Without words, Josh took each of her feet and planted them flat on the cushion, his big hands curling around her ankles, which effectively bent her knees and spread her legs wide. This time Hunter’s fingers were the ones that slid down between her thighs, grazing her pussy, first over her panties, then under. The man had magical fingers and just the slightest graze of them had goose bumps forming on her skin.
“Kiss him,” Hunter rumbled in her ear. “I want to watch you.”
Josh leaned forward, but he didn’t initiate the kiss. It was clear he was waiting for her, and if Dani wanted to kiss him, she was going to have to make the effort. She had no idea why, but she did. She wanted to feel his mouth on hers, his hands. Maybe she was going crazy. Or maybe she was so blinded by the feelings she had for Hunter that she was willing to do whatever he wanted.
Reaching up, Dani put her hand on the back of Josh’s head and guided him closer. He came willingly, allowing her to kiss him before he took control, thrusting his tongue into her mouth. His lips were softer than Hunter’s, his kiss different, not nearly as hungry, not quite as reckless, but still potent. She slid her fingers in his silky dark hair, and just like that, her body ignited. She wasn’t sure she was supposed to want this, but it was clear her body did.
Hunter growled, something primitive and fierce, the vibration from his chest thrumming against her back. It made her pussy clench around his fingers.
“Oh, fuck, baby,” Hunter whispered, thrusting two fingers deep inside her. “You like this, don’t you?”
“Yes,” she said honestly. She liked it a little too much.
“I want to watch you suck his cock,” he said, his words wrapping around her. “I want you to suck his dick while I fuck your pussy. Can you give me that, Dani?”
He was grinding his erection against her ass, her pussy filled with two of his fingers. If he wasn’t careful, she was going to come.
Josh pulled back, staring at her, heat in his emerald eyes. She could see the question there, knew he was waiting for her to give him the go-ahead.
“Yes,” she whispered, reaching for the button on Josh’s jeans.
Before she could get a grip on him, the two men took control, relieving her of her panties, shedding their own clothing. While Josh perched naked and waiting on the arm of the couch, Dani crawled forward, eager to take him in her mouth. She felt incredibly wanton. The gleam in his eyes spurred her on. The instant her lips wrapped around the thick crest, Hunter groaned from behind her. It was a wild sound, laced with approval and lust.
While she sucked Josh’s cock, working him with her tongue, she felt Hunter behind her, the shift of the cushion, his legs brushing the insides of hers. In one slow thrust, he filled her. But it wasn’t enough. Dani needed more. She needed everything, just like Hunter had asked for.
Hunter seemed to know what she craved, because he grabbed her hips, holding her still as he impaled her again and again. She could do nothing but offer her mouth to Josh while he drove his cock past her lips. They were in complete control and she didn’t deny them. She didn’t want to.
Dani tried to hold on. She tried desperately but it was too much. Her insides coiled tighter, warmth pooling deep in her core until it ignited an electric current that sparked every nerve ending.
“Hunter!” She cried out his name over and over as she came, her body racked with glorious, infinite pleasure that made her muscles weak, her breaths choppy.
She’d never been fucked liked that.
Josh pulled her head back down, his cock filling her mouth. She was sucking him furiously, desperate to give him the same intense feeling the two of them had given her.
“Fuck, yes!” Hunter slammed into her once more before she felt him pulsing inside her. “I’m coming, baby.”
Josh’s hand tightened in her hair as she felt him swell in her mouth seconds before he came. “Fuck, Dani,” he groaned. “Your mouth is so damn sweet.”
And then, as quickly as it had started, it was over.
She felt an odd tranquility wash over her as Hunter pulled her into his arms. They fell back onto the couch, Hunter spooning behind her. Dani didn’t know where Josh disappeared to, but he didn’t come back for several minutes. And when he did, he was dressed. To her surprise, he slipped out the front door and into the night.
“Dani?” Hunter whispered as his fingers trailed down her arm.
“Hmm?”
“You okay, baby?”
“Yeah.” And surprisingly, it was the truth.
“You can’t tell anyone. You know that right? People wouldn’t understand.”
No, they wouldn’t. He was right about that.
“I won’t say a word,” she assured him.
Dani was good at keeping secrets.
After all, this wasn’t the only one she was keeping.
Nor was it the biggest.
ONE
Five years later
Thanksgiving Day, 2016
DANIELLE COULDN’T BELIEVE SHE’D ALLOWED Max to strong-arm her into coming to this stupid dinner. She should’ve told him to go to hell, but that would’ve been rude. Not that she was opposed to being just that, but when it came to Max, she tried to refrain. So, rather than turn on the one person who had been keeping an eye on her since she’d returned to the States months ago, Dani had come up with a way to make this a win-win for her.
It also helped that she’d timed her arrival perfectly, avoiding the dreaded family dinner. Thankfully, it looked as though they’d already finished that portion of this evening’s hellish activities.
Because Max had married Courtney Kogan, Dani had known there would be more than Adorites in attendance at this family get-together. More accurately, Courtney’s brother Hunter would be there, and by showing up, Dani would appease her cousin, then, by approaching Hunter, she could, in essence, kill two birds with one stone.
Admittedly, now that she was here in Max’s house, it seemed some of the nagging determination she’d harbored recently was waning.
Chin up, she mentally ordered. She could do this. She would do this. And once she’d spilled the beans to Hunter, she could get back to this life she’d just recently returned to, without all the guilt she’d been carrying around with her.
Despite her little pep talk, Dani was tempted to turn around and run out the same way she’d come in. With all the critical eyes tracking her as she moved across the room, the simple thing to do would be to disappear.
Again.
But … if she did that and caved to what would clearly be the easy way out, there would be no way to get her life back. It was bad enough that Samuel Adorite had been dead for a year now and Dani had yet to stop hiding completely. As far as she was concerned, she’d been on the run for long enough; it was time to stop and face the music. The threat to her was no longer, now that the old bastard was dead.
Okay, so that wasn’t entirely true. However, if the horrific secret they’d been keeping was buried with him, then yes, she was finally free.
Well, almost. She still had to confess her reasons for hightailing it out of Dodge four years ago, but once that was done, she would be in the clear and able to move on. And this Thanksgiving meal was the perfect place to show the world that she was no longer putting miles on her Manolos. She’d picked this particular event for a reason. Namely because there were so many people. Here, she could confront Hunter Kogan and not risk having him go postal on her. She hoped.
Then again, Dani didn’t even know if Hunter would speak to her after what she’d done to him all those years ago. And she couldn’t blame him if he didn’t.
Now that she thought about it, they’d been in a setting much like this one.
Only instead of a festive holiday dinner, it had been a wedding.
Hers.
And his.
Talk about coming full circle.
Since a wedding required vows, hers didn’t quite qualify, because they’d never made it that far. Nope, that’d been the day she’d chickened
out, running far and fast from the one and only man she’d ever loved.
It’d been easier than living a lie, or so she told herself.
“Dani?”
Turning at the sound of her name, Dani came face-to-face with Hunter’s mother and father, Casper and Elizabeth Kogan. They were looking at her with wide-eyed wonder, as though she’d come back from the dead.
In a way, she kind of had.
“Mr. and Mrs. Kogan,” she greeted politely, her voice trembling only slightly.
“We’re so glad you could make it,” Liz replied, but Dani could see it for the lie that it was.
They were more than likely trying to figure out why she was there. How she fit into this whole fiasco. They definitely weren’t happy to see her, but she hadn’t expected any less. She’d done the unthinkable, leaving the man she was supposed to marry—who happened to be their son—at the altar and not contacting him even one time since.
If only they knew who she really was, why she’d come into their lives in the first place … they certainly wouldn’t be smiling at her now—fake or not.
“I’m glad I could, too,” she lied.
Because Max had insisted—the man was probably unable to make a request—that she attend, Dani had known how things would turn out. And because of the guarantee that she would be face-to-face with the one man who probably never wanted to see her again, Dani had opted not to seek Hunter out earlier than now. This might’ve been the family’s holiday celebration, but Dani was using it for her own agenda. As a way to see Hunter, to convince herself that what she thought had been the love to end all had only been a figment of her imagination. Plus, to free her conscience by admitting to him the truth. Or most of it, anyway.
“It’s good to see you,” Dani told Liz and Casper, desperately wanting to get away from her once-future in-laws. After all, Casper was the head of Sniper 1 Security, as well as a trained military sniper, and she didn’t doubt that he could probably single-handedly take her out before she ever made it across the room to her intended target.
Not that he would.
Hopefully.
“You, too,” Liz whispered, staring after her as Dani headed off to make her way around the perimeter of the room.
She scanned the crowd, noticing Hunter’s brother Conner and Conner’s daughter, Shelby, sitting together on one end of the oversized cream sofa, along with RT and Z on the opposite end. She took a moment to give the two men a cursory glance. Seeing them together brought back a memory of two different men and a very sexy night from so long ago. A night she would never forget for as long as she lived. It’d been the night she’d moved out of her comfort zone, trusted the man she’d fallen in love with, and experienced sensations she’d never even imagined possible.
A night that she would never have again.
Shaking off the thought, Dani took stock of the room. Others had started to move in, some seated on Max’s furniture, several standing around, looking as uncomfortable to be there as Dani imagined them to be. These were two families who were on opposite sides of the law. Yet somehow they managed to coexist, or so it appeared, despite what Samuel Adorite had been up to all those years ago.
Dani caught sight of Courtney and Max, walking into the kitchen, hand in hand.
As good as it would’ve been to see some of her old friends again—if they would even talk to her—Dani hadn’t come here for that. She wasn’t looking for friends from her past. She was looking for one man in particular.
As though magnetized, her gaze swung to the far corner of the room, closest to the floor-to-ceiling windows near the back entrance.
And there he was.
Hunter Kogan.
Her heart did a strange little jump kick in her chest, but she ignored it.
God, he looked good.
Six foot one inch of prime alpha male sporting dark jeans that showcased his impressive ass and a crisp white shirt that accentuated his broad shoulders and wide back. As though he sensed her looking his way, Hunter turned. She could practically see his white-gray eyes glowing from where she stood. His light brown hair was a little longer than before, shaggier, his face a little more weathered, but he was just as ruggedly handsome as he’d always been.
Without stopping to chat with anyone else, Dani snaked her way through the people, glancing toward the kitchen briefly to ensure Max wasn’t watching her. So far so good. He was the last person she wanted to run into at the moment, but only because their relation was supposed to be a secret. Only she knew that it was just another lie in a long list of them that’d been put in place over the years. Max might’ve believed that Dani was his first cousin, but she knew the truth.
However, she was only willing to divulge so much information.
Which she would do. Tonight.
But she needed it to be on her terms.
HUNTER KOGAN DIDN’T NEED TO be damn good at his job to know that the proverbial shit was about to hit the fan. He’d felt the prickling at the back of his neck for several minutes now, and though he’d scanned the room, searching for a threat, he’d already suspected what he would find.
And sure as shit, the threat was real, only this one was a woman—oftentimes far more dangerous than any top-secret mission he could be sent on by his family’s security firm.
This particular woman decidedly so.
His cell phone buzzed in his pocket and he pulled it out.
Principal has arrived at the party. She had no issues walking right in.
The final confirmation of what he’d suspected. Danielle Davidson at Max Adorite’s home. An invited guest, apparently.
Rather than respond to the agent he’d been using to follow Dani around since she’d miraculously reappeared in town several months ago, Hunter tucked his phone into his pocket. Although sneaking out the back door was ideal, he managed to remain motionless, pretending not to be affected by the determined chick who was making her way across the room toward him.
Truth time. He knew it. She knew it.
He hated it. Based on the extreme look of discomfort on her face, she did, too.
Good. At least they were on the same page.
Fuck.
But why did it have to be here? Now?
Even from across the room, he recognized that resolute gleam in her golden eyes. She was on a mission, and those sexy legs were carrying her right to her intended target.
Maybe he should run.
Though it was long overdue, Hunter suddenly didn’t want to talk to her, didn’t want her to share with him the reason she’d fucked his world beyond repair years ago. He didn’t want to know the truth. Her version, that was. He didn’t want to know anything at all. He simply wanted to continue pretending to be blissfully ignorant, drinking his Corona, talking to his brother, and acting as though he didn’t know the sinfully beautiful woman whose attention seemed to be focused on him. The same sinfully beautiful woman who’d left him at the altar four goddamn years ago.
The same one who had crushed his heart into fucking dust.
Danielle Davidson. Max Adorite’s fucking cousin.
Yeah. She thought no one knew that little secret, but he certainly did.
“You’ve got incoming, bro,” Trace muttered in warning before turning away from Hunter and leaving him standing there, completely vulnerable.
Asshole.
“Hunter.”
The sound of his name on her lips was very much as he remembered. For fuck’s sake, he still heard that raspy tenor in his dreams.
Not by choice.
Opting for polite—this was his sister’s home, after all—Hunter met her gaze. “Danielle,” he replied, tipping his beer bottle to his lips as he peered down at her. “Surprised to see you here.”
“No, you’re not,” she countered hotly, her eyes belying her frustrated tone.
What he saw in those glittering gold eyes wasn’t animosity. If he didn’t know better, Hunter would be inclined to believe she actually felt bad for what she’d done to him,
leaving without ever looking back.
Too bad he did know better, and he wasn’t falling for it again.
Setting his empty beer bottle on the tray of a passing waiter—a waiter, for chrissakes, at a family dinner—Hunter grabbed Dani’s arm, pulling her deeper into the corner. Even with her in those five-inch heels, he towered over her and he needed that. Anything to give him the advantage. Bending down, he went nose to nose with her, refusing to inhale, not wanting to be reminded of how fucking good she used to smell.
“What the fuck are you doing here?”
Her eyes widened, but she didn’t flinch. “We need to talk.”
Hunter was tempted to laugh in her face, but he managed to refrain. “Talk? You’re a few years too late for that, aren’t ya, sweetheart?”
Dani frowned, and Hunter could feel that vise on his heart tighten.
She was the very reason he’d spent the last few months out of the country again, working any assignment that would keep him as far from here as possible. Here being anywhere she was. He’d known she was coming back, known she was planning to seek him out, and no matter how hard he tried, he hadn’t been able to avoid the inevitable. Hence the reason he’d assigned Kye Sterling to keep an eye on her for the past few months. Hunter had been apprised of her whereabouts for three very long, very painful months.
And here she was, ready to chat.
He wasn’t going to be her goddamn whipping boy this go-round. He didn’t give a shit about her trying to get out from under the weight of her conscience, either. And damn it all to hell, seeing her now, he had anger boiling in his veins. But along with that, there was something else.
Longing.
Stupid fucking bastard.
Yep, he was, and arguing with that stupid-ass voice in his head wasn’t going to make a damn bit of difference.
“Whatever you have to say,” he began, keeping his tone hard, “I don’t wanna hear it.”
“I think you do,” she said simply.
Hunter stood to his full height, glaring down at her as he studied her face. “Why here? Don’t you know this is supposed to be a family event, Danielle?” A family she’d decided she didn’t want to be part of. “Don’t you have even a little respect for my family?”
Tomorrow's Too Late (Sniper 1 Security, 3) Page 2