. The blood.”
“It wasn’t mine.” Not all of it. He’d gotten some cuts, but nothing like what had happened to his friend, what should have happened to him instead.
“He was important to you,” she said perceptively, “the man who died.”
“He was,” he admitted, his gut clenching with regret and dread.
“How many people have to get hurt before you stop your war against St. John?”
“Just one more,” he said, rage testing his control. “Just him.”
“Why do you hate him so much?”
He shook his head, amused by her persistence. “How can I get you to stop asking questions?”
Her lips curved into a tempting smile. “Kiss me.”
So he did. And as his mouth covered hers, his control snapped. For the first time since his nightmare had begun, he forgot about it—forgot who he really was and everything he’d lost. He thought only of her.
And Jillian stopped thinking entirely. She could only feel as Dante lowered his body onto hers. As his lips skimmed down her neck, his fingers dealt with her blouse, deftly unbuttoning it. The silk parted, revealing her bra—the lace so thin, her nipples visibly pushed against the cups. She sucked in a breath when he moved his gloved finger along the edge of her bra, tracing the bare flesh above it before moving his thumb over the nipple that pushed against the lace. She arched her back, wanting—needing—more.
She had been so busy, so focused on her career, that she couldn’t remember the last time she had made love.
While he continued to tease her nipple through the lace, his other hand slid beneath the back of her blouse and unclasped her bra. Then he pushed down the cups, baring her breasts.
A groan slipped through his lips. He lowered his head, and the leather of his mask rubbed against her skin. His mouth skimmed the curve of her breast, and a moan slipped out of her. His lips trailed across the mound and closed over the distended nipple. His teeth gently nipped and tugged.
Pressure built inside Jillian, winding tight with desire for him. The intensity of her need was almost painful, and a cry slipped from her lips.
He stilled. His voice rough with passion, he asked, “Did I hurt you?”
She shook her head, her hair tangling on his pillow. “Nooo…”
His lips curved into a slight grin, but it faded as he studied her face. “You are so damn beautiful,” he murmured, the words sounding like more of a curse than a compliment. “I want to see all of you.”
She shivered, suspecting he wasn’t talking about just her body. She’d already told him more about her life than she had anyone else. Fortunately, he hadn’t pressed her for details. He hadn’t asked for more than she was willing to share. But she wanted to share…everything…with him, and she didn’t even know his name, couldn’t even see his face. But maybe that made it easier. Since she couldn’t see him, he couldn’t see her, either.
But he stared at her now as he stripped off her skirt, leaving her clad only in her open blouse, hanging, unclasped bra and black lace panties. He groaned. “So damn beautiful…”
And vulnerable. She was nearly naked while he remained fully clothed. Except for the gloves he now stripped off. “I have to touch you,” he said. His hands slid over her, his skin rough as if chapped and scarred.
“I have to feel you….”
He left on the mask and answered the plea she hadn’t been able to voice. Pushing aside her panties, he kissed her intimately, his tongue flicking over the nub of her desire before dipping inside her. The leather mask rubbed against her, adding to the eroticism.
She squirmed, the pressure so intense that a moan slipped from her throat.
His groan echoed it as he feasted on her body. His t
ongue moved in and out of her with delicious friction.
“Oh!” The spiral started, the free fall into pleasure.
His bare hands moved up her body, cupping her breasts, his thumbs teasing her nipples as he continued to make love to her with his mouth. His lips sucked. His tongue stroked.
Her body shuddered, and a scream tore from her throat at the intensity, at the never-ending pleasure that rippled through her.
“Jillian…” He sighed.
Her body humming with satisfaction, Jillian closed her eyes and just barely resisted the urge to purr as she shifted on the tangled sheets.
“You’re not going to sleep,” he warned her as he kissed his way back up her body.
Passion stirred again as he tugged at first one nipple, then the other.
“We’re not done,” she promised him. Not when he touched her like that. He only made her greedy for more.
Her hands trembling, she pushed his coat from his shoulders. It fell to the floor with a ping. Something metal must have fallen from the wool, a button, perhaps. She forgot about it as she lifted his T-shirt, rolling the cotton up over the washboard abs of his stomach. His hands covered hers, pulling them away. He pulled the shirt off for her, dragging it up his chest and over his head.
A gasp slipped through her lips—at the masculine perfection of his body and the scratches and gouges that marred his smooth flesh. “You are hurt.”
“I’m hurting now,” he said, his voice a raspy whisper. “I’m hurting for you….”
Her hands skimmed gently over his chest, avoiding the ridges of dried blood on the deep scratches. His skin was as smooth and supple beneath her palms and as rich in texture as the leather of his mask. Then she moved her hand lower, over his rippling abs, to the snap of his jeans. “Then take me…”
He caught her fingers in a tight grasp. “Are you playing games with me, Jillian?”
“I’m not playing any games,” she insisted, but she wished that she was, that her attraction to him was only a ploy to gain his confidence and discover his identity. How could she be so attracted to a man she didn’t know or trust?
“I won’t stop you again,” he warned her as he unsnapped and pushed his jeans down his legs. “You better make sure this is what you want….”
His thighs were as heavily muscled as his chest and arms. And the rest of him…
“I want you. I won’t change my mind.”
He kissed her deeply, sliding his tongue in and out of her mouth. And as he kissed her, he finished undressing her, pulling her unbuttoned blouse and unclasped bra from her shoulders.
Cool air rushed over her back. Then his hands were there, sliding over her bare skin as he pulled her tightly against him. Jillian arched into him, pushing her breasts against the silky skin of his muscular chest. A moan burned in her throat. His lips skimmed across her cheek, to her ear, then her throat. He suckled at her madly beating pulse. Then his hands moved, too, from her back to her hips, and he slid down the last bit of lace that covered her. Lifting her, he wrapped her legs around his waist.
The sensitive skin of her inner thighs rubbed against his hard muscles. She clenched him, but he slid her up his body. His hands stroked over her breasts. Her nipples pushed against his palms as she arched again, whimpering for his touch. For him to release the pressure that built unbearably inside her.
He lifted her higher, bringing her breasts level with his mouth. Leather brushed against her skin as he skimmed his lips over the mounds.
She clenched his shoulders, her nails nipping into the broad expanse of muscle, as his teeth nipped her skin. Then his tongue soothed over the love bite. She moaned, wanting more. Needing more.
And he gave her more. He tugged a nipple into his mouth, his tongue teasing the aching peak. Sliding over and over the sensitive point. He knew exactly where and how to touch her. He knew her as no one else ever really had.
She locked her legs behind his back and arched against him, moaning. “Please…”
Foil tore as he sheathed himself, then he pulled her down onto his erection. She arched her hips, stretching to accept him. But he was so big…so overwhelmingly big.
“You’re so tight,” he murmured, his jaw clenched, his teeth gritted, as he eased inside her. “And hot…”
Passion burned deep within her. Jillian’s body had never been filled the way he filled her—stretching her taut, touching her more deeply than she’d ever been touched. She locked her legs behind his back, holding on as he began to thrust in and out of her.
His hands joined hers on the headboard, locking around the rails above her fingers. The brass bed rattled as they found a frantic rhythm, each of them racing to release the pressure that threatened to shatter their bodies. Stars danced behind Jillian’s eyelids as pleasure exploded inside her body.
He thrust harder, intensifying that pleasure until she screamed. Then his cry—a primal cry of release—joined the echo of her scream as he filled her with his hot passion. She’d known he was a powerful man from the minute he had grabbed her off the street, but she’d never suspected the power of the emotions he would be able to draw from her. He’d rescued her time and time again, putting himself in danger to save her. And now he’d saved her again, from locking her feelings away behind the wall she’d built up to protect herself from hurt. Warmth flooded her chest, and her pulse pounded with a terrifying realization.
Could she actually be falling for her mystery lover?
FRUSTRATION POUNDED inside his head and pulsed in every muscle of his body. Dante had found a greater release than he’d ever known in her arms. But it hadn’t changed a thing. If anything, it had only reminded him more of all that he’d lost.
He hadn’t even been able to disclose his identity to the woman in his bed, in his arms. The woman who slept now in sheets tangled from their lovemaking. But he’d left her there, locked in his private rooms. And now he had to forget about her; he had to focus on the plan. But that proved hard when he could feel her on his skin, taste her on his lips. When he couldn’t stop wanting her…
“Today we’ll hit St. John’s private airfield,” he announced to the soldiers gathered in the annex of the underground tunnels, “disabling the planes and the helicopter.” And making sure St. John couldn’t escape. “Then after that mission is complete, we’ll take out the power station and jam the satellite receivers.”
“The power station?” one of the soldiers echoed, his voice bouncing off the cement walls of the annex.
“We have to shut down the city,” he explained. “No electricity. No communication.” Because tonight, when the entire city was dark, the man with no face intended to take back his life.
“But we’ll cripple the city,” someone murmured.
“We’ll cripple St. John,” Sergeant Wallace replied for him with a sideways glance at his mask. Like the man who’d died in the explosion, Wallace was aware of his true identity. Only the ones with whom Dante had served in the Special Forces had been trusted with his secret. They’d enlisted the others to help, paying them with booty from the breakins. But his friends knew this was about so much more than money.
“What if he knows it’s us?” a young man whispered, his voice squeaky with fear.
He knows.
“St. John will not have the means to come after us,” he assured his men, “not once we’re done with him. The plan will work,” he promised his soldiers. And himself. The plan had to work….
“What about the reporter?” the sergeant asked.
What about her? He could not think about Jillian, could not let her back into his head. And never into his heart. He would not let her interfere with his plan. He had to remind himself that it was all a ploy. She had just been manipulating him, trying to con him into giving her the story that would make her career. He knew better than to trust anyone other than these men. And they had to trust him. “I have locked her in my private room. She won’t be a problem,” he assured his men.
Doubt flickered in the ey
es of the sergeant. “But if she were to escape before our missions…” Wallace said.
“If she were to tell someone…if she were to tell St.
John…”
He shook his head in reply to the question in his old friend’s eyes. He hadn’t revealed his identity to her. “She won’t escape. And even if she did, she wouldn’t tell.” He hoped.
“But she’s an investigative reporter,” Wallace persisted. “She has a reputation for being relentless when she goes after a story. You can’t trust her.”
“I don’t trust her,” he assured the older man as well as the others. “And because I don’t, I won’t be letting Jillian Drake go anywhere.” Not until his ultimate mission was accomplished. “She won’t be a problem.”
Even as he uttered the words, he recognized the lie. She was already a problem. Then he noticed a shadow on the wall of the annex; the curves and wavy hair did not belong to one of his soldiers.
Jillian had awakened and somehow escaped. Now he had to catch her before she ruined everything.
FEAR PARALYZED JILLIAN. He was going to kill her. If he found her…
Wasn’t that what he’d meant…? She wasn’t going to be a problem. He wasn’t letting her go.
She’d awakened, naked and satiated, only to find herself alone in bed. The door locked. Fortunately she’d stepped on the key that had dropped from his coat when she’d pushed it from his shoulders. When she’d made love with him…with a man who intended to hold her hostage or worse…
Tears of regret and shame stung her eyes. She had the worst judgment; she always put her trust in the wrong people. Every time she let herself begin to care about someone she got hurt. Damn…
She blinked back the tears, refusing to give in to self-pity. She had to move; she had to find her way out of the sewers, had to make her way back to civilization. The tunnel from his private rooms had led her here, to where all the tunnels converged. Coming upon the group of men, she had crouched down, hiding herself behind rows of metal barrels. They hadn’t seen her because all of their attention had been focused on him.
