Nauti Deceptions

by Leigh, Lora

  His gaze darkened, though it never moved from her. Sometimes, she wondered exactly what was going on behind that fierce gaze. Hawklike light brown eyes that seemed to reflect shadows of emotions that she could never really decipher.

  “I’ve never seen the pictures,” he finally said, surprising her.

  Rogue’s brow lifted. “Really? You must be the only man in the county that hasn’t managed to find them.”

  Zeke wasn’t a man to lie, about anything.

  “I never went looking for them,” he told her. “I didn’t want to see them, Rogue, because they didn’t matter between you and me.”

  THREE

  Of course they didn’t. Those pictures, one way or the other, would never change the fact that he might want her, but he had no intention of touching her.

  She’d tested that theory over the winter. All the rides she’d requested after the long hours she had put in at the Mackay restaurant. The nights she had invited him up for a drink or tried to linger in his vehicle to talk, to flirt. She’d given up. She’d let it go. She wasn’t begging him.

  She unfolded herself from the couch, reached down, and picked up her shoes before staring down at him.

  “Do you have any further questions, Zeke? It’s late, I need a drink, and I was looking forward to a bubble bath. Honestly, I don’t know what else I could tell you about Joe and Jaime that you don’t already know. Or think you know.”

  And she couldn’t handle being in the same room with him tonight. She wasn’t as strong as she had been in the winter. Perhaps those winter months had weakened her. Hoping against hope each night that she had flirted her way into his car that something, anything, would come of it. Only to have her hopes dashed time and again.

  “You’re throwing me out?” He tilted his head and looked up at her, his gaze flashing with a heat she was afraid to delve too deeply into. “After weeks of trying to get me up here to your apartment, you’re not even offering me a beer?”

  “No. I’m not. Good night, Zeke. Lock the door on your way out.”

  She turned and walked to the open bedroom door. She could feel his gaze on her, felt him watching her, his eyes burning into her. Suddenly, her skirt was too short, the vest flashed too much skin at her midriff and back. She felt exposed, vulnerable. She felt weak.

  “Hell of a change, Rogue. You tried to seduce me half the winter. What happened?”

  She stopped and turned around slowly to see him standing, cocky, assured, confident.

  “I gave up,” she replied shortly. “As you said, I tried to seduce you. You weren’t willing. I don’t beg. End of story.”

  His expression tightened, a muscle jumping at his jaw as his gaze raked over her then.

  “You’re too damned young,” he finally berated her, and perhaps himself as well, she thought. Or he was trying to convince himself.

  “I’m too damned tired to play games.” It was all she could do to keep her shoulders straight and to fight back the tears. “Joe and Jaime were family. This has hit me rather hard, and as you see”—she lifted her arms wide to encompass the empty apartment—“it’s just me and the bubble bath for comfort. I don’t need to add games to tonight’s stress if you don’t mind.”

  Zeke watched Rogue closely. He saw it then. That shadow in those deep violet eyes that had held his attention. A shadow he had never seen before. Loneliness. Loss. He knew that feeling. And in the past five years whenever it struck, it was Rogue that came to mind. Her smile, the promise of passion in her eyes, the need to touch her, the certainty that she could calm the beast that raged inside him.

  Damn her. She’d managed to worm her way into his life, there was no doubt of that. He’d missed her in the past few weeks since she had started riding her Harley to the restaurant rather than calling him and bumming a ride. Hell, he’d more than missed it. It was as though something were suddenly missing from his life. There was an emptiness where those hours lay now, a sense of waiting.

  “Why don’t you have a lover, Rogue?” He looked around the apartment. To his knowledge, as long as she had lived in Somerset, Rogue had never had a lover.

  He didn’t count the pictures that had ended up on the Internet. He’d investigated that himself, and though he could never find proof, there was enough suspicion to prove to him that Rogue had been used somehow. Rumor was Nadine Grace and Dayle Mackay had targeted her when she had defended Zeke’s son over a test at school. Nadine had never liked Shane because Zeke had refused to walk the same path his father had walked. Thad Mayes had held the position of sheriff for years, and through that time he had protected Dayle Mackay and the Freedom League’s collective asses. He hadn’t just protected them, he had been part of them. Zeke refused to follow that path, and Nadine had finally found a way to strike back, through Shane.

  A month after standing up for his son, Rogue had left the bar with a strange couple. She hadn’t been well known then; no one had thought to question her when she left. And then Rogue had been out of a job in the school system and the pictures had shown up on the Internet.

  Oh, Zeke knew how Grace and Mackay had worked, he thought as he found himself moving across the room, his gaze drifting, again, to the scalloped lace that peeked over her leather vest.

  Bra or camisole? he wondered. Probably one of those short little camisole things. Scarlet red and flirty. Just like the shoes she carried in her hand.

  “You didn’t answer me, Rogue,” he reminded her. “Why don’t you have a lover?”

  And he wasn’t certain he wanted to hear the answer to that question. The same reason perhaps that he didn’t have a lover. Because he couldn’t have Rogue.

  “Does it matter why?” She stood still, determined as he moved to her, stopping within a breath of touching distance.

  He stared down at her, feeling things he knew he had no right to feel. Things he knew he shouldn’t feel, not for this spritely little woman-child that was much too young for him.

  He was playing a dangerous game tonight and he knew it. But he needed a taste of her. Just enough to hold him over, to dampen the lust raging through him.

  “Don’t play games with me, Zeke,” she breathed out wearily. “Honestly, I don’t have time for them. I don’t have the strength for them right now.”

  “Have I ever played games with you, Rogue?” he asked, reaching out to touch her cheek, knowing, damn, he knew this was a mistake. The worst mistake he could possibly make right now. Because he couldn’t follow through. He couldn’t have her and revenge. It wasn’t possible.

  She didn’t answer him. He could have used one of her smart remarks right now. Something to remind himself that she was way too young. Twenty-six, even if it was almost twenty-seven, was too far from thirty-seven years old. Eleven years. Two years less than that which separated Alex Jansen and his fiancée, Janey Mackay, Zeke thought. But just because Alex could handle it didn’t mean Zeke could. Hell, his son, Shane, was nineteen. He was closer to Rogue’s age than Zeke was.

  “You don’t play games,” she whispered, her expression softening, transforming, turning sensual, tempting.

  Damn, the things he wanted to do to her. The ways he wanted to do them. He was here to question her about her cousins’ deaths; instead, he found himself relishing the softness of her cheek. Skin like satin and silk combined. And as he looked, he realized it was all but devoid of makeup.

  She looked like a temptress with those violet eyes though. Those long, riotous red gold curls flowing around her, making a man wonder what it would be like to be bound within them.

  “This is a bad idea.” He sighed, lowering his head and allowing his rougher cheek to brush against hers. “Tell me to leave.”

  “Leave,” she breathed as she softened against him.

  He almost laughed. Damn her, she could make him laugh when no one else could. “That wasn’t an order, Rogue.”

  “Oh. It was supposed to be an order?” A little, knowing smile tugged at her lips.

  Oh yeah, she knew he wanted h
er until he ached with it. And she wanted. She wanted with the same hunger. He could see it in her eyes.

  Her shoes dropped to the carpet, the light thud barely registering in his head. Hell, he could barely hear anything over the race of his own pulse and the thunder of lust in his veins.

  He let his lips skim her cheek. The need for her threatened to erode his control and his senses.

  “I’m leaving,” he told her. “This is too damned dangerous.”

  “Of course it is.” One small hand clenched on his upper arm. The fingers of the other were pressing against his stomach. She could feel his abs flexing; he could feel the warmth of her through the material of his shirt.

  His cock pressed imperatively against his jeans. The hard throb was making him crazy. It had made him crazy all evening. How much hell was one man supposed to endure before the hunger overrode control? he wondered. And what was it about this one woman that threatened his control?

  He let his lips brush against the curls at the side of her face. They were soft, fragrant. Like silk that smelled of dawn. He wanted to crush them between his fingers, hold her in place, and eat her up with kiss after kiss. He wanted to taste those lush, sensual lips. He wanted to feel her tongue against his, hell, he wanted all of her.

  “You’re teasing me.” Her voice was weak, a hint of need quivering within it as she shifted closer to him. “Don’t tease me, Zeke. Kiss me, or let me go.”

  “You’re supposed to tell me to leave,” he reminded her.

  “Kiss me or leave. Do one or the other.”

  “Kissing you would be a very bad idea.” So why wasn’t he stepping back? Why wasn’t he letting her go? Instead, he was moving closer, one arm curling around her back as he gripped her jaw with his hand and lifted her head.

  “Or one of your better ideas,” she retorted breathlessly.

  He didn’t give himself a chance to think, and he should have. He should have considered the consequences, and he damned sure should have considered the spark that blazed between them even when they weren’t touching.

  He should have considered it, because each time he did, he knew better than to draw closer to the fire. He knew better than to let his hunger get the best of him. But he didn’t consider.

  He brushed his lips over hers as they parted. Light as a whisper, he let himself feel her lips. He came back for a taste. The barest taste of that full lower lip, and it was ambrosia. Nectar. It was the sweetest taste of flesh that he swore he had ever known. If he wasn’t mistaken, there was the lightest flavor of his favorite drink that lingered there. The slightest hint of the dark, potent whisky he preferred.

  “Zeke,” she whispered his name against his lips. “Please. Don’t tease.”

  She didn’t whimper, she didn’t beg. It was a demand given in the tone of a woman who accepted that the tease might be all she would receive.

  But the man wasn’t teasing. Zeke didn’t tease. He was almost as helpless in the grip of the sensuality weaving around them as she was in his hold. He lifted her closer, notching the hard width of his cock against her as he turned and pressed her into the wall, his lips parting, his tongue pressing between hers, his need controlling every objection his head was listing as he allowed himself to sink into her kiss.

  Her arms were around his neck. Her legs lifted until her knees rode his hips, and hell, he was lost. He was barely aware of the fact that he was jerking her skirt over her hips. Short-assed skirt. It tempted him. Teased him. Made his hands itch to jerk it up and see what she was wearing beneath.

  Feeling what she was wearing worked, too. Or not feeling it. All he could find was the thinnest scrap of material running between the cheeks of her ass, a tiny triangle covering the hairless folds of her pussy.

  He was doomed. He was going to hell. He was going to be flayed by the whips of guilt and remorse the second he managed to pull his lips from hers. So why the hell should he bother now? He could keep kissing her, kissing her until the guilt and remorse were burned away to cinders beneath the hunger that blazed out of control.

  Because Rogue tasted as wild as her name, as free as sunshine. She was the promise of an eternal flame, the illusion of something he knew didn’t exist. The illusion of true emotion. Because in this kiss there was more than pleasure. There was the darkness he held within him rising to the fore, and the fantasies he knew he had no business considering with this woman tempting his mind.

  “Damn you!” He muttered the curse against her lips, because he couldn’t get enough. He couldn’t taste enough of her, couldn’t kiss her deep enough, wild enough. He couldn’t press his jeans-covered dick tightly enough between her thighs, he couldn’t feel her heat close enough. They were both damned. Because he couldn’t stop. Because the feel of her, the sweetness of her was too much. She kissed like a dream, and God knew, he had given up on dreams years before.

  “Damn me?” Rogue gasped, breathless, nearly panting as flaming little fingers of sensation raced over her body.

  Her lips were swollen; she could feel their tenderness as his kisses moved from her lips to her jaw, to her neck. His lips caressed; he might have nipped with his teeth. She was certain he had. But oh God, his tongue. He was licking over her neck as though taking greedy, tiny tastes of her flesh. And between her thighs. His fingers were between her thighs, tucked beneath her rear as her knees gripped his hips, caressing, feathering over the silk triangle of the thong she wore. Caressing the damp material as her juices eased from her sex.

  She could feel how slick she was, how wet. Her flesh was swollen, her clit throbbing. Her pulse raced, adding to the sensitivity of her flesh, the ache of need between her thighs.

  Moaning his name, her head fell back against the wall, her eyes closing as she felt his lips at the top of her breasts, above the scalloped edge of her camisole top. The top button of her vest eased open.

  “This is insane.” The words sounded torn from him.

  Insane? It was the most pleasure she had ever known in her life.

  “Damn. Rogue. This has to stop.”

  She kept her eyes closed, her hands on his head, holding his lips right where they were, brushing between her breasts. The feel of them, like rough velvet stroking her, was a heady sensation.

  She was going to have to let him go. She knew it. She could feel it. She was going to have to let him walk away and spend the night alone. Again. Without him. Without the comfort she needed, without the man she needed to hold on to.

  She fought the tightening in her chest, her throat. The tears that wanted to fill her eyes and she held back, trapped inside her heart.

  “So stop.” Her head fell forward, her lips pressing against his forehead, her fingers still gripping his neck. “All you have to do is stop.”

  And kill her. And take away something she hadn’t known she was missing until now. She hadn’t known how good it could be, how hot it could be. She hadn’t known how his touch could send pleasure tearing not just through her body, but deeper, to that untouched core of her. To that part of her that had always held back, that had always remained aloof.

  She wasn’t aloof with Zeke. She wanted to beg. She wanted to plead with him not to stop, not to take the warmth away from her. Not to steal his touch when she had waited so damned long for it.

  A second later, he was easing back from her. Rogue forced her knees to unclamp, forced herself to find her footing as he slowly, so slowly released her, then stepped back from her.

  “Did you get all you wanted?” She resorted to sarcasm to keep from crying. “If so, as I said before, you know where the door is.”

  She turned, almost stumbled actually, to get away from him and find the relative comfort of her bedroom, her big bathtub, heated bubbles that in no way would replace his touch.

  “I’m too old for you, Rogue; you know that as well as I do.”

  A second later she found herself pulled against his chest, her back flush against him, absorbing his heat and his anger.

  She shook her head slowly. “
It’s not the age, Zeke,” she said softly. “That’s your excuse. Why don’t you just admit it? Your reputation can’t afford me, and we both know it.”

  Silence filled the air between them. She felt his fingers tighten at her hips, his chest expand behind her.

  “You think I won’t fuck you because you could hurt my reputation?” There was an edge of mockery to his voice that was cutting. “Oh, Rogue, sweetheart, you have no damned idea how wrong you are. I won’t fuck you, baby, because I know what no one else knows. I know exactly why a relationship with me would destroy both of us.”

  “Oh really?” She didn’t see destruction. She saw the need, the aching, dark loneliness that no one else could help ease. A hunger that only Zeke could fulfill. That she had always known only Zeke could fulfill. “And what is it that you think you know?”

  “I know, Caitlyn Rogue, how very innocent you are next to me and what I know I’ll end up taking from you. You’re not a woman who will let a man fuck her for the emotionless pleasure of it. You’re not a woman who could ever give what I need easily. And you’re not a woman a man can walk away from without regrets. You’re too young for those regrets. And I’m too damned old to want to see them strapped on you. Think about that. Remember that. Because the next time you invite me to your bed, you just might find more there than you expected.”

  If he expected her to take veiled threats and innuendo as an excuse, then he’d better be thinking on that one again.

  She tossed him an angry little snarl as she jerked out of his arms.

  “What, Zeke, do you like to get frisky with your handcuffs?” she snapped, turning on him and nearly bursting into flames at the look on his face. “Do you like to play the big, bad sheriff when you fuck your women?”

  His lips quirked with an edge of amusement that she simply didn’t appreciate. Almost a smile as those predatory brown eyes roved over the loosened front of the leather vest.