Damaged Goods

by Dane, Cynthia

  “Don’t take your time, boys. I’m actually kinda afraid that I’m going to step out there and be overpowered by him.” Been a while since Sylvia saw it that way. Shit. So, if he has sex with me… shit, shit. This was not the headspace she wanted to be in. She didn’t want to think about a client assaulting her because she suddenly had a change of heart about her job.

  Would she had felt this way if he had contacted her independently, outside of the investigation? Or was this turn of events from knowing what Alexander Sheen was involved in?

  No.

  It was because of Joseph.

  “You’re going to be fine, Sylvia,” he reassured her with his smooth, deep voice. Was that a slight accent? Or wishful thinking on Sylvia’s part? “I won’t let anything happen to you in there. If necessary, I’ll come in there myself.”

  “No, don’t do that. I’ll go through with it if I have to. Don’t blow our covers. I feel like I’m really close to getting something out of him. And not sex. God. Please, hurry up.”

  “Hold tight, Sylv. Distract him. I think we’re close, though.”

  Great. Distract him. Distract the giant asshole who wanted to fuck her with little regard for her humanity, let alone her pleasure. That was winning.

  “There you are,” Alexander said once she emerged from the bathroom. He held two glasses of wine, one lifting in her direction. “I’ve been waiting for you. Quite impatiently.”

  She tacked on a smile and accepted the glass of wine. “I’m sorry to keep you waiting. But when a girl’s gotta go…”

  “Far be it from me to get in the way of nature. I only know too well.”

  “Oh?”

  Alexander drank his wine, eyes leering at Sylvia’s chest. Uh huh. There was a reason she picked a cleavage-heavy dress for today. “When it comes to my line of work, one can never be too wary of nature.”

  “Right. The tigers and cubs.”

  Silence settled between them. An awkward, uncomfortable silence in which Sylvia worried she had somehow blown her cover. “Transporting wild animals is a dangerous gig, even if I’m not directly involved. If something goes wrong? It’s my ass on the line. That almost happened last night.”

  “I bet that guy got fired.”

  “Once we found him…” Alexander sipped his wine. “You could say that.”

  Chills. Sylvia did not like those implications.

  “Tell me, Sylvia.” He gestured to her jewelry. “Where did you get such lovely diamonds?”

  She pretended to be flattered. “An old lover.”

  “Maxwell Carlisle?”

  Sylvia grimaced. “No. Not him.”

  “Good. I’ve heard many things about Mr. Carlisle, but gifting fake diamonds to beautiful women was not one of them. He always had an eye for jewels, based on what I know about him.”

  Bristling. Shuddering. Swallowing, hard. “He certainly did.” Sylvia finally drank some of the wine. “Unfortunately, I don’t have most of the ones he gave me anymore.” She had either given them away or thrown them out her bedroom window after breaking up with the asshole.

  “I’m sorry to bring it up. I wanted to make sure that you knew these supposed diamonds you keep wearing around me are fake. I can tell all the way from over here.”

  Like law enforcement can afford real diamonds, duh. Sylvia looked away. “I’m sorry if they offend you, sir.”

  “Offend me? I’m merely looking out for you.” Alexander put down his glass and reached into his pocket. “Here. Let me make you richer.”

  One of Sylvia’s eyebrows went up. “Sir?”

  He revealed a diamond ring. No, not an engagement ring, but something almost as valuable. It twinkled in the lamplight, ready to grace Sylvia’s ring. “Here. Give me your hand. I insist that you have this.” Alexander grinned, deviously. “I promise that it’s real.”

  Sylvia held out a shaky hand. “Thank you so much,” she whispered. “This is really too kind of you.”

  “Consider it a bonus.” Alexander slid the ring onto her right index finger. Most men did not anticipate how dainty Sylvia’s fingers were. Maxwell got my ring size totally wrong when he bought me an engagement ring. Had to get it resized before I could wear it on the right finger. No, not memories she wanted to drag up right now. “You’ve been a delight to be around, even if we haven’t indulged in… well, what I’ve paid for.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  His hand remained locked with hers. This is it. He’s going to pull me in for a kiss, and then there’s no turning back. Sylvia steeled herself. Where the fuck was Joseph?

  Joseph apparently was not around, but he had his ways of getting her out of there.

  A bright red light flashed in the center of the hotel room. A screech as obnoxious as trains on squealing tracks peeled in Sylvia’s ears. If that wasn’t dramatic enough? The sprinklers burst.

  “What the hell!” Was that her? Alexander? The both of them? Sylvia held her hands over her face to protect it from the cold water raining on her. She thought far enough ahead to grab her clutch before the bodyguard pounded on the door.

  “Sir! There’s a fire, sir! I insist that you evacuate!”

  Cursing, Alexander grabbed his jacket the moment the electricity went out.

  To say the next few minutes were a bit chaotic was an understatement. The bodyguard broke into the room, making off with his boss and leaving Sylvia to fend for herself against smoke and fire. Except there was no smoke, and there was no fire, no matter how loudly the alarms throughout the hotel went off.

  “This way, please!” A hotel staff person urged Sylvia to go down the stairs. Damnit, we’re on the fifth floor! At least it was a small, upscale hotel that didn’t have too many rooms. Enough floors to make hustling down five flights of stairs in heels an absolute nightmare if she wasn’t careful.

  She found Alexander and his bodyguard in the lobby. They barely paid her any mind as every guest and staff person in the hotel was sent onto the sidewalk.

  “Do you see any smoke?” An older woman wearing a hotel bathrobe held her glasses up. The sun had long began to set, creating a glare above the building. “Because I don’t see any fire.”

  Joseph. Sylvia looked around. The van was nowhere in sight. “Did someone pull the alarm?” she asked no one in particular. The man beside her shrugged.

  “You’re welcome,” Joseph said over their line.

  Relief consumed her. Relief that she didn’t have to deal with Alexander, and relief that there wasn’t an actual fire threatening the historical hotel.

  Nobody knew that yet, though. All the staff – and the fire department, once it showed up – knew was that the alarm had gone off. Sylvia could only figure that Jim or someone hacked into the system and fired off the alarms. That’s some real spy shit… She was rather impressed.

  “So,” she said to Alexander, who was in the middle of a discussion with the hotel manager. “This sucks, huh?”

  He waved her off. Even better.

  Sylvia kept her smirk to herself until a few minutes later, when the hotel staff declared that the building was safe from danger. By then, Alexander was embroiled in an argument with his own protective detail. Both bodyguards implored him to get rid of Sylvia and to relocate hotels for the night. Something about “You know how the Mexicans are right now. They’re still mad about the payment that got caught up in the wires last month. You didn’t piss them off, did you?” Yeah, those damn Mexicans…

  Wasn’t Joseph half-Mexican?

  “As soon as you can get away,” he said, “meet us five blocks from there. Head south. We’re on Salmon.”

  Sylvia nodded. “Perhaps it is best that I go,” she said to Alexander. “I know you’re not getting your money’s worth from me. Speak to my madam and she may be able to arrange a partial refund.” She hoped that Cindy Kline had some lines to feed Alexander, because he was never getting that money back now that it was logged as evidence. The poor baby.

  “All right, fine.” Alexander held his hands
up to his security team. “I understand. We’ll go to our backup hotel.” He turned to Sylvia. “I’m sorry that something has happened twice in a row now. You would almost think that the universe is conspiring to keep us apart.” He wrote something down on a tissue from his pocket and handed it to her. “My personal number. I don’t hand this out easily.”

  Sylvia nodded, accepting the paper. “We still have Friday, sir.”

  “Yes. I’ll see you Friday.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “On Friday we will have some quality alone time together. Don’t worry about me, Sylvia. I’ll get my money’s worth eventually.”

  She was rather afraid he would say that.

  ***

  “You saved my ass back there,” she said to Joseph once she was back in the van. The place was sweltering. No windows open, and that many electronics going on a hot July day? No amount of fans could keep that place cool, and it was too expensive to keep the air conditioner running for so many hours. By the time Sylvia climbed in, it was already eighty-five degrees in there – and it was probably getting started. “Now take me home so I can shower and get that guy off me.”

  Joseph was the only one in the van, although Sylvia had seen Jim standing outside having a smoke break. They had nodded to one another before Sylvia hopped in. Now she was alone. With Joseph. The man who was jealous enough to make it known all day.

  The man Sylvia was hoping would go home with her. Or at least take her home with him.

  She didn’t care if they didn’t have sex. All she cared about was spending some time with him. There was something oddly comforting about the uptight agent who wasn’t really that uptight once he let his guard down. For some reason, he fancied keeping it up around Sylvia.

  Not now. The moment she sat down in Jim’s chair, eyes flitting toward the monitors replaying what she filmed that day, Joseph covertly brushed his hand against her leg. Intentionally. That was a boyish grin attempting to break his stone-cold law enforcement demeanor. But he wasn’t going to lavish Sylvia with the attention he probably wanted to smother her with. There were cameras in the van watching them, after all. If they were going to be a public couple one day? It wouldn’t be until the investigation was formally over.

  Then there was that whole escort thing. Genevieve Stone was not going to be impressed about that, no matter what her relationship with her son was. (Perhaps it was even worse that they were not close, and thus Joseph was not likely to get his way.) The Montoyas would probably raise a stink as well if they found out about Sylvia’s past.

  I couldn’t be seen working at the strip club either. She’d be downgraded to waitressing at the Italian restaurant only, and unless her new boyfriend here was willing to move her in with him or give her a healthy allowance… yeah, right.

  “I bet it was torture watching me out there,” Sylvia said, removing her equipment. She left the fake diamonds on the desk she rested her arm against. All she had left was the diamond ring Alexander had given her. Like I’m keeping this. First chance she had, she was selling it. Sylvia did not need those kinds of mementos in her life. If she hadn’t kept Maxwell’s crap, then why would she keep Alexander’s? I’d rather have a cubic zirconia from Joseph. She did like to think, however, that he would spring for the real stuff since he wasn’t, ahem, poor. He may not be inheriting his family’s business, but he was still the son of a billionaire and another millionaire. Yeah, I looked into his mother’s family. Joseph was her only heir, too.

  Damnit. Sylvia really needed to stop letting her imagination run away with thoughts of men and their riches. This was how she ended up in two toxic relationships that had managed to kill the last of her naiveté.

  “It was torture.” Joseph lowered his voice. “Kline is following up on those leads. Jim is going back to the office and backing up the data we collected today. Me…”

  Sylvia chuckled. “What are you doing, Agent Montoya? Something really important?”

  “I like to think it is.” Ah, there was that smile cracking his hot face. “I’m going to take you home and make sure you know what to expect Friday.”

  That’s what he said when voice and film were running in the van. What he implied with those dark, handsome eyes? “I’m going to fuck you again, like I did last night. And the night before. I want you, Sylv. Hope you want me too.”

  Yeah, she wanted him. Every time Alexander flirted with her, touched her, insinuated a sexual relationship about them… she thought of Joseph. He may not be perfect – yet – but he was leagues above any of the men Sylvia had been with since coming to Portland a year ago. And he was even better than most of the men she saw through her career.

  “Then you better take me home.” Sylvia refrained from touching him. There would be plenty of time to start touching him in his car.

  Chapter 16

  Sylvia

  Delicious. That was the only word floating through Sylvia’s head as she was pushed into her bedroom and readily fell on top of her bed. Well, that and Joseph.

  His mouth tasted so damn good. What? Who had a proper, above eighth-grade vocabulary when it came to describing what Joseph Montoya tasted like? All right. You want a better description? He was earthy. Musky. Clean and hygienic, but exuding a natural dirtiness that couldn’t be washed away by water – and thank God for that. Sylvia got higher off kissing this man and inhaling his scent than she did from marijuana contact highs on her bus commute.

  Not to mention the energy levels consuming her. This was the happiest Joseph had been with her since they first hooked up. Yes, even since back then. He smiled against her cheek. He growled into the crook of her neck and snaked his tongue into her ear. His hands grabbed, moved, and groped parts of her body she didn’t even know needed stimulating. Sylvia was so willing to defer to him and what he wanted to do to her that she barely realized she had yet to touch him until she was on her back, legs wrapped around his waist.

  “Buenos fucking dias,” he murmured the moment Sylvia grabbed his cock through his jeans. “Hello.”

  “Yeah, you like it when I grab your cock.” She was already unzipping him. Should they use her condoms or his? “You’re already hard for me.”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” He sat up, holding her down with one hand. Joseph apparently preferred to pull out his own cock. Or maybe he wanted to mess up her dress enough to fuck her within the next two minutes. “You wet for me?”

  “I’ve been wet for you since three this afternoon.”

  He pulled a condom out of his pocket. Oh, so we’re using yours. Got it. “Wasn’t that when Sheen was trying to finger you at that party?”

  Yes. He didn’t get very far. “You’re naughty. I didn’t once stop thinking about you today. I didn’t want anything to do with that other man.” Sylvia pushed herself up, hooking her fingers into his belt and kissing his happy trail and the firm abdomen beneath. “I’d much rather be with you and the way you do me.” That was the truth, after all. “Now say something sexy in Spanish.”

  Joseph was halfway to pulling that condom out of its packaging. Sylvia urged him on with a careful stroke to his stiffening cock. “You serious?”

  “A girl does not joke about hot and sexy Spanish. Come on. Spill it. I know you got the goods to make me even hornier.”

  Joseph tossed the wrapper into the garbage and hooked his hand around Sylvia’s neck. Her head tilted back, mouth open, eyes fluttering. “Cielito mio.”

  Hot damn! That didn’t hit the spot. It blasted it away with a battering ram. This time Sylvia’s shudders were nothing but pure pleasure. Damn. She shuddered so hard that if she wasn’t wet before…

  “How the fuck do I compete with that?” she whispered.

  “You let me fuck you, that’s what.”

  “How do you say that in Spanish?”

  “Quiero que me cojas.”

  “My French is good enough that I think you said I want you to fuck me.”

  “Same difference. Just raunchy.”

  “I love raunchy.”

  Hi
s eyes met hers. Joseph was spending more time slowly stroking his cock than putting on that stupid condom. Get it on and fuck me, please! Sylvia was about to take matters into her own hands. Those matters included his cock and balls, of course. Fuck me in the pussy, in the mouth, in the ass for all I care. Do it!

  “Now you say something to me.” Joseph eased her back down onto the bed, keeping her legs wide open. Am I wearing underwear? Meh. Doesn’t matter. It’ll be gone soon. All her underwear was good enough to tear to the side for some good ol’ fucking. “I want you to try saying…” He said his next few words in Spanish much too quickly.

  “Come again?” And again, and again!

  Joseph nipped her lips. “I’ll say it more slowly. Only because I want to hear you say it.”

  “Then you’ll fuck me?”

  “Si.”

  Giggling, Sylvia tried to ignore the electricity exploding between them. But what was a girl to do when her lover’s excellent cock was two inches away from her? “Quiero que estés dentro de mi.” She tried to leave a French accent out of that. Tried to. It’s the only Romance accent I know. Joseph would deal.

  “Fucking hell that’s hot.” Apparently it worked for him. Within five seconds he was on top of her, slowly, slowly pushing his cock into her. Sylvia yanked on his shirt, but it refused to come off his torso. That’s okay. This is hot too. Men could be as hot clothed as they were naked.

  “What did I say?”

  Inch by inch he filled her, his visage unchanging – always on fire, waiting for Sylvia to come undone around his cock. She was about to. “You said you wanted me inside of you.”

  “Fuck.”

  “Were you lying?”

  Their kiss preoccupied Sylvia from saying much for a few moments. “No. This is a good place for you.”

  He kissed her harder after that.

  And fucked her harder after that.

  It was an exquisite mix of last night and the night before. The urgency, the heated need of Monday night. The emotional connection of Tuesday night. Wednesday, so far, was shaping up to be the best of both worlds, and they had barely started.