by Dianna Love
She felt the weight of his gaze and blinked away her moment of weakness, then lifted her eyes to his, but when the words would not come she stepped up and hugged him.
He could have just stood there and let her take what she needed, but his arms closed around her.
To be held was such a small thing compared to all that was happening in her life, but she’d forgotten entirely what it was to be held in arms that she knew would protect her. Had not felt that since she was a tiny child.
When she finally regained her composure, she eased away and lifted her eyes to him. “Thank you for ... everything.”
Warmth flitted through his expression before he locked down whatever thought had softened his gaze, but his voice had a gruff gentleness to it when he spoke. “Go on and shower so I can.”
She carried the bag into the bathroom, spending a moment to take in the size and amenities offered guests. In fifteen minutes, she’d scrubbed every inch of her body, washing away not just the grime from the past twenty-four hours, but the layers of desperation that had grown on her skin over the last three years.
The cut on her scalp stung from the shower water, and later, when she dried her hair.
When she pulled on his gray, short-sleeved shirt, a hint of his scent curled around her, warming her and feeling as intimate as a lover’s caress.
She wrapped her hair in a towel and walked back into the room.
He lifted a small leather bag and clothes then swung around and froze.
With a slow sweep, his gaze roamed over her from the towel around her head to the way his shirt clung to her breasts and down to her bare legs.
Heat burned away the exhaustion in his eyes. She shivered in response to the animal hunger prowling behind that gaze. Her body reacted as if he had his hands on her. She should be feeling uncomfortable under that raw perusal, not ... excited.
What was wrong with her?
Jin fidgeted with the T-shirt, unsure what to say or do. “Your turn.”
That broke the moment. He grunted something and walked into the bathroom.
By the time he came back out, she sat in the middle of the empty bed and had the towel off her head. The shopping bag probably had a brush or comb in it, but she’d neglected to bring the bag out of the bathroom with her.
She’d been finger-combing her waist-length hair, but the silence pulled her attention to him.
Her cowboy wore a pair of jeans and no shirt. He’d been toweling his hair and let the towel fall around his shoulders.
Even with the reading lamp casting only a soft light over the room, there was plenty to see. His chest and arms were carved with muscle. His skin had the bronze tone of someone who spent time in the sun with his shirt off. Or did that tan go further? He had that look in his eyes again, the one that said he might pounce on her.
Would he?
What would it feel like to have his hands on her body? She hadn’t shown interest in any man for over four years. Not when he would face a brutal death for returning that interest. She’d accepted the reality that she’d spend the rest of her life alone unless she ever managed to escape North Korea.
She was out of North Korea, but far from being free.
The room had felt cool just a few minutes ago, but her skin was baking under his sizzling stare. Fine, let him look all he wanted, because she was doing the same.
The silence grew until the cowboy tossed his towel aside.
She let out a pent up breath, thankful he’d lost interest. If her skin grew any hotter, she’d have to get out of it.
But he hadn’t lost interest. He was moving slowly toward her.
Now he had a look on his face like the one she’d seen before she’d kissed him on the boat. That cowboy had a sexy mouth and knew how to use those lips.
Ben had kissed like a young man. Sweetly and tentatively.
But this cowboy kissed like a man. Period.
Would kissing him again be so bad? No.
Stupid? Yes.
Her breasts tightened at the memory of that kiss. Her body was begging to be touched, but her body had no more sense than a rock.
The cowboy reached inside his bag, pulled out a comb, then moved to sit on the bed. Her bed. She froze.
He was right behind her.
So close she could feel the heat coming off him.
Her heart took off racing again.
“Calm down, Jin. I’m just going to comb your hair.”
What?
She felt a small section of her hair being lifted, then the gentle tug of a comb sliding through the strands. He really was combing her hair.
She asked, “Why are you doing this?”
“I used to do it for my little sister when her hair was long.”
She hadn’t imagined this man with a family. Not after seeing the deadly and powerful side of him. The idea of him caring for a younger sister softened her image of him.
She closed her eyes and enjoyed the moment. Things would no doubt change tomorrow, but for the first time in many years she indulged in the joy of being touched instead of fearing it.
Who was this man really? Would he truly keep his word tomorrow? She had no choice but to risk believing in him for now. She’d never met a man before who had ever kept his word, but she was sitting in America because this man had done so when he could have left her anywhere along the way.
He asked, “Where did you learn to fight the way you do? What’s that called? Didn’t look like Taekwondo.”
He was correct. She’d never been taught any kind of Korean martial arts. “It is called Nindokai.”
She had trained long hours to excel, because she had not had a big brother like this cowboy to watch over her.
But she wasn’t thinking of him as she would a brother.
Not at all.
The simple motion of the comb through her hair relaxed her. He was close, and his heat drew her. His strength.
What are you doing? She tensed and realized she was leaning against his arm. She tried to move away without being obvious, but the damage was done. He could easily think she was offering some kind of intimacy. He’d stopped combing her hair, so she twisted to look up at him.
He studied her, but she couldn’t read the expression on his face. She searched for something to say, but what would it be? I care about you. But I shouldn’t. I trust you. But I don’t. Leaning on you feels good. But I can’t. This man stood between her and stopping something worse than an apocalypse, but he’d protected her when he had no idea who she was.
She had yet to tell him much of the truth, and certainly not the entire truth.
One more kiss from a man of honor. A kiss like the one on the boat. She might die in the next two days. She wanted that kiss. Maybe the last she would ever have.
Lifting a hand, she touched his cheek.
He seemed torn between two thoughts, then one of them must have given up because he caught her hand and moved it to his lips to kiss.
She sat there, wanting him to touch her, but stunned at how it made her feel. He kissed her wrist then her arm until she was leaning up to meet him without realizing it.
His mouth covered hers and heat spun into a tornado, churning her insides. He ran a hand into her hair, grasping a handful and drawing her closer. She held his face, smooth where he’d shaved. His tongue slid into her mouth and tortured her with every stroke, then he kissed her with the hunger of a starved man.
The power of his mouth on hers rocked her. Her one relationship had been mild compared to the way her body yearned for this man.
His phone pinged with an alert.
He broke the kiss and dropped his forehead to hers. “Kryptonite.”
She sucked in a breath and asked, “What?”
“Nothing.” He eased her away from him and got up to check his phone.
He’d moved quickly, but not fast enough to hide the bulge in his jeans. Not his fault. She had reached for him.
What if his phone had not interrupted? Would he have wan
ted more from her? Then what?
Her conscience had more questions she didn’t want to acknowledge, and she had no answer for any of it. She had a goal that was far bigger than her own wishes, so was it wrong to want a moment for herself, just once? One time that she could be happy?
She’d never had that.
Life had given her a brutal education, but the one lesson she’d learned well was that anything she had today could be taken away tomorrow. Never pass up any chance at happiness.
He finished reading something on his phone, placed it back on the desk and took a breath so deep the exhale sounded cleansing. When he returned to the bed, he sat behind her and started combing her hair again as if nothing had happened, but he did say, “I don’t want you to worry about spending the night here. You have your own bed to sleep in.”
Her shoulders drooped. She’d let her body overrule her mind and blamed it on being so tired she should have fallen on her face already. She’d made a fool of herself with this man, again, and now she was too wired to sleep.
What did this cowboy think of her now after she’d kissed him again?
The constant slide of the comb through her hair lulled her, pushed her worries aside, and a few minutes later she was fighting to keep her eyelids open. Maybe not too wired to sleep after all.
His voice was softer when he asked, “Nindokai is ... isn’t that German martial arts? Why would you choose that?”
He wanted to talk about fighting? She yawned and blinked her eyes, trying to stay awake. “Yes, it is, but that fighting style was not my decision. I have never had a choice about anything in my life.” She rubbed her eyes and let another yawn overtake her. “I was taught Nindokai because my superiors felt that would give me an advantage over Koreans taught Taekwondo. They would not expect me to fight a different way.”
Her body begged for sleep, but she fought it because it felt so good to have him here, combing her hair. Still, her eyelids were made of lead. She struggled to keep them open.
He kept up the questions. “If you could fight like that, why were you allowing that attacker to take you to the van?”
“What?” she murmured.
“When that guy had you at the van, you weren’t fighting him at first.”
She drew in a deep breath to answer. “I wanted to go with Pang and Har so I could find my sister.”
Her muscles were slowly melting.
She never slept soundly, but she was so very tired and he was being nice. So nice, her mountain made of honor.
“Why’d you change your mind and fight him when I came after you?” he asked, then his voice came to her from a distance. “Was it because you care about me, Jin?”
Sleep was dragging her into a dark pit. She didn’t want to answer his questions. Why wouldn’t he stop talking so she could sleep? She mumbled, “Yes, I care for you. He would have killed you if I had not attacked him.”
Then she didn’t hear another word.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Tanner caught Jin as she slumped in a boneless pile against his chest, damp hair and all.
She was out cold.
Not exactly cold. In fact, her warm little body was draped all over his very awake one.
He’d been teasing her again at the end, but her reply stunned him. Yes, I care for you. He would have killed you if I had not attacked him.
Earlier, in the truck, she’d said she was going after her sister. He hadn’t missed that little detail, but he had to be skeptical. Couldn’t afford not to be. Now though, he would lay money on a bet that the mostly-asleep Jin had told the truth a few seconds ago about why she’d been going along with the kidnapper to get into the van.
Her sister was not in some Korean prison camp, as he’d originally thought. She was here, in the US, and part of some terrorist plot.
Going with Pang and Har was the next step in Jin’s delusional plan to find her sister. Did she think the physicists would just take her to her sister? Didn’t she realize how dangerous that whole idea was?
Jin must be damned confident in her fighting skills.
But she ruined her own plans to save you.
Wasn’t that a kick in the chest? He’d thought once he had her here, showered and relaxed, he could convince her to give up the information she had without going along with her deal to leave her free.
How was he going to hand her over to anyone after she’d risked losing her sister to save him?
He didn’t know and he was past the point of figuring out anything until he crashed for a few hours.
If Sabrina called, he’d go at Jin again, but until then he was going to sleep and get back to full speed.
He got up and pulled back the covers, then scooped her up and settled her on the bed, pulling the thick bedspread over her. His hand got caught under all that hair. It wasn’t black, but a beautiful mahogany brown. He sifted the drying strands through his fingers, then reached down and brushed it off her face.
What a dog-sucking mess she was in.
She was trying to save her sister.
But she was holding back more than she was sharing. Like the role Pang and Har were playing in an attack on the US.
Once he’d caught enough sleep to think clearly, he’d give her one shot at selling him on her value.
Allie had done a helluva sales job on him when she’d convinced Tanner to stick his neck out for her.
Unless Jin could do a better pitch job than Allie—which he seriously doubted because that scientist had been a master at manipulation—Jin would be headed to Atlanta tomorrow for the simple reason that Sabrina needed a bargaining chip right now.
Tanner owed Sabrina first.
Jin sighed softly.
The sound reached in and yanked hard on his heart.
Dammit, Bodine, do not let this woman get to you.
He had a bad feeling it might be too late for that warning.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Pentagon, Washington, DC
The General strode down the hallway from his Pentagon office to H.P.’s. When he walked in, he shut the door softly and H.P.’s head popped up from where he’d been typing furiously on his laptop. “Yes?”
Covering the three long steps to H.P.’s desk, The General spread his hands shoulder width apart and slapped them on the desk. He leaned down, gritting his teeth at the pain in his back. Miserable doctors couldn’t heal him without surgery. That was fine. The pain gave more fire to his words.
“Where are my Koreans?”
“That’s not an easy question to answer.”
The General kept his deep voice at a quiet level of threat. “You told me we were sending a team to pick them up last night.”
“I did send people, but someone ... got there first.”
“I. Know. In fact, I heard there were three Koreans.”
H.P. was genuinely surprised. “The Slye woman said nothing about a third physicist.”
“I’m not sure who—or what—the third person is, but I just got an intelligence report that a protective squad was seen escorting two Korean males and one Korean woman from a Gulfstream jet at the Los Angeles airport at the time we were being informed the physicists were stateside.”
“I’m on it. I’ll find out more—”
“No, I don’t want to know more. I want all three of them brought in before someone here finds out we brought three North Koreans into this country who have knowledge of nuclear weapons design and turned them loose.” The General pushed off the table. “You have twenty-four hours. Find all three or send out a unit that will make this problem go away. Are we clear?”
H.P. nodded, his face as white as his shirt.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Jin woke slowly, feeling rested for the first time in longer than she could recall. Her nightmares had come as usual, but ended quicker than normal, or at least it seemed that way. She enjoyed waking slowly, wrapped in a firm cocoon of warmth.
Firm?
Her heart went into overdrive for a second, the
n she inhaled and recognized the male scent. The cowboy.
It was a rich, alive smell. She opened her eyes and blinked as her vision adjusted. Daylight slipped through the hotel curtains, just enough to see the dark hairs on the broad chest she faced.
The memory of last night caressed its way back into focus. He’d combed her hair. Lulled her into rest.
They had two beds.
So what was she doing here, wrapped up against him?
That’s when she noticed the rise and fall of each breath he took. He had her tucked up against him, arms bulging with muscles holding her so close and ... safe. She hadn’t felt safe in a long time, not since she was a tiny child. Long before she was handed off to a couple who had never considered her family, only a pawn to train for their own agenda.
She was wrapped up against this big man who should be in his own bed. But she felt no fear. That was not normal. Something was wrong with her survival instincts. She should move away. Now.
Her mountain mumbled something and she froze for a second. Was he wearing anything? She took stock of her body. Still in the T-shirt. Nothing felt different, at least physically. She moved her leg and touched cloth. He had on boxers.
Naked other than that.
She started to shift away and her knee brushed one very awake part of his anatomy. She jerked her leg back, but her crazy body had a completely opposite reaction. Her mouth dried out at the size of him.
All of her was awake now.
What should she do? Take her time moving away so she didn’t disturb him?
Does taking your time have anything to do with staying snuggled up against him?
No. Not at all.
Liar.
The truth was, she’d never felt anything like this before. Never been so close to anyone remotely like him.
One big arm was wrapped all the way around her back and hooked under her arm that rested on his shoulder. The palm of his hand dangled so close to her breast. The power and strength in this mountain of a man made her a little dizzy. Made her want.
