by Justine Davis, Amy J. Fetzer, Katherine Garbera, Meredith Fletcher, Catherine Mann
Sitting in the passenger seat of her car, Josie hitched her elbow in the open window and let the wind swirl around her. Her head was still reeling from the shock of being detained then released all by the end of the workday.
And somehow Diego was in the middle of it, because when word came through to let her go, he’d been waiting by her Mustang shortly before sunset. Now he filled the driver’s side, unspeaking as he guided the car toward her condo. She hadn’t even bothered arguing. Even if she’d been able to grab hold of her tilting world, the fierce gleam in Diego’s eyes would have stopped her.
Was the anger directed at her for leaving him? Or at the situation with Bridges? Regardless, Diego was in some feral territory she was wise enough to steer clear of.
After that horrifying meeting with General Quincy, the SPs had escorted her to her condo to pick up clothes and other necessities. She’d packed her belongings and barely made it back to the VOQ before the whole mess simply disappeared.
Quincy had arrived at the VOQ with an apology and release. Apparently Mike Bridges had cleared up the “misunderstanding.” Quincy would do his best to see that the television feature never aired—probably easier now that the reporter had been discredited for her incorrect information.
How damned ironic.
When it was her ass on the line, the show ran. But when Bridges was at fault, suddenly everything went away. All this injustice could really start to give a girl a complex.
All the same, she owed Diego. She’d walked out on him—had it only been that morning?—hadn’t even bothered to call him and still he’d been there for her. She didn’t doubt for a minute that somehow he was at the heart of her release. Even as much as she’d wanted to save her own hide, she wouldn’t be an ungrateful brat.
“I don’t know what you did to make all of that go away for me, but thank you.”
“No problem.” His eyes stayed hidden behind the shades, his jaw taunt.
“Did my sister contact you?”
“Yes.”
She pressed her lips tight to keep from calling her sister an insulting name she would later regret, because Diana had only been concerned. She counted telephone poles whipping past to calm herself.
Seventy-nine later, it hadn’t helped.
Why couldn’t Diana have just looked up the questions on Bridges like she’d asked? There had to be dirt on the guy that wouldn’t bring Kayla into the picture.
Kayla.
Mortifying heat tingled. She’d told Diego all about Kayla and Jazz while crying her eyes out in the sauna. “Diego, what did you do?”
“I threatened him.” Diego downshifted gears with deceptive calm, muscles flexing under faded denim as he slowed. “Then I gave him the punch you should have been able to deliver.”
“And he crumbled that easily? I’m not buying it.”
Diego turned into her condo complex. “Guys like him are basically cowards. I brought up your sister’s amazing ability to find any dirt in the guy’s past, not just in formal records but unofficial channels, as well. You had even asked her to do just that. You set this in motion by calling her.”
Had she subconsciously known Diana would call him? She chewed her bottom lip, which was devoid of orange tryst today.
He cut the engine. “Confronted with that, just as you undoubtedly expected, Bridges folded. My guess is he’ll cut his losses and take the offer of an assignment out of here.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. “Great. He gets to move while I was threatened with a court martial.”
Once the roof was secured, Diego turned off the engine and opened his door. “Unfair without a doubt. At this point, I think Quincy wants it all to go away, too.”
He rounded the car while she sat. He raised a brow and waited. But she couldn’t go into her apartment with him because they would have sex. She wouldn’t be able to resist him. If she’d thought her emotions were vulnerable before, she’d been stripped of a fresh layer today. She didn’t want to be that close to him. And she definitely didn’t want to cry again.
Diego hitched his boot on the running board beside her. “What the hell’s wrong now?”
“I’m pissed because I have no control over what’s going on around me. Bridges set me up. You take him out. Now I can’t even tell you to get on your bike and go home because you drove me in my car.”
“Buttercup.” He hooked one arm on the edge of the roof and leaned inside, filling the doorway. “You really don’t want to mess with me today. You may have forgotten this, but I woke up in an empty bed because somebody’s too much of a coward to face the morning after. I don’t consider myself Mr. Sensitive by any damn stretch of the imagination. But common courtesy applies when two people exchange body fluids.”
She studied her bootlaces. “I didn’t leave you stranded. You had your truck.”
“Don’t even insult me by pretending that’s what I’m talking about. Or hey, wait, maybe I should get you a pen and paper so you can write it all down in another note to leave me while I’m asleep.” Anger leaked into his curt tones.
She understood well the tendency to hide pain behind anger. She looked up at him. “I’m sorry.”
“No. You’re not.”
“What?” So much for feeling sorry for him. “Now I don’t get control over my life or my own feelings?”
“Do you even know what your feelings are?”
He had her there.
“I didn’t think so.” Inches of crackling air separated their faces. “I’m a big boy. I can get my own ass home. But if you want me to leave, have the guts to tell me to my face,” he challenged.
“Leave.”
“Fine.” He pivoted on his boot heel.
Ah, hell. This guy really did level her defenses. She slid out of the car. “Diego?”
He looked back over his shoulder. Josie’s hand shot out, gripped his fringed jacket.
And yanked his head down to hers for a hard and deliberate kiss.
Chapter 16
Birddog resisted the urge to ram the car ahead and shout at other drivers passing him on the desert highway. All of which would make him look insane.
And he wasn’t.
He had faultless control of his senses. He checked his speedometer. Perfect.
The fact that he could manage at all through the howling outrage over Josie Lockworth’s release attested to his sanity. That he hadn’t strangled Diego Morel with his bare hands for interfering said much about his strength of will.
He only needed a drive to clear his head and remove himself from the temptation to wreak havoc in his office. Mile after mile away from the base, he talked through his options.
He wasn’t speaking to himself or hearing voices. Hell, no. Just reasoning aloud to test how things sounded.
His skin burned raw where he scratched away dust, and he forced both hands onto the wheel. His foot twitched heavier on the accelerator. Sandy landscape blurred in his side window.
Something had to be done soon.
Why couldn’t Josie Lockworth have crawled into a hole after the crash like her mother had done years ago? After all, the present mirrored the past so cleanly with the accident and death of a co-worker, he’d thought surely the daughter’s reaction would follow the mother’s.
Things didn’t have to get this complicated. He’d only needed Josie out of the way long enough to plug in his own test theories. They would work as well if not better than hers. He could finally get the credit he deserved.
And show her his worth.
Now Josie had messed every damn thing up by wriggling out of the net so quickly. There was little time for him to cover his tracks and start the new path—unless she was completely out of the picture.
Reaching an empty stretch of desert, he roared off the road, skidding to a stop in a tidal wave of sand. He bolted out of the car, slamming the door, his long-bottled howl begging to be set free. The primal scream tore up from his throat until he gasped for air.
Last echoes fadin
g, he bent to grasp his knees. No question about it, Josie Lockworth would have to die. That bastard Morel, too. Birddog straightened, resolve set, in control and already reaching for his cell phone.
One call to his old bodyguard outside of L.A. would set the contingency plan in motion within an hour.
Fingers digging into Diego’s shoulders for balance, Josie wished it were as easy to brace herself against the storm of emotions pummeling her. Her world was a jumbled mess. Work and personal. Past and present. Her days of controlled emotions and careful planning hadn’t gained her jack.
The logical part of her brain told her she should get hold of herself and think. But at the moment, with her mouth plastered to Diego’s, her hand tunneling under his leather jacket, she couldn’t come up with a single reason why she should stop.
What else did she have to lose?
She’d been so sure she was stronger than her mother, that if she never lost control, if she dotted every i and crossed every t, things would work. How damned arrogant.
Her mother had been meticulous. Her mother had most likely been right, too. Hell, her mother had even known how to maintain a steady relationship with someone other than a pile of tiny stuffed critters.
She’d tried to stay in control and her life had fallen apart anyway. Why not take what she wanted? And right now, she wanted to get inside her condo and get naked with Diego.
Without breaking their kiss, he kicked the car door closed and backed toward Josie’s condo. Their feet tangled, her combat boots with his biker leathers, yet somehow they managed to make it to her front door without landing on their butts.
“Key,” he grunted against her lips.
Devouring his mouth, she flattened her foot on the wall beside him while she fished in her calf pocket. He wrapped his fingers around her thigh and brought their bodies closer—nowhere near close enough, with so many clothes between them. All the pent-up emotions of the day bellowed inside her, and apparently she’d found a matching frenzy in him.
Her mouth nipped an urgent path down his neck while he jerked the keys from her hand and jammed the correct one home into the lock. They stumbled into the entry hall and again he kicked the door closed, blocking out the world and problems.
He pivoted her against the wall, anchoring them both before they truly did fall on their butts. She should probably call his behavior Thor material. But all she could think of at the moment was how damned awesome it was to be with a man who didn’t care if she carried a big knife or if she flew jets. Diego gave as good as he got and she respected that in him.
He braced both forearms to the spackled wall. “Are you sure you want this?”
“Yes. Yes,” she panted, clawing at his jacket. “I want this, you, now. Here, or I would have flipped you onto the cement back in the parking lot.”
“So you’re sure? We could go upstairs to your bedroom for slow and thorough—”
“We’ll do slow and thorough later. After.”
“Fair enough.” He jerked down her flight-suit zipper. She shimmied her arms out and raised them over her head in an unmistakable invitation. He gripped the edge of her black T-shirt, sweeping it up and off to reveal her sports bra, which he sent sailing, as well.
Her frantic hands tore at his belt. “Birth control.” She worked fly buttons free. “Do you have it or do we go to my bedroom after all?”
“Wallet,” he barked as his hands rose to cup her breasts, teasing tight nipples between his fingers. “Back pocket.”
Sighing, she sagged into his touch for two breathless seconds before regaining her balance. She abandoned his fly and reached behind to tug his wallet and smack it onto his palm. With determined hands she opened his pants, reached into his boxers and found…
Yeah, he was more than ready.
He whipped out the condom, ripped it open and rolled it down while she whispered her impatience against his neck. The scent of leather clung to him, drifting up and spiraling through her. A swift sweep sent her flight suit and panties down. Could he be any hotter? Could she get any hotter?
And then he plunged inside her. Hotter still.
He filled her again and again while she rocked her response, moaned her pleasure, called out her assent with a ramble of yes, yes, yes.
Pictures rattled against the wall alongside them in an echoing tattoo setting a pace, encouraging, louder. One silver frame slid and crashed to the floor. Glass shattered. Not that she bothered to look since the sight of Diego fighting back his release with gritted teeth held her, aroused her as much as his thrusts.
Then her eyes refused to stay open. Her breath hitched. She was close. So close, so soon. So incredible.
Crying out, she arched against him, taut and moaning for…she didn’t know how long the sensation pulsed. Until finally Diego’s growl of completion against her ear launched a final soaring release. No other word for it.
Slumping against the spackled wall, she couldn’t avoid the truth any longer. Cool and logical was no longer an option.
Five minutes—or was it five hours?—later, Josie hooked her arms around Diego’s neck to keep from crumpling to the ground. Her fingers glided along the bristly, shorn hair at his nape. She didn’t want to think about the emotional meltdowns that seemed to follow sex with Diego. She certainly wouldn’t indulge in one now.
Not even twenty-four hours ago, she’d been certain she needed distance from Diego and yet here they were again, open and vulnerable to each other after another explosive encounter. Maybe she needed to ride the wave of this passion. Nothing could be this intense forever. It would have to crest and disperse eventually. They would move on. At just the thought, a sadness pooled deep inside her.
Diego’s chest expanded with a breath, muscle pressing against her sex-sensitive breasts before he hefted himself away and zipped his pants. She angled from the wall to right her clothes, but he dipped, swinging her up into his arms.
Josie gripped his shoulders for balance. “Going back into Thor mode are you?”
“Thor?” Diego sidestepped the shattered glass from the picture frame. “Not even close or I’d have pitched you over my shoulder instead.”
“All right, then more of a Rhett Butler deal. But be warned, I’m not the Scarlett O’Hara type.”
“Rhett?” He snorted and tossed her onto the sofa, her legs draped over the arm with her flight suit still tangled around her ankles. “In case you didn’t notice, I’m not hero material.”
Clicking on a lamp, he studied her with an unmistakable gleam. He unlaced her boots with practiced hands, tossed both aside and peeled her flight suit off before stripping away his clothes.
“Nice view, Cruiser. So there’s more for me tonight?”
“Definitely more. I owe you one that lasts longer than five minutes.” He flung his jeans over the ottoman and stood before her in totally unselfconscious nude glory. “Unless you’d rather talk.”
Talk? Not a chance. Too much turmoil bubbled inside her. She couldn’t risk ending up blubbering in his lap again.
Josie stood, bare and thoroughly enjoying the appreciation in his eyes. She pointed to the sofa. “Get your naked butt over here right now.”
She definitely needed to be in control of something today.
“Yes, ma’am.” He dropped to the couch and stretched out, arms behind his head.
She swung a leg across to straddle his hips, draping herself over him and losing herself in the luxury of lazy kisses they’d been too frantic to fully explore earlier.
He shifted under her.
“No.” She cupped his shoulders to urge him back down again. “This show’s mine.”
“Yeah, and I’m looking forward to that, but there’s something—” he reached under his waist “—beneath my back here.”
His hand reappeared with her horsy Beanie Baby that had captured her attention because it reminded her of riding lessons with her sister. She started to take it from him but he kept it out of reach.
“I meant to ask about the
se when I was here before, but I got distracted by you.” He skimmed the fuzzy toy along her spine. “Why do you have a gross of Beanie Babies in your living room?”
So much for losing herself in sex. Was his an idle question? Or a move to venture into a more personal connection? Her chest went tight as if trying to hold back sharing words.
How silly.
She swallowed hard and forced herself to speak. “The day I was commissioned, my dad gave me a new nine-millimeter to carry into battle. My sister gave me a year’s worth of ammo for target practice. All my Athena Academy sisters—the Cassandras—gave me the ranks and insignias for my uniform.”
“And?” He traced the toy along her shoulders over skin still tingling from the power of a release more intense than any she could remember.
“And my mother gave me a camouflage Beanie Baby. She told me I was strong and that she was proud of me. But never to forget that being soft could sometimes be the greatest strength of all.”
Except that was so much easier said than done when it seemed every time she let down her guard something went wrong. So she had collected the doggone Beanie Babies on the sly and hid them in her condo until the place was damn near bursting with them. “Remember when we were talking earlier in the parking lot about my note this morning and whether or not you should go home tonight?”
The tickling softness stopped on her back. “So this was ‘wham bam thank you, sir’ sex?”
“No!” Everything inside her rebelled at treating him that callously. “That’s not at all what I meant. That the words would come out that way is just all the more proof that I’m not thinking straight or making smart decisions. I need my objectivity back, Diego, and I can’t be objective around you.”
He tossed the tiny horse onto the coffee table. “Somehow I don’t think you’re complimenting me.”
She braced up onto her elbows and searched his darkening eyes. “Are you going to go ballistic on me again if I tell you I need a little space?”
“Not as long as you tell me to my face.” His jaw flexed.
“I really do need breathing room.” And how strange did that sound with her naked body pressed to his? Her peaking breasts already betrayed how much she wanted him again. “That’s what the note was supposed to be about. I can’t think when you’re around and I have a helluva lot to wade through. I need you to take a step back. Not a big one. Just enough that I can clean up my life—”
