Hero Undercover: 25 Breathtaking Bad Boys

by Annabel Joseph

  “You would be torn apart in seconds where I came from, small woman, ripped to shreds, screaming. Had you known me, you would come running, begging for my shelter.”

  The comedy was over. River gnawed a nail, hating the way he could color a room and remind her that he was actually terrifying beyond his bumbling inquiries. “I can take care of myself.”

  “Not there. There you would die.” Stephen’s answer was matter of fact, the man going back to drying the clean dish she had handed him. “The way you smell would only bring that end sooner.”

  The psycho’s insults were easier to stomach than his alluded to craziness. Handing over the last dish, River glared, held the pale eyes of the man and said nothing.

  His gaze narrowed. “Take your hair from the braids.”

  “No.” River let the plate slip from between them to clatter on the wood floor, walking away.

  Chapter 4

  The woman was in the bathroom, scrubbing her body with the bucket of fresh powder collected after she’d dug out the door. Like a metronome, there was a muffled shriek then a curse, the sound of her elbow banging the wall, over and over.

  Ankle improved, Stephen paced, slowly strengthening the limb and easing any lingering swelling through careful movement. Back and forth before her bookcases, he shuffled, staring at various covers more interesting than the wood walls. Having already read through all the trail guides as she slept, possessing a fair grasp of where he was now and which map he would need, he ignored them in place of poetry and fiction, novels well-worn and fading, a large book on cosmetics… He pulled it out to see the pages were still glossy, though it was clear she had at least skimmed through it. Grabbing a book that looked different than the rest, he lay back on the couch and began to read.

  The female was taking an inordinate amount of time.

  Stephen checked the fire. It needed no tending. The blankets did not need folding. His eyes went back to the book, then the bathroom, then the book again. The bathroom door opened. River emerged wearing a different set of shapeless lumpy clothing, hugging herself, teeth chattering. He knew she would go to her perch by the fire to warm, a little to the left, nearer the poker, as she did every day. He also knew that speaking to her when she was very cold would result in unsavory conversation.

  His eyes went back, again, to the book. Ten minutes passed.

  “Do you like that story?”

  “No.”

  “Care to elaborate?” River scooted nearer, eyeballing the cover. “What do you dislike about it?”

  “The protagonist is unbelievable… real men do not behave in this manner.”

  Words mangled by chattering teeth, River chuckled. “No shit. That’s why women buy romance novels. Real men are usually self-serving jerks.”

  Looking at the cover where a shirtless, muscular man embraced a woman in a yellow gown Stephen asked, “Women want men to behave this way?”

  “I think you’re missing the point.” It was funny enough finding the man reading a trashy novel, and ten times more amusing that he didn’t even quite grasp what was in his hand. “It’s just a story where, say a neglected wife might pretend to be the heroine... where she’s pretty, stylish, the one the handsome stranger can’t live without. She doesn’t have to think about making dinner or getting the kids ready for bed. Books like that serve as a harmless escape—one small fling with a fantasy you don’t have to wake up next to and feed for the rest of your life.”

  “Why do you have it?”

  “It came with the cabin.” River winked. “Let me choose one I think you’ll like better.” Standing, she went straight to an old hardback missing its jacket. Sitting back in her chair, she opened it and began to read aloud.

  The two stories were like night and day. There was no more pastoral setting and long flirtatious looks, but an ancient city ripe with murder. In Stephen’s opinion, it was the best book she’d chosen so far. He understood the violence, the darker thoughts of the characters... there were even parts that were funny.

  He wheezed something that sounded almost like a laugh.

  River looked up, she even smiled at him. “...he likes it.”

  Stephen’s eyes narrowed. “Continue.”

  The woman’s grin expanded. “Say please.”

  “I do not like your cooking.” Stephen stared at her, unblinking, mean. “But you have proven to be an adequate hunter. You understand the necessities of survival here and adapt. You also read well.”

  Cabin fever had clearly driven River insane. That was the only thing to account for believing she’d heard her guest offer a borderline compliment. “It’s just one word. You can say it and I’ll never tell.”

  “Please.”

  He’d made the woman happy with so small a thing. She glowed as she sat back in her chair, husky words spinning the tale as if she made a greater effort to do well.

  The nature of the tale was graphic, violent, but he grew soothed under the power of her voice. Perched on the couch, his ankle elevated, it seemed peaceful.

  Peaceful was abnormal, causing him to interrupt her in the middle of a very gruesome murder scene. “Why did you choose this story?”

  Resting the open book on her lap, she ran her fingers across the page. “I knew it would be comfortable for you.”

  Brows drew down over displeased eyes, aware that was not exactly a compliment. Sitting up, he leaned closer. He was going to say something cutting but it would have only proven her point.

  The lightest of quirks changed her lips, as if she knew he’d been verbally waylaid.

  “I still do not understand why you live alone in the forest.”

  The dark fringe of her lashes went down, her eyes found the book again. River continued to read.

  Very few people would dare to disregard him, she’d done so often. “Answer the question.”

  “That was a statement.” She glanced over the top of her book.

  Stephen scooted fractionally closer.

  Ignoring him, River continued the story, picking up right where they had left off.

  Fingers hooked the top of her book and Stephen pulled it down so that she had to look at him again... so he could look at her. The female had known he was dangerous the second she fished him out of the water, yet she had invited him in, saved him from death by exposure.

  He could hardly understand her. “Are you that naive or that fearless?”

  River spoke the simple truth, “You are not going to kill me.”

  No, he was not. “Keep reading.”

  Brushing against her when they tended the dishes, seeking to grab her attention, had only irritated the woman. Demanding she take down her hair made her walk away.

  It had taken another day, but he’d found a way to entice her to watching him. Leaning against the wall of her house, her arms crossed over her chest, the expression on her face altered from confusion, to humor, to a sense of being impressed, all the way back to confusion again. Gaining her attention had been almost laughably easy; all it took was simple, necessary exercises. Sit-ups had made her shake her head at him, the woman scuttling out of the way. It was the push-ups that followed... those had brought about the confounded look on her face and unwavering attention.

  “How many have you done?”

  His eyes had not once looked from the female. “Three hundred fifty-three.”

  “How many can you do?”

  Stephen answered, nonchalant, “As there is no weight on my back, at least one thousand.”

  River cocked her head. “Weight? Like a person?”

  “At my strength level, resistance is necessary for expedited improvement.”

  “So if I sit on you, this will end quicker and I can reclaim my living room?”

  “Yes.”

  River walked up, waited for him to hold plank, and sat right across his shoulder blades. When he immediately started right where he left off, she started to laugh. “I didn’t really believe you.”

  She was about to hop off, to leave him
to continue, but he barked, “Remain where you are.”

  It’s not like she had anything better to do. “Are you going to bench press me next?”

  In a grunt, he answered, “You are too light to offer sufficient resistance.”

  Having to brace to keep in place, her hands felt what made him bigger than a grizzly bear beneath his thermal. The stranger was a rock, inhuman, everything bulging under her palm. “Just watching you do this is making me more sore.”

  Freezing inches from the ground, Stephen turned his head to cut a glance at the woman from the corner of his eye. “Due to the storm, there has been little need for you to perform physical labor. You have no call to be sore.”

  “Pffft,” River cocked her chin at the couch. “You’ve been sleeping on my bed for six nights now. The chair is not nearly so comfortable.”

  He started to stand, River toppling unexpectedly, only to yip when he moved with inhuman quickness, twisting her arms over her breasts. Stephen spun her around, and yanked her back up against his chest. One good jolt and the bones in her spine popped, the startled woman squealing.

  She just hung like a wet noodle, unsure for a moment if her legs would work.

  “Is that not better?”

  She managed to squeak, “Umm...Yeah.” When her feet found the floor, and over-huge python arms let her go, she added, “A little warning would have been nice.”

  Stephen frowned, watching River plop belly down on the couch. “You would have tensed, making the adjustment less effective.”

  “It was effective. I feel like everything went cockeyed.”

  Beefy fingers flipped up the hem of her sweater before River realized what he was doing. When she cursed and tried to shuffle off, a flat palm pressed her into the cushions. Thumb and forefinger pinched down her bared spine. “Everything is in alignment. It feels unnatural because you are unaccustomed to proper spinal positioning.”

  “Stop poking at me, jerk!”

  He ignored her complaint. “Hold still.”

  The pad of a thumb dug in from the base of her neck and drew down the left side of her spine. A jump of muscle, another yelp, and the tension was forced off. He even managed to draw out an agitated sigh. The process was repeated on the other side.

  Kneading the way that best alleviated his discomfort, he found her squirming less and settling more. A shoulder was cupped, drawn up so the blade projected and he could reach the smaller muscle groups beneath it. She held still and allowed it, going so far as to stifle a groan when he forced a knot to release.

  The more he touched, the less clinical it became, there was too much to learn from such a grand amount of exposed flesh. He was correct about her athleticism, though he assumed her physique came from hiking and the necessary labor of survival in the wilds, not organized exercise. But it wasn’t her musculature that had his eye. The entirety of her exposed back was painted, a tattoo alive with the movement of gentle muscle under vivid skin. He traced it with his fingers, the design complicated, created by a master of both flow and color, absorbing the hours upon hours she’d submitted to a needle, to pain, for a thing of such beauty.

  A rising phoenix and the flowering branches of a tree embedded in the totality of the design. It extended beyond where faded jeans covered hips and buttocks, above the bunched up fabric of her ugly sweater.

  The portrait was breathtaking, the subject unique.

  It wrapped her side, asymmetrical, and he needed to know what remained hidden. But when he tried to turn her to see it, she pulled down her sweater and began to sit up.

  Stephen wanted her back as she was. “I am not finished.”

  “Look, a lot of people get the wrong idea when they see the tattoo. It doesn’t mean you can touch me.”

  He didn’t understand. “My back is also marked.”

  “Oh yeah?” River was uncomfortable, sitting back into the cushion while the man continued to hover too near. “Let me guess, a tribal tattoo or your name in script? The same ugly smear every meathead wears.”

  “No.” Stephen stood and moved the short distance to continue his exercise, no longer in a pleasing mood.

  The atmosphere was awkward, River irritated he’d walked away. “Well, what is it?”

  Making no effort to answer, no longer looking at her as he strengthened his body, Stephen went back to his endless push-ups. She wasn’t having it. Their fights always ended with a clear winner—her. Silence was not an option. Rolling from the couch, she walked right over and did to him what he’d done to her, flipping up his thermal to see what she’d missed when she’d stripped his lake sodden clothes.

  “Oh... my... god...” The words were hardly a breath.

  Every muscle on the man flexed, his back rippling as she gaped. He bore the long crisscross scars of a whipping—many, many scars from his shoulders to his lower back.

  She didn’t quite understand it, but she felt terrible. “I’m sorry.”

  Popping to his knees, glowering at her as if he might strike should she misstep, he hissed, “Why should you apologize?”

  “Does it hurt?”

  A fist flew out so quickly River never even saw him grab her shirt, only felt him yank her down so they were eye level. “I have risen above such mediocrity as infirmity and pain.”

  “So I see...” Half kneeling, half hanging by the grip he had on her clothes, River deadpanned.

  It was an animal noise. “Pitying me would be your last mistake.”

  “Pitying you is what saved your life.” Her hands went to his chest, to push just enough to make a point, she wanted him to let go. “Or did you forget? I pulled you from the lake, got the water from your lungs. I breathed for you.”

  “What did it feel like?”

  The suddenness of his question, the instant shifted tenor of his speech unbalanced her. Unsure what he was asking she muttered, “The water—”

  “When you breathed for me.” Correcting her, Stephen hardened his phrasing again, “What did that feel like?”

  Her eyes went to a pretty mouth that did not belong to such a hard man. “Perhaps... like an awkward kiss.”

  By the grip on her sweater he pulled her a little nearer. “What if it wasn’t an awkward kiss. What does that feel like?”

  Swallowing, watching his pale-eyed expression, or at least what she could make out of the clenched jaw and tight brow, she was unsure how to answer. “Ummm... fuck... that entirely depends on the participants and the goal.”

  Stephen spoke the words slowly, “What if the goal was pleasure?”

  River colored a little, thinking she might be hearing something in the statement she’d missed before.

  When she didn’t offer the reply he was pressing for, Stephen grunted, “Well?”

  She had to say something. “You want me to kiss you...”

  The man just nodded.

  Black eyes looked to his lips.

  He seized her action as acquiescence, Stephen using his free hand to immediately pull her closer. His mouth was on hers before River could really grasp how far the situation had snowballed. He pressed in so hard her neck gave. Trying to steady herself, she grabbed broad shoulders, River only making it so far as to jump when he tasted the seam of her lips and garbled her squeak. The kiss was entirely one-sided, ending almost as quickly, and abruptly, as it began.

  Stephen felt failure when she tensed. The second he could find the means to speak, he argued, “You didn’t kiss me back.”

  Really? “You didn’t give me a chance to!”

  Irritated that the woman always snarled, Stephen sucked in another breath, and glared.

  So very tempted to pop him right in the mouth, River curled her lip, leaned forward, and gave the obnoxious intruder his first real kiss. It was soft, the way she ran her lips over the beauty of his. A full lower lip was sucked into her mouth, one tiny swipe of her tongue teasing the flesh before she nipped and let go.

  He stared, severely disappointed she’d stopped when River untangled his slack fingers
from her sweater, murmuring, “That is what a kiss feels like.”

  Rubbing his lips, he sat silent while River grabbed her coat and went out into the storm.

  Encased by the zipper of his cargo pants was something aching, something long foreign.

  Standing so as not to put more pressure on his cock, Stephen looked at the door, annoyed she had left just as his body responded and progress could have been made. In the freezing cold of her bathroom, he reached into his pants, withdrawing pulsing flesh that had not known attention in almost a decade. Thinking of how soft her skin had felt, how strange her lips had tasted, he pumped his fist.

  Imagining that same mouth on him again, Stephen came, the strength of the orgasm uncomfortable.

  It would have been easier had she not heard him, the grunts and groans, the obvious noises of the stranger jacking off. But she had. He’d been loud enough she’d heard him over the storm and hated herself for edging nearer.

  All that ferocity had been... hot.

  Hot wrapped up in nut job.

  She’d left the room because things had gotten out of hand, and as usual, they were not communicating on the same level. In all fairness, River had never thought he would actually kiss her—not after days of finding disgust in his eyes. The man who could do a thousand push-ups but had never kissed a woman.

  River wasn’t sure if that made her more comfortable, or less.

  And now he was grunting in her bathroom, and her ear was to the wall.

  That’s it. She was a total pervert.

  River thanked God it was below freezing, and thanked him again when the man groaned his release thinking that was the end of it... then cursed herself for listening on to enjoy the extension of his moans. It wasn’t cold enough anywhere for any woman to not get a little turned on by something so base.

  Six days trapped in a room was making her crazy. As he was already crazy, he seemed totally unaffected. It wasn’t fair.

  Her bad judgment aside, she would have to go back in there.

  Everything would be fine, River told herself, letting the cold work on her further.