Playing Dirty

by HelenKay Dimon

  Frustration blinked out and satisfaction took its place. This was better. The traveling would continue but now he clued her in, gave her advance warning.

  The unexpected warmth flowed through her again. “Well, look at that.”

  “I can be taught, you know.” His fingers slid under the clasp of her bra as he pressed a line of kisses down her throat.

  She felt a tug and the band around her middle loosened. Then his hands shifted until her breasts filled his palms. The way he flicked his thumb over her nipple as that hot mouth kissed the dip at the base of her neck and headed across her collarbone had her head falling to the side.

  Her eyes closed as she breathed in his scent and concentrated on the way his tongue and lips inflamed her skin. “It is that hope that keeps women coming back for more.”

  “If you want more, I can give you more.” Using his nose, he moved the V-­neck of her shirt down and swept a tongue across her nipple.

  “Dirty boy.” And thank God for that. Heat exploded and his hands traveled over her skin. It took all her control to ignore the heartbeat pounding in her ears as blood rushed through her.

  Her lips went to his cheek, to the rough brush of hair over his chin, then found his mouth. The kiss hit her with a zap of electricity and had the need inside her spiking.

  Something snapped then. Her body rubbed against his and her hips rode up and down, building the heat through their clothes. She held him close. Fingers slipped into his hair. Their mouths crossed over each other once then twice. Then she lost count.

  Just as her fingers switched to his T-­shirt and started tugging, his body jerked. His hands went to her sides and he shifted her off his lap as he sat up straighter.

  “Ford, what are you—­”

  The front door clicked shut. “Hello?”

  Hearing her uncle’s voice had her flipping around on Ford’s thighs as she struggled to shove her shirt back down and prevent a disturbing peep show. She noticed her uncle, imposing in his usual dark suit. “Anthony?”

  “I see you have company.” His dark-­eyed gaze stayed on her face then drifted away. “It would appear I shouldn’t have used my key.”

  “Probably not,” Ford mumbled as his fingers went to work putting the clasp of her bra back together.

  She nearly fell over trying to get up off the couch. His thigh trapped her leg and she had to yank to stand up. Between the heavy make-­out session and the wrestling to get her clothes back in place, her bra strap had twisted and dug into her skin. At least he walked in before all their clothes hit the hardwood floor.

  Forget about being a grown-­up and in her own damn house, heat rushed to her cheeks and she stumbled over her words trying to explain. “We were just—­”

  “I can see what you were doing, Shay.”

  “Well, this is awkward.” Ford whispered the comment into her hair.

  She didn’t bother to whisper her reply. “You think?”

  She heard a long exhale as a puff of breath blew across the top of her ear. Hands went to her hips and moved her body a few inches away from the couch. Before she could blink, Ford had his hand on her lower back and guided them to stand in front of her uncle.

  Ford held out a hand. “I’m Ford Decker.”

  “I figured.” The men shook hands. “Anthony Creighton, Shay’s uncle.”

  She was transported back to being fifteen and getting caught making out in the back of Paul Freeman’s car. Years had passed, but her uncle’s disapproving frown, the one he wore then and now, had the power to have her shifting her weight from foot to foot. “Now that we all know each other.”

  “I was just telling Shay the other day that we should all have dinner together.” Anthony spoke directly to Ford in what came off as a serious man-­to-­man discussion.

  “Absolutely, but did you need to talk with Shay about something now? I can wait in the other room.” Ford talked with an easy grace and stood tall and confidant, as if getting caught with his hands on her breasts didn’t phase him at all.

  And maybe it didn’t. This seemed to be her issue, not his. She didn’t associate sex with shame and refused to apologize for the choices she’d made about men, but there was something about disappointing Anthony that always made her twitchy. He’d taken her in, let her grieve, gave her focus and handed her a job.

  She had tried for years to pay him back all he’d given her by being perfect, and had failed miserably. She didn’t possess Trent’s smarts or Anthony’s business ruthlessness. The most she could do was manage his properties so he never doubted his investment in them or her.

  But right now he was intruding, and she’d need to take him aside at some point and remind her about things like privacy and knocking. “Why are you here?”

  “Right.” Anthony finally glanced at her again. “I’ve been searching around and finally heard from Trent. He needed a few days away so I sent him to my property in Charlottesville.”

  Ford’s eyes narrowed. “Virginia?”

  “You saw him?” she asked at the same time.

  “I own a place by the university.” Anthony put his hands in his front pants pockets and rocked back on his heels. “A small condo complex.”

  The pieces didn’t make any sense to Shay. The searching spoke to Anthony’s work absences but not Trent’s behavior or why he didn’t answer his phone or at least return a text. “Did he give you an explanation?”

  Anthony smiled. “This has all been about a young woman.”

  With that, Shay’s mind went blank. “What?”

  She struggled to make sense of what her uncle was saying. Good genes blessed Trent with sunny blond looks and big brains. Neither qualified as an excuse for his recent bout of rudeness.

  “Someone in his office. I got the impression they worked long hours, something happened and . . . well, things didn’t go as Trent planned. He’s embarrassed and upset.”

  She waited for the wave of relief to hit her but it never came. The story raised more questions than it answered. All of it highlighted her need to hear Trent’s voice. Maybe yell at him for a few minutes for all he’d put them through.

  “Okay.” She had no idea what to say, so she went with that.

  Ford’s hand continued to rub over her back. “Kind of an extreme reaction to young love, isn’t it?”

  “He can be intense, and that spills over into his dating.” Anthony held up a hand. “Well, look. You two are in the middle of something.”

  She rushed to direct the conversation before her uncle turned it to her private life. “Thanks for telling me about Trent. I’m annoyed and kind of want to drive down there and shake him, but at least he’s safe.”

  “No problem.” Anthony treated Ford to a guy nod then leaned in and kissed her cheek. “Call me about that dinner.”

  “Sure.” But she said the word to the closed door.

  Anthony had disappeared as fast as he came. He’d swooped in and dropped the information then took off again. That summed up his behavior lately—­never staying still long enough to answer hard questions.

  “You okay?” Ford asked.

  When she focused again, he stood in front of her, all handsome and reassuring. “Just trying to process it all.”

  His arms encircled her hips in a loose wrap. “Want to drive to Charlottesville and check on Trent?”

  Ford would pile them into a car and drive a few hours without complaining. She could tell by the way he asked. The guy got hotter by the minute.

  “Maybe later.” But she didn’t mean that. She was exactly where she wanted to be, with him, right there.

  “And until then?”

  She slid her hands under the edge of his T-­shirt and trailed them up his chest. “I need some help with my bra.”

  Heat filled those sexy eyes. “I hope you mean—­”

  “Taking it off and keep
ing it off this time.”

  His palms slipped over her ass and he pulled her in closer and rubbed his erection against her. “I’m your man.”

  Yeah, she was beginning to think he was.

  12

  FORD DRAGGED his sorry ass into the Warehouse the next morning. He’d been undercover for most of his career. He took on other personas, used everyone, played games, stole whatever needed to be stolen. Shot and blew up ­people and things, all in the name of national security. For reasons he couldn’t explain but could name—­Shay—­the stakes increased exponentially on this job.

  The end goal wasn’t exactly difficult to figure out. They had to stop a reckless genius from wrecking the world. That meant pulling every string and tracking every lead in the search for Trent Creighton. Ford understood the game. He just fucking hated it this round.

  Sitting on the couch with Shay, sleeping with her, dragging his mouth all over her hot body, qualified as part of his assignment. He’d done it before, pretended to be attracted to this person and acted the role of a long lost grandson to that one. His whole work life boiled down to one long hand of “the end justifies the means.”

  It had never been okay with him before, but he had justified and tolerated it. With Shay, the betrayal kept him in a constant state of agitation, as if his skin didn’t fit and every word he said to her had to be ripped out of him because with her it wasn’t an act.

  He didn’t realize he’d stopped in the middle of the Warehouse floor, staring at his feet, until another pair of shoes broke into his line of vision. He glanced up to see Jake Pearce standing there, crooked smile in place and hands folded together in front of him.

  “You okay there, Ford?”

  With the glasses and brown hair graying at his temples, Pearce could be a professor. That happened to be one of his most effective covers. On a joint CIA/MI6 operation years ago he taught at a university in Germany, gathering intel on emerging radical groups. Those poor kids never knew the guy pacing in front of them in a tweed blazer could whip out a machine gun and take out a town without one ounce of regret.

  That was just one of the man’s skills. Ford had heard more than once about how impressive Pearce was with the ladies. If the CIA needed to charm information or weapons or drugs out of a woman, the ­people in charge sent in Pearce. Ford thought the whole “model good looks” thing was way overblown, but he couldn’t deny Pearce’s ability to drag the most obscure piece of information out of nowhere.

  Ford reached out and shook the other man’s hand. “When did you come in?”

  “After the royal fuck-­up.”

  That described the entire job to date. “Be more specific.”

  “I was talking Hampstead but I heard about the DC warehouse debacle.” Pearce shook his head. “Starting to look like this assignment is spooked.”

  That’s not quite how Ford saw it. “Or being sabotaged.”

  Ward joined them with a welcome clap of a hand on Pearce’s shoulder. “Hey, man.”

  For a second Ford blocked his memories of Shay, the flash of images on the screens around them, and Ellery’s frantic typing and moving from one desk to another compiling information. He boiled his concerns into two simple sentences he knew the men standing with him would understand. “Someone is spinning us around. That can only mean this Trent kid is getting help from someone connected and dangerous.”

  Ward nodded. “I agree. No way this kid—­brilliant or not—­could make all this happen without someone running interference.”

  Pearce hid his thoughts behind a blank expression, as he always did. The guy never gave anything away, which was one of the reasons he was so effective in the field. Rumor was, he’d withstood torture in the Sudan by singing to his captors, and survived being thrown in a hole and nearly buried alive in Afghanistan by reciting a book he’d memorized. The man might look pretty but his veins were ice cold. Had to be to live through what he’d gone through and still be standing.

  “We’re really thinking this kid got mixed up with Benton somehow?” Pearce asked. “Any ideas on how they got together? I mean, Benton doesn’t normally look for science types.”

  “All options are on the table.” Ward leaned over Ellery’s shoulder at the nearby desk. A few clicks of the keyboard and a diagram of potential targets filled the screen. He gestured to the mass of lines connecting photos to each other. “You’re welcome to help us trim this mess down.”

  They had to wade through all of it, but Ford sensed they needed to dig deeper in another direction. One that would plant a gulf between him and Shay the size of the Grand Canyon. “We should look at his dad, Anthony.”

  Ward nodded to Ellery. A second later personal information on Anthony and his companies filled another screen. Photos, bank statements, corporate documents. All private but none of it problematic. Ford knew the real information would be buried somewhere, and he depended on Ellery to work her voodoo computer magic to uncover it.

  “Rich, connected.” Pearce stood close to the screen with his hands on his hips as he took it all in. “This relative angle makes sense.”

  “Add to that the fact Anthony lied his ass off to Shay yesterday about Trent and we have a reason to dig.” Between the smooth delivery and genuine tone, Ford’s internal alarm had started buzzing. Maybe Anthony thought lying would put Shay at ease and justified it that way, but Ford sensed something else was at work. “Shay didn’t blink, but I did.”

  Pearce glanced over his shoulder. “Uh, Shay?”

  Yeah, that tone wasn’t good. “Anthony’s niece and Trent’s cousin.”

  Pearce laughed. “I think you’re missing my innuendo.”

  Not exactly. Ford would have to be the worst field agent in the world not to pick up on the direction of Pearce’s thoughts. “Ignoring it, actually.”

  “What did the uncle say exactly?” Ward asked, cutting through the crap and bringing them back to the job.

  Ford appreciated the conversation assist. “He said he talked with Trent and the kid was lovesick and needed some time away to heal a broken heart.”

  Sounded like pure bullshit to Ford. The kid supposedly worked such long hours that he slept on a cot in his lab, yet had enough time to fall for some girl? No way could anyone sell that line.

  “So, daddy supposedly sent the kid to his property in Charlottesville to recuperate from getting his feelings hurt?” Ward swore. “I’m not buying it and nothing in the intel supports it.”

  An understatement as far as Ford was concerned. “Join the club.”

  “Wait a second. Go back.” Pearce whipped around. “Shay told you all of this?”

  “Anthony did. I was standing right there.” Which was the other reason Ford questioned the too-­convenient story. Her uncle had seemed all too eager to have the conversation overheard. He didn’t break off and call her aside to discuss a private family matter. No, Anthony made sure he got the news. Felt like covering his tracks to Ford.

  “Shay didn’t buy the heartbreak thing, did she?” Ward asked.

  Relief smacked into Ford. Sounded like he was not alone in thinking they had a new direction to investigate in the uncle. “She clearly wanted to, but she’s not dumb.”

  “Interesting.” Ward made a humming sound. “Makes you wonder if Uncle Anthony is looking for a new way to make money, and piles of it.”

  “While we’re digging into backgrounds, we also need to take a closer look at Trent’s boss at the Center for Scientific Research.” Ford scanned the screens for the man’s name. “Matt Claymore.”

  “I have experience with that group.” Pearce leaned against the desk, right next to Ellery, who kept on typing. “He’s been vetted and has a solid history. To hold that job he needs a top secret clearance and has his assets checked often, along with being subjected to random lie detector tests.”

  Ford added Claymore being too clean to the list of things
he didn’t like about this assignment. “True, but every employee who goes in or out of that building gets searched. So, if everyone is above reproach and following the rules, explain how the toxin got out.”

  “I’ll put Delta team on the Charlottesville angle, just to be safe.” Ward wrote something on a notepad and handed it to Ellery. “They can also handle walking back through the ­people who work and guard CSR.”

  “Claymore is mine,” Ford said as he watched the by-­play, knowing Ellery’s next move would be to call in the Delta team from combing through the warehouse area and squeezing the last bit of information out of Billy.

  “Funny but it sounded like Shay was yours.” Pearce picked now to break his blank expression and be a sarcastic smartass.

  Ford refused to play along. “She’s not involved. She’s collateral.”

  “Have we definitely decided that?” Ward asked.

  Ignoring all of them proved a pretty big temptation. “She’s worried about Trent and looking all over for him.”

  Pearce dropped his arms and grabbed the edge of the desk behind him. “Or she’s a great actress and is working with her uncle to throw you off Trent’s trail.”

  “She has no idea what I do. She thinks I’m a computer tech guy.” She also viewed him as honest and decent and a whole bunch of positive shit Ford knew he could no longer claim.

  “Maybe she’s in the dark, but I’m not trusting anything we think to be true on this job but don’t know for sure. I don’t trust the intel or the ­people digging for it.” Pearce looked at Ellery and held up a hand in what looked like mock surrender. “No offense.”

  She snorted. “Whatever.”

  The frustration in Ford’s gut kept building and rumbling. He let it spill over and work its way into the anger in his voice. “Speaking of which, your half-­assed info almost got me blown up in Hampstead.”

  Pearce didn’t even blink. “My contact is missing. I keep waiting to hear his body has been found in a dumpster somewhere in London.”

  “That’s fucking great.” Just what they needed. Another dead end—­literally.