Hard As You Can

by Laura Kaye

  “Really?” Maybe where he was from. Then again, she worked in a strip club. Dancing was something people did to make money. So, okay, maybe her view of dancing was a bit jaded.

  “Absolutely. Ask anybody.” The song faded away, followed by the announcement of a Southern rock station’s call sign. A new song started, and Shane turned to her with a smile. “Dance with me.”

  Crystal peered up at him without the slightest idea how to respond. Because her body was saying hell, yes!, while her brain was screaming bad idea, really, really bad idea.

  He stepped closer, arms raised, expression full of all kinds of invitation.

  The next thing she knew, her right hand was in his and her left had slipped around his neck. Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod, ran over and over in her mind. What am I doing?

  But then he tucked her hand against his chest and tugged her against him with the hand that settled at her lower back. And the closeness stole her breath.

  He moved them to the beat of the song, a slow, sexy, bluesy number she didn’t know but would never forget. Some songs carried memories like the images were imprinted upon the very lyrics themselves, and she had no doubt this would be one of them.

  All of a sudden, the air in the room felt ten degrees warmer. As they swayed to the beat, Shane’s body pressed against hers from thighs to chest. With every step and move and turn, Crystal’s breasts rubbed against the hard plane of his chest. Strong hands held and guided her body, making her want to feel them explore her everywhere. Arousal rose like a waking dragon inside her. Cautious. Curious. Dangerous.

  This was wrong and stupid on so many levels. But, scary as it was, it felt so freaking good that she couldn’t force herself to pull away.

  One song. It’s just a dance. Just a dance just a dance just a dance.

  And, holy crap, she wasn’t the only one aroused.

  Against her belly, Shane hardened.

  Crystal sucked in a breath, and he pressed his lips close to her ear. “We’re just dancing here. That’s all. I promise,” he said.

  But the adrenaline was already in her blood, setting her to a trembling she couldn’t control. Part curious interest and part instinctive fear.

  “Sshh,” he almost cooed. “Just dancing.”

  The echo of her own thoughts from a moment before allowed her to draw a breath that almost calmed. They turned and swayed to the music, moving closer, pressing tighter, Shane’s lips so close to her face that she could feel his breath shudder across her cheekbone.

  He was a fire she had no business playing with. She knew that even as she leaned her face against his . . . and got exactly what she’d hoped for.

  He kissed her.

  Just a brush of his lips against her cheek, but a kiss all the same.

  And as much as it made her head spin, it was the little catch of breath in the back of his throat that sent a jolt of electricity down her spine to settle low in her belly. Light as a feather, he caressed her cheek, her temple, her ear with his lips. With him, always such gentleness, so different from almost every other sexual experience she’d ever had. It made her feel safe to allow this to continue.

  Between them, his erection was firm, long, totally unyielding. She shivered, caught between interest and fear, desire a river moving faster and faster inside her. The whole experience was a revelation—that her body had the capacity to respond this way, that a person existed who could pull these reactions from her.

  For a moment, she gave herself over to the dizzying sensations. In her mind’s eye, she saw them undressing, fumbling their way back the hall, falling naked and wanting on the bed. What would it be like, just once, to take something that she wanted without worrying about anyone else, without being afraid? Just one wild, secret night, all for her? What would Shane be like?

  The way the room started spinning around her made it clear Crystal wasn’t really up to finding that out. Not that it mattered. Because it would never happen anyway.

  Crystal had been so deep into Shane, she didn’t hear the song ending. The moment of silence before the next song began captured her awareness, made her realize what she’d been doing—what she’d been wanting to do—and she gasped and jerked her face away from Shane’s worshipful lips.

  “I know I can’t stay,” he said as if reading her mind. “Just give me one more song.”

  That was two songs more than she should’ve ever agreed to. She knew it. But that didn’t stop her from nodding yes as the next song, a harder, faster, rock song with a driving beat, filled the room around them.

  SHANE WAS WELL aware he was wandering off the reservation, but damnit all to hell and back, Crystal was pushing every one of his buttons. Her soft, warm body pressed against his. Her hands held him tight. Her gaze was an open book, begging him to stay, pleading with him to kiss her again, but also making it clear that those desires scared the hell out of her.

  No part of his plan had been about seducing her. He didn’t use sex to manipulate female informants. Ever. The music had been about blocking any listening devices that might’ve been planted in her apartment. And the dancing had been about getting them close enough to communicate despite the tunes.

  It might’ve been an unnecessary precaution, but it didn’t seem too great a stretch to think that whoever she was afraid of, whoever had hit her, whoever had given her reason to believe that Shane would be willing to do that, too, might be controlling enough to keep tabs on her. Even in her home.

  And, given that his bathroom visit had been a cover for planting a few bugs of his own—one in the handset of her bedroom landline, one on the molding above the bathroom door, and one just now on the side of the stereo blocked by a collection of picture frames—he had surveillance on the brain.

  Except her touch, her heat, her closeness has chased his rational mind into a corner until all he could do was feel.

  As Crystal swayed with him to the music, her fingers softly, maybe even unconsciously, stroking the skin of his neck, he felt like a total prick for violating her space that way. And none of the good rationales made that feeling go away. Not that she was their best lead for learning what was going on inside Confessions. Not that his gut told him she wouldn’t open up, at least not yet. Not that the devices might give him the ability to help Crystal and Jenna if some bad shit ever went down here.

  In her beautiful, hesitant expression, he could see the war playing out inside her. To trust him or kick him to the curb. To push him away or pull him tighter. To accept his help or reinforce the fortress of walls she’d clearly built around her. And he knew those bugs were a risk.

  In the final analysis, though, he’d done right by his team.

  But that fact wasn’t doing near enough to stuff a sock in the piehole of his guilty conscience.

  Unthinkingly, Shane pressed his lips against the shell of her ear. His mouth went dry, and he had to restrain the urge to taste her there. To taste her everywhere. Goddamn. “What’s your last name, Crystal?” he finally managed.

  “What? Oh.” Pause. “Roberts. Crystal Roberts.”

  Annnd there it was. The hesitation, the touch of perspiration on her hand, her pulse kicking up everywhere they touched. He didn’t know who Roberts was, but it wasn’t her. The lie didn’t surprise him one bit, though. Just meant he’d read her right.

  “Well, I really need your help, Crystal Roberts. Before I go, can I ask you a few things?”

  The question shot tension through her body, but Shane kept them moving to the beat of the song. “I don’t know.”

  “Fair enough. My asking doesn’t mean you have to answer. Just remember that, okay?”

  “Okay,” she said, skepticism coloring her voice.

  “Do you know why Church was holding my friend hostage?” he whispered against her ear.

  “No.”

  Truth.

  He nodded, his cheek brushing hers. “Do you know who Church was supposed to meet with last night at Confessions?”

  She shook her head, inserting a tiny pa
use. “No.”

  Also truth. Though his gut told him she knew something even if it wasn’t who.

  “You’re doing great. Just a few more. Were they holding anyone else with my friend?”

  There went her pulse again. “Uh, no,” she said, though there was an upward lilt on the end of that last word that gave it the hint of a question.

  “Are you sure?”

  “He was the only one I saw,” she said, anger swirling into her tone.

  Truth. And it was clear Crystal was practiced at answering questions in their most narrow constructs so that, in absolute terms, she could tell the truth.

  Shane nodded. “Okay, okay. Just stick with me. Now, this next one’s a doozy. There’s no way to ask it without just asking it.”

  She released a shaky breath. “What?”

  Their voices remained soft, hidden under the musical umbrella of the song. The conversation was holding Crystal on the very edge of her tolerance for risk. Shane could feel the truth of that in her touch, in her reactions, in her very physiology. But he had to ask. “Is Church involved in trafficking girls?”

  Sure enough, the tension in her sweet body ratcheted up under his hands. “I’m just a waitress.”

  “I know,” he said, keeping his voice soft, calm.

  “Why do you care?” she asked, still dodging the question. And, in so doing, giving him the answer.

  Sadness slinked through his gut at the realization that, in her world, caring was apparently so rare it was noteworthy, and maybe even suspect. He didn’t need the firsthand experience of Molly’s loss to be outraged that women were bought and sold like commodities on a shelf. He cared because he was a human being who couldn’t stand injustice. And because he was a soldier who had the skills, training, and knowledge to do something about it. “ ’Cause maybe I could help.”

  She scoffed. “I can’t decide if you’re crazy or have a death wish.”

  He shrugged. “Both have been asserted by my very best friends, so you’d be in good company either way.” Shane dipped his head until he could look Crystal in the eyes. Fear and panic danced in those green depths. “What does he do with the girls?”

  She shook her head.

  “You’re just a waitress.”

  She nodded. The song—their dance—was seconds from ending.

  “I know.” He cupped her cheek in his hand, careful not to push against the bloom of red on the fine bone below her eye. “One more question then, because I’m almost out of time. Can you tell me about the delivery taking place Wednesday night?”

  For less than an instant, her gaze widened. “No.”

  There was that precision again. He winked. “Let me rephrase. What do you know about the delivery taking place Wednesday night?”

  “I . . . don’t know.”

  “I might have gotten my friend back, but he’s still in danger, Crystal. This meeting might be the key to something for him. For both of us.” He let the question hang there, then . . . silence. Their song ended. For a moment, it seemed perhaps she hadn’t noticed, because she kept moving. So he did, too. A commercial came on. An obnoxious car salesman shouted about sales and interest rates and zero down payments.

  “Oh,” she said, just noticing the change. Her arms withdrew from his body, and he missed her touch everywhere though she didn’t actually step away.

  “Well, our song’s over.” He reached for her hand but let her be the one to actually make contact. After a moment, she slipped her fingers into his palm. Shane lifted her hand to his mouth and let his lips linger against the smooth skin on the back of her hand. Without warning, he flipped her hand over and placed a small silver cell phone into her loose grip. “There’s a single number programmed into it. It comes directly to me,” Shane said quietly, patting the phone in his pocket. “It’s a brand-new prepaid, so it’s clean.”

  Her gaze lit on the rectangular device like it was a snake that might rear back and bite her.

  Shane wrapped her fingers around it, relished the skin-on-skin contact for one last moment, then gently let her go. “Thank you for the dance. And the conversation. If you—or Jenna—need anything, use that.” He nodded toward her hand.

  Crystal gaped at him, only now her face was a lot less readable. But by God, she was a beautiful little thing. Hair like a low, warm fire on a cool winter’s night. Skin like peaches and cream. Curves meant to be traced and gripped.

  Stepping to her side, he brushed a kiss on her cheek. Without saying a word, he crossed the small room to the door. Man, he hoped he was playing this right. But he feared if he kept pushing, he’d send her fight-or-flight response into overdrive. And then those walls would go up high, hard, and fast in a way he might never be able to counteract. Backing off seemed the only way to go.

  He gripped the doorknob.

  “Hey . . .”

  “Yeah?” he said, smiling over his shoulder.

  Her mouth moved, but no sound came out. She cleared her throat, and the whisper that came out was nearly inaudible. “Thanks for helping me with Jenna.”

  He gave a single nod. And then he walked out the door.

  Chapter 6

  Shane planted himself in the shadows across the parking lot from Crystal’s apartment. Would she leave? Would someone arrive? He couldn’t pull himself away for the night without seeing if there would be any discernible repercussions of his visit.

  A half hour passed, and everything remained quiet. From the outside at least. Then, one by one, the lights inside the apartment went out and the windows went dark. It was after 1:30 a.m., after all. The lateness and the darkness and the quiet were all perfect for the last thing Shane needed to do before he left.

  He crossed the lot and the scrubby grass in front of Crystal’s building, then circled the building to the rear. Bingo. The electrical, phone, and cable wiring congregated down the back of the brickwork at one corner. Shane retrieved the receiver-transmitters and Swiss Army knife tool set from the side pocket on his thigh and made quick work of wiring up the units so Marz could collect the feed from the devices he’d planted.

  At the middle window above him, a dull glow just hinted at light behind the curtains, and Shane could almost picture the small lamp on Jenna’s nightstand. Had Crystal gone back in to check on her? Or did Jenna need help again?

  The latter question flooded a restlessness through him he really had no business feeling. Didn’t mean he could make it go away, though.

  Best solution was to bug out.

  Shane ghosted through the night-darkened backyards to the side street on which he’d left his truck. For shits and giggles, he drove a circuit through the apartment complex and around the immediate neighborhood surrounding Crystal’s place. Not that he ever expected to need the intel he gathered, but in his world there truly was no such thing as too much information.

  He spent the ride home analyzing all his interactions with Crystal Roberts. The lie about the surname had him wondering about the first name, too. She did work in a strip club, after all. Didn’t most of the dancers take stage names? Though she wasn’t a dancer, at least not that he’d seen so far.

  An image of Crystal onstage, dressed more scantily than ever before, crawled unbidden into Shane’s brain. Moving that lithe body to the music. Gyrating around a pole. Removing clothing piece by tantalizing piece. While every man in the audience eye-fucked her—

  “Sonofabitch,” Shane bit out in the quiet of the cab. He shook his head and forced the image out. Focus, McCallan. He had no right to have an opinion about what she did or didn’t do anyway. So what did it matter to him?

  Buuullshit, a little voice said inside his head.

  “Fantastic,” he muttered. Because his subconscious was clearly aware of something he was working his ass off to ignore—that a nascent sense of investment, of responsibility was taking root where Crystal and her sister were concerned. Mission or no.

  Twenty-five minutes later, Shane reached the driveway along the side of Hard Ink. Pressing the button
on the black rectangular clicker he’d received just this afternoon caused the chain-link gate blocking the drive to swing inward, clearing his entrance to the parking lot beyond. His tires crunched over the gravel, and the truck’s movement set off the new motion-sensor lights. Had they really just installed all of that this morning? Seemed like days ago. Or maybe that was just his exhaustion speaking.

  Because Shane couldn’t remember the last time he’d woken up in the morning feeling fully rested.

  As he crossed the lot to the back door, he blew a kiss and flicked the bird to the closest security camera. He could imagine Marz’s laughter—as well as the few choice words he was probably saying in reply.

  Shane keyed himself in, passed the locked door to the long-closed tattoo shop, and jogged up the cement steps to the second-floor landing. He went straight to the gym, wondering who might be up that he could debrief at this hour.

  Marz and Nick sat around Marz’s desk in the far corner. Both men’s gazes cut toward him as he stepped into the room.

  “Hey,” Shane said, crossing the wide space.

  “Wassup, my brother? Besides your middle finger? Where’s the love?” Marz said, reclining in his chair. He was the picture of ease, with his hands laced behind his head and his feet propped on the desk, the prosthesis his cargo shorts exposed crossed over his ankle.

  “Blew ya a kiss, too,” Shane said, grinning.

  “You know I can’t handle these mixed signals.” Marz winked.

  “How’d it go?” Nick said, rising from where he’d been propped against the desk’s edge. “Make any headway with the waitress?”

  She’s not just a waitress. Shane forced himself to dial back the irritation Nick’s label had unleashed. Crystal was a waitress. It was just that, in the few hours he’d spent with her, he’d also learned she was so much more. A survivor. A sister. A caregiver. A fighter. And Shane suspected he’d only scratched the surface.

  But if he spilled any of this personal reaction toward her instead of speaking about her like the operational asset she was, Nick’s radar would sound off all over the place. “A little. Not as much as I hoped, but I laid some good groundwork. And, I managed to get us some ears inside her place, too. Whatever good that may do.”