Aces High

by Kay Hooper

  She blinked, and the ebbing flush of passion welled back up in her cheeks for another reason. In an uncertain voice she said, “We can’t stay here all day.”

  “Why not?” He pushed a lock of fiery hair back off her damp forehead, smiling just a little. But his eyes were watchful.

  Katrina was too conscious of the starkly intimate weight of his hard, heavy body covering her own to be able to resurrect her wariness, and after what they had shared on her bed she was too honest to pretend shyness. Her love would remain unspoken, but if this powerful, relentless passion could keep him with her a while longer, she was bound by that love to cherish every moment.

  She lifted her head from the pillow and kissed him, her tongue dancing, teasing, and when he caught his breath and his arms wrapped around her, she felt a stab of pleasure in the knowledge that she could excite him so instantly. “Why not?” she agreed huskily against his mouth.

  He laughed, a rough sound, and his teeth nipped her bottom lip gently. “All day—and all night. In fact, sweetheart, it’d take a determined army to keep me out of your bed now.”

  Katrina erected only one barrier in her mind, hiding behind that only her love and inevitable painful thoughts about a future without him. Smiling up at his intent face, she said, “I don’t think I could move anyway.” And she protested wordlessly when he moved instead to slowly withdraw from her.

  Her disappointment was brief, however, because he immediately gathered her into his arms and carried her into the bright, spacious bathroom. He had never carried her six years before, and she was both surprised and moved by the curious emotions his easy strength awoke in her; she felt small and fragile, and oddly cared for even though he wasn’t especially gentle with her.

  And she wasn’t, this time, surprised by the inexorable building of heat that had little to do with the hot water streaming over them as they stood in the glassed-in shower stall. She did find a moment to marvel at his apparently limitless energy, but the soapy hands moving slowly over her wet body very soon stole her ability to think at all.

  Standing so close to him, nakedly vulnerable, she was again conscious of his immense physical strength. He could break her so easily, she realized vaguely, her trembling fingers compulsively stroking over the thick, wet pelt of black hair on his chest, his ribs, and hard, flat stomach. He had a natural, almost primal force that few men could boast of, the kind that would require a conscious and iron will to temper.

  And though he wasn’t gentle with her, he nonetheless reined that vital strength. He handled her body with hunger, yet despite that starkly savage need he had not once hurt her.

  He had washed her hair, soaping and rinsing, his long fingers so pleasurable she almost purred aloud. Then, luminous eyes intent, utterly silent, he began stroking her body slowly. Leaning back against him, her eyes closed, Katrina felt the slippery caress of his hands as they lingeringly soaped her swelling, aching breasts, and hot shivers coursed through her.

  Her hands went back by reflex to brace herself, and her fingers closed over the hard muscles of his thighs, clenching when his caresses moved down over her ribs and stomach. The pulsing ache between her legs was a sweet torment, and when his palm covered her she almost collapsed, moaning.

  Skye muttered something, low and rough, and abruptly turned her around to face him. He pulled her hard against him, his hands sliding down her back to her buttocks, lifting her. Katrina felt the cool tile wall against her back, and her body responded instantly, as always, to his potent urgency. Her legs parted for him jerkily, and her strangled cry lost itself in his mouth as he thrust violently into her.

  She clung to him, half sobbing at the almost punishing force her body accepted and craved more of. And even as the hot friction of their passion pushed them rapidly to the brink and over, she faced the stark truth that what she felt for him was more than love, far more basic than desire. He was her match, her mate, she belonged to him body and spirit, and her woman’s body had known that with the instant, soul-deep shock of recognition.

  He could destroy her.

  —

  Almost two hours later Katrina slipped from the wildly mussed bed and found a terry robe in her closet, being as quiet as possible so she wouldn’t wake Skye. He was sleeping deeply, his lean face relaxed and vulnerable, and she paused to look at him for a long moment before leaving the bedroom and easing the door closed behind her.

  A glance at the wall clock in her kitchenette told her it was mid-afternoon, and a pang from her stomach told her she was hungry. Her cupboard, however, was somewhat bare since it was easier for her to eat most of her meals in the hotel’s restaurants. She returned to the den and called room service, ordering coffee and food. Plenty of it.

  Skye was still asleep when the order arrived, but he came out of the bedroom a few minutes later, wearing only his jeans, to find Katrina curled up on a corner of the couch sipping coffee.

  He leaned over the back of the couch and tipped her face up with one hand, kissing her. “Hello,” he said. “You taste of coffee, sweetheart.”

  She lifted her cup in a small salute, smiling. “I ordered some food. We missed lunch.”

  “That,” he said, “is a matter of opinion. But I am hungry. Have you eaten yet?”

  “No. I waited for you.” She watched him move over to the cart holding covered dishes, and a pang sharper than any she’d ever known made her catch her breath in silent anguish.

  What was it Dane had said? That his brother needed someone to care for him so that he’d stop and think before risking his neck? Her love for him went through her like a knife, and she gritted her teeth to hold back the wild cry.

  I care!

  Chapter 5

  “Are you going to invite me to move in here with you?” he asked bluntly a while later as they moved away from the small table in her kitchen.

  Katrina had her back to him, and she was glad of that. She went to one of the wide windows and stood gazing out on the huge park spread out below. After a moment, infusing her voice with dryness, she said, “Are you going to wait for an invitation?”

  “No.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  “You don’t have to tell me my manners are rotten.” There was a pause, and then he moved up behind her and slid his arms around her, pulling her back against him. And his voice was no longer amused when he said, “Ask me to stay, Trina.”

  She wondered vaguely if there would ever come a time when she didn’t go weak at his simplest touch, and knew the answer. Some last vestige of pride made her voice light. “I suppose it would be stupid to keep your room when it isn’t needed. And Hagen won’t be surprised; I hear he’s come to expect his agents to get involved with women.”

  “Damn Hagen.” Skye turned her around, his hands hard on her shoulders. “Are you saying you don’t want me here?”

  She gazed up into his intense violet eyes, again baffled by the searching look they contained. Still clinging to her shred of dignity, she managed a laugh. “You know the truth of that, and why should I deny it? Don’t worry, though, Skye. This passion of ours is too powerful to last very long. It’ll burn itself out quite soon, I expect.”

  His mouth tightened. “Do you?”

  Katrina smiled easily, the outward calm hiding her desperate inner struggle to hold on to something she could be left with when he was gone. Even if it would only be pride. “Naturally. Any fire dies once the fuel is gone. Without love, passion doesn’t last.” She winced when his hands tightened.

  “So wise,” he mocked her harshly. “Experience, Trina?”

  Katrina felt a flicker of pain even though she was too familiar by now with his suspicious nature to be much hurt by it. “I told you there hasn’t been anyone else.”

  “And I believed you. I wonder if I should have.”

  She gazed at him steadily. “That’s up to you.”

  His hands lifted to her face as they so often did, holding her still for his searching scrutiny as if she were trying to esca
pe him. “Where do you go?” he muttered.

  She blinked, but couldn’t answer the question even if she’d understood it. He kissed her before she could speak, his mouth hot and demanding. Katrina had been conscious of a languid physical weariness until then, but at the first touch of his lips, sharp energy went through her like a jolt of electricity and her body came alive. She felt it all over, her breasts swelling, nipples tightening, a burst of heat deep in her belly, and her legs went weak and began trembling.

  In an abrupt movement Skye ended the kiss, raising his head and staring down at her. His nostrils were flaring in a look that was almost savage, and when he released her and stepped back, his vivid eyes raked her body in a hard appraisal.

  Katrina knew that her thin terry robe hid little, that her body’s response to him was obvious. She put out a hand to the window frame to steady herself, looking at him with helpless longing. Did his hard face soften? She couldn’t be sure.

  “Now ask me to stay,” he ordered in a dark and velvety voice.

  “Stay.” It was less a question than a plea, and her voice was almost inaudible, shaking. He could, she thought dimly, have the triumph if he wanted it.

  Skye lifted one hand and cupped her cheek briefly. “I’ll go and get my things.” He turned away from her and, without bothering to put on shoes or a shirt, left her suite.

  She stood where she was for a long moment. It was odd, she thought, but he hadn’t seemed triumphant at her total inability to withstand him. Satisfied, yes, but mixed with that very male complacency had been something else, something she couldn’t identify. Hurt? But that didn’t make sense…unless he was beginning to care for her.

  Katrina felt her heart almost stop. Was it possible? He was too complex to read easily; despite his quick temper and seemingly volatile mood swings, she knew that much of Skye lay beneath his compelling surface. Six years before he had been quick to voice his love, even impetuous in his words and actions, sweeping her along on an irresistible tide. But this older, more complicated man, she thought, was far more guarded and wary than he had been then. She had hurt him badly once, and even if she had somehow managed to touch his heart this time, he wouldn’t be quick to admit it.

  The realization gave Katrina a surge of hope, until she remembered what he had said to her only days before.

  I did everything I could to forget you. Everything. But nothing worked, and I hated myself for that. You’ve been my own personal demon for six years, Katrina, locked inside me too deeply to be torn out.

  Her hope faded. He had talked of obsession, she thought, not love. And he had not said or done anything since then to make those words meaningless. He had asked for a second chance, yes, and had bided his time with unusual patience. And he was clearly determined to make certain she couldn’t ignore her own need for him. But no word of caring had passed his lips, and he had neither made promises nor asked for any.

  I hated myself for that.

  Could she ever be anything to him except an obsessive need he was bent on ridding himself of?

  Katrina shook off the painful question and went slowly into her bedroom. She remade the bed with fresh linens and picked up the clothing still lying haphazardly on the floor. His shirt smelled of him, faintly musky, and she wanted to bury her face in it.

  Idiot. The inner scorn was unreal, and she knew it. She felt greedy in her love, desperate to take everything she could, to store memories in her mind and heart. Grimly she hung on to the thread of pride, determined to survive this if she could.

  She changed into shorts and a thin blouse, then called down to have the room service cart taken away. It was a momentary temptation to ask to have her kitchen stocked, a luxury provided by the hotel that she had rarely taken advantage of, but the mental images that evoked made her resist. She and Skye weren’t living together, she reminded herself fiercely. They weren’t married. He was just staying in her suite for the duration of his assignment. Period. And she refused to be coy, to paint an illusion of domesticity by pandering to a little-woman-in-the-kitchen image.

  A sudden memory brought her sense of humor to the rescue before she could get bogged down in self-pity; she wouldn’t have been in the kitchen anyway. Unless he had forgotten more in six years than she had learned, Skye was a much better cook than she was.

  She wandered around restlessly for a while after the room service waiter left. Then an abrupt thought sent her to the telephone, and she called the hotel’s switchboard. “Megan, if there are any calls for Mr. Prescott, put them through to this number, will you?”

  “Sure, Katrina.” Megan giggled suddenly. “As a matter of fact, he already called me about that. Some women have all the luck!”

  Katrina, who had kept her voice calm and dignified, cleared her throat and said, “Well, thanks, Megan,” and quickly hung up. She sat staring at the phone, uncertain if she was amused or annoyed by Skye’s swift action. Possession, she wondered, or professionalism? Had he been determined to alert the entire hotel via the talkative switchboard operator that he had moved in, or had he taken that step simply out of a good agent’s precaution?

  Ten minutes later, watching as he methodically unpacked in her bedroom, she had to know. “I thought Hagen might try to call you, so I phoned the switchboard. It seems you had the same thought. Megan all but congratulated me.”

  He straightened with his shaving kit in his hand and turned toward the bathroom, saying, “You’re a fallen woman now.”

  Katrina stared after him, irritated by the satisfaction in his calm voice. She went to her dresser and began shifting some of her clothing to make room for his. “You didn’t have to shout it to the whole place,” she muttered.

  Coming back into the bedroom, he patted her on the fanny as he passed. “No?”

  She glared at his reflection in the mirror for a moment, but his quick smile disarmed her. He was in a better mood than he had been, she realized, and wondered if she’d ever fathom him. “No,” she returned, but in a milder voice. “It may interest you to know that it’s a well-known fact I don’t sleep with guests, much less when they haven’t been here a week.”

  He shrugged, but he was still smiling. “Bets have been on for two days now. I just thought somebody should win the kitty.”

  This time Katrina turned around to stare at him rather than at his reflection. “What?”

  “Sure.” His eyes were gleaming with amusement. “I wasn’t supposed to know, but Dane told me about it yesterday. One of the room service waiters saw him practicing a crooked deal and asked if he liked betting pools. By the way, the odds were running strongly in my favor.”

  She didn’t know whether to swear or laugh. “Are you telling me that the staff has been betting on your chances of getting me into bed?”

  “Yes. And they must have seen something I didn’t; until this morning, I was almost ready to bet against me.”

  Katrina bit her lip, staring at him, then suddenly laughed. “Would you like to wager that Gigi didn’t start it?”

  Skye was looking at her intently, a different, softer smile playing around his firm lips. “No. Dane taught me long ago never to bet against a sure thing.”

  Without having noticed either her own laugh or his reaction to it, she shook her head and stepped over to pick up a pile of his shirts lying on the bed. “I’ll have to ask Gigi who won,” she said dryly. “It should be interesting.”

  He watched her place the shirts in a drawer, conscious of a deep surge of satisfaction. His shirts lying beside a stack of her T-shirts, his shaving gear set firmly among her perfumes and bath soaps. He had forced her to accept his presence here, and he damned well meant to put down roots and make sure she realized it. If he had to shake her loose from that secret place inside her head a dozen times a day, he’d do it.

  And it wasn’t just passion that made her unable to hide from him, though that was a surefire method and one he was prepared to use ruthlessly. Temper did it as well. She had been annoyed by his presumptuous order to have his
calls routed to her number; her lovely eyes had flickered with irritation and there had been a definite snap in her voice. She had laughed too, reluctantly amused by the knowledge that the hotel’s staff had placed bets on the state of her virtue.

  She had laughed.

  Skye reached out suddenly and pulled her into his arms, smiling down at her when her arms went instantly around his neck. “Why did you get dressed?” he asked.

  Katrina flushed slightly and cleared her throat. “Well, I felt a bit ridiculous wearing my robe in the middle of the afternoon,” she explained.

  “I should hope you would.” He began exploring the soft flesh of her throat. “You’d better wear nothing at all.”

  She caught her breath. “Is that an order?”

  “Yes,” he said, unbuttoning her blouse with deliberation.

  Katrina thought vaguely about telling him he couldn’t order her around, but it didn’t seem very important. And when his big hands slid inside her opened blouse, she forgot to think at all.

  —

  It was after midnight when Skye eased from the bed and dressed silently without turning on the lights. He was reluctant to leave Katrina even for a couple of hours, but after spending all day and half the night with her, his professional responsibilities were beginning to nag at him.

  He had decided on the Ferris wheel: it was time to set the stage and prepare it for Hagen’s inspection.

  He had left his briefcase by the door, and picked it up on his way out. The hotel was peaceful, though there were still people stirring in the lobby, and he took care to make his exit unobtrusive. Dressed in the dark clothing he wore habitually, even when he wasn’t skulking at night, Skye moved away from the hotel building, avoiding lighted paths. There was a locked gate between the hotel grounds and the park entrance; he had a key and used it swiftly.

  Fifteen minutes later he was kneeling beside the lowest car of the Ferris wheel. The lack of bright light didn’t hinder him since he had excellent night vision, and he quickly got his briefcase opened. He started to reach into the case and then froze, all his senses flaring. He had heard nothing, but—