by Liliana Hart
The groan coming from Sebastian when he came rushed over me like wildfire. It weakened my knees and if I had really been in the room, I would’ve needed to sit down before I collapsed. Jenny’s scream didn’t even take away from the deep, guttural growl coming from her conquest.
Heavy panting filled the room a moment later, and I heard the springs give on the bed.
“Now, that’s what I’m talking about,” Jenny said.
I barely turned to see Sebastian fasten his pants in my periphery.
“Don’t put that bad boy away just yet,” she said, grabbing his wrist and pulling him toward her. “I’d bet my last dollar he has a couple more of those in him before the night is through.”
He didn’t lie down as she’d wanted. Instead, he hiked a knee on the bed beside her, took a T-shirt, and began tearing it into strips.
“I like where this is headed,” she purred, crossing her wrists above her head.
He straddled her, pulling her wrists toward him to tie them together. She was naked except for the vest that lay open, and she was absolutely lovely. No wonder she scored an exclusive in a motorcycle club. Most women were fair game for one and all. I couldn’t blame Sebastian for taking advantage of the situation, especially in his condition.
He lifted her onto her feet and turned her to face the wall. Her hands still above her head, he kneeled and tied her ankles together as well.
“Okay,” she said, completely clueless, because this could only end one way. I saw that now. “I don’t normally allow that route, but if it’s the back door you want, then the back door you’ll get. You have to promise to fight for me, though. Corte won’t take this lying down.”
He finished tying the knot, then stood behind her, pressing his body into hers.
“Promise?” she asked again, waiting for a commitment out of him.
Instead of promising her the moon, he wrapped a hand around her waist and lifted her into his arms.
At first, she was very into it. She squirmed with delight until he carried her to the large window that looked out into the forest behind the cabin. The large window that was now open.
“What are you doing?” she asked when he lifted her toward the opening.
“Keep her detained until all this is over.”
A man was there dressed entirely in black. “Yes, sir. Does she maybe have clothes?”
“I’ll get them. Hold on.”
“What the hell?” she screamed. The man who took her slammed a hand over her mouth, but she continued to yell past his gloved fingers.
“You didn’t even have to fuck me. You could have taken me away at any time, if that was your plan.”
“Not at all,” Sebastian said, tossing her belongings to another man who emerged from the shadows. “I had to keep you entertained until the guy Vince set to watch me fell asleep. The fuck was completely necessary.” He pointed to the front window as though he could see his guard past the darkness.
She kicked furiously, and I couldn’t help but admire her spunk. In truth, I felt she gave him little choice.
The guy who caught the clothes hurried up to grab the woman’s legs. He paused and offered Sebastian his sympathies. “I’m so sorry about your partner, sir.”
“Thanks, Danvers. Watch her left hook.”
The men chuckled and absconded with her into the night. I wondered how much they saw of the tryst beforehand. Sebastian certainly didn’t seem worried.
His phone rang as he started unfastening his pants again. He answered it with a simple, “Yes.”
I eased close to hear the call.
“We got her,” a male on the other end said. “The girl sending the notes. She’s being held in Chicago, and they’ve had her for almost three days. You should get over here, if you can.”
“I’m in the middle of something,” he said, his face lined with exhaustion. I could feel the weight of his anger, of the sorrow he felt with his partner’s passing.
“I think you were right about her, Strand. She’s different.”
I recognized the man’s voice. It was the deputy secretary.
“I’ll be on the next flight.”
“Forget that. I’m sending a chopper. Can you get away?”
“Yeah. Everyone’s asleep. I’ll take the truck to the rendezvous. No one will notice.”
“I’ll have it there in thirty.”
Chapter Seven
Sebastian hung up and showered quickly. I didn’t look in on him. Not that first time, anyway. I fast-forwarded until I was almost at the present. Sebastian was in the shower again. This time I risked a quick peek. He was right. The curtain wasn’t opaque, but nothing was opaque in this realm. I watched as water sheeted over his wide shoulders, down his back and over his delicious ass.
He turned off the shower and pulled back the curtain to reach for his towel. I watched unabashedly as he wiped steam off the mirror with the towel, standing gloriously naked. I was abusing my power on so many levels, but I just had to try one last thing. I walked forward and ran my hand down his back. I could almost feel him. The smoothness of his skin. The bunching of his muscles. When my hand met a steely buttock, it kept going, caressing the curve, marveling at the dip that lined his hips, the divot in his shapely buttocks.
I would probably never see him again after tonight, but I most definitely would never forget him. I was even considering a career in law enforcement. Perhaps I’d go to Langley. Nah. The CIA gives a psych eval before they’ll hire. I’d never pass. I might make a good cop though. I’d never considered it before now.
I felt the pull of the present. I must’ve been close. With one last look, I released time the second I noticed Sebastian had stopped what he was doing. He’d turned as though looking for something. As though looking for someone.
My eyes flew open as Sebastian bolted through the door. He paused, scanned the area with a wary expression, then planted his cerulean gaze on me. His hair hung in thick, wet clumps around his face. He raked a hand through it, slicking it back but only for a moment before it fell forward again.
I raised my brows in utter innocence. While he held the towel in front of the most pertinent parts of himself, the dips in the hips were still clearly evident. As were his killer abs.
“Did you feel something?” he asked me.
“No.” Gawd I was such a good liar.
He furrowed his brows then nodded, not quite convinced as he closed the door behind him again.
The close call had my heart racing, but had he felt me? There was simply no way. The very idea was impossible. When I dropped, I wasn’t really there. I wasn’t really corporeal. How—?
The door opened again. This time he wore the towel around his waist, the image just as jawdroppingly sexy as before. He’d slicked back his hair and I got to see more of the angles and lines of his handsome face. His masculinity would never be in question.
He narrowed his lashes at me in suspicion. “Are you sure you didn’t feel anything?”
“Yep,” I said, barely able to rip my gaze off the towel. It could drop at any moment. I didn’t want to miss the show.
He stepped around the bed and sat on the edge of it. The freshly showered scent of him filled the room and made me heady. His arms, so beautifully woven, rested on his knees and he gazed at me from underneath wet lashes spiked with water from the shower.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Absolutely,” I said a little too enthusiastically.
Understanding flooded his expression. “You dropped, didn’t you?”
“What?” I asked, appalled. “I beg your pardon.”
He stood and turned his back to me. “How much did you see?”
I bit my lower lip until I tasted a drop of blood. “Not much. Really. There wasn’t anything to see.”
After a quick scoff, he lowered his head. “This is what I do, Andrea. I detect lies, and I’m the best, I promise you. It’s how I’ve gotten so far so fast.”
His admission had me wondering if
he didn’t have a touch of something supernatural himself.
He pressed his mouth together as though in regret. “She’s okay. She’s being detained at a local facility until all this is over. That’s all.”
I nodded. “I shouldn’t have invaded your privacy so blatantly. I…I didn’t watch.”
He laid a humorless grin on me. “I detect lies.”
“I didn’t watch everything.” Humiliation surged through me, heating my face until I was sure it shone scarlet. “I’m sorry.”
He was angry, and I’d just lost what little trust I’d gained from him with that one, stupid drop. But it didn’t stop him from being curious.
“How do you do it?” he asked as he sat down beside me again. “How on earth can you see things that have already happened?”
With a one-shouldered shrug, I said, “I have no idea. We can just do it.”
“We?”
His nearness was warming me ever further. I wanted to scoot away from him, but only because his proximity made me ache to reach out and touch him. I wanted to lace my fingers into his. I wanted to run the back of my hand down his arm. I wanted to trace the hills and valleys of his biceps with my fingertips. Or my tongue. Either way. It made me a little pathetic to want him so badly, and I grew more embarrassed with the thought.
“The women in my family. We’ve been dropping since before my great, great grandmother. She was in the circus. Her boss used her to get information about people so he could extort money from them. My great grandmother was killed by a man who thought she was possessed. My grandmother and her twin sister were practically hermits. No one really knows what happened to them, what made them so afraid of the world. They were quite popular when they were young, but as they got older, they became a little touched.”
“Touched?” he asked.
“Insane.”
He shifted even closer and my desire to touch him grew exponentially. I crossed my arms over my chest to keep from acting on said desire.
“And your mother?”
I glanced away, embarrassed. “She got mixed up with organized crime somehow. She showed her gift to the wrong person, trusted the wrong man, and ended up doing unspeakable things.”
“Like what?” he asked, his voice still a touch harsh.
He would probably never trust me again, and the thought broke my heart.
“I have no idea. She never told me. All I remember is growing up with an alcoholic, emotionally absent mother. But she left me a house,” I said, ending the tragic story on a happy note.
“How long have you been able to do it? To drop?”
“Since I was little. My mother taught me.”
He sat back in contemplation. “What was it like growing up with this?”
“It’s the wrong kind of power for a kid.”
He lifted my chin so I had to look at him. “I’m sorry, Andi.”
I sucked in a soft breath. He called me Andi. My friend, my crazy friend who’d been abducted by aliens as a child, said that the man I would fall in love with would call me Andi. Damn, did she ever nail that one. Too bad I’d probably never see him again after this case was solved.
His gaze dropped to my mouth and my whole body vibrated with want. I’d never felt anything like it. He ran his thumb over my bottom lip and time stood still. Metaphorically.
The alarming sound of his phone chirping startled me out of my euphoric state. As though he regretted doing so, he dropped his hand and stood to get the phone, swiping it off the table impatiently.
“Yes,” he said, his voice suddenly brusque. After a moment, he walked back into the bathroom for some privacy. Did he learn nothing? I could totally drop and listen to the entire conversation at will. But I refrained. Best to get rid of such bad habits before they spiraled out of control. Nip them in the bud my crazy friend Mindy would say.
After a few moments, Sebastian came back out. This time he was wearing a fresh pair of loose jeans. But nothing else. No socks. No shirt. Holy mother of—
“They found it,” he said, sitting beside me again. The bed dipped with his weight, and even gravity wanted me closer to him.
I drew my knees to my chest. It was a defensive mechanism. I was defending him against me.
“That’s great.”
He chuckled softly. “Do you know what I’m talking about?”
“Not so much, but it sounds like good news.”
“It is. Very. And it’s all thanks to you.”
“That’s a plus. I’m not usually on the ingratiating side of the table.”
“They found the chemical bomb.”
I bolted upright. “They found it? How?”
“Based on the description you gave, they realized the drop was actually going to be tomorrow. Midday Eucharist at that church is on Thursdays. That didn’t give them much time, but they went in to install surveillance cameras tonight and found the device on accident. Vince had already stashed it there so no one would find him with it.”
“And they’re sure it’s the only one?”
“We know the Disciples were only bringing one into the country. But we should know more soon. They have Vince in custody and, thanks again to your description of the vehicle, Yousefi as well. He was pulled over in Albany for a missing taillight and brought it for driving a stolen car.”
“No way.” I couldn’t believe it, how easily it all came together. “This…this is—” I had no words, but for the first time since I’d met him, Sebastian flashed a huge, bright smile at me.
“Amazing,” he offered.
I flew forward and wrapped my arms around him. Relief that he would be okay washed over me. He encircled me in his arms, his hold solid, his embrace warm.
“We’re not really sure what to do with you,” he said into my hair.
I leaned back. “What do you mean?”
A playful grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. Gawd I loved that tug.
“On one hand,” he said, “you’re a threat to national security.”
My jaw dropped. “How am I a threat to national security?”
“You could stand outside the White House and listen in to everything that happens there. Do you know what you could do with that information?”
“Not especially.”
“Good,” he said, a sexy smile in his voice. “On the other,” he continued, “you could be an incredible asset.”
“I charge by the hour,” I teased. “And I demand benefits.” No matter that the benefit I most desired was him. In the back of my mind, I realized I could be locked up tomorrow. Once they considered all of the implications of my ability, I truly would be a threat to national security. I’d never thought of it that way, but he was right. Wonderful. I really could be sent for an extended stay at Gitmo.
After a long moment, he grinned. “I have a feeling you could demand anything your heart desires.”
Those were so the wrong words.
“My boss is quite taken with you.”
“Good to know. I’ve had my eye on a jet for a while.”
“They’re coming for you, now.”
I scooted back away from him. “Now? But I thought—”
“Yeah, well, since this is over, they see no reason for you to be stuck here with me.”
He stood and started gathering my things. “I’m being shipped to headquarters for debriefing and my new assignment.”
“Oh,” I said, my heart shattering. I was honestly the most pathetic being on the planet. I stood and helped him, not that I had much. Or, well, anything but a couple articles of clothing. “Are they going to bring my clothes back?”
“They didn’t say. Frankly, I like the look.”
I snatched the blouse I’d worn for three days out of his hands and glanced around the room. “Why did they take my pants and not my blouse? And where’s my jacket?”
“Being cleaned. It was covered in mud as well.”
I was trying to stay busy, but I had nothing to do. I had to leave. I was going away and would
probably never see him again and it broke my heart. How could I have gotten so attached to someone in so short a time?
My chest constricted painfully as I studied my blouse. Sebastian walked up behind me, close behind me, until his body was pressed into mine. “I would like to see you again,” he said, his voice husky.
“I would like that.”
I didn’t dare move. He’d placed his hands on my hips and buried his face in my hair. How could he even like me? How could he want to be so near me? While a part of me wanted to analyze the situation like I always did, another part wanted to pull him closer. That part won out. I reached back, grabbed hold of his jeans, and pulled until his crotch was at my back and there was no longer any doubt how he felt about me. He molded himself to my backside, his erection filling the small of my back.
He wrapped a hand around my throat and guided my face up to his where he kissed me. There was no hesitation in the act. His kiss was deep and dark and desperate, not at all like he kissed Jenny, and his taste was alluring and primal. He deepened the kiss, diving harder into my mouth as his free hand pulled the borrowed T-shirt up to the top of the boxers. Without breaking the kiss, he untied them and slid his hand inside.
My stomach jumped with anticipation. Pleasure pooled in my abdomen, hot and pulsating as his fingers slid so close, so very close. Then he cursed into my mouth and pulled away.
I wanted to scream. I turned to him, ready to plead with him to continue, but he put a several feet between us, running his fingers through his hair.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice raw with desire. “You’re an asset. I’m breaking all kinds of ethics, not to mention a couple of laws.”
I stood panting, clutching the boxers to my stomach, afraid they would fall if I didn’t.
“I should not have done that, and I apologize.”
“It’s okay,” I said, wondering if he’d simply changed his mind and was using ethics and laws as an excuse. I searched for my blouse again. “It’s okay. I understand.”
“No, you don’t.” He walked back and placed his hands on my shoulders. “You have no…no idea.”
