by Jen Talty
“We have some questions for you.” Logan sat on the edge of the desk.
She pushed her chair back, folding her hands across her chest. “I don’t think your mother would appreciate you harassing her employees.”
“I can send a cop over.” Logan continued to stare at Bonnie. “Once they are done questioning your boyfriend.”
Bonnie’s eyes narrowed to tiny slits. “Why would the police want anything from Oscar?”
“Maybe you could tell us why he was at the Vanderlin home last night?” Logan shifted his gaze to the desk, looking at her notebook.
“He wasn’t there.” Her eyes stayed tiny slivers as she drew her lips tight.
“Yeah, he was,” Dylan said, pushing himself from the door. “What I don’t understand is what do you or Oscar know about STEALTH? I mean, you didn’t get the computer geek gene like your brother and Oscar was more into smoking weed than school.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, now leave.” She pointed to the front door with a shaky finger.
“Not until you tell us how you’re involved with whoever is threatening Mia Vanderlin,” Logan said, leaning forward, noticing a few blonde strands peeking out from the bottom drawer.
Bonnie pushed the chair back until it hit the wall. “I’m going to call the police,” her voice trembled.
“Be my guest.” Dylan inched forward, but Logan stopped him.
No need to scare her even more.
“Look.” Logan ran a hand over his head. “We can do this the easy way, or the hard way.”
“Are you threatening me?” she shirked.
Logan shook his head. “The hard way is we call the cops.” He opened the bottom drawer and pulled out a wig, holding it up. “The girl you hired to follow Mia will be able to ID you. We know you gave her a key and asked her to call you, so you would have a record of the call.”
“But I bet that was your brother’s idea.” Dylan tilted his head. “Cuz you’re not that smart.”
“Fuck you,” Bonnie said. “I’m not telling you jack shit.”
“It will go better for you if you tell us where Raisin and Theresa are.” Logan watched as Bonnie’s eyes went wide, then narrowed again, confirming in his mind that Raisin was indeed Rock and the mastermind behind the entire attack on Mia. “What you’ve done is minor compared to them, so I’m sure the cops will cut you a deal.”
“I don’t know where he is,” she said. Her arms folded tight as she lowered her gaze. “I haven’t seen him since right before he dropped out of college.”
“Are you serious?” Dylan asked, standing next to Logan. “How did he contact you then?”
“He hacked me a year ago and he’s been making me do this shit for him.”
Dylan laughed. “Yeah, right. And I’ve got a Lighthouse for sale.”
“You’re such an asshole.” She raised her gaze. “Rock has control of my bank accounts, all my social media, he even changed a grade in one of my graduate courses, fucking with my GPA. He did the same thing to Oscar.”
“That sucks.” Logan dropped the wig on the desk. “I’m only going to ask this question once. If you say no, I won’t help you with the cops.”
“What do you want?” She dropped her hands to her laps, relaxing her body.
“I want you to let Mia into your computer system, so she can flush out your brother and we can put an end to this.”
Bonnie bit down on her lower lip. “Will she help me get control of all my finances and personal on-line life? Oscar’s too?”
“We’ll make sure it happens.” Logan pushed from the desk. “But you also have to tell us everything you know about his plan to destroy Mia.”
“I don’t know much, but I can tell you it’s not going as he orchestrated and he hadn’t anticipated on you showing up.”
“All right then.” Logan held out his hand. “Let’s get with the local police so we do this right.” Logan held Bonnie by her elbow as he guided her out of the office, making sure the door was locked before tucking her into Dylan’s car.
“You good with dealing with her?” Logan asked as he made his way to the driver’s side of his Jeep.
“I could care less about her and haven’t in years.” Dylan waved. “It’s not true what they say about your first.”
“She was your first?”
Dylan shrugged. “We’ve all made mistakes.”
“My first wasn’t a mistake.” Logan smiled. “I’m thinking about making my first, my last.”
The shocked expression plastered on his little brother’s face made it all the sweeter. Now all he had to do was eliminate the threat and then tell Mia’s father that he planned on deflowering his daughter for the rest of his life.
CHAPTER 11
MIA SLIPPED OFF HER headphones and rubbed her shoulder as she peered over the computer screen and stared at the sexy man she’d come to love. Or maybe her mother was right and she’d loved him all along.
Logan leaned against the doorjamb to her bedroom. His muscles flexed under his T-Shirt.
“How long have you been standing there?”
“Ten minutes,” he said, pushing himself from the door and sauntered in her direction. “I didn’t want to disturb or scare you.”
“That is why I never have my back to the door.” She craned her neck, trying to get the kinks out. “What time is it?”
“Close to midnight. Here. Let me help you with that.” He stood behind her, his long fingers curling over her shoulders and neck as he found all the sore spots and worked magic on her muscles. “Feel good?”
“Oh…God…yes.”
“That sounds familiar, but you left off my name.”
“Logan…oh Logan.” She laughed, dropping her chin to her chest, letting him take away all the tension the last few hours had created. “Rock hasn’t taken any bait I’ve sent. Not even sure he knows I want to play.”
“I suspect he knows, but he’s waiting for what he thinks is the right time.”
“That’s what scares me. He’s deep underground as it is. He could disappear and in a year or two, come at me again. Seems that’s his MO.”
“I was thinking about that.” He rolled her chair in front of her bed and sat down, still rubbing her shoulders. “When you mentioned calling him out publically, I didn’t understand you meant underground with a bunch of hackers, where it seems he’s well protected. So, I was thinking we bring him out into the real world.”
“What do you mean?”
He spun the chair around, holding the armrests. His turquoise eyes staring deep into her soul. “We have the note Oliver tossed over the fence. We have Bonnie willing to do whatever it takes. STEALTH has said they had nothing to do with the hack.”
“But we don’t have any code from Raisin…Rock…in any of the files.”
“Markus is still working on that and I have faith he’ll find it.” Logan reached out and tucked a piece of hair that had fallen from her ponytail behind her ear. “Rock has always been jealous of you and he’s never liked you.”
“Not true.” Mia looked toward the window, leaning away from his touch, but Logan pressed his thumb under her chin, tilting her head.
“What do you mean by that?”
“We’d always been competitive with each other since middle school, but he wasn’t vicious back then.”
“He was with Markus,” Logan said.
“That didn’t start until eight grade.” She took in a deep breath, knowing this conversation could go sour quickly. “Right after I told him I wouldn’t go to the movies with him. That I’d never go out with him and when he tried to kiss me, I slapped him, in front of the entire science club.”
“I see.” Logan leaned back, dropping his hands to his lap. “I didn’t know that.”
“Not sure any of the popular kids or jocks would have cared to hear that juicy piece of nerd gossip.”
Logan arched a brow. “You turned him down, and that’s when he started messing with you, and he’s held that grudg
e since you were fourteen?”
“For the next two years, he made my life miserable, so I thought if I went on one date with him and—”
“You seriously went out with him?” Logan’s face contorted into something that looked like playdough that had been squeezed by a toddler. He rubbed the back of his neck. “So, tell me what happened on the date.”
“My goal had been to make him hate me, so I did everything I could to put him down. I even told him that his strategy in the science fair project sucked and that Markus was going to win. I’d be right after my brother and Rock wouldn’t even place.”
“He did say you were a conceited stuck-up bitch at prom, along with a few other things.”
“So glad you didn’t hit him that night.”
“I’m not.” Logan stood. “He said some weird things to me about you.”
“I’ve always wondered what he might have said.” She rose and stood behind him, resting her hands on his hips. “I was so mean to him on that date I figured I was walking home, but he wanted to go to the movies and I was like, Jesus, are you that blind to the fact you disgust me.”
“What happened at the movies?” Logan’s body stiffened.
“He tried to push the wrong girl and I kind of hurt him where it counts and ended up calling my dad to come get me.”
Logan turned, wrapping his arms around her. “Did you tell your father what happened?”
“I didn’t have a choice; my shirt was ripped.”
Logan’s eyes closed briefly. “Did Rock hurt you?”
“No,” she said. “He got a little to touchy grabby and I put an end to it.”
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“By the time we started dating, Rock had transferred schools. And I knew you well enough to know you’d haul off and hit him if I told you what happened, so there was that.”
“Yeah, well, when I find that dried up prune, I’m going to give him a long overdue fist through his teeth.”
Mia smiled. “My dad did call the police. Your father came and I’m not exactly sure what went down, but Rock did stay clear of me after that.”
“No, he didn’t.” Logan cupped her face. “He might have stayed away from you in this world, but he’s been coming at you in the hacker world for over a decade and I’m going to make sure the dipshit gets what he deserves.” He kissed her nose. “Nobody messes with my woman and gets away with it.”
She opened her mouth to question his words, but instead she raised up on tip-toe and crash landed her lips to his in a wet entanglement of passion. His hot tongue met hers with a sense of hunger. Her arms wrapped tightly around his waist, fingers dug into his taut muscles. “Lock the door,” she managed. “I’ll get the condom.”
He pulled away, chest heaving up and down. “You stole another one?”
“I took the whole box.”
He growled, ripping off his shirt.
“I love that noise. You make it when you cum and you always have.”
“How do you know I always do?”
“Always with me and that’s all that matters.”
He growled again and every inch of her body sizzled. Grabbing the box off the dresser in her closet, she raced back to the bed where Logan had already stripped down to nothing, his glorious toned body glistening in the moon light.
“Well, hello there.” She tossed him the box before turning on the television, keeping the volume low, but high enough she wasn’t worried about anyone hearing her and Logan. “We’re crazy, you know that?” As she yanked her shirt over her head, his fingers fiddled with the front clasp of her bra.
“Our inability to keep our hands to ourselves certainly says something about us.” He scooped her off the floor and laid her on her back, kissing her neck, cupping a breast in his protective hand.
“What exactly does it say?” She cupped his face, forcing him to look at her. She searched his eyes for something that told her he didn’t feel the same way. Part of her wanted this to be a trip down memory lane.
Part of her wanted it to be forever.
He propped himself up on his side, his warm arm draped over her middle. His green eyes turned a softer shade of turquoise. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to walk away from you this time.”
“I’ve thought about you over the years, hoping you never found anyone, but wishing you nothing but happiness.”
“I’m happy right now.”
She’d never been one to cry, but a single tear formed in the corner of her eye. “I didn’t know how unhappy and unfulfilled I’d been until I saw you pull into our driveway the other day. It’s crazy, but I’m pretty sure I lov—”
He hushed her with his forefinger. More tears welled in her eyes as insecurity rose from her toes to her brain. “Logan—”
“Shhhh,” he whispered as he undid her pants, lowering them over her hips, kissing her belly button. “Let me show you how I feel.”
Mia arched her back as his tongue glided across her intimately. Her pants and underwear pooled at her ankles while she desperately tried to kick them off. She caught his gaze. His fingers deep inside her, stroking her tenderly. Lovingly. Without the urgency of need, but laced with a deep abiding affection.
She gripped the sheets, staring down at him while he loved her in a way she’d never experienced. Sex with him had always been mind-blowing and wild. Raw and out of control. As young lovers, they couldn’t keep their hands off each other, constantly exploring and experimenting. But now she found herself wanting something more than the physical orgasms. She wanted the emotional one too.
She watched as he wrapped the condom over himself before settling between her legs, staring into her eyes. He pressed himself against her, easing in slowly.
She dug her heels into the mattress as she lifted her hips. He kept his hands pressed into the bed by her shoulders, lifting himself in and out of her in a single deliberate motion.
“Oh…Logan…” she whispered, turning her head and closing her eyes.
“Look at me,” he said in a deep throaty groan. “Don’t take your eyes off me.”
She shifted, grinding against him.
“No,” he whispered. His eyes changed into a kaleidoscope of green. “Move with me.”
He continued to move his hips in a leisurely circular motion, nearly pulling all the way out before gliding back in, her nerve endings sparked like firecrackers. Her body matched his pace as she dug her fingernails into his back, but resisted the urge to grab his ass while she wrapped her legs around him, forcing him to pound her harder and faster.
Her chest tightened as she stared into his eyes, mesmerized by the way he looked deep into her soul. Her chest heaved up and down. “Logan…” she panted. Her eyelids drooping, but never braking their trance. She arched her back, rocking with him, becoming one with him. At that moment, she knew Logan Sarich belonged only to her and he always had.
He smiled as if he knew exactly what she was thinking.
He leaned in and brushed his lips against hers, still looking deep into her eyes. The rolling of his hips came in quicker strokes as he raised his chest up, arms stretched out. “Mia,” he whispered. “Do you understand what you mean to me?”
She swallowed her breath.
He smiled. “Do you know how I feel about you?”
She opened her mouth to respond, but only a deep moan came out. Her body on the verge of exploding. Her insides clutching him with force, feeling every inch of him in a way she’d never experienced.
“Tell me how I feel, Mia.” He came down his elbows, hands holding the sides of her head.
“I lov—”
He hushed her with a quick kiss. “No. Tell me how I feel.”
She blinked. Her body confused between the desperate need to have release and the deep abiding love her soul needed to share. Her mind told her they were on in the same. The way he held her, rocked her, stared at her… “You love me.”
His eyes rolled back as he slammed himself inside her.
“Oh, my, God…” her body convulsed, and shook, and quivered as she’d been shocked with adrenaline mixed with a dose of raw primal need.
He growled and her body exploded again.
“Oh…yes…Logan!”
He sucked on her earlobe as he continued to stroke, whispering her name until he let out a long breath and collapsed on top of her.
She roamed his back with her hands, massaging his neck and shoulders, occasionally grazing his spine with her fingernails.
“Was that just a way to get out of saying those three words?”
He laughed, rolling to his side, kissing her neck, her cheek before cupping her face. His eyes laden with something other than lust…something real…something permanent.
“I have no problem saying I love you, Mia Vanderlin, but I needed to know you felt how much I love you.”
Her breath hitched as her body filled with the warmth she’d been missing all her adult life. “That’s more romantic than how you asked me to prom.”
“I have my moments.”
She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I love you.”
“I know.”
She closed her eyes and snuggled into the crook of his shoulder. The sense of not knowing where she belonged dissipated in to thin air.
CHAPTER 12
LOGAN HIKED UP HIS JEANS, securing the zipper and button. He glanced over at Mia, who sat behind him at her desk, headphones on, wearing a tank top and jean shorts. Doing whatever it was she did listening to some heavy metal band that sounded more like a bunch of pigs being castrated than music.
The corners of his mouth tipped upward. He had no idea what the future held, except that somehow, someway, Mia would be a part of it.
The night sky turned a pale shade of grey-blue as a new day approached. He glanced around the room, looking for his shirt. He wasn’t going to sneak downstairs without it this time.
Mia jumped, kicking back her chair. “I found him!” She tried to yank her headphones off, but they tangled in her messy ponytail. “Crap.” She fiddled with her hair, untangling the strands and tossed the massive headphones on the desk, head banging music still blaring. “We need to get Markus in here…No, we’ll go to him.”
