by Lucy Monroe
Chapter 17
Beth felt bereft without the warmth of his hand connected to her, but there were unresolved things about the night roiling around inside her. She wanted him and the more they were together, the more the wanting grew until it was an aching need that reached more deeply than physical desire.
It clawed at her very soul.
But she had enough instincts of self-preservation left to know she couldn’t give in to it if certain things were true.
“I have a very good sense of smell.”
“What?” he asked.
“I grew up learning to judge a woman’s place in the social strata by the perfume she wore.”
“That’s a handy trick. Your mom teach you?”
“Yes. My dad encouraged her. He was proud that I could tell so much about people by their scents.”
“Not all women wear perfume and a lot of men don’t wear cologne.”
“I graduated to learning to recognize almost everything. Dad made a game out of it, teaching me to identify other types of scents and what they might mean as well. We used to call it the Sherlock Holmes game. The smell of mothballs on a designer suit that said it wasn’t new or worn often. The fragrance of certain spices that linger after a meal on people can tell you where they’ve eaten, or even what they eat usually and can reveal a lot about their culture and background.”
“That’s very cool.”
“You think?”
“Yes.”
“It’s come in handy a time or two.”
“And you are bringing it up now because?”
“I could smell Miss Fournier’s perfume all over you.”
“All over me?”
“Yes. You were making love to her, weren’t you?”
Ethan reached down and laced his fingers through her hand, stopping her from playing with the chiffon. He rubbed gently over the back of her hand with his thumb. “Tell me why we went tonight.”
“To learn what we could. So, you’re saying you were using seduction to get information out of her.” She tried to tug her hand away, but he wouldn’t let go.
“No. We also went to plant listening devices, remember?”
“Yes, but I don’t see how putting a bug down her bra is going to help us find out what Prescott is up to.”
He laughed. “You’ve got an acerbic tongue when you want to, Sunshine. I didn’t touch her bra. I touched her throat.” He brushed his fingertip lightly over a spot on Beth’s neck. “Specifically, here. With the correct amount of pressure exerted, you can cause a short blackout in your opponent.”
“Are you trying to say you had to fight her off?” Her voice came out husky with an invitation she was trying very hard not to give him.
“No. I’m saying that I used her as a blind to get to the second floor, where I caused her to go unconscious without hurting her so that I could exit through the window and plant a receiver outside the master bedroom window.”
“Why do you reek of her smell?”
“Her hands were everywhere after she yanked me onto the bed. She pressed herself against me.”
“Did you kiss her?”
“No.”
“Is that part of the special training you were talking about me needing?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t like the idea of you using your body for the cause.”
“We’re even. I didn’t like the sight of Prescott’s hands on you at dinner.”
“He barely touched me.”
“It was enough.”
“Would you have kissed her?”
“I didn’t kiss her…by choice.”
“Would you, if you had to?” She took a breath and then asked the question that mattered most of all. “Would you use your body…if it meant getting what we needed?”
“No. Not for the sake of the case and not because of desire. I don’t want anyone else. Only you.” He pulled their entwined hands so they rested on his thigh, all the while keeping up the soft massage with his thumb.
“But what if—”
His finger moved from her neck to press against her lips. “There are no buts. I couldn’t make myself touch another woman with intent right now, Beth. Not for this assignment. Not for anything.”
“Even though I said no sex?”
“Even then.”
“But I have no hold on you.”
“Apparently, you do.”
“I don’t want to. I don’t want you to have a hold on me.”
“I know I’m not the kind of man you see in your future, but that doesn’t change that right now, we are bound together. Like it or not. Think it is smart or not. You are mine and I am yours.”
The words were more seductive than his touch. “But we aren’t sleeping together.”
“I know and it’s killing me.”
“Is it?”
“You know it is. Don’t play innocent. You know how hard you turn me on, how much you excite me.”
“You don’t like my intensity.”
He laughed, like she’d said something really, really funny. “You are so wrong. I purely revel in it, baby.”
“But you said—”
“That it made doing my job harder and it does. I’ve never been less than one hundred percent focused on my objective on any assignment. It’s different this time, Beth. No matter what I’m doing, a little part of me is always focused on you. I thought it was just the sex, but it’s not. I’m attuned to you like I’ve never been with another person. You make me feel needy, damn it.”
“You sound angry.”
“I am angry. These kinds of feelings are what make great agents screw up.” Even angry and frustrated by feelings that clearly blindsided him, the man was ultra-confident in his assessment of himself.
“Are you sure about that?”
“Having my attention divided is always a risk.”
“But we aren’t having sex.”
“And I told you it doesn’t matter.”
“It sounds to me like you’re the intense one.” Which was a revelation. A nice one.
“You could say that.”
“But it bothers you.”
He sighed, frowning. “Yes.”
“You aren’t bothered by who I am though, are you?”
“No. In fact, I’d feel a lot less like a fool if you shared a little of this intensity, Sunshine.”
“You’re not a fool.” She was admitting to feelings she’d rather pretend did not exist, but living outside her fantasies meant admitting to realities she didn’t like as much as being willing to take risks on making dreams real.
He didn’t look appreciably cheered by her admission. “I feel like a green agent lately.”
“Why?”
“I should have let Prescott walk with you in the maze. Nothing could happen to you with all of us so close by, but I couldn’t stand the idea of you being alone with him like that. Even for a little bit.”
“Are you sure you aren’t just getting into your role so deep, you’re internalizing projected feelings?”
“You thinking about taking up psychology, Sunshine?”
“I read about actors doing that…even writers feeling the emotions of their characters so deeply it affects their moods.”
“I’m not an actor and we hired a ghostwriter to generate the books for my Ethan Grange persona.”
“But you do play a role…you’re playing one right now.”
“No, Beth, right now, I’m Ethan Crane and I’m sitting on the sofa with a woman who drives me insane with desire and the need to protect her. That’s not a role, that’s the real deal.”
Beth didn’t want to believe him. Because if she did, her defenses were going to crumble. But his green eyes glowed with sincerity. His body radiated both a heat that wrapped around her and a sense of security she could not dismiss.
He meant it. He wasn’t talking about forever. Neither of them was. But he was talking about having something more than physical lust in the here and now. He was talkin
g about feelings mirrored in her own heart. The case had brought them together. But it was genuine feeling that kept them both from being able to ignore the intimacy between them.
She licked her lips, feeling wary, nervous, and filled with scared hope. “When you touch me, things go a little crazy.”
“When I don’t touch you, I go crazy.”
“I don’t want to be responsible for you losing your focus.”
“I’m not used to these feelings. I’ll admit that. I want things with you that I haven’t wanted with another woman, but I’m learning to deal with that. Pretending the feelings aren’t there won’t work.”
“Pretense is never as powerful as reality.” She should know. She was an expert on fantasy.
He moved so both his hands cupped her neck. “I’m learning that.”
“I’m scared, Ethan.”
“Why, baby?”
“I don’t want to love you.”
“You said that before.”
“And you said sex wasn’t love.”
His thumbs brushed along her jawline, tilting her head just a little. “It’s not.”
“It feels like it.” The words were out before she knew they were on the way, but she wouldn’t take them back.
Neither of them was going to hide from this truth.
“Then we’ll deal with the emotions when and if they come. I’ve never run from trouble, Sunshine, and you’re no scaredy-cat yourself.”
She wondered how he’d worked that one out. “Self-preservation isn’t cowardice.”
“Sometimes it is.”
“I’m not a coward.”
“No. You’re not.”
“You’re too good, you know that?”
“Am I?” Even those two words were seduction personified.
“Yes.” She met his gaze, the hunger in his eyes matching her own. “Kiss me, Ethan. Kiss me like you mean it.”
“I do mean it, baby.”
There was no time to answer because his lips were on hers, possessing her with a tender determination that felt different than anything they’d shared before. But then it was different. They were both admitting that it was more than physical. That love might very well be lurking beneath the explosive desire they shared.
The woman she’d known herself to be a month ago would have run from that knowledge and the possible ramifications it could have on her heart and on her future. She’d learned painful lessons from her parents and Alan. But that Beth had not yet known the depth of Ethan’s passion, or her own. Even so, she hadn’t been able to walk away from Alan and what he represented.
Yet the feelings she’d had for him were a misty reflection of the deep well of emotion Ethan stirred inside her. She had no hope of turning her back on him and what he was offering, but she wouldn’t hide from the truth this time either. She wasn’t going to weave fantasies in her head about the kind of life they could have together.
Ethan was an agent. First, last, and always. She wouldn’t ask him to give that up and she’d never make the mistake of assuming he was going to. If they had a future. And she would not pretend he’d offered that either. He’d used the phrase for now more than once. He wasn’t thinking in terms of a life together, but he also wasn’t dismissing the possibility.
He was being honest with her and she could be no less with herself.
She wanted and needed this man and all he would give her.
He lifted his head. “I feel like you’re not with me on this, Beth.”
She’d been responding, but he’d sensed her mind was elsewhere. He was so in tune with her, it was scary.
She smiled. “I was thinking.”
“About us?”
“Yes?”
“Good thoughts or bad thoughts?”
“Mostly good.”
He brushed his lips over her eyes, closing them. “I’m an overachiever, Beth.”
“I noticed that about you.”
“I’m not going to settle for anything less than great thoughts…” He slid his lips along her cheek and bit her earlobe gently. “Spectacular thoughts…” He licked her ear, sending shivers along her nerve endings. “Deeply erotic and pleasurable thoughts.”
“You aren’t?” she asked on a breathy whisper, concentrating on the feel of his mouth on her and keeping her eyes shut so the world she knew was only where their bodies connected.
“No.” His lips were back to playing with hers. “Now, think about this.”
This kiss was pure carnality. He wanted her thinking about nothing but the passion igniting between them and used his considerable expertise to guarantee it. His tongue was hot and tantalizing against hers, taking possession of her mouth with a marauder’s confidence. She’d never kissed a man who could make her feel the things Ethan did with his mouth.
It went beyond the physical response of her body to something deep inside her that responded to him as if he was the other half of herself.
As the kiss went on and on and on…she did what she’d been aching to do since he took his shirt off. She smoothed her hands over the hair-roughened contours of his chest, memorizing every indentation and muscular formation with her mind as well as her fingertips. He was so perfectly, utterly masculine. And she loved that. She felt like Eternal Woman simply from touching him.
He shuddered, making a very male sound of appreciation against her lips as she caressed him. His skin was hot satin against her hands. It had only been a couple of days since they’d made love, but she felt like it had been forever. She was so hungry for him. Ravenous. Starving. Her nerve endings each craving the food of their mutual passion.
She pushed him backward, straddling his hard hips and aggressively responding to his kiss, all the while her fingers kneading him like a cat establishing its territory. His body shook with laughter as if he found her assertiveness funny, but she didn’t care. He wasn’t pulling away and this was what she needed.
She rubbed herself over the hard bulge straining against the seam of his trousers and his laughter abruptly ceased—to be replaced by a low, feral groan. He gripped her hips and surged up toward her, caressing her sweet spot through the layers of fabric with a long glide. She rode him like that, fighting the guide of his hands, wanting to set her own pace.
He let her go and she rocked zealously against him. She was dimly aware of his hands on the zip of her dress and then she was naked from the waist up, her bodice bunched up around her hips. Air cooler than her body brushed breasts swollen with desire and nipples beaded with almost painful lust.
She stopped moving and allowed the sensation to wash over her as goose bumps formed on her sensitive skin.
His big hands cupped her, the shocking difference between their warmth and the air sending pleasure arcing through her to be expelled in a tiny cry against his mouth. She pressed herself into his hold, moving side to side and up and down, reveling in the friction of his rougher hands against such soft flesh. He shifted his hold so her nipples were between his fingers and then squeezed them together, sending sensation zipping straight from the hard buds to her clitoris.
Another scream rose from her throat, but no sound emerged. She could do nothing but begin rocking her hips again in an anguished attempt to assuage the need exploding inside her womb and throughout her body. But it wasn’t enough. She needed to have him inside of her, filling her until she thought she could not take any more.
The desire was so strong, she tore her mouth from his and leapt off his lap, her dress falling to the floor with her violent movements. She stepped out of it and stripped her tiny panties down her hips, kicking them off with an urgent flick.
He didn’t say a word, but yanked off his pants and shorts, grabbing a condom from the pocket before he let the clothes fall to the floor.
“Thought you were going to get lucky?” she asked, panting.
He shook his head in a single hard denial as he ripped the packet open. “Afraid I wasn’t going to be able to keep my hands off you.”
“You were
right.”
“Yes, I was.” She went to unhook her suspenders while he donned the condom, but he shook his head. “Don’t. Leave them on. Please.”
She looked down at herself. The suspender belt and stockings outlined her feminine mound like an erotic picture frame. Lifting her gaze, she smiled at him, feeling sexier than she ever had. “All right.”
“Come here, baby.” He put his hands out to her, his erection jutting from his body, thick, hard, and intimidating.
A sensual thrill ran down her spine and she reached for his hand, letting him pull her close. When that big shaft rubbed against her stomach, she moaned and leaned forward to bite him softly right beside his nipple. “I need you, Stud.”
He laughed, the sound low and sexy. “For the first time, I don’t feel like you’re calling me that in an un-complimentary way.”
He was right. She wasn’t. “You are the ultimate stud to me.”
“Good. Because, baby, you are the quintessential woman to me.”
Her body trembled against him. “You use big words for being so turned on.”
“They’re coming from someplace other than my brain, because right now, you’ve got that part of my anatomy fried with pleasure.”
Something in the region of her heart went on melt-down. “I need you, Ethan.”
And she wasn’t sure she was just talking about making love.
But he took the words as an express invitation and lifted her. Happy to let the disturbing thought go, she spread her legs and wrapped them around him, whimpering when his penis pressed against the entrance to her body. She pushed down, taking more of him inside her, while he surged up with a tortured groan. He was moving, but she was too busy trying to increase the level of his penetration to care where he was taking her.
Her back landed against the wall. He pinned her there with his big body and with the leverage was able to thrust hard, filling her. “You’re so tight, baby.”
“You’re big.” She was stretched beyond comfort, but not to the point of pain. It felt so right.
“Is that an accusation?”
“A compliment. I like it.”
“Only like?” He thrust into her heavily.
She moaned and moved to enhance the feelings arcing through her like lightning. But there was no question about which of them was in control at the moment. Ethan made love to her, his hands on her hips, holding her against the wall as he pounded in and out, driving her higher and higher until she couldn’t think and could barely breathe.
