by Em Petrova
When they tore away again, she searched his face. He pressed his lips to her forehead, drinking in her scent and committing it to memory.
Looking over her head at the windows they’d steamed up with their increased body heat, he experienced a sharp pull on his heart.
“Pippa—”
She tipped her face up to his.
Her beautiful eyes captured his heart.
“I… I don’t want to let you go after this. I…” The words swirled in his mind and edged to his lips. “I love you,” he grated out.
The lights in her eyes cooled and then dimmed. She stiffened in his arms before clambering out of his lap. She hit the passenger seat, her head twisted to the side window so he saw only the back of her head.
He lifted a shaky hand and pulled off his hat. Fuck. What just happened? Didn’t women want declarations of love? When she looked at him, he swore he read the same thing on her face. Had he completely misread her?
Tense silence filled the truck, equal to the weight of being held at gunpoint. Neither of them spoke. Minutes ticked by. To avoid looking at her, he glanced at the gas gauge and saw it dropping. Cutting the engine would mean they’d lose precious time if they had to find a quick escape. But they couldn’t go anywhere without gas.
He’d never confessed his love before. Well, not since third grade when Amanda Grace Richards gave him a pink paper heart on Valentine’s Day. To finally say the words and receive only silence in response had him swerving between confused and pissed off.
Should he say something else to cover it up? And why the hell didn’t she love him too? Her body reacted to his every look and touch. She laughed at all his jokes. When she told him she didn’t have any interest in Ryan Letters, he believed her. If there wasn’t someone else, then what stopped her from having feelings for him?
“Dammit,” he said under his breath. Her shoulder tensed but she didn’t turn.
Turning his worries to her safety, he withdrew his phone and called Roman to ask if he could see anything and received a joking reply that he was a whole twelve feet in front of them and their angles were the same.
Then he called Josiah, who told him the calf was doing better and it would most likely live. Also, Boone had reached Seattle and was now networking with security at the hotel and conference center. These small discussions didn’t help his mood or distract him from the mute woman seated beside him.
“I found something in Pippa’s spam folder, too,” Josiah said.
Clutching the phone to his ear, he waited for more.
“An email that bounced between about ten different IP addresses. It could be nothing—or it could be something.”
“Forward it to me and I’ll take a look. Did you run it past Shanie?” he referred to Silas by his last name.
“Yup. He thinks it might hold some weight in this case too.”
After he ended the call, he sent a sidelong look at Pippa’s ramrod-stiff spine.
“Pippa—”
She twisted in her seat to face the front. “What did Josiah say?”
In total Pippa Hamlin style, she changed the subject. What choice did he have but to roll with it? He wasn’t about to argue about love, and he wouldn’t say it a second time.
“They discovered something in your spam folder they want me to have a look at.” They didn’t look at each other, which had his blood boiling in his veins. Minutes before, she rubbed her pussy on his cock and kissed him like she meant it. Now she was ice-cold.
Maybe she didn’t want more than sex from him, and he’d crossed that line. In this scenario, he was taking the typical role of the female who wanted more than the man did. Now he saw why some women hated on men.
He flipped up the screen containing the email.
“Well?” she asked. “What is it?”
He gave a slow shake of his head. “It doesn’t appear to be spam to me. It looks like it came through the chain of command at MIZR.”
She finally turned her head to pierce him in her gaze. “I don’t know how it’s possible I’d miss something associated with my company. Everything comes through a filter but doesn’t go to spam.”
“I think this might be why.” He held up the phone for her to read.
As her gaze moved down the screen, they widened until the whites showed around the hazel irises. “Oh my God.” Her voice rasped with fear. Over their days together, her voice had grown clearer, healing from her injury. But it still held a womanly husk that echoed like a gong inside him. Now, the throatiness returned full force.
She reached as if to snatch the phone from him but dropped her hand to her lap. Her fingers clamped on her leg until the knuckles turned white. “Someone offered me money for my breakthrough?”
“Looks that way.”
“MIZR doesn’t operate that way.”
“Seems as if someone is acting on his own. And he has enough money behind him to pay you a lump sum of twenty-five million dollars.”
“That’s…” She broke off, shaking her head. “It has to be a scam. One of those men from Europe who found my name in his mother’s will and is going to send me the inheritance if I provide him with my bank account number.”
“I don’t think so, Pippa.”
When she met his stare, he saw shock mingled with sadness there. “You’re suggesting someone in MIZR offered to pay me off and when I didn’t respond to that email, they turned to hunting me for it?”
Pain pulsed in her tone. Her eyes flooded with tears, causing them to sparkle brighter. He could be an asshole and hold back any comfort he could give her because she didn’t return his feelings. But he would never do that.
“I’m sorry, honey. C’mere.” He reached out for her and pulled her into his arms. She rested her head on his chest, and he waited to hear the hitching sounds of her crying, but when he glanced down at her, he found her cheeks dry.
She didn’t make a move to slide into her seat. In fact, she seemed pretty damn content to be curled against his chest as she processed the new clue as to who could want her dead.
Even if she didn’t love him in return, she did want his support.
And he loved her enough to provide everything she needed and then some.
“Ross.”
“Yes?”
“I need you to do something for me.”
“Anything.”
“I want you to get me a weapon. Because I’m not going into that conference center unarmed.”
By now, he shouldn’t be surprised by anything she said or did. The woman had more ability than some security officers or prison guards he’d met.
“I’m not going to ask if you know how to shoot. I know your father would have taken you to the range.”
“Yes. He’s an outdoorsman, and he taught me everything he knows.”
“I can’t give you a weapon, Pippa. I can’t put you at more risk. You asked me to protect you—now trust me that I will.”
A shiver shook her, and he tightened his arms to safeguard her from the worst of the storm.
“If it really is someone who heads MIZR—and I can’t imagine who else would have that kind of money—then I feel I’ve lost everything.”
“What do you mean?” He smoothed his hand over her silky hair.
“I’ve believed in this company since I was a teen, when they paid for my way through college and to get me through a doctorate degree in trade for working for them.” She lifted her head and looked at Ross. “I feel like a sow that’s been fattened up for market. They gave me every opportunity to learn. For them. They trained me and provided me with the facility to discover this thing that will change the world. Now they want to pay me off or kill me to get it. Well, I’m not giving up my secrets, and I’m willing to die to keep it out of their hands.”
He closed his eyes on her forceful oath. “You won’t have to, Pippa. Because I will.”
* * * * *
Pippa felt as though someone had clubbed her over the head and dragged her into a pitch-black cav
e. No light shed on the problems she was facing. And no shadows meant she didn’t know what to hide from.
There was also the huge problem of Ross.
His declaration of love blindsided her—shocked her to the depths of her soul. It was the only thing she wanted to hear from the man, and yet it terrified her. Their lives were too different, and loving each other only complicated things more.
He was married to his work. She was too. Yes, they were so alike it was scary. That should give her some hope that her feelings could actually go somewhere, but she knew better. What was she going to do? Give up her important life’s work, a life she was willing to sacrifice in order to share her finds with the world on her own terms, so she could live on the Wynton Ranch and support Ross’s dreams?
Not that she didn’t care about his dreams—far from it. The edges of their universes hardly touched, though.
The Seattle hotel felt cold and without personality after the motels they’d stayed in on their journey. The four white walls, king-sized bed piled with pristine white bed linens and down pillows, and the stark modern furniture in the room had nothing on those bear cubs playing in a creek on the motel wall.
She was also alone. Ross had installed her in this room with her bag and a promise that he or one of his team would be outside her door at all times. After the closeness they’d shared of hours in the truck, being alone left her hollow.
On those miles of road, they’d shared so much of themselves. They’d been trapped in two whiteouts. Been shot at and hunted down. But she’d been alive.
Coming from a sterile lab and now being dropped in this lonely white room, she had to ask herself how she’d journeyed so far from the things she loved. The outdoors. Her family. Ross’s family. Personal connections. The one person she managed to retain a relationship with was Meredith, and she was lucky to have her. She hoped her evasive responses to Meredith’s kindness over the past few days hadn’t pushed her friend away too.
Her room towered over Seattle, and she had a great view of the skyline. She also had a wall of glass doors leading to a private balcony. Growing up in Seattle, she knew the weather fluctuated all over the place at this time of year, but suddenly she wanted nothing more than some fresh air.
She walked to the French doors, but stopped short of touching the handle. Ross told her not to go out there alone. At the time, she asked how anybody would get to her so high and with huge spans between her and the next balcony, but he only gave her that hard look that brooked no arguments.
Turning from the balcony, she looked at the other set of glass doors, these partitioning off the bathroom suite from the rest of the space. She already had a shower today, but maybe a nice soak in a hot bath would ease her nerves and help the icy cold dread of what would come in the morning when she took that podium as keynote speaker.
Right this second, Ross was organizing an army of security to protect her. But she’d studied too much about security breaches in American history—just looking at the US Presidents. Things could slip.
She walked through the glass doors and locked them behind her. Then she paused at the long teakwood vanity to pull the elastic out of her hair. From beyond the glass, she heard a knock on the outer door. She was too exhausted to deal with more information Ross would give her about MIZR or her colleagues, so she ignored the sound.
He knocked more insistently until he pounded the door.
She turned from the vanity to face the entrance as it burst inward. Ross stood there like a brick wall, head jerking right and left in search of her. Her heart tripped as his stare landed on her.
Through the glass, she saw raw desire spelled over his rugged features. She sucked in a sharp gasp. When she backed up a step, she hit the vanity.
He took a step toward the doors, muscles rolling, the denim pulling taut over his chiseled thighs and his fists curled.
Giving herself up to him now would tear her apart. Her heart already halfway belonged to him—if he took her body right this minute, she’d give up her entire soul.
As she watched him cross the white carpet, his cowboy boots leaving divots in the plush fibers with each stride, she started to shake.
She wanted him. All she had to do was open the door and invite him in.
He already loves me.
She clasped the vanity to keep from going to him.
“Pippa.” He peered through the glass at her.
Her gaze dipped to his chest that pillowed her head so perfectly to the front of his jeans. His erection swelled his fly outward. Shivers hit her core, and her nipples hardened in reaction.
If she let him in, would she win or lose? Would she give up or gain everything?
She swallowed hard as their gazes locked once more.
His jaw firmed, and he reached out to a nearby table, ripped the heavy stone lamp off it, tearing the cord from the wall, and smashed it through the door.
She cried out as glass shattered. Ross stepped through it as though he walked through a wall of cloud. In two steps, he grabbed her into his arms and kissed her, whirling to set her on the vanity with her legs spread to fit his muscled hips as he claimed her mouth, her senses, her heart, in one scorching kiss.
He straightened to stare at her. “Don’t try to hide from me. You can’t.”
Raising trembling fingers to his chiseled jaw, she whispered, “No, I can’t. I need you, Ross.”
“Damn right you do.” He swooped in, slamming his mouth over hers. She moaned in surrender as he lifted her, crunched through the glass shards to the bed and lay her down. Following her with his body, his chest heaved against hers.
“Say it, Pippa. I can see it in your eyes.”
Could she? They were only words, right? They weren’t vows, and she could still walk away afterward.
A voice deep in her mind gave a short, dry laugh. Go ahead and try.
His jaw firmed more and his eyes glittered with what appeared to be banked anger. “Say. The. Words.”
She gulped. “Ross, I… I…”
Say it.
“I love you.”
His eyelids slipped shut and when he opened them again, intense love poured from his green gaze. When he lowered his lips to hers, a new tenderness leaped between them.
Passion rose inside her. Locking her legs around his hips, she dragged him down so his weight pinned her. Need hummed through her veins, flickering hotter with each stroke of his tongue.
In a swift jerk, he removed her top. Finding her braless, he let out a groan a split second before he leaned in and lightly grazed her right nipple. She arched, and he bit her left. The dark need his love bites rose inside her shook her to the core.
She yanked at his shirt buttons. When she issued a noise of frustration, he took over. She shoved off her jeans and panties and then reached for his belt.
Slipping a hand under her nape and one beneath her ass, he drew her into his lips and cock. She melted at the passion transmitting into their kiss, combusted at the way he lifted her into him again and again until she thought she’d die from the pressure.
She tugged at his hair. He buried his face against her neck, kissing and licking her to a frenzy. As if him hurling a lamp through the glass door in order to reach her hadn’t already done enough to turn her on.
With pulling and tugging, she managed to unzip his fly and draw his thick length into her hand. As she stroked the velvet steel, he let out a wild growl that sent goosebumps skittering over her flesh. Panting, she stroked him even as she worked his jeans down his hips on one side.
He leaned onto one arm to help her. Thrusting her hips up, she begged him with her eyes.
“Nothing could stop me,” he ground out. He fit the head of his cock at her slick core and filled her in one smooth stroke.
Buried to the balls.
She cried out, gripping his shoulders for leverage. She wanted more. All of him.
She needed to hear him say it again.
“Ross!” Catching his face in her hands, she met h
is stare.
He stilled.
“I’m in love with you.”
“I’m so in love with you.” The moon and stars hung in his eyes as he leaned down and kissed her, taking their frenzied lovemaking to the next level.
Chapter Twelve
An animal need to hear Pippa screaming his name melded with his warrior’s desire to kill for her. Whatever magic lived in those three little words—I love you—stole the rest of his heart and made it hers.
She gripped her inner walls with a tight hold as he drove into her body. A tight knot stretched to the breaking point, but he held back. He couldn’t end this yet. Deep inside, he knew this moment would free them both.
When she scored her nails lightly over his spine, a low rumble vibrated through him. He had to take her every way. Everywhere. Now.
Withdrawing, he flipped her onto her side, locked his groin to her round ass and drove into her tight pussy from behind. The new position got him deeper. He also reached between her legs and located her stiff, slick nubbin.
As he circled her clit with his fingertip, she twisted her face. He kissed her briefly and moved his mouth to her pulse point. It hammered beneath his tongue.
“I’m going to…shatter!”
“Come on, honey. Come for me. Come on my cock. Let me hear you scream.”
She arched and thrashed against his cock and finger. The energy pumping through her tipped into him. Her pussy flooded his shaft, and that knot inside him snapped. He came with her, his mouth at her ear.
“I’m filling you with my cum. Feel that? It’s for you. I’ll give you everything I have. Everything I own. All of me.” He pumped his hips with each slam of his cock, and she twitched in his arms, his name on her lips over and over until it came out as a final panting whisper.
Until this moment, he didn’t realize how suffocating and lonely his life was. Dragging in a deep breath of Pippa’s heady scent, he shut his eyes and listened to his pounding heart begin to slow.
She dropped her head to his shoulder, and he banded his arm around her. Still joined, neither moved. After a long minute, her soft question reached through his pleasure haze.