by Lora Leigh
Free. He shoved her behind him, staring at Nathan carefully as rage flickered in his eyes a second before he slumped back to the wall.
“And here I thought he would have the nerve to kill if he found the chance.”
Kell swung around, pushing Emily behind him again to stare down the wrong end of the pistol Jansen Clay was holding on them.
“Son of a bitch!” Kell cursed. “I’m just about getting sick of having you in my fucking face, Jansen. There are two teams of SEALs out there. Do you really think you’re going to get away this time?”
“Only the three of you know about me.” Jansen shrugged. “I kill you and it’s over with.”
“Wrong.” Kell took great satisfaction in watching Jansen’s eyes narrow almost fearfully. “We knew who had her. We tracked your wife to that chateau in Switzerland. She’s being picked up by American agents even as we speak.”
He felt Emily behind him, her slender fingers gripping the Beretta he had tucked into the back of his pants. Fear slammed into his gut.
“It doesn’t matter,” Jansen stated quietly. “Without witnesses, it will be very hard to prove. You can watch your friend die, then die yourself as I take Emily.”
The gun turned on Nathan as Jansen’s finger tightened on the trigger, and the little fox that Kell would have sworn would never hurt a fly fired the weapon from his side.
Point-blank at the center of Jansen Clay’s chest.
The gun dropped from Jansen’s fingers, his hand covering the wound as he turned his surprised gaze back to Emily.
“I didn’t hurt you,” he whispered in shock. “I was going to save you . . .” He lifted his hand and stared at the blood staining it before his gaze returned to Emily. “I was coming for you—”
He collapsed to the floor as Captain Malone and Commander Charles rushed into the room.
“Em.” Kell jerked around, prepared to snatch the gun from her nerveless fingers, prepared for the horror in her eyes. What he saw instead sent a surge of heat rushing through his veins. Her gaze was clear; only a glimmer of remorse touched the blue depths as she deftly turned her wrist, holding the gun, barrel pointing down, out to him.
“Monsters don’t deserve to live,” she said calmly. “I won’t lose any sleep over killing him.”
He took the gun carefully, tucked it in the band of his pants again then jerked her into his arms, holding her close, feeling his throat tighten with the emotion that suddenly filled it.
“God, I love you,” he whispered.
Kissing her brow, Kell sighed deeply before releasing her just enough to turn and watch the men swarming into the room. The medics had come prepared for Nathan, but Kell wondered if anything could put the man together again.
He was slumped against the wall, naked, his eyes filled with madness as he glared at Jansen’s dead body. His muscles twitched spasmodically, his once-strong body nearly emaciated.
“Nathan?” The captain moved slowly into the room, staring at his nephew as tears filled his light blue eyes. “Boy, you’re slacking off. Did I give you permission to rest?” Malone’s tone snapped with strength.
Nathan jerked, dragging the blanket closer as he tried to struggle to his feet.
“Do you walk out of here or do we carry you?” the captain barked.
“Make him stop.” Emily flinched at the tone. “Please, Kell.”
“No, Emily. If he doesn’t walk out of here, he’ll never have a chance of surviving.” He held her close, watching as a glimmer of sanity returned to Nathan’s eyes as he struggled to come to attention.
“Boy. I said do we carry you out?” the captain yelled.
“No, sir.” Nathan shook his head. “No, sir.”
“On your feet.”
Nathan struggled to his feet, securing the blanket around his hips.
“Sir.” He weaved. “On my feet.”
“You will walk to that helicopter outside. You will submit yourself to the medic standing by. Are we clear, Lieutenant Malone?”
Nathan shuddered, shivered, but his head tilted before wobbling on his shoulders.
“Sir. Understood.” His voice was weak as he moved. One foot in front of the other. A harsh frown creasing his brow.
The captain’s eyes gleamed with dampness as his nephew neared him.
“Sir.” Nathan paused beside him.
“Yes, Lieutenant.” The captain firmed his shaking lips.
“Sir. I could use a crutch.” His knees gave way, but the captain was there, his arms going around the taller man’s bony body, holding him to him as he shook with silent sobs.
“I have you, son,” he whispered. “I’ll be your crutch.”
Kell watched as they moved through the doorway, nephew and uncle.
His arms tightened around Emily as his gaze was drawn once again to Jansen’s dead body.
“Those gun lessons came in handy,” he murmured.
“Yeah, they did.” Her voice was shaky now, but hell, he was shaky, Kell thought. “And I won’t lose a moment’s sleep over it.”
He met her eyes and saw an understanding there he hadn’t expected. One he wouldn’t have asked for, because the warrior inside him wouldn’t be denied. But she understood. For the first time, he thought, she understood why he and her father had gone off to war, why they had risked their lives and the happiness of those they left behind.
To give innocence a chance.
“You two ready to go home?” the senator asked from the doorway. “We’re going to be doing a lot of explaining.”
“Home sounds damned good.” Emily sighed. “Real damned good.”
“Have they picked up Elaine?” Kell asked the senator.
“They took her into custody a while ago.” Richard grimaced. “We sent agents to the hospital Risa was admitted to and had her forcibly removed and taken to Bethesda. She was in bad shape.”
Kell felt the shaky breath Emily drew in.
“Jansen let the guards rape her on the plane the first time we were kidnapped,” she whispered, tears choking her voice. “She’ll need help.”
Richard nodded. “And she’ll get it. Come on, children, let’s load up. I’m just getting too damned old for this shit.”
He wasn’t the only one. Kell swung Emily into his arms, holding her close to his chest as she buried her face against him and let her tears fall free.
She had been strong. So damned strong. She hadn’t even hesitated to take Clay out. The single shot had pierced the other man’s heart and exploded from his back. At close range, cold as ice and madder than hell, his kitten had taken her vengeance despite his wishes to the contrary.
“Okay?” He cradled her in his arms as the helicopter lifted from Clay’s seaside home.
She nodded. “Tired though. Very tired.”
“Sleep, baby.” He kissed her forehead. “Just sleep and I’ll take care of everything else. I promise. I’ll take care of it all.”
Twenty-nine
SHE DIDN’T HAVE NIGHTMARES. IT was twelve hours before she collapsed into a bed only barely aware of Kell moving onto the mattress beside her and pulling her into his arms. There were no nightmares. She slept deep and undisturbed until a kiss feathered across her lips.
Emily felt the blankets easing slowly from her body as Kell kissed her with an aching hunger she had never known from him. Gentle kisses, soft nips at her lips, the lick of his tongue over the rounded curves as he pulled her closer to him.
“Emily.” He breathed her name into the kiss. “Wake up for me, baby.”
His hands moved over her body, sliding over her skin and setting off flares of pleasure that overwhelmed her awakening mind.
She had to touch him. To lean into his kiss, to soak up the heat and power that was so much a part of him. She needed him. Here and now, before he had time to remember the world outside and to walk away from her.
Struggling in his hold, she pushed him to his back, aware he was lying against the pillow now only because he wanted to. Whatever the reaso
n, she rose over him, her eyes opening in drowsy heat to stare into the brilliance of his.
So green. His sun-darkened expression was different. Stronger. More intent than she had ever seen before.
“No condom,” she moaned. “I want to feel you. All of you.”
“We’ll make babies, Emily,” he whispered back. “Beautiful little babies.”
Emily froze, her hands splayed against his shoulders.
She could feel herself shaking then, a fine tremor beginning in her heart and spreading through her body.
“Babies mean forever,” she whispered as he lifted her above him, parting her thighs until she straddled his hips.
“So does love,” he said, guiding his hard cock to nudge against the damp folds between her thighs. “Love is forever, Emily. And I love you. Forever.”
He eased inside her. The thick crest parted her vagina, fiery warmth began to invade her body.
His lips caught hers as his cock impaled her, easing in to the hilt as the breath caught in her throat and she swore her eyes crossed at the pleasure.
“You ran me to ground.” He smiled against her lips as he turned her onto her back before his lips moved to her neck, her shoulder. “I’m yours, Emily. I’ve always been yours.”
His lips moved to her breast, covering a nipple, sipping at it with greedy hunger as his hips began to move, sliding his cock through the slick portal he possessed, sending sensation and exquisite pleasure to build and consume.
Lifting to him, Emily’s arms went around his shoulders, her lips to his neck, tasting him, feeling him.
Heat poured from his body, from hers. It was like this each time they touched, as though no part of her body had ever been cold. The fires of need carefully banked whenever he was away, always flared to life once she saw him again.
But the flares were building. Like fingers of wicked, white-hot pleasure they rushed through her, snapping and zapping over tender nerve endings, sensitizing her, building the pleasure until she was crying out for him, begging for more.
“Ah, chère,” he groaned in her ear. “You move like silk against me.”
Her legs tightened around his thrusting hips as he fucked her harder, deeper. The way she liked it, with desperate demand, without control.
His hips churned above her, thrust and impaled, driving his cock into the tightening muscles of her pussy as she fought to hold back, to milk every particle of sensation, every microsecond of hunger swirling around them.
“I love you, chère,” he whispered at her ear, his voice gasping, thick, rough. “With a soul I didn’t believe I possessed, I love you. Always, Emily.”
“I love you.” Her eyes opened as his head lifted from her breast and his eyes snared her. “I love you—Kell—love you.”
She was screaming as sensation overtook her now. The orgasm ripped through her, tore through nerve endings, spasmed in her womb, and as she felt his sperm flooding her pussy, she went higher.
Past and future disintegrated. Her mind disintegrated. It melted beneath the heat and the power of release. Her release, his release. The completion of it seared her soul even as he whispered his love again. Vowed it, swore it. Kell collapsed over her, catching his weight on his elbows as his chest heaved with the need for oxygen and something inside his soul seemed to tear free. As though facing what he felt for her, facing her with it, had somehow torn free the shadows that had held him for so many years.
With his dick still semihard inside her, the first wave of hunger sated, he lifted his head from the pillow beside her and found his gaze snared by hers.
Sweet, soft sapphire. Her gaze was filled with emotion, with love. It was soft with gentleness, filled with satiation.
“Say it again,” she whispered, her fingers trembling as they lifted to his lips, touching them, like heated silk.
“I love you.” He spoke the words against the pads of her fingers, watching the tears well and overflow her eyes, the glistening moisture tracking down her flushed cheeks.
“You love me.” Her lips trembled.
“I love you, Emily.”
“No more condom fetish?”
“No more condom fetish, Emily.” He nipped at the pads of her fingers. “Just the two of us.”
He was fully erect once more, his sensitive cock surrounded by the milking heat of her pussy as he began to move again.
“Babies?” she whispered.
“When you’re ready.” His throat tightened with fear as he leaned his forehead against hers. “Be patient with me, sweetheart. A step at a time.”
“A step at a time.” Her breath caught as her eyes began to daze. “Oh God, Kell—” She lifted to him, her hips moving beneath him, churning, writhing, as her legs lifted to clasp his back once again.
She surrounded him, held him, warmed him.
“I love you,” she cried out.
She loved him.
“I treasure you,” he groaned into her neck. “With my life, my heart, my soul. I treasure you, Emily.”
As their breathing slowly returned to normal long minutes later, Kell rolled to his back, dragging Emily with him and staring down at her where she rested on his chest.
“So what now?” she asked, her gaze drowsy and replete, despite the questions he could see there.
“What do you mean?” He was almost hesitant to ask.
“It’s time to let the past go,” she whispered then. “All of it, Kell.”
He lifted his gaze from her, staring at the ceiling thoughtfully as he remembered his grandparents. The hope and pain in their eyes, the knowledge that they wouldn’t be around much longer. And Emily was right, it was time to let the past go.
“Feel like a trip to Louisiana?” he asked as he stared back down at her, anticipation suddenly filling him, a sense of rightness invading him.
Her smile lit up his heart. “Louisiana sounds wonderful, Kell.”
“I have to show Grand-père that I did indeed learn how to catch a fox.” He smirked then as he tugged at her hair. “He won’t believe me if you aren’t with me.”
“I’ll always be with you,” she promised.
And he believed because loving her meant believing. It meant trusting. And it meant life. It meant Kell Krieger was no longer alone.
Epilogue
IAN MOVED THROUGH THE SILENCE of the hospital. It was close to three in the morning, security was at its weakest now, and it was easy for him to slip into her room.
She was sleeping. He was grateful she wasn’t awake. Saying goodbye sucked. Hell, he had barely gotten to know her.
He moved to the bed, brushing the strands of black hair back from her pale face.
“I wanted to say goodbye,” he whispered as he stared down at her, his lips quirking at the faint frown that marred her brow. Hell, did she ever really rest? He was certain she didn’t.
“I wanted to tell you that I could have—” He winced. “I could have cared for you.”
She couldn’t hear him, and it was better that way. It made it easier to say the words rather than to just feel them.
“I didn’t want to leave without saying goodbye,” he said softly. “Without seeing you one more time.”
A frown flitted across her brow, her fingers moved restlessly beneath his.
“Goodbye, Agent Kira Porter.”
The Chameleon. She was one of Homeland Security’s best agents.
He leaned forward, his lips touching her brow in the faintest caress before he straightened and left the room. He moved quickly down the hall. He had wasted enough time, he had a meeting to keep.
As the elevator doors opened, he came face-to-face with Macey.
The other man was leaning against the back wall, his brown gaze brooding as Ian stepped into the elevator.
“You getting out?” He held the elevator doors open, praying Macey was there to check on Kira.
“Naw. I came to see you.” Macey crossed his arms over his chest and stared back at him.
Shit. He let the doors close
.
“I traced that last message,” Macey said. “It took a while. Almost two years, but I finally found you. You’re Judas.”
Ian stared at the elevator doors.
“Tell me what the fuck is going on, Ian. We’re buddies, man. Help me out here.”
Ian shoved his hands into his pockets. “Let it go, Macey.”
“I can’t let it go. Judas is one of Fuentes’s men. We know that. I just traced his fucking e-mails back to you. Tell me it was a mistake. Tell me something, goddammit.”
“It wasn’t a mistake.”
Diego Fuentes’s plane was waiting for him at the airport. A private plane sent to fly him to his father. Hell, it wasn’t supposed to end like this. Fuentes wasn’t supposed to ever learn he had a son. It was a promise Diego’s father had made to Ian’s mother when she left. That Diego would never know she was pregnant. For some unfathomable reason the old man had wanted to save her from Diego.
“Did you betray us too, Ian?” Macey asked then.
Ian grimaced. Hell no. He had never betrayed his country. He would never betray his friends.
“Lieutenant Richards, I asked you a fucking question,” Macey snarled.
Ian turned and faced him slowly. “Fuentes.”
“What?”
“Ian Richard Fuentes. He’s my father.”
Ian took advantage of the elevator doors opening and stepped free, his gaze locked on Macey’s face. On the betrayal in his friend’s eyes, the fury building in his face.
He had just made an enemy. The first of many.
Read on for an excerpt
from the next book by Lora Leigh
Killer Secrets
Coming soon from St. Martin’s Paperbacks
Killer Secrets
HE WAS THERE. She knew he was.
The moment Kira stepped out of the elevator she knew Ian was waiting in her room. Her nipples peaked against the thin leather covering them.
It wasn’t any particular premonition. It was the bodyguard leaning casually against the wall several feet from her door.