SPY IN THE SADDLE

by Dana Marton

  Her soft scent in his nose was bad enough. He could have handled that, but other things... Her bottom was crushed against him, firm and round and everything he shouldn’t be thinking about.

  Don’t move, he said in silent prayer, trying his best to focus on the men who were still talking.

  “I need one shipment tonight,” the deeper of the two voices was saying. “I have nothing. If I don’t provide the merchandise, my buyers will go to someone else and I lose them.”

  “Put them off for a few days. Jonesing ain’t never killed nobody.”

  “I’ve been playing that game for weeks. I need to give them something. I’m going over tonight.”

  “The hell you are.” A chair scraped the floor, as though it were being shoved back.

  “You gonna stop me?”

  “If I have to.”

  The sounds of a scuffle filtered from the back office, then suddenly a gunshot rent the night. Then came the sound of a body hitting the floor with a dull thud.

  Shep gripped his gun. He could feel Lilly tense, going for her own weapon.

  “Are we gonna get in trouble for this with the boss?” a new, younger voice asked inside the office.

  “You just keep your mouth shut,” the deep-voiced man answered. “Dumb bastard thought he was gonna tell me what to do. Hell with that.”

  “What are we gonna do with him?”

  “Leave him. We got a long night ahead of us. Ricky’s on duty tonight at the border crossing. He won’t give us no trouble.”

  Footsteps sounded, coming their way, boots scuffing on the tile floor. Shep held his gun ready in his right hand, grabbed Lilly’s hip with the left and pulled her even closer as he flattened himself tightly against the wall so they wouldn’t be discovered.

  He couldn’t see anything from where he was. Maybe Lilly would catch a glimpse of the men. They each held their breath as the two walked by the supply closet.

  The men didn’t go to the door that led down to the secret tunnel. They went to the clinic’s back exit that opened to the alley.

  As soon as the door closed behind the men, Lilly and Shep hurried to the back door, but they didn’t open it until they heard a car start, and even then just enough to catch a glimpse of a black Chevy Blazer and its license plate.

  Shep pulled out his phone and called it in. Since his pickup was at The Yellow Armadillo, a full block away, there was no way they could catch up to these two.

  He turned back to Lilly, holding the line. “Did you see them?”

  “The younger one was Brandon from the bar,” she said as she hurried away from him, back toward the room where the men had been arguing. “The other one I haven’t seen before.”

  Shep passed that information on to the office. “They’re heading for the border-crossing station. They have a buddy there called Ricky.”

  “We’ll follow them across, see who they make contact with,” Ryder said at the other end. “You go back to your place and take your break. You have a shift in the morning. Those of us who are on duty will handle this.” Ryder paused. “We’re getting close to something. When this goes down, I want everyone in top shape. Keith’s trip to San Antonio panned out. We know the target is one or more government buildings in Washington, D.C.”

  “That’s a big step forward.”

  “And we’ll take more until we get to the end of this. Now you go and take your break,” Ryder said before the line went dead.

  Shep followed Lilly into the office where the men had been talking. She was taking pictures of a dead guy with her phone.

  He filled her in on the news from Ryder before asking “Do we know who he is?” as he gestured at the body with his head.

  “Jack Alexander. Local guy, according to the address on his driver’s license.” She put her phone away. “Do we call in the cops?”

  “That would be the correct procedure,” he agreed.

  “But we won’t?”

  “You’re learning.” He felt a smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “Let the staff find him in the morning. We don’t want to call attention to the fact that we were here. Any objections?”

  “I’m not here to make your job more difficult. I’m here to help.”

  He hesitated a few seconds as he watched the earnest expression on her face. “All right.”

  She nodded and gave him a smile, a sincere one, not like the ones she flashed around at the bar. “Thanks for treating me like a real partner. I appreciate it.”

  She looked genuinely pleased, as if he’d given her a gift. Her eyes were all lit up and shining at him. Some unnamed emotion stirred inside his chest.

  “Let’s go,” he said and turned from her, going back to the basement.

  She padded after him, making sure she locked the door behind them.

  They followed the tunnel to a sudden stop where iron bars with a massive lock barred their way. Lilly’s picks failed here miserably. One bent nearly in half.

  “We need more to get through here.” She stood after twenty minutes of hard trying.

  “TNT?” he suggested.

  “My kind of guy.” She laughed, but then she shook her head. “Come on, cowboy, we’re not going to reach the bar through here tonight.” She walked back in the direction they’d come from, keeping her LED light in front of her.

  He had a hard time directing the light from his. It kept illuminating her long legs in the short skirt she’d worn onstage. He refused to look at the winding flowers of her tattoo as it disappeared under the fabric.

  She was talking about the tools she needed and wondering aloud if she could get them tonight so they could come back before the stores opened in the morning. Probably not, she concluded and sounded damned disappointed.

  And he realized miserably that he liked this new Lilly Tanner. She was exactly the kind of woman that a man like him could fall in love with.

  He couldn’t afford to let his guard down for a minute.

  * * *

  TO LILLY’S RELIEF, they got back to his pickup without trouble and without running into anyone they knew from the bar.

  Shep remained silent. Almost brooding, which was kind of strange, since he wasn’t the brooding type. He was the type to take action if something bothered him.

  They stopped by the pickup and he looked at her, his gaze searching her face. Was he still upset that she was here, that she’d been inserted into the middle of his op?

  “I can just walk back to the hotel,” she offered. If he needed space, she could certainly give him some—at least tonight—even if she couldn’t withdraw from the op. And a brisk walk might help as she processed the latest developments.

  “The hotel is on my way.” And then he reached out, took her arm and backed her against the truck in one smooth move, and kissed her.

  And it was not one of those lips-brushing-against-lips almost-kisses he’d planted on her before for show. This time he kissed her as if he meant it. With the adrenaline of tonight’s work still coursing through her, she responded, her arms going around his neck as his hands grabbed for her hips.

  Instant heat. Or maybe not so “instant,” considering. The moment had years’ worth of teenage fantasies behind it. If the sudden, overwhelming need was more than just a blast from the past, she didn’t want to think about it.

  His right hand slid up to her breast and cupped it. Zing. She moaned in pleasure and he used the advantage. His tongue swept in to kiss her deeper.

  Oh.

  All her senses were buzzing, her body screaming that she wanted this. And maybe she somehow telepathically communicated that, because the next thing she knew he was opening the pickup’s door and she was sideways on the passenger seat as he stood in front of her, her legs wrapped around his waist.

  Her hands slid up his side, to his ba
ck. He had a great body, the kind that made a woman want to run her fingers all over it. Since he didn’t look as if he would protest, she did. The thin shirt he wore didn’t provide much impediment. She could feel every muscle, every hill and valley.

  He was hard everywhere, and he ground that hardness against her, against the aching need where her thighs met. Heat rushed to that spot. Another moan escaped her throat.

  Which was beyond strange because she normally wasn’t the zero-to-sixty-in-three-seconds kind of girl.

  But his hand on her breast was doing amazing things, his clever fingers teasing her nipple into a hard knob. She ached for him there, too. She ached for him everywhere.

  In the middle of a stupid parking lot, on the front seat of a pickup. So not her. She might have been acting the tough rock chick onstage, but in the bedroom...she was more the type to turn out the light when it came to intimacy.

  And none of this was real, in any case. They’d been pretending to be a couple all night, touching and kissing. Neither of them had significant others. Both could have used some release. But she couldn’t be casual with Shep. The last thing she wanted was to start falling for him again.

  She didn’t trust anyone with her heart, and especially not Shep Lewis, who’d already rejected her once.

  “This is crazy,” she mumbled against his lips. “We have to stop.” Before it was too late.

  He immediately pulled away and stared at her, breathing hard.

  She tried to gather some shreds of sanity about her. “We should...” Should what? She couldn’t finish it, because what her body and her mind wanted were two different things.

  And after a long moment, he stepped away.

  The shock of separation had her body protesting. She pressed her lips together so she wouldn’t beg him to come back to her. She pulled her legs into the car.

  His expression darkened as he watched her, his eyes narrowing with suspicion as if he was thinking maybe she’d somehow tricked him into the kiss.

  “I—” She closed her mouth, not sure, again, how to proceed.

  He walked around to the other side, got into the car and slammed the door behind him. “I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry. It’s not going to happen again, dammit.”

  That should have made her feel reassured. Instead, it made her feel disappointed. They drove to the hotel in the most awkward silence she could imagine.

  Instead of dropping her off at the front door, he pulled into the parking lot.

  “I’m coming up,” he told her as he shut off the engine.

  Judging by the dark clouds that sat on his face, his visit wouldn’t be to finish what they’d started.

  She got out, more than ready to leave him and have some time to herself to recover. “We don’t have to hash this out tonight.” Or ever.

  “We do. And I—” He hesitated, then pulled a folder from the backseat and came after her. “I meant to show you something.”

  Did his team find information he hadn’t had a chance to share with her yet?

  They went up in the elevator. This time it was just the two of them, nobody out this late, but he didn’t say a word to her until they got up to her floor and they were inside her suite.

  “Things can’t go on like this,” he said at last, standing inside the door. “You shouldn’t be here. It’s dangerous, and it’s—”

  “I can handle it.”

  “Well, maybe I can’t,” he snapped, holding her gaze. “I don’t know what to do with this.”

  By this he meant the attraction between them, she guessed.

  “We’ll ignore it.” She wasn’t even sure if it was real. Did she really want him, this Shep, or was it something left over from the past?

  “Because that’s worked so well until now.” A wry smile tilted up his lips. “The bar is a dangerous place. Brian is up to his neck in smuggling.”

  “It’s just one last night. If we find a clue, it’d be worth anything. And you don’t have to worry about me. I’m an FBI agent,” she reminded him.

  He shook his head. “I don’t seem to be able to catch up to that.”

  Was that it? He came up to talk her into quitting and going home?

  Anger lit a small flame inside her. He didn’t think she was good enough. For the job. Or for him. She stiffened her spine. Nobody ever thought she was good enough. Not her parents, who’d sold her for drugs, not the couple who bought her then threw her away, not the system she’d ended up in.

  She stepped back. “You should go. It’s late.”

  “Are you walking away from the bar?”

  “I’ll do the job I came here to do, and I’ll thank you for not interfering.”

  “Lilly—”

  “Do you ever try to talk your teammates into taking it easy on their job and walking away from danger?”

  His forehead drew into an annoyed frown. “No,” he admitted.

  “I assume you work with outside law enforcement from time to time. How about them?”

  He watched her for a few long seconds. “Fine. I get your point.”

  “I’m not the same person I was ten years ago.”

  “No kidding,” he said miserably.

  It nearly made her smile, squashing her anger. “What bothers you more, the fact that the FBI sent someone to keep an eye on you guys, or that you’re attracted to me?”

  He shot her a dark look. “They’re both wrong. Neither should be happening.”

  “Tough cookies.” He used to tell her that all the time back in the day.

  “The team will get the job done. You shouldn’t be here.” He paused. “You shouldn’t look like this,” he said accusingly. “And I shouldn’t have kissed you. Not for show, and most definitely not for real.”

  She bit back a smile.

  “Quit looking so damn pleased.”

  She let the smile bloom. “You don’t get disconcerted every day. You’ll just have to forgive me if I take a moment to enjoy it.”

  She took her time. Then shook her head. “Listen, seven years of age difference when I was seventeen and you were twenty-four might have seemed like a lot. It’s not now. I’m not in your charge or under your protection.”

  “You’re under my protection,” he said unequivocally and stood there all wide shouldered and tough looking.

  He’d tried to protect her back in the day. She couldn’t let him. Too many people had let her down by that point. So she’d left Shep before he could let her down, too. She’d run away.

  She glanced at the folder in his hand. “What did you want to show me?”

  He followed her gaze, his eyebrows furrowing as if he’d forgotten about his papers. He hesitated for a moment before holding the folder out for her. “Your case file from ten years ago. After you disappeared, I emailed the files to myself so I could work on them at home. I did my best to find you.” He cleared his throat. “I realized the other day that I might still have them in that old email account. I did.”

  Her mouth went dry as she took the folder.

  She drew a deep breath before opening it, took a look at the document on top, then paged carefully through the others. She scanned the list of foster homes, medical checkups, a list of her bad behaviors, grade cards, a report on the circumstances of how she’d come into foster care—found abandoned at a bus stop.

  But what really got to her were the pictures. Her smiling at six or seven. Her looking sullen a few years later, holding a scruffy cat. Her throat tightened. She’d forgotten about the cat.

  She closed the file and put it on the desk, needing a moment, then looked up into his dark eyes.

  He’d given her back her missing years. Something to fill some of the empty spaces in her life. As if he’d somehow seen into her heart and knew exactly what was missing.

  Maybe
she could trust him just a little. She swallowed. “I appreciate it. Thanks.”

  He nodded and turned to leave.

  “Wait.” She stepped closer. She didn’t want him to leave yet, but she wasn’t sure what to say. “We have a complicated relationship.”

  He nodded, watching her face.

  “I wasn’t sure how it would be. I mean, us meeting again.” The people you cared for, the ones who were supposed to protect you, always let you down. Or sold you for coke. “I don’t do relationships.” But she did want him in the here and now, this edgier Shep who sometimes looked at her as if he could devour her.

  His masculine lips twisted into a wry smile. “Me, neither. I want you.” He echoed her thoughts. “Pretty much all the time now. It’s driving me crazy.”

  She took another step closer to him.

  He held her gaze. “Lilly?”

  She watched him and waited.

  “Say no,” he said as he reached out and pulled her into his strong arms.

  She said nothing.

  He lowered his head, fitted his lips to hers. “Tell me to get the hell out of here,” he murmured.

  It would have been the smart thing to do, probably. But her lips were tingling. So she pressed them a little closer to his.

  He capitulated with a groan and wrapped his arms fully around her, gathered her tightly to his chest and tasted her.

  Her knees turned weak. It didn’t matter. He was holding her up. All those muscles came in handy at a time like this.

  He licked the seam of her lips then nibbled on the bottom lip again, scraped his teeth against it. And when she opened up for him at last, he didn’t hesitate. He took all that she offered. He took thoroughly.

  Since her boots had heels, he was just a few inches taller than her and they fit together perfectly. He was all hard male and she was...a puddle of need, frankly.

  He eased his hands down her sides, splayed his fingers over her hips as he held her to him. The tube top left her midriff bare and he took advantage, his thumbs moving in a circular motion on her skin, sending delicious shivers across her abdomen and lower.