But is this so wrong? she thought on a sudden spurt of defiance, and deliberately took the kiss deeper, sliding her hands down to touch his heavy equipment belt and the taut muscles of his abdomen. Was it wrong to take something now, something she could hold on to and remember later, not with shame, but with the thrill of flesh on flesh?
In a few hours it would be over one way or the other, and she and Ty would part for good. What harm was there in taking what she wanted now?
He tore his mouth away and pressed his forehead to hers, his ribs heaving. “Gabby.” He kissed her as though he was helpless to do otherwise, as though the same mad impulse rode him as well. “I think—” He broke off and shuddered against her as she raked her fingernails beneath his shirt, up and across the taut muscles of his chest. “Geez.”
“Here.” She took his hand and held it so they untied her knotted shirt together, giving him access, giving him permission and a demand all at once. His breath hissed out, then hers did, as well, when he used both hands to cup her breasts and rub her nipples to points beneath a bra she’d chosen with him in mind, though she’d had no illusions they would even meet, let alone come so far so fast.
Fast. The word echoed in her mind, trying to slow her down when she wanted to race ahead, wanted to feel the wind screaming through the T-tops of a hot rod once again. But she didn’t want to be slow anymore, didn’t want to be cautious.
What she wanted was Ty, here and now. And fast.
She went to work on his pants, where the material felt slick to her fingers, like the fine wool of a suit or maybe a tuxedo. His shirt, too, had the ridged gathers of formal wear. Remembering that he’d been at a formal party just before the blackout, and she added a tuxedo to the image in her mind, with devastating effect.
“Let me,” he said, when her fingers went to her waistband, and then, “Are you sure?”
“Check my back pocket and see for yourself.” She didn’t have to tell him it had been a joke, Maria being silly about what might happen when they went to their late-night rendezvous. They’d laughed about the condom, and Gabby had kept it as a sort of talisman, as though by carrying it she could pretend a little longer that what she and Ty had built together was real.
Only, it had become real when she wasn’t looking. TyJ had become Ty to her, a flawed and imperfect man with a loose grasp on the truth and a stubborn streak a mile wide. And somehow none of that seemed to matter when it came to the way she felt about him.
She liked him. She wanted him. Couldn’t it be as simple as that?
His fingers found the small foil packet, and his breath hissed between his teeth. She shimmied out of the rest of her clothing “What do you say?” she asked, and slid a hand inside the warmth within his tuxedo pants, finding him hard and ready. She thrilled to his hiss of indrawn breath, and the jump of his shaft beneath her touch.
“I say hell, yes.” He boosted her up onto the desk, sheathed himself in the condom and stepped between her knees. Then he lowered his head and kissed her deeply, searchingly, until there was a thread of tenderness coiling alongside the heat. Then he pulled away, he pressed his forehead to hers. “I know this isn’t the right time or place, and I’m sure as hell not the right man, but I can’t make any of that matter right now.”
With his forehead still pressed to hers, he stepped into her until the blunt tip of his shaft nudged against her opening, a tantalizing pressure she’d taken for granted during one part of her life and gone without during the other.
“Ty,” she breathed, loving the feel of him against her, the sound of his name on her lips.
“Gabby,” he said, responding in kind as he eased forward and slid home.
She felt that first wonderful, glorious burn of invasion, then the warm glow as her body adjusted to the size and shape of him, to the reality of him. In that moment she felt feminine. She felt beautiful. She felt whole.
And then he began to move, and everything else ceased to exist.
He thrust into her and withdrew, urging her to the edge of the desk and cupping her buttocks with his warm hands, holding her fast as he surged into her again, stretching her, filling her.
Gabby fisted her hands in his finely woven shirt, threw back her head and hung on for the ride as he thrust into her again and again, the tempo increasing, the sensations increasing, layering one atop the next until she thought she might scream with the pleasure.
Instead she wrapped herself around him, leaned forward and pressed her mouth to his shoulder, silencing the cries that threatened to break from her.
They strained together in silence broken only by the noise of their breathing and the slap of flesh. The sound was brutally erotic, coiling the heat inside her higher and higher until she tightened around him. The orgasm was a sharp, vicious slice of pleasure that cut straight through her and left her shuddering, gasping and not quite settled inside her own skin.
Then Ty stiffened against her and she felt him swell inside her, felt his hard flesh jerk with his release, setting a rhythm that echoed within her, calling to the unsettled energy and bringing the whiplash of a second, unexpected climax.
This time she did cry out, a little moan that she quickly muffled against his hot flesh.
Ty sagged against her, barely breathing. He slid his hands out from beneath her and held her tight, held her against him so hard it seemed as if they had become a single unit, their hearts beating in tandem, their flesh fused until it was difficult to tell where one of them left off and the other began.
They stayed like that for a long moment, then pulled apart without a word.
Swaying slightly with vertigo, Gabby dropped her feet to the floor and pulled on her clothes with trembling fingers.
“Wow,” she whispered, her voice breaking on the word, on the sensations still rocketing through her body. “That was amazing.”
“Yes. Yes, it was.” His voice rasped deep in his throat, and she thought she caught a hint of emotion in his voice. Regret, perhaps, or maybe something softer. Instead of saying it never should have happened, or any of the hundred excuses that flashed through her brain in a nanosecond, he simply said, “Thank you.”
Her lips curved. “The pleasure was mine.”
“I think we can safely say it was mutual.” He dealt with the condom and righted his clothing, and then she heard the rasp of metal on leather that was becoming all too familiar. “Speaking of safety, we don’t know what’s going to be on the other side of that door when we open it. I want you to take this.”
He pressed the warm plastic grip of one of his guns into her palm.
Gabby’s fingers instinctively curled around the gun even as she said, “No way. Don’t even think about it.” Shock had her words coming out far louder than she’d intended, far louder than was wise.
They both froze as the sound echoed in the small room, but there was no response from outside.
There was only silence.
After a moment Ty exhaled. “Well, that’s a good sign at any rate. Maybe they’re gone.” But she noticed that he kept his voice to a bare whisper. He gripped her shoulders, wordlessly urging her to the side of the door. Then he stood behind her and reached around to position her hands on the gun. He rubbed her index finger across a small nub and whispered, “That’s the safety. This is on. This is off. Rack the action like this.” As he demonstrated, she was all too aware of the feel of his arms around her, and the hard planes of his chest pressed against her back, echoing their embrace of moments earlier. “Keep your finger outside the trigger guard until you plan on firing,” he continued. “And when you pull the trigger make sure you mean it.”
She shifted to whisper in his ear, “You do remember I can’t see, right?”
He dropped his arms and moved away from her, leaving her skin to cool where they’d been pressed together. His voice went deadly serious when he said, “I don’t know what’s on the other side of that door. I want you to be protected in case…just in case.”
A shiver crawled
across Gabby’s shoulders. Instead of insisting he take the weapon back, she tightened her fingers on the grip, keeping the index finger of her right hand stretched out beside the trigger guard as he’d shown her. “Okay. Thanks.”
She didn’t intend to fire the gun, but the weight gave her an odd sense of confidence.
“I’m going to open the door on the count of three,” he whispered. “If anyone’s out there, I’ll do my best to get the door closed.” He didn’t follow with the logical corollary—that the door would only keep them out for so long. Instead he said, “I’ll try to let you know where I am and what’s going on. If I go down—” He broke off, and she sensed him moving closer, felt his warmth on her skin when he said, “Never mind. We’re going to get out of here in one piece.”
But she noticed that he didn’t make any promises.
She nodded. “I’m ready.”
He hesitated momentarily and she thought he might kiss her, thought he might call her sweetheart.
Instead he turned away.
* * *
Focus, for chrissakes. Ty forced himself to reach for the doorknob rather than the woman who stood beside him. Then he paused and took a deep breath. He had to focus, had to get hold of himself. What was it about her that distracted him so easily, derailed him so thoroughly?
Whatever it was, it was dangerous. He’d never meant to kiss her, never meant to give in to the temptation and make love to her, but all his best intentions hadn’t stood a chance against the feel of her, the taste of her, hell, against her.
He’d come damn close to falling for her online, when he’d been pretending to be someone else, someone kind. Now he was teetering even closer to that edge, and that made it even more vital that he step the hell away from her and pull it together.
If anything happened to her…No, he thought fiercely. I won’t let anything happen to her.
Then again he’d promised to protect Mandy, and look how that had ended up.
“Here goes nothing,” he said, trying to sound confident for Gabby’s benefit, but carrying a knot in his gut as he slowly unlocked the dead bolt with one hand, holding his revolver at the ready with the other. He opened the door in one smooth move, stepped through and swept the short hallway from one end to the other, finger already on the trigger.
His adrenaline was buzzing so high it took him a moment to register that the hallway was empty.
Exhaling an almost shaky breath, he whispered, “Clear so far.”
It was clear the rest of the way out, too, though he hardly dared believe their luck. At the same time, he was cursing himself for the delay. God only knew how long Snake and his boys had been gone.
Ty would’ve known, too, except he’d been making love to exactly the sort of woman he’d made it a habit to avoid. She was the home-and-hearth type, the type who’d want him home every night. More important, she was the type who needed more from him than he was capable of giving. He needed his freedom. She needed a partner. Complete disconnect.
“Come on,” he said, not whispering now. His voice came out gruff with anger, not at her, but at himself. He knew better, damn it. What had gotten into him?
That question was answered moments later, when he flicked on the flashlight and saw her standing in the hallway, her hair falling down around her shoulders in glorious disarray, looking as though she’d just climbed out of a man’s bed. Not any man’s bed, Ty thought with a territorial surge of possessiveness that undermined all his vows of moments earlier. My bed.
She was gripping his Glock two-handed in a position that should’ve been intimidating, but as far as Ty was concerned looked pinup sexy.
Damn, was he in trouble.
He could try to talk himself out of it as much as he might like, but she’d gotten under his skin long before they’d met face-to-face.
“It’s getting late,” she said, forcing him back on track. “I think we should risk a car.”
“My thoughts exactly,” he lied. “I’ll take that back if you don’t mind.” He snagged the gun, checked the safety and holstered the weapon. “Come on.”
He took her hand, shaded the flashlight with his free hand so only a tiny beam of light emerged, and led her through the front room of the candy store, which showed new evidence of vandalism.
Snake and his boys had upended the remaining tables and smashed the remaining display case on their way out, looking for food, maybe, or entertainment.
Knowing that fledgling gangs tended not to stray far from their territories, Ty stayed alert as they left the store and headed east, back toward the waterfront. They stuck to the shadows and moved fast, hustling away from the swath of destroyed homes and businesses as quickly as possible.
Once they were clear of the looted area, he un-shielded the light and shone the beam in a wide arc, gauging the neighborhood. The brick row houses were similar to those farther south, but they were in far better repair, and the cars lining either curb were mostly late-model sedans and SUVs.
Best of all, the street was clear of wrecks and abandoned vehicles.
“Nicer neighborhoods get National Guard action sooner than the scary ones,” he noted.
“It smells cleaner.” Gabby tested the air. “Less smoke, too. No looting?”
“Not here.” Ty scanned the street again, checking for motion behind the pitch-dark windows, then made his choice. He decided on a low-slung gray car with familiar smooth lines. “Come on.” He tugged her toward the vehicle, pulled a flexible cat’s paw tool from his belt and went to work on the driver’s-side window.
“You’re not doing what I think you’re doing, are you?”
Ty chuckled at her dry tone. “If I don’t tell you, then you’re not really an accomplice to grand theft auto, are you?”
“And that was not telling me how?” Gabby took advantage of the brief delay to rummage through his knapsack for a chocolate bar.
By the time she got it unwrapped, Ty had the car unlocked. He opened the driver’s door, leaned over and popped the lock on the other side. “You want to walk to the medical center?”
“No,” she said firmly. “We don’t have enough time.” She picked up the knapsack and headed for the passenger’s side, trailing her free hand along the length of the hood. As she did so, a faint frown puckered the smooth skin between her eyebrows.
At the mention of time, Ty glanced at his watch and cursed. “We’re going to be cutting it close. Let’s get a move on.” He swung into the driver’s seat and went to work on the steering column, cracking it to expose the relevant wires, stripping them and crossing them in under a minute.
When he had the car started, he looked up to find Gabby still standing in the doorway on the opposite side of the vehicle with her hand on the T-top roof of the classic car he’d chosen because he’d take an old-fashioned hot rod over an SUV any day.
Gabby’s face was ghost white.
It took him a few seconds, but then he remembered what she’d told Kayleigh. We were racing a souped-up Camaro with a T-top…we missed the turn…hit a minivan…flipped end over end.
“Oh, hell. I forgot.” Ty couldn’t believe he’d forgotten. Or maybe the car choice had been a dig from his subconscious. Who the hell knew? What was done was done. “I’m sorry, sweetheart.” The endearment slipped out unbidden, just as the urge to comfort her came out of nowhere, unwanted and unwise.
She swallowed miserably, but got a glint of fight in her eyes. “Then you were listening to me and Kayleigh back at the halfway house. I thought so.” She lifted one shoulder, but the haunted expression didn’t drain. “Saves me the trouble of going through it again if you wanted to know how it happened.”
Ty stopped himself from saying that of course he wanted to know, because he didn’t have the right. He couldn’t give her what she needed, which meant he didn’t get to pretend that they were still TyJ and CyberGabby, that they were feeling their way into a relationship.
So instead of asking about the accident, or her parents, or what she’d do
ne when the doctors gave her the news, or all the hundred other things he wanted to know about her, he said, “I’m sorry, but we don’t have time to jack another car.”
“I know.” She took a deep breath, lowered herself into the vehicle and strapped herself in, handling the three-point harness with ease. Then she closed the door firmly and nodded. “Let’s go.”
* * *
When she’d first realized what sort of car Ty had boosted, Gabby had thought she was going to throw up again. When she’d climbed inside, she’d nearly done exactly that. But the moment Ty hit the gas, sending them flying out onto the street, everything changed.
Oh God, she thought as they rocketed forward, and inertia pressed her back against the seat. I’ve missed this.
She hadn’t missed riding in cars one bit. But now she realized she’d missed riding in fast, mean cars with engines that sounded like a dragon’s roar.
“It’s not going to take long for someone to notice us.” She heard Ty rummage around for a second, then felt him press a cell phone and charger into her hand. “Here, plug this in, will you?”
“What? Oh, sure.” Rousted from street-racing flashbacks, Gabby did as he’d said, only fumbling momentarily before she managed to hook up the phone.
Within moments it dinged with a ready chime, indicating that it had both power and a signal, though she couldn’t have said how strong that signal actually was.
“Dial for me, will you?” He reeled off a number. “You’ll have to do the talking. I’m running without lights here, and I’d rather not multitask.”
“You’re running without—God, I don’t think I wanted to know that.” Gabby winced, shut up and dialed the number. “It’s ringing.”
“Say a prayer it doesn’t dump to voice mail. I text messaged Dana and told her to have Ethan snag some charge on his cell for a 4:00 a.m. call.”
Gabby raised a brow. “What happened to not contacting the authorities?”
“Dana and Ethan aren’t with the Secret Service. We’re—” Ty broke off. “They’re friends.”
Something prickled at the base of her spine when she realized that deep down inside, she knew he was lying. “Friends.”
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