Hero Undercover: 25 Breathtaking Bad Boys

by Annabel Joseph

  All the while, Gretchen had mostly followed his lead, playing the part of a dutiful submissive in public, and they’d kept their hands to themselves.

  And if he’d noticed her lying awake in the moonlit cabin, watching him with a question in her eyes, or if she’d caught the way his gaze lingered on her flushed cheeks as they shared an adrenaline-fueled smile at the end of the zipline, neither of them mentioned it aloud, even though he’d had to grind his teeth together to stay silent.

  She doesn’t want you, he’d reminded himself relentlessly. Not long-term. Not for anything more than a quick orgasm based on… how had she phrased it the other day? Attraction and opportunity. The reminders worked… sometimes.

  Today, though, after a solid hour of watching her toned, petite body gliding through the water as she swam laps, he could take no more. He’d felt his palms literally itching with the need to touch her, to claim her. He’d given her some bullshit about how this wasn’t a vacation and how he was going to take the investigation seriously, then he’d fled the scene with his hands clenched into fists, while she stood by a deck chair, gaping.

  The proximity was making him crave things he knew better than to want. They needed to finish this investigation and get off this boat, before he snapped. Apparently, his breaking point was two days, one hour, and… oh, would you look at that? Fifteen minutes.

  Maybe if he wasn’t so horny… but then, simple sexual need wasn’t really the problem here, was it? He thought about the nearly-naked girl who’d almost run him over just now, and the buxom redhead in a skintight purple dress who’d made her interest extremely clear at The Club the night before he’d embarked on this little adventure. Neither one of them, in all their glory, had made his dick twitch the way the slightest thought of Gretchen did.

  Damn Ms. Liu, and damn his fucking one-track mind.

  “Drink?” the friendly blonde behind the bar asked, as Lucas mopped at the sticky liquid that dripped down his arm. She held out a bottle of his favorite imported beer and colored when Lucas raised a questioning eyebrow at her. “Y-you were here yesterday,” she stammered in explanation, blushing furiously. “When Juan was working. I-I remembered you ordering this.”

  Observant. This could be useful. Lucas hid his surprise behind a charming smile.

  “Well. Mariela,” he said, reading the name embroidered on her shirt. “You’ve got an amazing memory.”

  She shrugged but smiled shyly, her eyes fastened on his.

  “I wonder if you can help me with something.” Lucas pulled his phone from his pocket and set it on the bar, flipping to a picture of Zelma Pickler that Slay had included in his file. “I was hoping to catch up with my cousin while we were on this cruise. You see, she’s a bit flaky.” He smiled conspiratorially and leaned a bit closer to the woman. “She took this cruise a few weeks back, and it seems maybe she got it into her head to run off and live on one of the islands permanently. I’m really worried.”

  Mariela nodded and her eyes shone with sympathy, but when she glanced down at the phone, she blinked several times before glancing at Lucas. Guilt and panic shone in her eyes. “Sorry. I-I don’t know where she is.”

  “Are you sure? My family would be willing to pay…” Lucas began.

  The girl stood up straight and shrugged, no longer meeting Lucas’s gaze. “I don’t know what to tell you,” she said. “We get so many people on the ship.”

  Fuck. This woman had information on Zelma. Lucas would bet the sweet new Ducati parked in his garage on it. He let a thread of warning enter his voice. “If you know something, you need to—”

  Small, cool hands came to rest on Lucas’s t-shirt-covered shoulders and pressed slightly, and the surprise of it halted his words. Gretchen squeezed her way onto the stool next to his and gave Mariela a commiserating smile.

  “Lance, honey, calm down,” she said, rubbing Lucas’s thigh in a soothing way. To Mariela, she explained, “My husband gets so agitated. It’s just that his family is really close, you know? He loves his cousin. And his poor Aunt Peggy is really taking her daughter’s disappearance hard.”

  What the hell?

  Mariela’s eyes met Gretchen’s cautiously. “Aunt Peggy?”

  Gretchen nodded. “She blames herself for her daughter running off.” She sighed. “Of course, we keep telling her it’s not her fault, but Mama Peggy—that’s what we all call her, you know? Mama Peggy—she’s just wasting away more and more each day. She won’t eat, she never leaves the house, and we worry that she’s not taking her heart medication.”

  “H-heart medication?” Mariela’s eyes widened.

  “Mmm. Mama Peggy has a bad heart.” Gretchen pushed her lips together as though trying to hold back tears, and Lucas wasn’t sure whether he wanted to applaud the performance or drag the exasperating woman over his knee. “She knows she doesn’t have long to live, and she’s been so brave. An inspiration to all of us, as you can imagine. She just wants to know that her baby girl is safe and happy—wherever she may be—before she joins her husband, Joseph, God rest his soul, in Heaven.” Gretchen rolled her big, brown eyes upward, and Lucas had to stop himself from snickering as Mariela’s eyes followed hers and the two women paused for a moment in respectful silence, their gazes fixed on the crystal blue sky, as if waiting for a sign.

  A moment later, Gretchen sighed again. “Lance and I promised Mama Peggy that we’d help out in whatever way we could, to give the woman a little bit of peace before she… you know.”

  Mariela nodded, clearly looking conflicted. “That’s very kind of you,” she whispered.

  “Oh, not just me!” Gretchen demurred. “No, it was Lance’s idea.” She patted Lucas’s thigh and beamed up at him proudly. “He insisted. He may seem a bit dark and broody, but he’s really very sweet. He’s overprotective and controlling, but he grows on you.”

  “Do I, honeybunch?” Lucas drawled, wrapping his arm around Gretchen’s waist to pull her tightly against his side. She’d pulled a short, strapless dress on over her damp bikini, and he felt a shiver run through her as his hot palm stroked down over her hip.

  A rush of something—some undefinable but heady combination of lust, annoyance, and reluctant amusement—raced through his bloodstream, and it took every ounce of his self-control to keep from taking her lips with his and gorging himself on her smile or hauling her back to their cabin and spanking her ass until she begged him to never let her go.

  Gretchen frowned up at him, but whatever she saw on his face—whatever faint traces of the churning emotions in his gut had made it to the surface—made her gaze soften. She blinked. She stared. She bit her lip, and a tiny frown creased her brow. Finally, she said in a soft voice, “You really do.”

  Lucas sucked in a breath. Christ, but he wanted her. Now. Fuck the investigation, fuck the lies and the questions, fuck Gretchen’s job and his own resolutions. His other hand snaked around her waist, pulling Gretchen closer until she was nearly on his lap. Her face flushed, and her eyes grew heavy-lidded with arousal. “Let’s go…” he began.

  “There you are!” Becky, the cruise director, said in that chipper voice that Lucas was starting to associate with impending sexual frustration. She came up behind them and put a hand on each of their shoulders, forcing Gretchen to slide back onto her stool.

  Becky’s smile was wide and guileless, but Lucas was pleased to see that Gretchen was barely able to repress her irritation at the woman’s interruption. For once, the two of them were on the same page. Lucas closed his eyes briefly and blew out a breath.

  “The beginner demonstration is today!” Becky nearly sang, hugging Gretchen slightly. “I know you’re going to want to be there a bit early so you can get ready.”

  “Demonstration?” Lucas demanded. Gretchen’s face was still flushed with arousal, and the look she shot him was adorably confused.

  “Yes. The, uh… spanking demonstration,” Becky said in a low voice. “The one you volunteered for.”

  Lucas looked at Gretchen, wh
o shook her head. She hadn’t known a thing about this, either. “I… could you refresh my memory?” Gretchen nearly whispered, her eyes never leaving Lucas’s.

  “Uh, okay,” Becky said doubtfully. “One of the professional dominants asked for volunteers for a beginner’s spanking demonstration, and you agreed. You said you wanted to film it for Try It Gina, remember?”

  Now Lucas’s gaze shifted to pin Becky’s. “You mean to tell me that my girl’s supposed to be spanked by some other guy in public?”

  Becky blinked. “Well, no. I mean, yes, that’s what he originally wanted. But when we discussed this, you said you’d rather that he instructed you, instead. I think… er, I believe your exact words were, ‘No way will I let some other guy touch my wife’s ass,’“ she quoted, obviously embarrassed.

  Lucas felt a flash of camaraderie with the unknown Lance Arnault. “Too fucking right,” he gritted out. His eyes moved back to Gretchen’s. “What do you say, doll? You up for it?”

  He watched as Gretchen’s eyes flared. Her breaths were short and shallow, and beneath his arm, he could feel her body tremble slightly. But the look in her eyes held more than just fear, more than just a small amount of reluctance… there was curiosity there, too, and more than a little bit of the arousal he’d seen in her before.

  He shifted his weight against the barstool as his cock hardened.

  “Y-yeah,” she told him. Then she looked at Becky and said with more confidence, “Yeah. We’re ready.”

  Becky’s smile was relieved. “Come with me, then, and I’ll show you where you can undress.”

  “Undress?” Lucas and Gretchen said at the same time. No fucking way was his woman going to be…

  “You refused to be naked, but agreed to do the demonstration in a bathing suit,” Becky said patiently. “You don’t remember any of this? I have all the emails.”

  Gretchen waved a hand in the air. “No, no, of course I remember,” she lied. “It’s just been such a long week.”

  Becky’s smile slipped and Lucas was sure the woman rolled her eyes as she turned and began walking towards the front of the ship. “Uh huh. Follow me.”

  Before following, Gretchen turned to Mariela, who had watched the entire exchange with wide eyes. “Maybe we’ll come back and chat later?” she suggested. “For Mama Peggy’s sake?”

  Mariela nodded, her eyes darting from Lucas to Gretchen speculatively. “Okay.”

  Gretchen gave her a broad smile, then jumped down from the stool and began to follow Becky.

  “Whoa, hold up,” Lucas said in a low voice a few seconds later. He wrapped his arm around her waist, slowing her steps, then tucked them into a small alcove along the cabin wall where they wouldn’t draw many eyes. “We have things to discuss, you and I.”

  “Lucas, we need to catch up to…”

  “Talk first,” he said, brooking no argument. “Mama Peggy?”

  Gretchen rolled her eyes and smiled sweetly. “She’s your darling aunt… Lance.”

  “Where the hell did you come up with that line of bullshit? Seems like you’ve forgotten the first rule of undercover work, Gina. Never invent an overly complex backstory.”

  “What was I supposed to do?” Gretchen seethed as he steered them around a group of chatting women. “Let you flirt with her all day?”

  “Jealous?” he demanded.

  “Oh, please! I was so not jealous,” she cried. “If you wanted to flash her your fuck-me smile and stare down her cleavage all day, that’s your business, but it wasn’t working. You were losing her interest, idiot.”

  “My fuck-me smile?” he repeated. He nearly laughed but then the rest of her words registered. “I was not losing her interest.”

  “You were. You insulted her by offering her money, and you were about to completely blow our chances by threatening her!” In the dim alcove, her eyes sparked up at him.

  “Blow our chances!” he scoffed. “I was about to get the information we need!”

  Gretchen shook her head once. “You forgot the first rule of investigation: Figure out her motivation. She wouldn’t crack for money, and she sure as hell wouldn’t do it if you threatened her. She cares about love.”

  Love? He thought back to the way Mariela had closed herself off at the mention of a payoff… and the way she’d been almost receptive to Gretchen’s ridiculous story. His eyes narrowed. “So, you created this whole story…”

  A story of love, family love. Yes. And it worked. Since she clearly didn’t want to flirt with me.”

  “And you wanted me to flirt with her?” His disbelief was clear in his tone. If that was what Gretchen wanted, then maybe they weren’t on the same page at all. Maybe they never had been. “Is that how you get a story?”

  Her spine stiffened, and she ignored his first question entirely. “Screw you, Lucas. I’m a professional and I do my job.” Her voice nearly cracked with some underlying emotion but he didn’t stop to identify it.

  “Oh, yes, I know. You’ve made that perfectly clear. Your job comes first. But on this job, doll, you follow my lead, before you get us into trouble.” He grabbed her hand and led her in the direction Becky had gone.

  “Follow your lead,” she muttered. “That, right there, is why it would never work between us, no matter how tempted I am. I need a partner, Lucas. But you don’t want an equal, you want someone who’ll blindly follow you. You need to be the guy with the master plan, the guy with all the power, and you want me to be a pretty, submissive face in the background. I can’t live like that. I’d suffocate.”

  Stunned, he stopped walking and turned to face her. Was that really what she believed?

  “I have never tried to control you that way. Christ, Gretchen, when have I ever done anything to make you think that? I have only ever wanted to protect you, to support you. That was true three years ago, and it’s sure as hell true right now. Why is that so hard for you to get?”

  “Because!” she cried, tears filling her eyes. “Because I don’t need your help or your protection. I am capable of doing things for myself. Yes, sometimes I get overwhelmed, and I get scared, but it doesn’t matter because I can still get shit done.”

  He pulled her against him until her chest was flush against his, and he lifted his hand to swipe at the drop of moisture that fell on her cheek. His heart was beating out of his chest and he struggled for words, all too aware that he could not mess this up.

  “Of course you can. Fuck, I love how strong you are, how single-minded. Even when it pisses me off. You’re capable of doing whatever the hell you set your mind to, all by yourself. Ziplining through a jungle, interviewing refugees, tracking down notorious crime bosses, whatever. But Gretchen, why should you have to do that alone?”

  She stared at him in shock and he continued.

  “I don’t want to take anything away from you, baby. I have never wanted to make you feel weak. I want to be your shield, Gretchen. To be your sword. To make you stronger. Because…” He blew out a breath and cupped her face in his palms, searching for the right explanation. “There’s freedom in submission. Let me take care of you, so that you can take care of all the other things you want to accomplish. Whatever you want, whatever you need, we’ll figure shit out together. Let me show you that giving up control to someone you can trust, someone who loves you, will calm your mind.”

  Well, fuck. He’d said love. He waited a moment for the panic to begin, for the clawing, restless feeling that gripped his chest whenever he thought about committing himself to anyone to set in, but it never came. Instead, saying the words seemed to release something in his chest, to ease a tension he hadn’t known he was carrying.

  Her mouth opened and her throat worked, but no words came out, so he pushed through one last time.

  “It all comes down to this, honey. Do you trust me?”

  Chapter 5

  Do I trust him? Do I?

  There was too much information to process here, too many things to dissect and contemplate. Images and impressions fl
ashed through her mind, disconnected and disorienting.

  Lucas, three years ago, insisting on accompanying her when she met with Diego Santiago and standing intimidatingly by her side throughout the meeting… but never asking her to cancel the meeting or to leave the dangerous stuff to him.

  Lucas, yesterday morning, grilling the snorkeling instructor about safety practices… but never suggesting that she should simply stay safely in their cabin.

  Lucas, three years ago, asking her to be with him… and accepting her refusal, even when a corner of her mind silently begged him to push her.

  Lucas, a few minutes ago, telling her that giving up control to someone who loved her would free her mind.

  Someone who loved her.

  Was it possible that she’d read this whole thing wrong?

  She thought of Elena, of Blake, of how their relationship had made Elena a stronger woman, with even more love and compassion to devote to her work. How Elena often wrote on her blog about the strength that was needed for submission and how a dominant often needed their submissive just as much as the submissive needed their dominant. Like trees twined together, supporting one another, she’d said.

  Gretchen had a hundred thousand doubts and worries that felt like knotted ropes around her chest. Was she strong enough to submit? What if she couldn’t tolerate punishment? What if she let herself fall for Lucas, the way she almost had three years ago, and things didn’t work out? What if he broke her heart? What if, what if, what if… And then, like a drowning man, grasping for a life preserver, her mind caught onto his final words. Do you trust me?