Stripped

by Tori St. Claire

  Drawing away, she arched an eyebrow, but a glimmer of emerald slipped in to darken her jade green gaze. She liked that, did she? Well, he’d be more than happy to lather every inch of her body once he found out who Nikolai was and why his name had turned her ghost white.

  She turned to Kate, denying him the opportunity to taunt her further. “Kate, can I borrow something to wear?”

  “Closet’s there.” She pointed down the dim hall to her open bedroom door.

  Surprising Brandon, Natalya gave his hand a tug and started down the hall. He followed, ignoring Kate’s knowing smirk and the deliberate way Sergei suddenly found an issue of Woman’s World interesting.

  Natalya barred them inside Kate’s room by closing the door and leaning against it. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “I think the better question is, what are you doing?” He moved closer and set his hands on her hips. Nodding at the closed door, he leaned his weight into her and murmured, “This seems vaguely familiar.”

  “Mm. It does.” Though her voice mirrored the purr of arousal, her pursed lips spoiled the effect. So did the palm she flattened against his chest and the push that distanced their bodies. “I can’t spend all day playing with you.”

  “But you want to.”

  She scolded him with a frown.

  Undaunted, Brandon stepped close again, fastening his hands on her hips. He dropped his head and trailed his lips down the length of her neck. “Admit it, Natalya, you’d like nothing more than to get rid of these clothes and feel my body against yours. My mouth on you, my hands on you.” He lowered his voice, whispering at the base of her ear. “To have me so deep inside you that you make me tremble.”

  At the catch of her breath, he tugged on her earlobe with his teeth. “I’m not going to lie about how much I want you. But we’re in Kate’s room, and we’ve got to pick up Derek.”

  The hand on his chest relaxed, slid down to his abdomen. A soft sigh escaped her parted lips. “What do you want from me, Brandon?”

  He traced the tip of his tongue around the hollow beneath her ear. “I want to know what you’re afraid of.” Fitting a hand into the slight distance that separated them, he palmed her breast and gently squeezed. “I want to know where you go when you’re hiding behind this infuriating indifferent attitude.”

  Abruptly withdrawing, he placed a soft kiss against her lips. “And I want you to stay in my shirt.”

  As he’d expected, she latched on to the least intimidating confession and grinned. “Your shirt? I think that’s manageable.” Her gaze dropped to his groin along with her hand. As she stroked a finger down the length of his flagging erection, wry humor danced in her eyes. “That is, if you can control yourself enough to let me change the rest of my clothes.”

  Brandon grunted and stepped away. He sat down on the edge of the bed, all too aware of the intimate setting. Kate’s bed, the comfortable pillows, the closed door, Natalya’s desire bright in her laughing eyes. It held a strange appeal. Lacked the usual discomfort bedrooms brought. He could almost feel what it would be like to lay Natalya on the down comforter, the way her body would pillow his, the way the mattress would support their joined weight. The linens would be clean and crisp, her body as soft as the feathers behind her head.

  He stood up, certain if he stayed another minute he’d suffocate. “I’ll wait in the other room.”

  Without so much as a backward glance, he swiftly exited. No bedrooms. No beds. He might be falling for her, but not that hard.

  Kate appraised him with a single glance that said she knew exactly what he’d done the night before and all the dirty thoughts that flooded his mind. He focused on Sergei, in need of some male support. But he found none in the face that watched him with the same wisdom in his quiet stare. A face that Brandon again felt certain he’d seen somewhere before. Maybe without the long hair.

  Impossible. He’d never spent time in any of the places listed on Sergei’s file.

  Natalya exited the distant bedroom, wearing a pair of Kate’s tiny jeans shorts and his shirt. Beneath her arm, she carried a flimsy turquoise top. A pair of low-heeled matching sandals dangled from her fingers.

  Good. She was planning on staying a while. The night—if he had his way.

  “Hey, Moretti,” Sergei called as Brandon made for the door.

  “Yeah?”

  “Natalya said you got sideswiped yesterday. You want me to take a look at your car this afternoon?”

  “You know cars?” Brandon asked with a touch of surprise. He’d have never pegged the guy as a grease monkey.

  “I can find my way around them. Done a little body work here and there.”

  “Sure, if you don’t mind. It’d save me the trouble of taking it in.”

  Sergei answered with a long, slow nod.

  “I’ll call you later,” Natalya told Kate as she opened the front door.

  “Bring my son back in one piece. No more bloody noses!”

  Despite the very real reference, Brandon chuckled. “Not a problem.”

  Now that he had Natalya alone, he intended to find some answers before they picked up Derek. It was two—that left him a full hour to dig before Sue expected him. He slid into the car, Natalya having beat him inside, and turned the key. “Do you have any siblings?”

  Puzzlement shadowed her face. “Yes. Why?”

  “Just curious.” Truth. Good start. “Are you close?”

  “Never met her.”

  Lie. He sighed inwardly. Before he could reclaim the lost ground, however, Natalya turned the tables. Swiveling in her seat, she said, “Tell me about your brother.”

  Shit. Not the subject he wanted to discuss.

  T

  he tightening of Brandon’s hands on the steering wheel evidenced his discomfort. As Natalya observed the way his knuckles whitened, a wave of guilt lapped at her conscious. He didn’t like talking about his family. She’d witnessed the same closed body language when she’d mentioned the picture in his front room. This time, however, she didn’t intend to let him clam up. He’d pulled enough of her secrets free since his arrival at Kate’s. She needed to regroup. “Were you close?” she pressed.

  “Yeah.” A heavy sigh preceded several drawn-out moments of silence where he did nothing more than stare at the road and navigate around two corners. Then, as the car straightened out on a flat stretch, he sighed again. “The little shit used to tag around with me and my friends every chance he could. Couple of times, when I first turned sixteen, I had to haul him out of the backseat so I could go on a date.”

  Picturing confident Sergei lapping at Brandon’s heels brought a smile to Natalya’s face. He’d kill her if he knew she was learning this kind of dirt.

  “How many years apart were you?”

  “Two.” A wistful smile lifted one corner of his mouth. “I remember when we were real little I used to beat the crap out of him. I was jealous as hell. Couldn’t stand it when Mom made a fuss over him. I bit him so many times that going to my room became part of my morning routine.”

  She laughed softly, the image of Brandon and Sergei wrestling on a carpeted floor, Brandon emerging the victor with some coveted toy, taking root in her mind.

  “God, I miss him,” Brandon whispered.

  Struck by the raw emotion in his quiet confession, Natalya reached between the console and slid her palm over his thigh. He dropped his hand, wrapped his fingers around hers, and squeezed.

  Twenty-four hours. You’ll see him again in twenty-four hours.

  “And your sister?” she asked hesitantly.

  Brandon shook his head, swallowed visibly. “I can’t talk about her. She was too young. Just an innocent kid. I let her—” Another fierce shake of his head silenced whatever he’d intended to say.

  Natalya’s heart twisted. She closed her eyes, wishing she could absorb his pain. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”

  The tightening of his fingers around hers said it was okay.

  “Stefan was
Mom’s golden son. He did real well at school, had an easier time than I did—but he tried to hide it. I think he bombed a few classes just so no one would know how smart he was. Always thought he’d end up someplace like NASA.”

  Natalya turned her hand over and laced her fingers through his, sensing Brandon needed to talk.

  “He’d wanted to come visit me at A&M that weekend. I had a date with this sorority girl, and I didn’t want my little brother hanging around. Told him he could come down the next weekend.” Brandon gave a sad shake of his head. “Last time I saw him,” he chuckled, a forced sound that lacked true amusement, “I think his last words to me were, Fuck you, Bran.”

  That she could believe. Sergei had an inordinate way with words. But the fact that Brandon believed his brother had died angry with him tore her to pieces. The words sat on the tip of her tongue—He’s not dead. He’s at Kate’s. She clamped her teeth, forbidding the truth to escape. He’d been gone fifteen years, and while making Brandon wait longer bordered on cruelty, twenty-four more hours wouldn’t make much difference.

  Brandon pulled into a parking space before the brightly colored carnival rides and shut off the car. Struck by the sudden need to ease his loss, Natalya did the only thing she could think of. She leaned across the console as he reached for the door, caught his shoulder, and turned him around with a tug. Then, she settled her mouth on his, and kissed him with all the topsy-turvy feeling that his overwhelming presence provoked.

  Their tongues tangled hungrily. His greedy murmurs sent ripples of indescribable pleasure shooting through her nerve endings. The pull of her hair as he tangled his hand through the long lengths sent shivers coursing down her spine. And as his heart drummed hard against her breast, Natalya’s opened wide. It let him in where he didn’t belong. This man felt. He grieved. He was real in so many ways. When he touched her, when he barged his way inside and demanded that she feel, she wanted nothing more than to be the innocent woman he believed her to be. A simple female, in need of his strength, his protection… Maybe even his love. Someone who hadn’t manipulated everyone she’d known in her adult life, except perhaps Sergei, to satisfy someone else’s agenda.

  Someone who possessed very real needs. Very real emotion.

  Brandon pulled on her hair, tipping her head back and terminating the kiss. His breath rasped in harmony with hers. He nudged her mouth with his, caught her lips again, then turned his head and rubbed his cheek against hers. “I want you to forget I said this,” he whispered as he increased the pressure on the back of her scalp and urged her forehead to his shoulder. “I don’t even know what I mean by it.”

  His mouth dusted over the crown of her head. “But I think I need you, Natalya.”

  Her breath caught, the sudden overflow of emotion bringing unbidden moisture to her eyes. He’d reached right in and pulled the words out of her very soul. If anyone needed the other, she needed him. Needed the way he made it impossible to hide.

  As her heart soared, however, sorrow dragged it back down. He might think he needed her, but that would change. When he realized she’d lied to him, that she’d played a prominent part in Rachel’s death, and he learned all the terrible things she’d done over the course of her career, he’d despise her.

  Nevertheless, this one moment was hers to cherish. She might have lied about her past, and a whole bunch of other things he’d hate, but she refused to lie about him. The words slipped off her lips, shaky and hesitant. “I think I need you too.”

  Thirty-five

  B

  right peals of laughter helped to soothe the unsteady hammering behind Brandon’s ribs as he held Natalya’s hand and led her to a bench across from the row of food vendor trailers. Need her—yeah. Crazy as it sounded, she woke him up in ways he’d never imagined. She drew him out of the shell he’d built fifteen years ago when he’d lost everything that ever meant anything. Hell, he’d just talked about Stefan for the first time in he didn’t know how long, and it hadn’t hurt. Hadn’t come with the immense guilt that threatened to squeeze the life out of him. Not like it had before Natalya. He doubted he’d ever get to the point where talking about his sister didn’t clog him up. But he would in time, and he also suspected when that time came, it would be okay if he broke down in front of Natalya. He just couldn’t deal with that collapse yet. When he could be certain Natalya was safe, and his best friend wasn’t trying to mark her as a killer, he could let Gina live again through words.

  Sitting down, Brandon watched the kids play and absorbed the comfortable silence he shared with this woman he’d known only a few days. He sighted Derek behind the slide talking to a clown with a puffy green nose. The clown twisted a yellow balloon as Derek watched in fascination.

  “I’m going to get a snow cone—you want one?” Natalya slid off the bench.

  “No thanks.”

  Brandon watched her walk away, admiring the sway of slender hips and waist-length auburn hair. As she stepped up to the window, he looked back at Derek. Sue caught sight of Brandon, bent to Derek’s shoulder, and pointed Brandon’s way. Derek’s face lit up. In seconds, he was bounding across the short grass, waving good-bye to Sue and her girls. Under his scrawny arm, a yellow balloon animal’s tail bobbed with the pounding of his feet. In his hand, he clutched a crumpled piece of paper.

  “Brandon! Brandon! Look!” Breathless and panting, he skidded to a stop near Brandon’s knee and held up his little raccoon-bear-cat shaped balloon. “It’s a panda!”

  A panda with a possum’s tail. Brandon chuckled. “That’s quite a panda. What’s that?” He pointed at the wad of paper in Derek’s hand.

  “This? It’s a fortune-teller’s game. You put your fingers in here, like this.” He fitted his fingers into the folded flaps and opened and shut them, in a complicated Pac-Man way. “And you pick a color. Then a number. Then it says something. But I can’t read it.”

  Instantly, Brandon recognized the origami fortune-tellers from grade school. Nostalgia warmed his soul. “Here, I can help you with that.” He plucked the folded toy off Derek’s hand and fitted the tips of his fingers into the paper pleats. “Okay, pick.”

  “Blue.”

  Brandon moved the paper in and out, spelling out, “B-L-U-E.” With the points closed, he asked, “Number?”

  “Six.”

  Diligently, Brandon moved the paper six times. “Pick your last number, little man.”

  “Okay! Three.”

  Catching Derek’s enthusiasm, Brandon grinned. “Let’s see what this says.” He pried up the number three flap, anticipating the usual children’s predictions. Something along the lines of “You’ll be rich.” What he read, however, made him do a double take. He scanned the flap again, his gut wrenching down tight.

  You will have an accident very soon. What kind of sick joke was this? Sue’s kids wouldn’t have teased so morbidly.

  “What’s it say, Brandon? What’s it say?”

  Brandon cleared his voice. “Nothing good, buddy.”

  “Do it again.”

  They went through the motions a second time, and Brandon peeled back the flap.

  Death will be slow and painful.

  Brandon ripped open the rest of the flaps, his temper escalating with each one. The last number he lifted, number 8, skyrocketed his anger. Did you like the bird?

  He grabbed Derek by the shoulders, his heart kicking double-time. “Where’d you get this, Derek? Who gave it to you?”

  Derek’s little eyes went wide as saucers, and he squeaked something unintelligible.

  Willing himself to calm down, Brandon eased his grip and urged, “C’mon, buddy, you’re not in trouble. Who gave it to you?”

  “T-The clown.”

  “With the green nose?”

  Derek nodded.

  “Did he say anything else?”

  “Just that it was a game for you and me.”

  Glancing over Derek’s head to where he’d last seen the clown, Brandon silently swore. A shadow descended on them, s
ignifying Natalya’s return. He took one look at her and jumped to his feet. “Watch him for a minute.”

  His blood boiled as he jogged toward the tall slide where the green-nosed clown had fashioned Derek’s balloon. Who the hell left threats with kids? What if Derek hadn’t shown it to him, and had tried the thing out with one of Sue’s girls? Damn it! Terrorizing a four-year-old who couldn’t read accomplished nothing. All it did was make Brandon that much more determined to see his father’s thugs to the grave.

  Passing an open trash can, a shock of candy-apple red caught his eye. He glanced inside at a fuzzy red wig topped with one foam green nose.

  “Son of a bitch,” he muttered.

  He scanned the grounds. A young blonde mother bounced a chubby baby near the merry-go-round. To Brandon’s left, a man knelt before a crying boy, offering comfort. Near the pair, a heavy-set man with a dark mustache hawked a cardboard flat of cotton candy. Further out, the crowd was too thick.

  Damn it. The bastards were here. Right beneath his fucking nose.

  Catching Natalya’s curious stare from across the way, he forked his fingers through his hair and swore again. She was too exposed. They’d gotten to Derek in the middle of a carnival in broad daylight. They could get to her just as easily.

  Brandon shoved the wadded paper into his hind pocket and willed himself to walk, not run, back to Natalya and Derek. The seconds that it took to travel the fifty feet or so spanned out to intolerable limits, every one of which he visualized a stranger coming up behind her and dragging her away.

  Finally arriving at her side, he brushed off the curious lift of her eyebrows with a slight shake of his head. “I think we should get him back to his mom now.” He set a hand on Derek’s shoulder, more to reassure himself the little boy hadn’t been harmed than for any real necessity. “What do you say, buddy?”

  “I’m hungry. I want a snow cone.”

  Natalya laughed, and the tenseness in Brandon’s spine ebbed. He caught both her hand and Derek’s and pulled them toward the vendor’s trailer. “One snow cone, coming up. What flavor?”