She really couldn’t worry about that now, especially with Colt out there in imminent danger. He was so damn stubborn! How dare he tell his men to stand down? What was the point of having security if you didn’t use them, dammit?
Not able to relax with Colt still out there in danger, she paced in the darkened bedroom, trying her best not to wake her friend. But Sarah must have sensed her presence, because, the next thing Imani knew, Sarah opened her eyes and sat up in surprise.
“What’s up? Did I oversleep?” Sarah asked groggily, and then she widened her eyes in horror.
“Sarah, I—”
She sprang from the bed. “Oh my God, did Colt see him? Did he hurt him?”
“Wait, wait…” Imani stared at her naked friend in horror. “Please put some clothes on. That’s too much boob in my face at once.” She laughed nervously.
“Imani, this is serious. What did Colt say when he saw Tony?”
“Tony?” Imani was stunned as realization dawned. “Anthony Dean? Your neighbor?” She didn’t want to get distracted from the situation of Colt out there fighting for their lives and couldn’t believe the ridiculous drama Sarah was stressing about.
“God, would you stop being so judgmental? He loves me!” Sarah walked to the armchair near her bed and pulled on a silk robe that fell to her ankles.
“Sarah, I live with you.” Imani stared at her in shock. “Last week you were dating Mike. What happened to that?”
“Imani, I’ve never had a boyfriend named Mike. In fact, I’ve never had a boyfriend other than Tony. Those other guys were just research. I needed to know how to hold on to an older guy.” She hung her head to let her hair fall about her face and hide her expression.
“Oh, honey, you should love whomever you want.” Imani thought about herself and Colt and hoped Sarah would be as understanding. She had no idea what Colt would think about Sarah’s relationship with a guy he’d gone to high school with. However, like her, Colt didn’t have the high ground on this topic.
“We’ve been together for five years,” Sarah told her with smirk. “He refused to have sex with me at first. But when I told him that I wasn’t a virgin, he was all into it. Please don’t tell Colt.”
Imani stiffened and couldn’t help feeling hurt by Sarah’s deceit. This meant that Sarah had been lying to her from jump. Their entire friendship was based on a lie. I know I kept my relationship with her guardian a secret, but that was more recent! This is something else altogether. Before last Sunday, I had no idea who Anthony Dean was! She fought to push the hurt from Sarah’s continued deceit at bay. There had been no need for Sarah to include her in the people to lie to, because her knowing would have done nothing to impede their affair. Who is this person that has been my roommate and, I thought, my friend for all these years? God, this shit hurts! Is nothing about this girl I’ve known before real?
“I’m sure Colt would be okay with this, Sarah.” Imani had no idea if that were true or not, but she would’ve told Sarah anything to get away from her. Imani just wanted out right now. She was almost numb with the stunning emotions she felt on hearing how long Sarah had been living this secret life. She couldn’t wrap her head around the depth of the lies Sarah had told to cover her tracks. She only now realized how strange it was that Sarah never introduced her to any of her boyfriends. She’d always assumed that Sarah had done that out of respect for her. And that had been a major part of why she loved the other girl so much. Now?
“No! Colt would hate me. He’d say Tony’s too old for me,” she wailed. “Please, Imani, don’t tell him.”
“You need to tell him and explain.” Yeah, and he needs to come clean too!
“You don’t understand. I don’t ever want him to find out. So, there’s nothing to explain.” Sarah turned on her angrily. “Promise you won’t say anything!”
Imani sighed. Was anything about this girl salvageable? “Sarah, I came in here to tell you armed men are in the house and Colt wanted us to hide in your room. He said you’d know what to do.”
“Oh my God! Are you insane? Why didn’t you say something!” Sarah immediately ran into her walk-in closet. “How many men are there? Who are they? Where did they come from?” Sarah shouted her questions from the other room, her voice frantic with worry.
“I think they’re from the Pentagon, but I have no idea how many men are there.”
“I don’t understand. Why the hell are they after Colt?”
“They’re not after your guardian.” Imani lowered her voice as Sarah returned to the room. “They’re after me.”
“You? Why?”
Before Imani could answer, Colt suddenly opened the bedroom door. “What the hell are you still doing in here?”
Imani noted that he directed his glare and question to Sarah. She shouldn’t have taken offense to that, but it seemed that he viewed her as less than useless. However, the relief she felt on seeing him safe made her weak in the knees.
“Colt!” Sarah ran and hugged him.
Imani cringed in disappointment that she couldn’t respond in a similar manner.
“Are you okay?” Sarah asked. She ran her palms over his face and his chest, as though she were checking for injuries. But she saw Colt grimace in distaste and remove Sarah’s too-busy hands.
“I’m fine,” Colt muttered and put her away from him. “Why didn’t you take Imani to our safe room?”
“We were just leaving,” Sarah informed him.
“And if those men had gotten past me? You both could be dead! Or abducted!”
Sarah raised an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, Colt. I didn’t react immediately to Imani’s warning.”
Imani wasn’t sure what she was feeling, but she distinctly disliked being ignored. “You didn’t react because I didn’t tell you right away. We were distracted with other things.”
Colt turned cold eyes on her. “I will not tolerate disobedience. When I tell you to do something, I expect you to fucking do it!”
“Colt!”
“No, Sarah, let him speak.” Imani suddenly felt overwhelmed with emotion, and the tears she refused to shed prickled in her eyes, clogged her throat, and burned at the base of her nostrils. “Contrary to what you believe, Colonel, I am not stupid or helpless! I don’t need or want your fucking protection. I’ve had men like Lippman after me from when I was kid. Everyone wants to use me. Everyone has a fucking agenda!” The tears came then, and she could do nothing to stop them from flowing or the harsh cry of anguish that tore from her throat. She was no longer thinking about Lippman or the Pentagon. She was thinking about Colt and Sarah. They’d both hurt her in unbearable ways.
“Imani,” Colt whispered with concern etched in his voice, and he cautiously approached her.
Imani backed away from him. “Don’t fucking touch me. Don’t ever touch me.” She wanted to say, “Don’t touch me again,” but even being angry at him, she couldn’t betray his trust.
Sarah came toward her then, opening her arms to hug her.
Imani backed away from her too. “You lied to me for four fucking years, Sarah.” Her tears were now blinding, and she couldn’t stop the pain that burned in her stomach at the betrayal of the two people she’d given her trust to. They were her only friends, and it hurt like hell that they’d brought her to this. “Our entire friendship was based on a lie!”
“I’m sorry, Imani.” Sarah started crying too.
Imani was convinced that it was for Colt’s benefit. Never again would she trust Sarah with her heart.
“I didn’t mean for this to hurt you,” Sarah sobbed. “It wasn’t done to hurt you.”
“What the hell is going on?” Colt stared at them in total confusion.
“I have to get out of here,” Imani sobbed. She tried to run past Colt toward the bedroom door, but Colt wasn’t having it.
He grabbed her arm, stopping her flight.
“I told you not to touch me,” Imani gritted out. She tried pulling her arm
out of his hold, but he was significantly stronger than her. He wasn’t holding her tight enough to hurt; however, it was impossible for her to break free. “Let go of me,” she pleaded. If she stayed there much longer, she wouldn’t be able to stop. She’d tell them everything that the other didn’t want out. It was crazy that, despite her hurt, she was still trying to protect them.
“Let’s calm down and talk this through. I’m not sure what happened here, but I know that neither Sarah nor I would intentionally hurt you for any reason.”
Imani gave a short bitter laugh. “So, you think I shouldn’t be hurt by you treating me as though I’m some brainless female, incapable of making her own decisions?”
“I never treated you like…” Colt voice trailed away as he seemed to rethink her comment.
“For your information, I know what I want for my life and I know who the hell I want to spend it with!”
Colt looked shell-shocked by her attack.
“Let go of me, Colonel.”
“We don’t want you to leave, Imani,” Sarah said softly.
“I don’t care what you want anymore! I’ve been doing too much of that recently.”
“Why don’t we have lunch and then talk?” Colt held her gaze.
“I don’t see what difference that will make,” Imani muttered. “Are you willing to disclose all?” She looked at them. “I mean fully disclose all?”
When neither of them answered her, Imani was finally able to pull her arm from Colt’s hold.
“That’s what I thought.” She walked to the door and then turned to look at them again. “Colonel, I’m not the pathetic, weak woman you keep trying to make me out to be. I’ve been taking care of myself since I was a kid.”
“I didn’t—”
“Shut up.” She glared at him and said softly, “And for the record, I am Jane.”
She left a stunned Colt, staring at her as though she’d sprung an additional head.
Chapter Eleven
“Imani, please come down to dinner.”
Imani heard Sarah, but as she’d done the last six times Sarah came to the bedroom, she ignored her.
“You haven’t eaten all day,” Sarah whined. “You can’t go on like this.”
“Wanna bet?” Imani whispered. She knew Sarah couldn’t hear her, and that was intentional. After she’d had her meltdown in Sarah’s room, she’d hastily packed her bag and dragged everything downstairs after calling a taxi. But not only would Colt’s security not let the driver through the gates, they were also guarding the cars in the garage as well.
With enough righteous indignation to last her a lifetime, Imani walked the three miles to the gate while dragging her luggage behind her, only to be told by the security team that she wasn’t authorized to leave and they couldn’t open the gate. That still didn’t deter her. She sat on a boulder near the gate and refused to go back to the house. Ten minutes into her silent defiance, Colt arrived in his truck.
He loaded her luggage into the truck bed before peeling her off the boulder and throwing her over his shoulder.
She screamed and yelled all manner of insults at his head while the five-man security team looked on. Imani heard a few spatters of laughter at some of her insults. She knew she’d gone too far, but it was as though another woman had invaded her body and she had no filter on her mouth. It was embarrassing the ease with which he carried her toward his truck.
While Colt ignored the previous insults she’d hurled at him, as soon as she uttered, “Put me down, you big pussy!” that earned her an immediate large palm to her ass.
However, that didn’t stop her from descending into further madness. “Oh, so you don’t like being called a ‘big pussy’? Well, you’re the biggest pussy in the whole United States!” All reason was gone now. She was internally cringing at her uncouth outburst, but for once in her life, she wanted to ignore all ladylike bullshit and let loose, let him have it.
“Stop cursing,” Colt growled.
“You cuss all the time! So, fuck you!” God, this shit feels good.
The slap on her ass was even harder this time and brought tears to her eyes. Shit! Maybe not so good. “I hate you,” she sobbed
Colt didn’t utter a word as he set her on her feet next to the truck and pulled her into his arms.
She pushed at his chest. When that didn’t work, she slammed a knee to his groin.
With a loud grunt, he immediately let her go and doubled over in pain.
Knowing that she didn’t want to be around when he finally caught his breath, she climbed up into the waiting vehicle. She’d never driven a truck, especially not a monster vehicle like this. She was at first awed by the cabin’s interior. It was clear that this was all Colt’s. The rugged beauty was made even more so by Colt’s masculine scent filling the air. The fact that her senses were immediately clamoring for more of it, reveling in it even, made her pissed at herself all over again.
The sharp rap of knuckles on the glass window of the door brought her back to her senses. She shrieked in surprise and stomped on the gas. Deliberating grinding the gears on the stick shift, because she knew it would piss him off, she sped back the three miles to the house. As soon as she arrived at the house, she ran up to her room as though the fires of hell were at her back. She even forgot to retrieve her luggage from the truck bed.
She’d been in the room only ten minutes before Sarah came knocking. And Imani ignored her, then and every hour after that when she came again. So far, she’d heard nothing from Colt. It was the worry of that and her still boiling anger that kept her hunger pangs at bay. However, now it was approaching eight p.m., and she hadn’t eaten so much as a piece of toast all day. She was starving.
She lasted almost another half an hour and was about to climb out of the bed when a sharp knock sounded at the door. She didn’t need an announcement to know that Colt was on the other side of that door.
“Dammit,” she muttered. She was too weak to think of insults to hurl at him now.
“Open the door, Imani.”
She pulled the cover up to her chest as though that was going to protect her from the wrath she heard in Colt’s voice.
“You have ten seconds before I kick this damn door in. I don’t promise to be in a reasonable mood if that happens.”
“Ah shit!” she muttered to herself. And then she yelled out loud, “Why don’t you leave me alone?” She climbed out of the bed and was stunned at how weak her limbs were. They could barely sustain her weight.
The sharp knock came again.
“That was five seconds, asshole! Keep your panties on!”
Did he just laugh? Imani needed five seconds and a little more to get her unused limbs to navigate the distance to the door. She cracked the door open and frowned at him with a, “What the hell do you want?” And her show of strength was ruined by feeling slightly dizzy and stumbling. Colt had to catch her with one arm, as his other arm was bearing a tray of food.
“What the fuck have you done to yourself?”
“What? I thought you liked carrying me around,” she said weakly.
Muttering under his breath, he frog-marched her across the room after kicking the door shut with his foot. And only after setting the tray on a table in the room and taking a seat in the accompanying chair did he pick her up and sit her on his lap.
“Why…”
He shoved a forkful of spaghetti and meat sauce into her mouth.
The burst of flavors on her tongue almost had her swooning in ecstasy. She’d barely finished chewing the food in her mouth before he shoved another forkful in. This happened for the next five times when she tried to speak, so she gave up and simply enjoyed the spaghetti, cheesy garlic bread, and red wine that he’d piled on the tray.
“If you weren’t in such a state, I’d spank your ass for that display this afternoon,” he muttered, but his harsh words were eclipsed by the concern clouding his gaze.
“I—”
He shoved another forkful into her mouth.
“You want to cuss at me? That’s fine. But you do that shit when we’re behind these doors, not in front of my men!”
“I—”
Another feeding.
“Nod if you understand me.” His hard glare had her nodding in acknowledgement.
“And if you ever do this shit to yourself again, I’ll beat your ass until you can’t sit for a week!”
His stern expression left her in no doubt that he was deadly serious about that threat.
“Do I make myself clear?”
Imani nodded without him asking because his take-no-shit demeanor was more than turning her on.
He kept feeding her, and when he wasn’t admonishing her behavior, he was praising her for obediently eating and getting her strength back.
Only when she was stuffed to the gills did she turn her head and whisper, “Enough.”
However, he wasn’t done yet. He stood and sat her in the chair he’d just vacated. Now feeling quite languid and drowsy, she watched him walk into her bathroom. He returned a few minutes later, picked her up, and took her into the bathroom. She didn’t protest when he stripped her as though she were a child and placed her in a tub of warm soapy water. Although she wasn’t feeling as weak as before, she still wasn’t up to fighting him physically and just reclined in the water as he tenderly washed her. There was nothing sexual in his touch. He seemed to simply want to take care of her. It took a lot of sting out of her anger with him.
He lifted her wet body, still dripping with water, from the tub and enveloped her in a huge fluffy bath towel. After drying her skin, he took her back to the bedroom and placed her, sans the now damp towel, onto the bed.
She really wanted to say something then, but her emotions clogged her throat as he filled his hands with her special body lotion and started rubbing it over her entire body. There was no place on her he didn’t touch. And even when he rubbed his hands over her inner thighs and then higher at her apex, he didn’t comment or linger on the dampness he encountered there.
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