by C. J. Miller
Now that a series of depressing emotions caught up to her, she wanted a lemon-lime soda and a box of icing-stuffed chocolate cookies. That would make her feel better. Emotional eating, but it was sugar binge or demand Griffin take her to a sex toy shop so she could find a vibrator to take the edge off. It was the only bedroom activity she was proficient at, and she needed release.
Whatever Griffin had done to her desire, it was worked into a frenzy, and she needed to sate it.
Griffin nodded. The room was crowded, but as he moved, people made way for him.
Once outside the building, they had a two-block walk to their hotel. The sidewalks and streets were busy despite the late hour, and the lights from the hotel illuminated the area.
Griffin touched his hips, where he had his guns and knife. “You okay?”
“That isn’t my scene,” she said.
“I thought we would run into someone important.”
She shook her head. “I can’t think with so much noise and so many people. I couldn’t focus on who was there with people touching me.” Her skin tingled, and she felt a wave of dizziness.
“I tried to keep them off you.”
Being close to Griffin had worked her up in a different way. “The issue was keeping women off you.”
He inclined his head. “I don’t care if people bump into me.”
He was a rock. Of course he wouldn’t. Had he missed the intention in those women’s eyes? “I don’t think those women were just bumping into you. They were propositioning you.”
Griffin made a sound of acknowledgment. “Wasn’t my first rave. It’s not my scene, either.”
Hadn’t he enjoyed the attention of the women who had surrounded him? “You could have chosen one of those women to take home.” Why was she picking at this wound? What did she want him to say? That he would love to have taken home one or two women to see what fun they could have?
“Maybe I could have. I wouldn’t.”
She should have let the conversation drop. “Because you’re working.”
“I’m working, and I was there with you.”
Loyalty. Interesting. “I could have fended for myself.”
“Undoubtedly. But I didn’t want some man groping you. The only way to stop that was to make it clear to every person who came within a foot of you that you were mine. Are mine.”
His possessiveness struck a chord with her, and she felt as if the air had been sucked from her lungs. Her skin prickled and her insides clutched with yearning. “Do you feel strange?”
Concern crossed his face. “No, do you? What do you need?”
She was tingling across her breasts and between her legs, like an itch demanding she scratch it, stroke it, handle it. “Sex.” And a soda. Cookies. Mostly sex, though.
Griffin drew himself to full height. “I can’t help you with that, and I won’t approve of you picking a partner to take to our hotel room. Not until I’ve screened him, and that will take days.”
“No sex, then?” she asked, her breasts feeling heavy.
“No sex.”
As they walked, an ache, a deep throb between her legs, pulsed distractingly. A chill swept over her from her head to her feet, leaving her core feeling hot and the rest of her exposed. “Griffin, I feel sick.”
Griffin faced her. “Did you eat anything in that club? Drink anything?”
She shook her head. “You were with me the entire time.”
Griffin lifted her and carried her beneath the streetlight. He searched her, kneeling in front of her and running his hands over her bare skin.
“That’s not helping me not want sex,” she said, pressing into his hands as they moved over her. His touch was so good. Too good.
He swore and pulled something from her thigh. It stung like ripping off an adhesive bandage.
“What is that?” she asked.
He took out his phone, snapped a picture of it and slipped it into his pocket. “You were drugged.”
Her eyes went wide. “With what?” She hadn’t taken anything stronger than over-the-counter medicine in her life.
“It explains why you’ve been talking to me so frankly. And why you’re rubbing against me.”
She was not aware she had been. She stilled her body.
Griffin lifted her and raced with her in his arms toward their hotel room.
Chapter 5
Carrying Kit through the hotel while she was moaning—a low moan, like she was in the throes of passion—invited stares. Since they were trying to stay under the radar, Griffin tucked her head against his shoulder to prevent anyone from recognizing her. His phone was vibrating, but he couldn’t answer it.
Every movement elicited more moans from her. She licked his neck. If he hadn’t had a tight grip on her, he would have dropped her. The elevator came quickly, and once inside, they were mercifully alone. As they reached their room, he set Kit down to fish out his key card. She slid her hand into his pocket. He caught her wrist and stopped her.
“I know you feel different right now, but give me a few minutes.” He opened the door to their hotel room and hustled her inside. “I need to call Connor and find out what we need to do.”
Kit sat on the maroon chair by the window. She was moaning and touching herself, running her hands over her breasts and between her legs. Distracting, but Griffin could handle it.
His phone beeped, and he had his answers for why and what was happening to her. The drug she’d been given was absorbed through the skin. It was a designer drug with the street name “rapture.” It made the user feel a flood of serotonin and crave sex.
“Griffin, come here and talk to me.” She had lifted her leg high on the chair, her short skirt sliding to her hip.
Not a chance. Holding her and having her crawl all over him was a mistake. He called Connor immediately. “Tell me the cure.”
“No cure. It has to work its way out of her system. Put her in the shower. Get the rest off her skin. Give her water and flush it out. That’s the only advice I have for now. I’m making more calls to find out if we can do anything else. If it’s too unbearable, I can get a doctor to you to drug her, maybe with morphine or alprazolam, but I don’t know how the drugs interact and what’s safe for her.”
He wouldn’t describe what she was doing now, but it was turning him on, and he was ashamed of that. He was supposed to protect her. That meant no sex, especially no sex when she wasn’t in her right mind.
“Griffin, I ache,” she said, peeling off her top.
She was wearing a red lace bra underneath. A test of his control. He was a good man, and no matter what she said, he would not give in to her.
“Can I let her take care of it herself?” Griffin asked. Would that make her feel better? Watching her suffer was hard.
Connor cleared his throat. “I can’t see the harm in that. Don’t leave her alone, though. Watch her.”
A drugged-up Kit who demanded sex, and he could only watch. Griffin had been trained to withstand torture and have absolute control of his body. He could get through this without touching her inappropriately. He could hide his thoughts. She didn’t need to know he was attracted to her. He thanked Connor and disconnected.
“We need to get you in the shower,” he said.
Kit giggled. “You want us to take a shower?”
“Solo. I’ll help you if you need it,” he said, feeling at a loss for words. Putting off a woman he was drawn to wasn’t easy.
She ran her hands over her bra. “I need you to touch me.”
“That’s the drug talking,” he said.
She slung her feet to the floor and crossed the room to him, moving stealthily. She grabbed the hem of his shirt and lifted it.
He removed her hands. “Stop.”
She pouted. �
��Don’t be a spoilsport. I bet you’ve done this plenty of times.”
“Taken advantage of a woman under the influence? No, never.” He preferred his encounters with women to be sober.
“You wouldn’t be taking advantage of me. I’m giving you the advantage.”
She was coming on to him, and resisting made his brain feel like it would explode.
Kit reached for his belt buckle. He again stilled her hands. He walked backward to the bathroom. “You need to get in the shower and rinse your skin. You’ll feel better after that.” He hoped. He could please a woman in the way Kit needed right now, but he was not sure how to do that without touching her.
She ran her fingers through his hair and pulled it a little. She tried to kiss him, and he turned his head. She dropped to her knees and ran her hand down the front of his pants.
“Kit, stand up.” His voice was harsh, but he felt his control slipping. “Shower. Now. We have to make sure your skin is clear.”
She frowned. He stalked into the bathroom.
She followed him inside and began removing her clothes. He looked away and counted, said the alphabet, boring recitations that wouldn’t make him think of her and climbing in that shower with her.
Anything she said was the drug talking. She did not want this.
“You are so uptight,” she said, standing behind him, resting her head on his back and reaching around him.
“Why are your abs this way?” She was moving her hands over them.
He wasn’t talking to her about his body, her body or anything their bodies could do together. “You’ll feel better after a shower.” That was his mantra for the night. Maybe he could run a bath. Didn’t women like that? Was that a good distraction?
“Help me with my bandage?” She extended her foot.
As carefully as he could and holding her calf in his hand, Griffin removed the bandage on her foot. He ignored the sounds she was making in her throat as he touched her leg. He set her foot on the floor and stood.
Reaching into the shower, he twisted the faucet and lifted the knob for the shower. The water spurted on, cold at first and then growing hotter. As steam rose from the tub, he gestured to it. “Get in,” he said. Hand on the Bible, he was doing everything he could not to look at her naked. Not to stare at her chest and her toned legs and her flat stomach. But he was a man, and despite his efforts to feel nothing while on the job, she was working every last angle and his libido was responding.
She shook her head. “Only if you will.”
He wasn’t beyond throwing her into the water, but he wanted to clean her body, especially where he’d found the drug strip.
He kicked off his shoes and stepped into the shower fully clothed. She followed and laughed. “You aren’t any fun.”
This wasn’t about fun. “You need to be soaped,” he said, tearing the wrapping off the hotel soap. He rubbed it over her thigh where he had found the drug. Then he soaped a washcloth and handed it to her.
“You want me clean because I’m dirty?” she asked. She leaned forward, bracing her hands on the wall of the shower and wiggling her bottom at him.
Griffin thought of war. Of grenades. Of being in a foxhole with men who had not showered in days.
“Aren’t you going to clean the rest of me?” she asked.
He wasn’t. He had only cleaned the area where he’d found the drug strip because he wanted as little of it in her system as possible. Her current mood was sex and impertinence, and he wanted the job done right. “You’re feeling the effects of the drug. But I need you to think. This is not who you are. This will pass. When it does, you would be furious and feel understandably violated if I did anything to you.”
Why was he trying to reason with her? He wouldn’t let her do something she would regret. But he needed her to tone it down.
She lifted the small bottle of shampoo and dumped some in her hair. “Please wash it.”
Was this necessary? The drug wasn’t in her hair. She moved closer to him. The steam from the shower and the wetness of his clothes made him uncomfortable. Uncomfortable was good now. To keep her from touching him, he spun her so the water hit her thigh. Then he washed her hair.
He hadn’t washed a woman’s hair before. He assumed the principles were the same as for a man’s hair. She moaned and swayed under the water.
“Are you dizzy?” he asked.
“No, just really, really excited,” she said.
Her backside brushed the front of his jeans. He ignored his body’s involuntary response. When he was finished lathering the shampoo through her hair, he removed his hands.
“Rinse,” he said.
She ducked under the spray, and soapy water filled the floor of the tub. Giggling, she reached for the handheld shower sprayer. “Look, it can do a lot of things. Clean me and help me.”
She brought it between her legs and moaned. He pivoted away, feeling simultaneously responsible and guilty for watching. Moving the shower head up and down, she let out a frustrated growl. “So close, but it’s not working. Please, Griffin. Help me. I know you can finish this.”
No, he couldn’t. He wouldn’t. “Kit, you might hate me now for saying no, but you’ll be happier in the morning.” Please let this wear off by morning.
“Just pretend for twenty seconds that you’re not my bodyguard. Pretend you’re my lover. I’ll be fast. I’m almost there.”
This must have been a punishment for the times he had met a woman, slept with her and hadn’t called the next day. Or retribution for some terrible crime committed in a past life. “No.”
Frustration was plain on her face. She hooked the water sprayer back on the wall and reached between her legs. She propped one foot on the tub brazenly, one hand on the wall. “It’s eighty percent a mental game.”
“Overcoming the drug?” he asked, hoping she was fighting it, and would collapse from exhaustion and sleep it off.
“Having an orgasm. At this moment, I am directing my energy into a fantasy I’ve been having since seeing you in that vampire outfit. The outfit I picked for you. Did you know it was my personal fantasy to be that character’s lover?”
She let her head fall back and closed her eyes. Griffin closed his. He wasn’t sure how much of this he could stand. His arousal was pressing at the zipper of his jeans insistently. At least if he couldn’t see her, he could imagine something unsexy, like sweaty gym clothes and kids’ used diapers. But even with his eyes closed and trying to fixate on unattractive things, he saw her. She was in front of him and his muscles twitched with awareness of it.
“I’m thinking of your hands on me. On my breasts and between my thighs. Your hands are big and they make me feel safe. Now your mouth is pressed to mine. You’re a good kisser. Talented. You kiss my neck and everywhere and then you get between my legs. I spread myself open for you and then you lick me.”
She shivered and cried out. Griffin opened his eyes, worried what had happened. As an orgasm ripped through her, she sat on the floor of the tub, leaning her head against the tile.
“Better. I feel better.” She was panting.
He didn’t feel better. His lust was overwhelming, and he felt like it was strangling him. “Let’s get you dry.”
“Are you worried that I’m so wet?” she asked and looked up at him with those expressive eyes.
He didn’t reply to that. He couldn’t. His mouth was sand and his entire focus was on keeping her safe, including from herself and him.
He stepped out of the tub and tossed her two towels from the rack. “Get dry.”
“Help me,” she said.
He sensed the orgasm had only taken the edge off her lust. She wanted more. “No.” He was wet and now cold, but undressing wasn’t an option. He needed his clothes to stay in place. Besides, it wasn’t the first time he’d worn so
aking wet clothes. At least their hotel room was warm.
He was a trained operative. He could withstand anything.
* * *
“These pajamas are really soft,” Kit said. She pulled the bottoms on, and Griffin was grateful.
“Don’t you want to feel them?” she asked.
“I felt them when I took them out of your suitcase.”
“Feel them on me,” she said.
“Get into bed. You need sleep,” he said.
Kit frowned. “Not sleep. Sex.”
“If you get into your bed alone and stay asleep and decide in twenty-four hours you still need sex, I’ll help you find it.” When the drug was out of her system, she wouldn’t request sex. It was an offer he wouldn’t need to fulfill.
“Help me find it? I don’t need to find it. You can give it to me.”
“It’s a deal. If you get into bed now, in twenty-four hours, I’ll have sex with you if you still feel the same.”
Kit climbed onto the bed and smirked at him victoriously. He handed her a bottle of water, which she drank.
“Can I trust you not to leave this room if I step into the bathroom to change?” he asked. He was responsible for her well-being and he already carried a sense he had failed. She had been drugged while he was responsible for her.
“Can I watch?”
“Nothing to see, so no.”
She blew out her breath in a huff. “Fine. I’ll stay in the room.”
Hurrying into the bathroom with dry clothes, he changed as quickly as possible and returned to the room. He braced himself for more tests of his professionalism.
She was kneeling on the bed. “You are really, really sexy. When I first saw you, I thought you might be a model.”
“I’m a regular guy.”
Kit rolled her eyes and settled back on the mound of pillows at the top of her bed. “You are not regular. How about you come here and let me tell you the ways you are not regular?”
“Our deal was that you stay in your bed alone.”