She didn’t respond.
“It’s going to blow in four minutes,” he said, reaching for her arm. “We've got to get away from here.”
She pulled against his grip and moved further into the lake. “No. I can’t let you do this. I can’t just stand here and let you destroy my plane.”
He could read the desperation in her expression and feel the latent panic tremble through the arm he still held. “Move, Emma. Now.”
“No!” With a burst of strength, she twisted out of his grasp and dived into the water.
Bruce plunged after her. He clamped a hand around her ankle and pulled her backward. She came up sputtering and tried to kick out of his hold. The clock in his head clicked another minute toward zero. “Damn it, Emma,” he gasped as her foot struck his chin. “It’s too late.”
“No! Let me go!”
There was no time left. He wrapped his arms around her waist, hauled her out of the water, and flung her over his shoulder.
“Put me down,” she yelled, pummeling his back with her fists.
His waterlogged sneakers slipped on the smooth rock at the shore. He went down hard on one knee before he recovered his balance and staggered onto dry land. Keeping one arm like a vise around the back of her thighs, he paused only long enough to take his bearings before he strode rapidly toward a ridge of boulders. Once they were in the shadow of the huge, square slabs of rock, Bruce shifted his grip to allow Emma to slide to her feet. He knew she would make another suicidal attempt to save her plane the moment he released her, so he held her firmly to the front of his body.
The blast blew the white Cessna apart as if it were no more than a paper toy. A second explosion followed the first when the fuel that still remained in the tanks detonated and a sudden fireball burst toward the sky. Debris cartwheeled across the lake and flew in spinning, smoking arcs.
Bruce pushed Emma to the ground and fell on top of her. The boulders provided shelter, but pieces of jagged metal clanked onto the rocks around them. He felt something hot strike his back and the smell of singed cotton mixed with the oily smell of smoke. Ignoring the pain, he remained motionless until the last of the debris had fallen. Cautiously, he levered himself up on his elbows and raised his head.
Emma’s eyes were squeezed shut, her face contorted.
Immediately Bruce lifted his weight off her and came to his knees, still straddling her body. “Emma? Are you hurt?”
“Is it gone? Is it over?”
There was no way to soften the blow. “Yes.”
With a sob she rolled to her side and slid out from underneath him. Clawing at the boulder for support, she pulled herself to her feet and faced the lake.
Emma didn’t want to look, but she had to. She could smell the sting of burning fuel, she had heard the fragments hit the ground around them. She knew with her brain what had happened, but still, she had to see.
It was truly gone. Her plane, the Cessna that was like an extension of herself, the wings that let her soar to freedom, everything was gone. Scattered chunks of wreckage littered the water’s surface, some of it smoldering, some of it drifting in lifeless silence like pieces of a shattered ghost. “No,” she mouthed, her voice failing her. “No.”
“I'm sorry, Emma.” Bruce stood beside her and laid his palm lightly on her shoulder. “There was no other way.”
Her wet clothes clung, the sodden fabric draining the warmth from her skin, but she didn’t feel the cold. She was too numb to feel the cold.
“We'll get out of here. We've got maps and a compass. If we head for the nearest logging road, we can follow it until we find a way to contact Xavier. I don’t know what kind of double cross I stepped into between you and your friends, but it won’t stop the rest of the team from taking in McQuaig and his group.”
McQuaig. Xavier. The names filtered through her head but she couldn’t deal with what they meant, what all of this meant. They had destroyed her plane, they had wanted her dead. She couldn’t think past that. It had happened too fast, too fast.
“We can turn this setback around, use it to give McQuaig a false sense of security while the net continues to be drawn together.”
“And that’s what matters, isn’t it?” she said, her throat tight with a lump she couldn’t swallow.
“That’s why I'm here.”
“And to hell with anyone caught in the middle. You don’t care, do you?” She whirled around, turning her back on the smoking remnants of the plane that had been her only joy. “You're like every other cop I've known. All you see is your job. You don’t care who you hurt or use along the way.”
He rubbed a hand over his face. His fingers were shaking. “I've heard all this before.”
“I could have saved that plane if you hadn’t pulled me back to shore.”
“There wasn’t time.”
“Yes, there was. You stopped me.”
“You never would have made it. And I already told you, it’s best this way.”
“Everything’s gone. You don’t know what you've done.”
“I know exactly what I've done. I did my job.”
“But I have to make that delivery tomorrow. My brother’s counting on me.”
“There was nothing to deliver. Can’t you see that yet? You were set up. Your deal with McQuaig is off. Your brother will have to take care of himself.”
“But I have to help Simon.”
“You should be worried about yourself. You're the one they wanted dead.”
“Then you should have let me blow up along with the Cessna. That would have guaranteed a successful operation, wouldn’t it? Not only wreckage to show McQuaig, but a body?” Tears of reaction burned behind her eyes. She blinked frantically, unwilling to let him see them fall. “Why didn’t you let me die, Bruce? I'm no longer any use to you. I can’t fly the drugs, I can’t lead you to McQuaig. Why did you bother?”
“That’s enough, Emma.”
Her bare feet slid over sharp fragments of stone as she took a step toward him. “Congratulations, Mr. Policeman. You've just made it a perfect score. The law has taken my family, my home, and all the plans I once had for my life. Now you've taken my plane.”
“I'm sorry, Emma. I know—”
“What do you know? You're just a cop. You think with your badge, you feel with your rule book.”
A blazing fragment slipped beneath the lake’s surface with a hissing splash. The night was suddenly silent, like the breathless pause between a flash of lightning and the inevitable roll of thunder. Bruce stood motionless in front of her, leashed tension humming from his fixed jaw to his curled fists. “Do you think you're the only one who’s lost anything?” he asked finally.
Some of the danger in his tone reached through her budding hysteria. She sensed it, but she pushed anyway. “You're still a cop.” She poked his chest with a stiffened finger. “You don’t care about anything except upholding the law. You're only worried about how this will affect your case.”
He caught her by the shoulders. In the colorless silver of the moonlight the angles of his face seemed honed from living steel. “Do you believe no one else has ever been a victim of circumstances that were out of their control, that you're the only one who’s had a rough ride from life?”
“You're the one who let my plane blow up, not me.”
“Yes, I let it go. It can be replaced. You can’t.”
She pressed her palms against his shirt front. The wet flannel rose and fell with each straining breath he drew. She could feel his restraint slipping away but she was in no condition to help him.
Bruce slid his hands down her arms and cupped her elbows, pulling her forward, forcing her up on her toes. “Do you feel this, Emma? Feel the heat between us?”
She gasped. His body was hard, vibrating with a primitive, unmistakable need. And just like that, she felt a response, equally primitive, equally unmistakable.
“Part of you may hate me, but there’s a part of you that’s got nothing to do with the grudge or v
endetta or whatever it is that you've got going with the law. You know that. You've known it from the start.”
Yes, she’d known it. “But you're—”
“Dammit, Emma! We're alive!“ He jerked her against him. “Even the hate is better than nothing.”
A piece of wreckage that had landed on the shore fell over with a tinny creak. At the sound, something snapped inside her. The events of only minutes ago kaleidoscoped in her mind, suddenly crystallizing into focus. The bomb, the landing, the explosion... “You carried me to safety.”
He splayed his hand over the small of her back and held her closer. “Yes.”
“You sheltered me with your body.”
“And you fought me.”
Only now was she beginning to realize how close, how very close, she had come to death. “Oh, my God. Bruce, we both could have been killed. If you hadn’t checked those packages we wouldn’t have had a chance. If you hadn’t caught me when I tried to swim back to the plane I would have... I would...oh, God!“
“I wasn’t going to let it happen. I couldn’t. Not again.”
She felt the strength of his grip, the sheer virility of his presence, and her breath caught. “You saved my life.”
“Damn right, I saved your life.”
Desperately she pressed herself against him, flattening her breasts to his chest, feeling his heat and his heartbeat. His arms were like bands of steel around her back. His cheek was like a butterfly’s kiss on the top of her head. Her pulse tripped and sped until it matched the rhythm of his. “How can you hold me like this?”
“I have to. Right now, I need to hold you as much as you need to be held.”
“After everything we've said to each other, everything we've done...”
“It doesn’t matter how much you fight me, Emma. Or how much I fight myself. I still care for you. I have from the very first. I don’t think anything’s going to change that.”
“And you don’t want to care, do you?”
“No, I don’t. I don’t want to admire you, or respect you, or understand you, but I do. Despite everything that’s going on, I do.” He moved his feet apart, drawing her even closer. “You're ripping me apart inside.”
“Because you're a cop.”
“Yes. That’s what I am. That’s all I want to be.”
She molded herself to his hardness, savoring each breath she drew, reveling in his familiar scent. Hate, anger, grief, all those emotions were swept up in the primal urge that flooded her body. The bond, the connection that had been there from the start, flared with a power that made her tremble. “You're also a man.”
Tension, energy barely leashed, sang through his frame. “Do you know what’s happening, Emma? Do you realize what we're doing?”
“We're living, and breathing and feeling.”
His hands dropped to her hips, pulling her closer. “There’s no door you can bolt out here.”
“There’s nothing out here. Nothing but you and me. Everything else has been blown away.”
“Emma.” It was a demand, a warning, a plea.
“We could have died, Bruce. But we didn’t. We're alive. Nothing else matters.”
He shuddered. His embrace tightened.
Recklessly, she spread her fingers and ran her palms over his shoulders, molding his wet shirt to the powerful breadth beneath. She slid her palms down his arms, exploring the hard muscles that had been able to lift her and protect her so effortlessly. He was so solid, so strong, so...male. Her feelings were too raw to deny the instinctive pull between them. The twisting, wrenching response that surged through her blood was as inescapable and inevitable as time.
A wordless groan rumbled from his chest. And then he was caught by the same storm. He lowered his head and kissed her. Only it wasn’t a kiss. It was a melding, a joining. It was the essence of every kiss they’d shared before. The comfort, the tenderness, the anger and the lust, they were all there, finally unleashed, out of control.
Emma parted her lips and welcomed the thrust of his tongue, pressing herself closer, craving more. The kiss that was more than a kiss drew the breath from her lungs and the strength from her knees until her senses spun. The world narrowed to just this place, this moment, this incredible yearning.
Gasping for air, he dragged his mouth from hers. “Emma. Emma.” He whispered her name against her skin as he trailed kisses across her jaw. His teeth grazed her neck and she shuddered. When he loosened his hold so that he could fit his hand between them, she leaned back and offered him her breast.
He covered it swiftly, greedily, cupping it in his palm, kneading it with his fingers, sending shafts of sensation to every secret part of her body. She moaned at the force of her response, as helpless to stop the sound from escaping as she was to halt the mindless passion that leapt to match his. His fingers moved to open her shirt. She didn’t stop him, she helped him. She fumbled with the clammy cloth, gasping at the jolts of pleasure as each button slid tightly through its hole. She pulled it apart with no thought beyond the moment, baring herself to the moonlight and to the mad, glorious urgency that possessed her.
The sound he made was deep, rough, indiscernible. He fastened his hands at her waist and lifted her, swinging her around until her back was to the largest of the boulders beside them. He sat her on the edge, slipped his arm behind her for support and buried his face between her breasts. At the touch of his lips on her flesh she cried out. Thrusting her fingers into his hair, she held him closer, arching her back, as greedy as him.
“I want you, Emma,” he breathed against her skin. “Just this once, I want to forget who we are.”
“Just this once,” she echoed, shutting out the hopelessness of asking for anything more.
He caught her nipple between his teeth. Pleasure-pain ripped away the last shreds of her control. She moaned and dug her nails into his neck. His tongue swirled and soothed, his lips surrounded, and he sucked her into his mouth. The stars spun overhead and Emma had to close her eyes against the wave of dizziness. Bruce drew back and the cool air puckered the wet nipple to excruciating sensitivity. He took the other one, flicking it with his tongue, drawing sobs and groans that she barely recognized as her own.
She curled forward, her blood pounding, her hands shaking, and reached for the collar of his shirt. She had no patience left. Wet fabric ripped as she pulled it apart and spread her fingers over his chest. She traced the rippling hardness of his stomach, sliding her palm down and down in a sensual path of discovery. When she reached his belt she didn’t stop, she couldn’t. She drew the leather through the metal buckle and let it fall aside, unsnapped the stud on his waistband and lowered his zipper.
The word he whispered was short and crude and suited the wildness of what was happening between them. He braced his hands on her thighs and straightened to his full height, tilting his pelvis to help her reach him. She ran her fingertips down the straining length, then grasped him in both hands. Her lips parted, her head fell back, and a wave of overwhelming urgency made her sway. He caught her and lifted her from the boulder, bringing her to her feet in front of him.
“I can’t stop,” he murmured, running his hands feverishly over her hips and between her legs. “Please, Emma.” He unfastened her jeans and peeled the damp denim past her knees. “I need this. I need you.”
She was beyond rational thought. Her response came from the level of instinct. It was an affirmation of life, of survival, of the strength they shared. It was as impossible to deny now as it had been the first time he had touched her. She kicked off her jeans and underwear and hooked her arms behind his neck. Shamelessly, savagely, she climbed onto him. He grasped her buttocks and lifted her, driving himself upward as he brought her down.
The explosion that rocked them was as powerful, as shattering and as violent as the one that had destroyed the Cessna. Emma screamed and clung to Bruce’s shoulders as wave after wave crashed over her. His fingers clenched, sliding her upward for a heart-stopping instant. She twined her leg
s around his waist and screamed again as he buried himself fully and released his own passion with a long, shuddering groan.
Minutes passed. Or maybe only seconds. Time suspended, then was counted off by their ragged breaths. Emma dragged her mouth over his neck, nuzzling her way past his collar. One of her breasts was squeezed to his bare chest, the other was shielded by someone’s shirt, whether it was his or her own, she couldn’t tell. Cool air whispered a chill over her naked thighs. She felt drained, exhausted, and she could no longer keep her ankles locked. Gingerly she let her feet slide downward.
“Not yet,” Bruce murmured. He slipped his forearm around the small of her back, anchoring her against him. “Not yet.”
She felt a sudden tightness in her throat. Reality was returning. They couldn’t stay like this. They shouldn’t have done this. Oh, God. What had they done? Her nipple ached, her nails had broken, she had screamed aloud. What had they done? Tension stiffened her body. She twisted away from him, wincing at the tenderness where they had joined. Her feet hit the ground, rock digging sharply into her soles. She staggered.
“Emma?”
She shook her head, covering her face with her hands. She couldn’t look at him. She couldn’t think about this. They must have been insane.
“Are you all right?”
“I don’t know.” Her voice was hoarse, unrecognizable. Her ears rang with painful clarity, as if she were waking up after a bout of delirium. The sounds of the night were suddenly loud, the crickets shrilled, the soft sigh of pines in the breeze was a roaring howl, the gentle lap of the water against the shore crashed like ocean surf.
A zipper rasped, a stud snapped. He moved toward her. Although he didn’t touch her, she felt his presence. “I don’t know what to say, Emma.”
“Whatever you do, don’t apologize.”
He stood silently for long, agonizing minutes. “I should apologize.”
“This...thing that happened. It was mutual.”
He didn’t dispute that. It was too obvious to dispute. “I was rough. Did I hurt you?”
She tingled and throbbed. She would probably have finger-shaped bruises in the morning, but right now the physical discomfort was minor. “No.”
True Lies Page 14
