by Julie Miller
The time. Oh, God, this was too slow. She wouldn’t finish. She couldn’t finish.
With his fingers massaging her inside and out, she felt herself swell. She felt his fingers get slick with her need. The scent of her own honey-sweet aroma filled the tiny space of air in the bathroom. But it wasn’t enough. She wasn’t coming!
She reached up to remove the towel but Logan moved his hands beneath her thighs and lifted her, pulling her right to the edge of the vanity. Thrown off balance, she had to lean back and brace herself with both hands.
She was so open like this. Open and wet and vulnerable. Logan’s fingers plunged into her again and her thighs convulsed. She had to close. She needed to close to savor the tension, to ease the driving heat.
But Logan had other plans. “Spread your legs,” he ordered on a husky command. “Spread your legs. I want to suck you.”
His hands pushed against her and her thighs fell open. Then he was kneeling in front of her, his dark hair an enticing contrast against her pale skin. In a contest of strength and subconscious will, he held her open. His tongue lapped at her crevice and she bucked in reaction. With his lips protecting her, he nipped at her swollen clitoris. His scratchy beard stubble rasped against her most delicate skin.
Grace contracted. Logan pushed. He plunged his tongue inside her and he began to suck in earnest.
Grace’s breathing picked up the same frantic rate. He drank her honey and pulled on her some more.
It was too much. His inner strokes were more than she could bear. She squeezed her thighs and buttocks, demanding her release.
But against Logan’s hands, she couldn’t close herself. She could only move herself closer, drive herself against the marauding assault of his hands and mouth.
Sensing her breaking point, Logan slipped his fingers beneath her bottom and lifted her right onto his mouth. With his superior strength he lifted her off the counter and bit down with one final plunge deep inside her.
Grace screamed into the towel. Everything inside her clenched, then flowered and flowed with her release.
He’d done it! They’d done it!
Before she came down from the pinnacle, Logan set her on the counter and gathered her into his arms. “God, you’re so beautiful,” he praised her. “So absolutely beautiful.”
Weak and spent she could only cling to him to try to catch her breath.
The obvious bulge in his pants against her thigh brought her back to the reality of the moment. She reached for him, intending to return the favor. But Logan caught her wrist and moved her hand away. “That was for you, sweetheart. I’m okay.”
He pulled the towel from her mouth and placed it between her legs to clean her. But even that rough texture on her sensitized skin threatened to arouse her again!
Logan smiled and stepped away, giving her space to close herself around the towel. He punched a button on his watch and the iridescent dial lit up. “Five minutes,” he said. “We’ve been in here five minutes.”
“Is that all?” She was both surprised and disappointed. “Well. Do I have that look?”
He turned her face toward the soft glow of the night-light and smiled. “Oh, yeah. Feeling more confident?”
Grace felt herself blush clear down to her toes. “Oh, yeah.”
He helped her climb down and while she washed herself and dried, he turned her panty hose right side out. She was dressed in a matter of minutes, though she and Logan kept bumping into each other in the small room, stirring her desire for him all over again.
When at last she was ready, Logan took her gently by the shoulders and backed her up against the sink. Grace tipped her head back as he leaned over her. Her lips parted as he moved in close enough for a kiss. But he paused, mere millimeters away. Their breaths mingled, their gazes locked, and the tension in the room stretched itself almost to the point of snapping.
But then he pulled away, leaving her breathless and hot. Her body still reeled with the aftershocks of his most intimate kiss. If they could stay locked together in this tiny room, she’d want to do it again. And again and again.
“You’re a man of your word, Logan. Thank you.” She plucked at the knit of his sweater, then smoothed it flat against his chest.
“I told you I could do it without kissing.”
She smiled at his boyishly male arrogance. Then she threw her arms around his neck and pulled herself up on tiptoe, hugging him tight in her arms and thanking him.
“I meant thank you for not letting me quit.” She kissed him beside his ear and unwound herself so she could look him in the eye. “I know this is hard for you. It’s hard for both of us. Thank you for being strong when I couldn’t be.”
He smoothed the hair away from her face in a gentle caress. In the room’s dim light, she couldn’t tell if she saw regret or something more caring darken his eyes. “You’re the strongest woman I’ve ever known, Gracie.” He turned her out of his arms and urged her toward the door with a swat on her rump. “Now go give Mitchell a kiss and tell him he’s the one who gives you that hot blush. I’ll keep searching the house for that computer terminal.”
Logan hung back in the shadows and watched Grace return to Mitchell’s office. There was a confident wiggle in her tush as she sauntered down the hall. She exchanged pleasantries with Ilsa and disappeared from sight.
Automatically, he closed his eyes and tuned in to the sounds through his earpiece monitor.
“Well.” Grace’s nervous laugh put him instantly on guard. “Isn’t this a surprise.”
What?
It sounded like Harris Mitchell needed to die a very painful death. “I thought I’d take off some of my clothes so you’d be more comfortable taking off yours.”
Was the bastard naked?
Grace shouldn’t have to do this. Although she needed to be a field agent. Though she was damn good at undercover, she shouldn’t have to do this.
This kind of work was meant for men like him. Men who’d lived in hell. Men who’d rubbed elbows with the scum of the earth and learned the gift of street-wise survival. He was the kind of man who dealt with perverts like Mitchell so that innocents like his mother and Roy Silverton and Grace Lockhart never had to.
“I’m not really into cross-dressing, Harris.” Was that pointed observation intended for Logan’s ears? He pulled himself out of his spiraling depression to listen to Grace. “I don’t know if I like a man who wears a camisole just like mine.”
“I have other selections,” offered Mitchell. “We don’t have to dress alike.”
Logan almost grinned at the notion of the notorious ladies’ man wearing ladies’ underwear. Almost.
He did his best to tune out the painful sound of some kind of embrace.
“I’m exhausted, Harris. Tell you what, let me get a good night’s rest, and tomorrow night I promise to make it all worth the wait.”
“We have dinner with an associate of mine tomorrow.”
She was probably touching him somehow. Touching him in a way that would turn Mitchell’s will to her own. Just as her touches had turned Logan’s will to mush. “Dinner won’t last all night, will it?”
Harris laughed. It was a low, secretive sound not meant for anyone’s ears but Grace’s. Logan heard it, anyway. He heard it and hated the sound. “Anthony Benzetti is a boring old fart. We’ll take care of business and end the evening early so that we can get down to business.”
“Sounds perfect,” said Grace.
To Logan, it sounded like a nightmare.
15
“QUIT TUGGING at your dress.”
Grace’s hands stilled at the low-cut neckline of her simple black dress. With all its boning, the knee-length silk sheath fit her like a second skin.
She’d make a good impression, she knew, judging by the appreciative interest in Logan’s eyes, which somehow always seemed to be watching her, no matter what he was inspecting around her bedroom.
“It’s just that it shows so much,” she explained, aligning the sp
aghetti straps that were there for decoration rather than support. “This is supposed to be a business dinner.”
“It’s supposed to be an opportunity to clear out the house so I can search the last two rooms.” He pulled the tiny microphone chip from his pocket and walked over to stand in front of her. His hands hovered above the horizontal line of black silk and the pale swells of her breasts that mounded above the top edge. “Are you sure there’s space in here for the microphone?”
“Now who’s worried about revealing too much?” she teased. She took the chip from him and tucked it down inside her strapless bra. “I’ll be out of range at the restaurant, but as soon as we get within the one-mile radius of the estate, I’ll start talking about tonight’s…festivities…with Harris.”
She could talk about it now, discuss how she would seduce another man besides Logan. But only because it was part of the job. Only because Logan needed her to keep Harris Mitchell distracted long enough to find the main computer terminal. Only because that seduction talk would warn Logan that Mitchell and his bodyguards were returning to the estate grounds.
No matter how hard she tried to apply Logan’s ten rules of sexy living to her relationship with Mitchell, they just didn’t work. Sure, Mitchell was attracted to her, challenged by her. But she felt nothing for him but pure revulsion. The achy excitement of having a man find her irresistibly sexy only seemed to work when that man was Logan Pierce.
Logan clasped her by the shoulders. His thumbs stroked across her breasts, straying toward the plunging neckline, making Grace’s skin prickle with an arousing heat.
But then he seemed to think better of giving in to the seductive connection that coursed between them. He pulled his hands away and pushed at the air in mock surrender. He walked back to his briefcase, pulled out his gun and checked the clip and firing pin before tucking it behind him in the waistband of his black jeans. It was almost as if he needed to keep his hands busy to keep them from touching her.
“I’m still really curious about what you plan to do tonight to entertain Mitchell. After meeting with Benzetti, he’s expecting a big show.”
She wasn’t fooled by the businesslike tone in Logan’s voice. She knew he wasn’t comfortable with her role in this assignment. But he trusted her to be able to fulfill her part. That trust alone deserved a reassurance. “Well, hopefully, by the time we get back, you will have found the hidden computer, downloaded the program, and we won’t have to stick around to find out.”
Logan nodded. “There’s just the hidden room behind his office, and his bedroom.”
Grace went over to the mirror above the dresser and touched up her ruby-tinted lipstick. “Remember, the switch is hidden behind the Kama Sutra. It’s the last book on the third shelf on the north wall.”
“How could I forget?” Logan came up behind her. He cupped her bare shoulders in his hands and pulled her back against his chest. Grace lifted her gaze to meet his in the mirror. “I wish I could kiss you.”
The low-pitched rumble of his voice vibrated along her nerve endings. “I wish you could, too.”
They stood there like that for an endless moment, gazes locked, absorbing each other’s sheltering heat.
Finally, Logan smiled. It was a wry expression that revealed frustrated regret rather than humor. “Don’t let Mitchell try any of that Kama Sutra stuff on you.”
“I’ll be fine.” She turned to face him, sharing her own concern. “Don’t get caught. Tanya and Ilsa are going with us, but there still will be other staff members on the estate.”
Logan brushed a loose curl off her forehead. “You don’t think I can charm my way out of trouble?”
She gave him back a little of the possessive streak he was giving her. “I don’t want you charming anybody but me.”
“Whatever you say, boss.” He touched her hair again, not quite able to let her go. “You remember everything I taught you, okay? Keep your head in the game, stay in control—”
“I know. I was trained by the best.” Grace moved before her heart refused to let her walk away. She picked up a matching silk stole and pulled it around her shoulders. “Remember, you’ll have about two hours. Find that computer.
“I shouldn’t keep Harris Mitchell waiting.”
DINNER AT CHEZ DUMOND was an elegant affair. The food was delicious, the service impeccable. The only thing marring the evening was the possessive squeeze of Harris Mitchell’s hand on her knee beneath the table the entire evening.
Well, not the entire evening. Occasionally he moved his arm to the back of her chair and let his fingertips graze the bare skin of her back. Sometimes, he broke up the monotony by leaning over and nuzzling a wet lick against her ear.
The only thing that kept her from gagging on her salmon steak was the relatively normal, straightforward conversation of her other dining companion, Anthony Benzetti. Even though Benzetti was a known suspect with several alleged connections to organized crime, he proved to be pleasant enough company. Refusing to discuss business until after dessert, he chatted of his home in Sicily, his grandchildren, and the boat he wanted to buy to sail the eastern seaboard.
But even with that to distract her, she could only take so much of Mitchell’s fixed stare down at the shadow of her cleavage. An old-world gentleman, Benzetti stood as she rose to excuse herself to the rest room, while Mitchell ordered a mixed drink, looking put out by her sudden abandonment.
As she scooted past Harris’s chair, his hand snaked out and latched on to her wrist. “Don’t be gone long,” he warned, his voice barely loud enough for her to hear. He pulled her arm so that she had to bend forward and give him a gaping view of her breasts. “Or I’ll send Ilsa after you.”
The two bodyguards watched with detached interest from a nearby table. Benzetti pretended not to notice Mitchell’s bruising grip. Grace squelched her panic and pushed herself upright, quietly pulling free.
“I’ll be just a few minutes.” She managed to hold the answering smile on her face until she pushed her way through the door to the ladies’ rest room lounge area. “Oh, God.”
She had just enough time to breathe a sigh of relief, adjust her gown and curse the day she’d ever been born with busty genes, before the door swung open again. She should have recognized the sudden burst of energy that filled the room before even hearing that shrill, maternal voice.
“Gracie! What on earth are you doing here with that man?”
“Mother?” She turned in surprise, bracing herself for Mimsey’s ebullient hug. But it never came. Instead, Mimsey took Grace’s arm and led her through a second door into the rest room area. With a furtive glance over her shoulder that had Grace checking behind them, too, she pulled open the door to the double-wide space of the handicapped stall and pushed her inside.
“Mother.” Grace avoided tripping over the toilet and whirled around. “We can’t stay in here.”
Mimsey planted her strappy silver sandals on the tile floor and refused to budge from the locked stall door. “I saw you with him.”
“What are you talking about?” This was so Mimsey. This was too weird.
“Honey, he’s no good.”
“Who?”
“Harris Mitchell.”
Grace froze at the announcement. Then she urged her mother to hush her voice to a whisper. “You know Harris Mitchell?”
Mimsey nodded. She patted her platinum hair and then wrung her hands. “He doesn’t look much older than when I dated him in the early eighties. He must color his hair. And those teeth—”
“You dated Harris Mitchell?”
“Yes. And it was one of the biggest mistakes of my life.” She wrapped her hands around Grace’s where she clutched her evening bag. She’d never seen her mother like this. Not without the cameras rolling. “Think about it, Gracie. Think of all the mistakes I’ve made. He was one of the worst. All that talk of marriage and financing a real, grade-A movie for me. I fell for his line. We needed the money so badly. I was losing our apartment in Burbank. And
he took care of us. He took such good care—”
“Mother.” She switched the position of the hands, holding on to Mimsey now. I’ve seen those breasts before. Maybe Mitchell’s come-on line wasn’t as sick as it could be. She and her mother did share a body type, if little more. “Are you telling me you and Mitchell had an affair?”
“Yes. Isn’t that what I’ve been saying?”
Grace’s pursuit of Harris Mitchell suddenly took a very personal turn down memory lane. He wasn’t just like the men who had hurt her mother. He was one of those men.
“He’s a criminal.”
She had no idea.
Mimsey clasped her hands at the cleavage of her red-sequined dress. “He’s worse than that. Oh, sweetie. He has a temper on him. I dated him for a couple of months before I found out the truth. I was late meeting him one afternoon after an audition and he showed his true colors. He had a whip, Gracie.”
“Mother.” Oh, God. She went back to classifying Mitchell as sick.
“He didn’t use it on me. He wanted me to use it on him.”
“What?”
“He said I owed him for standing him up. But I wouldn’t do it. I couldn’t.” Mimsey stuck one of her red-lacquered nails in her mouth and started nibbling. “He got so mad. He slapped me a couple of times, and threw me to the floor. I think he was trying to get me angry enough to hit him.” She stopped at the toilet and faced her. “Remember that day I came home with the black eye and said I’d fallen on the bus?”
Grace remembered it well. She’d only been five years old, but that was the day she got her first lesson in ice packs and first aid. It was the first of many times she’d played mother to her mom.
“He did that to you?”
Mimsey nodded. “I wanted to break it off right then. But he followed me. I was filming Batamaran that summer, and he’d come onto the set. He said he liked it when I wore my bat costume. He wanted me to bite him. Oh, honey, he’s just no good.” Grace already knew that firsthand. “That handsome agent friend you were with the last time I saw you—I’m sure he’s a much better man.”