Veiled Intentions

by Delores Fossen

She frowned, realizing all the blindsiding was probably leading somewhere after all. “And your point would be?”

  “No point. You’re smart, and that means you know if it comes down to a tight situation, then Rico can handle it. No matter how good of a shot you are—and you’re good—he’s better.”

  “And he’ll be even better if I’m backing him up,” she promptly added.

  “Absolutely.” He stood, kissed her cheek and headed for the door. “Be careful, okay?”

  Katelyn nodded, and even though she wasn’t pleased with the minilecture, she went to him and returned the kiss.

  She locked the door after she let him out. “One down, one to go,” she grumbled. She’d probably convinced Brayden to keep this case alive, but now she had to do the same with Joe.

  “Want some chili?” she called out.

  She took the two plastic containers from the bag. They were still warm so she grabbed a couple of spoons and prepared herself for a feast—which she really didn’t want yet—but that was beside the point. Wolfing down some chili might go a long way toward proving to Joe that she was fit for duty.

  He came out of the bedroom and started that staring thing again, so Katelyn shoved both the container of chili and a spoon into his hands. “Eat,” she ordered.

  She did. Katelyn sat back on the coffee table and dug in. “Practically orgasmic, huh?” she asked after he’d had his first taste.

  “Close.” Joe sampled another heaping spoonful. “Speaking of orgasmic, you’d rather let your brother think you have the hots for me than just tell him you’re hurt?”

  It was a good thing she’d just swallowed that mouthful of chili, or she might have choked on it. “You eavesdropped?”

  “Thin walls,” he countered. “Hard not to eavesdrop.”

  True. But that didn’t let him off the hook completely. “I didn’t want him to take me off the case, all right? Sometimes, he weirds out a little when he starts to think hard about what I do for a living. It’s that you’re-my-kid-sister routine. It brings out his protective instincts.”

  “If he’d known you were wounded in the line of duty, he would have pulled you off the case. It’s not protective instincts. It’s procedure.”

  She stabbed at the chili with her spoon. “I was scratched in the line of duty. Big difference.”

  “Why do you feel the rules don’t apply to you, huh? And before you start defending yourself, just hear me out. Officers who are wounded, even when it’s a scratch, take time off to recoup.”

  “I don’t have time to recoup.”

  He smacked his chili onto the snack bar and stared down at her. “Am I supposed to understand that?”

  No. And no explanation would probably help, either. Still, that didn’t stop her. “I want to be promoted to sergeant, okay? And I wish there were a stronger word than want, because it’d definitely apply here. In six months, I’ll be too old for that promotion.”

  “Too old?” he repeated. “You’ll be what—the ripe old age of twenty-nine?”

  “Both Brayden and Garrett made sergeant by the time they were twenty-nine.”

  He looked at her as if she’d sprouted wings. “This is about competing with your brothers?”

  She was right. He didn’t get it. He couldn’t. “It’d be simple if it were a competition,” she muttered, frustrated. “But it’s more than that. The job is who I am. If I come up short, then I’m not the person I thought I was, and I don’t think I could handle that.”

  Katelyn glanced at him, sorry that she’d just blurted out what was probably the only deep, dark secret she had.

  “And, no, I don’t really expect you to understand,” she added. She poked at the chili again, glad that she had something to prod. Maybe the fake violence would rid her of the alley-cat war going on inside her body.

  He dragged a chair closer and sat down right in front of her so they were eye-to-eye. And only inches apart. “I understand.”

  Of all the things that Katelyn thought he might say, that wasn’t one of them. “Which part?”

  “All of it.”

  She hadn’t expected that, either. The skeptical look she gave him no doubt prompted him to continue.

  “You know how everyone in your family are either cops or former cops? Well, in my family, they’re all military officers. All successful. My dad is a retired one-star general, and he never forgave me for breaking ranks to become a police officer. As much as he was sure I’d fail, that’s how determined I was to succeed. Every promotion, every citation, every award is to prove to him—and me—that I made the right decision.”

  “Wow.” That’s all she could manage for a couple of seconds. Talk about revealing deep, dark secrets.

  Somehow, this conversation had taken a very unsettling turn. And more. He was so close that she took in his scent—and that mixed with the understanding look on his face was a dangerous combination.

  “Okay, so maybe you do get it,” she managed to say. And there was way too much breath in her voice.

  “Yeah. But that doesn’t mean I think it’s a good idea to toss out the regs and procedures. Sometimes, you just have to step back and look at the bigger picture. Like this…” He reached for her bandaged arm.

  Katelyn snagged his wrist, a variation of cutting him off at the pass. Or something like that. All she knew was it wouldn’t be a good time for him to touch her. “Put your hands in my shirt again, and I’ll take you where you sit.”

  She waited for him to laugh or give her a wiseguy comeback for using his words against him.

  He didn’t do either.

  Joe sat there staring at her. Just staring. With those intense blue eyes that seemed to make her melt.

  Mercy, where did the air suddenly go?

  But it was too late for her to care about such things as air, or breathing. Katelyn let go of his wrist so she could reach for him.

  Joe beat her to it.

  Chapter Ten

  The timing sucked.

  Joe forced himself to remember that. Katelyn was injured and coming down from a terrifying ordeal. However, the reminder lasted for only a couple of seconds, for just the short period of time that it took him to haul her off that coffee table and onto his lap.

  Her mouth came to his. Man, did it. Her moist, sweet, hot mouth. The kiss was hard and hungry, and in that moment, Joe knew he was sunk. There wasn’t enough willpower in the universe to make him back away from her.

  He slid an arm around her waist, another around the back of her neck and pulled her against him. To him. Until they were pressed to each other.

  She wasn’t a passive participant. Not that Joe had ever thought she would be. It was a battle. Her kiss was an assault. A sweet one, but still an assault. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, fighting to bring him even closer—not really possible since he’d have to be inside her to achieve that. The way things were going though, that just might happen.

  Soon.

  He decided not to think about why that wouldn’t be a good idea.

  Joe reached for her shirt, or rather his shirt that she was wearing, and would have ripped it off her if he hadn’t tried to be considerate of her injury. Katelyn gave it no such consideration. She stripped it off and sent it flying across the room. Joe went for her bra instead but changed his mind when she shifted her legs to straddle him.

  Oh, man.

  There was no chance he’d talk his body or hers into slowing down so they wouldn’t kill each other. So without breaking their kiss, he went with it, embracing that dangerous energy that was already on the verge of erupting.

  He gripped her thigh and just kept going. Up. Not slowly, either. And not gently.

  There was a lot of bare skin thanks to her short skirt, and she’d apparently removed her panty hose. The only thing he encountered along the way was the woman going after his zipper—something he preferred not to have happen anytime soon. She’d have managed it, too, if Joe hadn’t maneuvered his own seeking hand around hers.

  Since
there wasn’t time for finesse, he went for impact instead. He succeeded. Joe shoved his hand into her panties, into the fragile swatch of lace and silk. His fingers found her. Wet and hot. He made his way through the slick moisture.

  One touch, and he heard her breath shudder.

  She stopped her quest for his zipper and instead anchored her hands, one on his stomach. The other slipped into her own hair. Meeting his gaze head-on, she rocked shamelessly against his hand. One stroke. Two. Three. A long, lingering caress that brought on another shudder, another erotic hitch of her breath. And he was sure he had her close to release.

  He was wrong.

  Katelyn located his mouth again, kissing him as if she’d escalated the war. And maybe she had. She skipped the zipper part she’d started earlier and moved her hand from his stomach. Down.

  Inside his pants.

  No fumbling. She got it right the first time. Those agile fingers bypassed his boxers and slid right over his erection. One stroke. Two. A rather skillful swipe of her thumb, and she had him close to begging for mercy. Or close to begging for something else.

  Joe gritted his teeth and launched them forward. Her back landed on the coffee table, and he landed on her. Between her legs. All in all, it wasn’t a bad place to be. For a moment, anyway. And then there was another round of jockeying for position. She rolled. Until his back landed on the table.

  Katelyn went after his shirt. He went after her skirt. It was out-and-out warfare, and for some reason speed counted. They battled the clothes and won. She even got her way with his zipper and managed to shove it down.

  “Now,” she demanded, already aligning the parts of them that would have made now happen once he rid them of their underwear.

  Maybe it was the sound of her voice, or maybe there was a thread of common sense that hadn’t been smothered in all that fire, but Joe remembered something he almost wished he hadn’t remembered.

  “I don’t have a condom,” he let her know.

  Katelyn stopped instantly and stared at him. “Neither do I.”

  Her eyes were wild, unfocused, and her breaths came out in short, hot spurts. She looked on the verge of cursing, but since she didn’t, Joe cursed for both of them. What he didn’t do was move away from her. It would take more than a lack of a condom for that to happen.

  In one swipe with his forearm, he cleared the coffee table. Chili, magazines and papers went in every direction. He didn’t stop there. Because she’d already started reaching for him, specifically for his erection, Joe latched on to her panties and pulled them off her. They tore. And neither he nor Katelyn obviously cared.

  Now.

  It had to be now.

  With the blood raging, and his heartbeat hammering, he went straight for that hot, sweet part of her that he’d already touched. But this time, he used his mouth and tongue instead of his fingers.

  The taste of her went straight through him like a double shot of whiskey. And more. It was a taste he wouldn’t forget, and somewhere in the back of his mind he knew he’d never be with another woman without thinking of this.

  Of her.

  She mumbled something and sounded as if she were on the verge of protesting, but a well-placed stroke of his tongue stopped her.

  “Okay,” was all she said.

  She arched her back, moaned and began to move to the rhythm of his mouth. It didn’t seem possible, but he’d actually found a way to get Katelyn O’Malley to cooperate. And he pleasured them both in the process.

  For a couple more seconds, anyway.

  “Maybe there’s a condom in the bathroom,” she decided, her tone more desperate than hopeful.

  Her hands were suddenly everywhere. Touching as much of him as she could possibly touch, she slid lower and caught on to his hips, dragging him to the bathroom with her.

  Still, the war didn’t stop.

  She did though.

  But only so she could take her mouth to his bare stomach. No simple kiss. No, not her. She had him seeing double when she circled his navel with her tongue and sucked not-so-tenderly. Before he could muster enough strength to stop her, she kissed his erection as intimately as he’d kissed her. She pleasured him, and from the way she moved against him, she pleasured herself, as well.

  Somehow, he stood upright so he could maneuver her and hopefully reciprocate. She caught on to his shoulders and pushed him against the wall. Normally, that wouldn’t have been an enjoyable experience, but he was in the zone where anything she did would have been enjoyable in this erotic battle they were waging on each other.

  Joe dragged her up with him. And turned so that she was the one against the wall. He was careful not to hurt her arm, but he wasn’t so gentle with the rest of her. He kissed her. Hard.

  She tasted of him.

  Smelled of him.

  Yet, somehow her own unique scent and taste were there, as well. Lingering around him and making him crazy.

  Turning as if in some bizarre dance, they made it into the bathroom. He couldn’t have told anyone how, but it qualified as a miracle.

  His shoulder slammed against the jamb when she looped her arms behind his neck and leaped up to wrap her legs around his waist. With one hand he fumbled through the medicine cabinet while he used his other hand to keep her fingers out of his boxers.

  She searched for a condom as well, tossing things from the glass shelves. Throughout her quest, she kept up the kisses, the touches. Until Joe was absolutely sure he couldn’t take any more.

  But somehow, he took more.

  She made him take more.

  “Truce,” Katelyn mumbled. With her breath thin, her voice had hardly any sound. “There’s not a condom in here.”

  Fighting with his own breath, he nodded. “It was a long shot anyway.”

  And it no longer mattered.

  He’d already prepared himself for the final battle, and he didn’t need a condom for what he had in mind. Joe turned and pinned her against the sink. Without her panties in the way, he wedged his knee between her legs and eased his fingers inside her.

  A long, deliberate sigh left her mouth. A moan. And a gasp of pleasure. Once again she moved into the strokes. And she moved against him. Deeper this time, though. Against his fingers, and against his body. A slow, sensual slide that brought out every basic, every carnal instinct inside him.

  “Not without you,” she insisted.

  “Yes, without me.”

  But he might as well have been talking to the air because she clamped her leg along the outside of his. Holding him in place. And she got her way by sliding her hand back into his boxers.

  Since it was obvious she wouldn’t give up, Joe just gave in.

  “Move with me, Katelyn. Move with me.”

  She did. She moved with him as if her very life depended on it. And with their blood raging, that wasn’t too far from the truth.

  Face-to-face. Body-to-body. Wet skin whispering against wet skin. His fingers, in her. Moving. Hers, on him. Clutching. Gripping. Sliding. To a frantic, feverish pace.

  “Take me where I stand,” she offered.

  And he accepted that offer.

  He snagged her gaze, because he wanted to watch her go over. Joe fought through the clawing primal need to claim and possess so he could see exactly what this did to her. It didn’t matter that he felt his own body going over, as well.

  Nothing mattered.

  Except this.

  Except her.

  They took that last climb together with strokes. Touches. Caresses. And they were right there to catch each other when the fire tore free and released them both.

  KATELYN SO HOPED the ringing in her ears was a post-orgasmic response.

  No such luck.

  When she heard Joe curse, she realized it was the phone. A phone she should probably answer since this was supposedly her apartment and since they were in the middle of an undercover murder investigation.

  Somehow, Joe got their bodies untangled so she could make it to the bedroom. To
prevent herself from having to stand around naked, she grabbed a towel and her pajama top along the way. Naked was great during the throes of passion, but now that the passion had been sated, she was already starting to feel as if she’d done the ultimate no-no.

  Which in a way she had.

  She’d just had sex with her boss, and even though it wasn’t full-blown sex, it qualified in every possible way that counted.

  Katelyn pushed that disturbing thought aside and grabbed the phone. After a couple of tries, she even managed a meager hello.

  “We have a problem,” Brayden immediately informed her.

  Okay. So that rid her of any lust-induced cobwebs. “What’s wrong?”

  She tried to brace herself, but the bracing failed when she heard her brother’s response.

  “The sniper struck again. There’s been another shooting.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “It takes thirteen average-size steps to go from one side to the other,” Garrett commented from the doorway of the headquarters’ conference room. “But then you probably already figured that out since all you’ve done is pace for the past fifteen minutes.”

  “I beg to differ.” Katelyn held up the foam cup. “I’ve had coffee with my pacing.”

  “How very multitasked of you. Try it with gum, and you’ll really impress me.”

  Too bad their attempts at levity failed.

  Mercy. Another shooting.

  She tried to choke back a sigh, failed, and dropped down into one of the burgundy leather chairs that encircled a massive oval table.

  Garrett glanced at Joe, who was in the adjoining room. He’d kept the door open, and the glass panel allowed them both to see that Joe was still talking on the phone. Too bad she couldn’t hear what he was saying.

  “You have an update on the wounded couple yet?” Garrett asked her.

  “That’s what Joe’s getting now.” She set her empty cup aside. “Their names are Melissa and Brad Garcia. They’re alive. At least, they were when they arrived at the hospital a couple of hours ago, but they’re both in surgery.”

  “I heard the shooting happened not too far from the Municipal Auditorium?”