“Sorry. I was going to put my clothes back on, then I remembered the suitcase we got at the airport. Do you mind if I look to see if there’s anything clean in there I can wear?”
Nick swallowed hard, trying to find the strength to breathe normally as he took in her appearance. Most women couldn’t carry off looking so goddamned sexy coming straight from the shower. Not Nicole. She was glowing, and her skin smelled so good that he wanted to… well, the exact same thought he’d had earlier in the kitchen.
“Umm, yeah, sure. It’s over there.” He pointed toward the front door, but then caught himself. What was he thinking? There was no need for her to go all the way over there. “Here… hang on.”
He picked up the suitcase and carried it into the bedroom for her. She followed along and waited while he opened the zipper. He flipped the luggage flap back, and both of them gasped a bit too hard.
“Holy shit,” she exclaimed.
Nick lifted out the item on top. A hot pink, red, and yellow flowery dress he could only describe as a “moo moo” or a really dressy house coat. Also, the size was an XXXL which wouldn’t only swallow Nicole whole, it might get him too.
“I wasn’t going for functionality,” he said. “I just wanted a prop.”
He continued sifting through the horribly designed clothes with designs of chickens and flying mushrooms, wondering not only who would wear such items, but where the fuck on earth had they purchased them?
Nicole stepped over and tugged out a pair of extremely large underwear and held them up. “I don’t think these will fit me,” she said.
“Definitely not,” Nick said. “We can wash your stuff out in the sink and hang it by the fire to dry.”
“What? No washer and dryer?” she quipped.
He rolled his eyes. “It’s being installed next week. Work with me.”
She retrieved the first dress with the brightly colored tropical flowers. “I guess this would work if I can borrow a belt or something.”
“We’ll throw that shit away,” he said.
“Wait,” she said. “That’s a gorgeous designer bag right there.”
He retrieved the purse and tossed it to her. “All yours. Now, for clothes, I can help you out.” He went over to the closet and opened the door wide. The aroma of cedar wafted out, pleasing him greatly since he’d designed and built the closet himself. He got a folded white undershirt and a pair of boxer briefs and handed them over to her. “Not stylish, but good to sleep in. I should know.”
She inspected the items and smiled. “This’ll work for the night. I’ll go wash my clothes out and get dressed.” As she walked toward the bathroom again, she stopped and sniffed the air. “Damn, something sure smells good.”
“Tuna Noodle Casserole,” he announced proudly.
She looked him up one side and down the other. “Umm, umm, umm… all that and he can cook, too.”
He laughed hard and tossed a pillow from the bed at her.
She danced away and waved.
Oh God, was he going to make it through the night without ravishing her?
He couldn’t promise he could.
Nick
“Damn, this is delicious. May I have more?
Nicole held her plate out, begging for another helping. Nick spooned out more of the creamy concoction his adoptive mom had taught him to make. She knew he was going into the Army, and they’d feed him three squares a day, but she wanted to be sure he could fend for himself when needed. He’d never been happier than right now to have been an unwilling pupil to his adoptive mom all those years ago.
“You really like it?” he asked. “Or… is it you’re so hungry you’ll eat anything.”
Nicole scooped another forkful into her mouth and moaned with pleasure. Since he’d heard that very same sound emitted from her during the throes of passion, he took it to mean she was enjoying herself.
“Wiiits deeewishhhus,” she said with her mouth full. He interpreted that as delicious, so he was pleased.
They continued to eat until they’d both had their fill. Nick appreciated a woman with a hearty appetite and not picky eating bowls of healthy grains and strange leafy greens. It was clear Nicole faced life head on, full-steam, and didn’t let shit slow her down.
“You like chocolate?” he asked.
Her eyes widened. “Have you just met me?” She paused, then laughed. “Oh, right… you have just met me. Yes, I love chocolate in any shape or form.”
He had some chocolate bars in his stash. Good for a sugar fill and a lift of caffeine, if needed in a survival situation. He could spare one of the dark chocolate bars if only to put a bigger smile on her face.
“Here you go,” he said.
“We’ll share.” She opened it up and broke it cleanly in half. “Damn, I’m good.”
“Yeah, you are,” he muttered. When she quickly lifted her dark eyes to his, he clarified, “I meant, in your job and such. Programming computer code for military contracts isn’t your run of the mill work.”
She tilted her head sideways as she sucked on the chocolate and considered what he said. “I have a head for math and logic and figuring things out, so I naturally tended to the programming. What can I say? I’m a geek to the core and really love what I do. I’ve been able to work on some cool projects.”
“Like when you worked for Delta Shandong?”
“How did you— oh, right.”
“It was in your dossier.”
“It was a cyber-security firm, and we did do some innovative products. They were always talking about more. Bigger and better things, ways to control the back doors of the internet.”
She plucked another piece of the chocolate, and instead of putting it in her mouth, she served it to him. He opened his mouth slowly and accepted it, careful not to connect his lips to her fingers. “How so?” he asked.
“They wanted full knowledge of key searches so they could sell the data to marketing and advertising firms. Knowing exactly what people are looking up all the time. Also, they were in the market for any kind of encryption devices which never came to fruition.”
Nick furrowed his brows. “Encryption codes?”
“Codes, messages, data, anything traveling on the information superhighway that they could glom on to like shopping preferences, login locations, personal information, and then turn into money.”
“As much as I like using it—and need to use it—the internet sometimes fucks with my mind at how much people can find out about you.”
“Right,” she said. “That’s all part of the programming and the keywords you search on.”
He propped himself up on his chin as he set his elbow on the table. He tried not to focus on her dusty nipples, free of her bra, almost showing through his white T-shirt or how his boxer brief rode low on her hips when she got up to pour herself another glass of cola. He averted his eyes, trying not to remember the feel of her soft ass in his hands, grasping and needing, experiencing all of her.
Coughing a bit to clear his throat, he asked, “So, is that what’s on the data drive everyone’s after?”
She bobbed her head up and down. “See, I got a recommendation from Delta Shandong to go and work at Terratech. I thought it was some sort of pull my father had there since it’s a strict military contractor, yet it turns out my friend in China, Mei Ling, set me up for her dad’s sake. He’s the owner of Delta Shendong, and he was one of the three Chinese men I saw in the boardroom that Saturday morning when no one knew I was there.”
Shaking off this information, Nick halted her. “Wait… I don’t know about this. Start from the beginning and fill me in.” Here, he’d had it made out to him that Nicole, a company programmer, had absconded away with some stolen software programming codes the company wanted back when that wasn’t the case at all. He listened intently as she explained working through the night, going to the kitchen in the early morning for water, and seeing and hearing the exchange between three Chinese businessmen and executives at Terratech. Now, h
e understood why she was on the run, especially after she shared how they’d called her in for a company interrogation Monday morning and how the goons from the airport had shown up at the building to do God knew what to her.
“So, that’s why I copied the TDE-5X data, source codes, and the security tapes from Saturday morning to show that executives high up in Terratech are selling US military commissioned and getting paid to sell our programs to the Chinese government.” She set down the chocolate and pushed it away. “I mean, what the fuck was I supposed to do, Nick? Let them walk away with a million dollar piece of software like that? Let them bully me and do who knew what else? I had to take matters into my own hands. I had to protect the United States.”
“That’s a tall order for someone so small,” he said.
“That’s just it. It’s not small at all. It’s fucking huge.”
His alpha male protective urges kicked into higher gear, and he was now more sure than ever he’d done the right thing by intervening. “Why would Delta Shandong want something like that if you say all they’re into is marketing data and selling shit to people.”
“It’s a ruse. A cover. Delta Shandong is a front for the Chinese military and their government. This is the level of international crisis shit, I’m telling you,” she said passionately. “You have to understand, TDE-5X isn’t just some device enabling our military to encrypt anything. It’s got a hidden back door to it allowing the potential to decrypt anything. Anyone’s encryption, no matter where it comes from. The algorithms and coding have keyword search criteria that make Google’s search engine seem like a box of alphabet cereal.”
He mulled this over and scrunched up his mouth. “Uncle Sam wouldn’t take it too kindly, the idea of a foreign government having that much access. Or control. Especially after the US government footed the bill for the development.”
“Exactly,” she said. “There’s always been a saying that ‘knowledge is power.’ It’s never been more accurate than now. So, you see why I did what I did. I don’t know who to take this to or what to do about it. That’s why I have to get to my dad. In his position, he’ll be able to get it to the right people and take care of everything.”
Nick wondered if that were the case. Damn right, there was no way TDE-5X could fall into the hands of any other world power. However, his biggest question right now was how did a retired Air Force Brigadier General fit into all of this?
Nicole
“How do you fit in all of this?” Nicole asked.
Nick sat back and laced his fingers together at the base of his neck.
“I thought I knew,” he began. “But, this doesn’t make sense. There’s a missing piece to the puzzle or a connection I’m missing out on.”
“Who do you work for then?”
He blew out a long breath and took a moment. “It’s an international firm representing top end clients on extremely sensitive issues.”
“Oh good Lord,” she groaned, waving her hand around. She wanted to laugh in his face over the ridiculously planned line. “Smells like bullshit to me.”
“Come on, Nicole,” he said, lifting out of the chair. “Give me a break.”
She followed him. “I told you what I knew, and now you have to do the same. You promised.”
He stopped and turned. “Yeah, I did.” He thought for a moment and added, “The Company I work for deals with a lot of high-end people, and we fight the underground evil on the globe. I’ve dealt with the scum of the earth and made them pay.”
“For pay.”
“Well… yes.”
“Go ahead and say it, Nick. You’re a mercenary.”
“I hate that word.”
“It is what it is,” she said, trying to understand. After what she knew about what her own parents had been through, she was completely aware that life wasn’t something you could paint by numbers and put up on the wall for all to admire. It was a lot more complicated than that. There were back doors and dark alleyways, people didn’t always appear as they should, and life wasn’t fair. Even those you loved and trusted had their own inner battles and turmoil. So, she’d do her best not to judge Nick for what he felt he had to do.
“I’m trying to make right by him,” Nick said to her.
“Who him?”
He moved through the cottage and settled in front of the fireplace. He lifted his muscled arm up and touched the edge of the frame that held his father’s American flag.
“He served his country proudly, doing things he probably didn’t think were one hundred percent right at the time. And, look where it got him. It killed him. Fucking cancer from Agent Orange. Jesus! Chemical warfare didn’t just shit on our enemies, it destroyed our soldiers, too.”
She winced at his words, yet she felt his pain. “No one knew at the time.”
“Desert Storm, he was older, knew better, was out of the military, but had signed up for the National Guard to keep doing his duty and have a hand at training a new generation of soldiers. Got his ass shipped over to the Middle East and came home with Desert Storm Syndrome, which finished him off.” Nick faced Nicole. “You see, I have to fight the unknown wars. The boardroom negotiations and treaties that serve no one. I have to help rid the world of the shits who prey on the weak and take advantage of the fools. Yeah, I get paid to kill people, Nicole. But, they deserve it.”
She wanted to gasp and cry out, but every ounce of her got it. She completely understood where he was coming from. The only thing she didn’t comprehend was how she became one of his commissions. “I’m certainly no threat to the world. Why me? Were you sent to kill me, too, Nick?”
Her heart slammed hard in her chest cavity, pounding out a Morse Code of “no, no, no.”
Hanging his head, he said, “I don’t know yet. The final orders haven’t been relayed to me.” Lifting his searing blue eyes at her, he added, “Can’t you see why I whisked you away? Why I had to take care of you and make sure we figure this out?”
Pulse continuing to race, she stepped over to him and wrapped her arms around him from behind. She pressed her body into the back of him soaking in the strength and muscle and power within him. Her hands splayed over his shirt covering his stomach. His fingers joined with hers.
It wasn’t sexual, or sensual.
It was survival.
And, she appreciated him and everything he’d done for her.
Breaking away, Nick lifted her hands and kissed them softly. “I stink. I think I’ll go grab a shower and then clean up the kitchen. You get comfortable and relax. You’ve earned it.”
Nicole let him go and watched as he walked down the hallway and went into the bathroom. She thought she’d give him a hand and clean the kitchen so he wouldn’t have to do it. She flitted around the kitchen cleaning dishes, scooping the leftovers into a plastic container, and putting everything away. It was the least she could do after his effort.
The shower was still running, so Nicole worked her way around the cottage taking everything in. It wasn’t the design of a man who killed for a living. It was homey, laid back, inviting even. She wondered if he had worked on it himself since acquiring it. She could imagine him doing things with his hands. He was good with his hands.
Her insides ached at the memory of them together in the airplane restroom. Was that today? It couldn’t have been. It felt like a lifetime ago. But, it was only earlier. Flying from the west to east coast, she had lost three hours. It was all a jumble now.
She should be on her way to London, right over Newfoundland about now. She’d be—
The thought died off when she thought of her father. He’d be worried sick not having heard anything from her. She had to find a way to get a message to him. Nick had left his cell phone back in Yonkers. But men like him always had a backup plan. Wouldn’t he?
What had he put in his duffel when he came out of the bedroom?
At the time, she’d acted like she didn’t see anything. Now, was her chance to see if he had anything she could use.
The shower raged on, so she snuck over to his duffel and carefully unzipped it. Beneath a magazine and a black fitted shirt, she saw a cell phone. Actually, several. Of course, he had burner phones, as well. Since he had so many, he wouldn’t miss one, she thought.
She sat on the couch and powered up the phone. As it came to life, she dug into what should have been an above-average memory to recall her father’s satellite phone number. She’d never written it down anywhere, but had added it to her cell phone in code, so only she could decipher the true number. Too bad Nick had destroyed that phone. Still, it was one of those pieces of information she’d taken the time to memorize to get a message to her father as an absolute last resort, no matter what.
When the phone came to life, she used the web browser first to get the GPS coordinates for her current location. She copied the information and then went to the messaging app and punched in the code for her father.
Shit. What did she even tell him at this point?
She didn’t want to put too much. She wanted him to know she was safe and in good hands.
Her fingers tapped on the keyboard as she wrote:
The eye drops aren’t going to help.
The cap keeps sticking, but my eyes aren’t too sore. For now.
Then, she entered the coordinates so he could see for himself she was out of harm’s way. She waited impatiently while the message sent, holding her breath for a response until Nick came out of the bathroom.
The water cut off. She heard him moving around as he dried off and got dressed. She didn’t want to think of him so close, so naked, so available.
She strummed her fingers on the screen. “Come on, come on, come on…”
The message indicator popped up, and she clicked it right away.
Understood.
Two Firefighters Next Door: A Bad Boy MFM Romance Page 30