by Edie Harris
No one should be forced to deal with Tobias un-caffeinated.
Deeming her face as good as it was going to get while extremely exhausted and emotionally overwrought, Beth flicked off the bathroom light, dropped the lipstick into the depths of the purse waiting for her at the foot of her bed, and snagged a pair of classic, red-soled Louboutin pumps, heels dangling from two fingers as she strode from the bedroom and into the apartment.
Her mission? Coffee. Any obstacles in her path would be slaughtered.
And yet she didn’t reach into her purse for her gun when she stumbled to a halt at the sight greeting her in the kitchen. The totally-naked-chest sight, complete with shower-dampened hair, morning stubble, and a fresh white bandage taped to clean, glowing skin. “Are you...are you cooking?”
“Yes.”
“You cook.”
“As we both know, you don’t, and I wasn’t keen on starving in your company.” Vick paused, heated gaze sweeping her from head to toe before he grumbled, “I’m hungry enough as it is.”
She knew better than to blush, but her fitful sleep had been plagued with dreams. Or perhaps they were memories? Details she’d forgotten about the first time they’d slept together had snuck past her defenses and denied her some much-needed rest. All she could think about when she looked at him now was what it had been like to have him slide into her, thick and heavy and driving her into ecstasy.
Even more potent? Last night’s toe-curling kiss. Knowing his name, knowing he was alive, feeling the sharply broken edges of her heart suddenly fused back together with searing intensity. All from the touch of his lips.
Dropping the purse on the dining table and the high heels next to a chair, Beth took a seat, determined not to give an inch with a man who’d take a mile. Heck, Raleigh Vick would take a whole marathon’s worth of miles if she weren’t careful—twenty-six-point-two of the suckers, straight into her soul. “You changed your bandage?”
“After showering. No signs of infection, by the way. You did nice work.”
“Hmm.” She cast a longing glance at the steaming coffee pot. Too bad it was in the kitchen, where he was taking up space in all his shirtless glory. And just like the Old West, her kitchen wasn’t nearly big enough for the two of them. “You didn’t get much sleep.”
“Neither did you.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t have a bullet pulled out of me last night.”
“Excellent point. And here I am, making you breakfast like a champ.” Far too much familiarity lurked within the wry glance he sent her way. “We’ve got it all backwards, don’t we?”
She couldn’t shake the feeling he was talking about more than their weirdly domestic morning, though that could be her coffee-deprived brain at work. “I’m a terrible hostess,” she said instead, forcing a light tone.
“I’ll mention it in the Yelp review.” As he plated a fluffy egg-white omelette that might as well have been plucked from the pages of a foodie magazine, a little voice in the back of Beth’s mind whispered, See? You didn’t need an Average Mark, after all.
When he set a steaming mug of perfectly sweetened coffee in front of her, she vowed never to think of Mark again. And once she’d had her first mouthwatering forkful of egg, Beth decided that perhaps an arson rampage was a tad extreme for seven in the morning. “This is delicious,” she murmured, barely suppressing a blissful moan.
Those broad shoulders, so much paler than they had been on Nissi Beach, flexed as he moved the pan to the sink and began scrubbing. “That was another thing I picked up during recovery. I’d always been too busy on the go to bother learning to cook, but once I wasn’t in the field...” Shutting off the faucet, he dried his hands on a dish towel she hadn’t even known she owned before draping it over his bare shoulder and crossing muscular arms over his chest.
Arms. Chest. Food. Kitchen. Good God. The man was actively trying to kill her, and he didn’t even need a gun to do it.
His eyebrow quirked as he noted her fork, frozen halfway between the plate and her mouth, humor warming his frosty blue irises, as though he knew precisely what was on her mind.
It was a terrible habit. She’d have to cure him of it immediately. Chasing the last bite of omelette with a swig of coffee—strong, but with enough raw sugar to kick-start a cavity, just as she preferred it on the mornings she couldn’t swing over to Starbucks—she dropped any pretense of subtlety and ogled him. If he intended to pose for her, taunting her with everything she’d ever wanted but never believed she could have, then she intended to prove herself more than capable of taking hold of those wants and never letting go.
Her gaze drifted over his collarbone to the taut curve of his left biceps when something struck her as...not right. Hold up. “Where’s your tat?”
“Fake. Ink like that is far too recognizable. Management has a strict no-tattoo, no-piercing policy for active field agents.”
“Oh.” Attempting to hide her dismay, she stared down at her empty plate. “That, um, makes sense.”
“You’re disappointed.” She heard his amusement.
“There’s nothing wrong with liking a tattoo on a guy,” she muttered. Especially a tattoo as deliciously dark, masculine and primal as his had been.
“Disappointed,” he murmured again, as if he couldn’t quite believe it. “And to think, you wouldn’t be if only I’d had a clean shirt to wear. An oversight on your part, not keeping clothes in my size in the spare room, but I’ll forgive you. This time.”
Leaning back in the chair, she glared at him. “God, you’re an ass. I don’t remember you being such an ass.”
“Ah, but I was never really me before. Consider this me the director’s cut of an epic feature film—you get the good, insightful stuff that normally ends up on the cutting-room floor.”
“First of all, your age is showing, old man. Everything’s digital now. No cutting-room required.” Beth decided she really hated his smirk. No smirk should be that sexy. “Secondly, there’s a reason why normal people with a healthy respect for time management avoid the director’s cut—it’s all pointless extra crap, and you’re bored when it finally ends, two hours later than it should have.”
“What luck that you’re not normal, then.”
“FYI, I hated Lord of the Rings.”
“You’re the only one.”
“Lots of walking, not enough action.”
The corner of his mouth curled upward, his smile smug. “‘Not enough action’ isn’t a problem with me, love. You would know.”
That was the problem—she knew all too well, but she sure as hell didn’t enjoy his reminder. “You, Raleigh Vick, are all talk,” she sniffed, lifting her coffee for a bracing sip. She’d never been any good at pretending, but this morning was a lesson in fake-it-’til-you-make-it. In this case, make it meant keeping in mind just how pissed off she was at this man. It meant remembering how long he’d knowingly kept her in the dark about the truth of his purported death.
After years of chance meetings and stolen interludes, Beth had come to believe in the veracity of their unusual courtship. Believe in the courtship...and in Vick. She would never have slept with him in Cyprus if she wasn’t convinced he cared for her. The words he’d spoken that night two years earlier rang now in her ears. Your first time should be with someone you love.
Wouldn’t you know it, her first time had been with someone she loved. She just wished he’d said, Your first time should be with someone who loves you. At least then she would know his position on the matter.
“All talk?” The barely leashed anger in his rumbling voice was reminiscent of the fury she’d heard on the beach, when she had announced her intention of having a casual fling.
She tapped one finger thoughtfully against her chin. “Hmm, no, you’re right. ‘All talk’ would imply you’ve said something worthwhile, when, let’s be hon
est, I’ve heard nothing but crickets from you.”
Her pointed jab hit its mark. Regret danced across his features before they resumed his ferocious glare. “Let’s get one thing straight,” he growled as he threw the dish towel to the counter and stalked toward her. “You silenced me, remember? No talking unless it was the truth. Well, I’ve got years of talk bubbling up inside me, love. And you’re going to fucking listen.”
Oh. Oh, God. But she couldn’t resist one last prod, needing him near even though he had hurt her. Because that was love, right? A breakable mix of need and pain?
She certainly felt breakable. “There are things I’d rather do with you than listen to you talk, if we’re being honest.”
“You little tease.” Grabbing the back of the chair, he caged her between his arms and leaned in to loom over her. “You think I don’t want to take you, right here, right now, hard and fast and then slow and easy until you forget everything except my name?”
It was nothing like she’d imagined he wanted to say during their first time, when he’d taken her in fraught silence, her own words mumbled and faint as foreign rapture had consumed her senses.
The words coming out of his mouth now were so much filthier. So much better. “I—”
“Vick. That’s the only thing you’re going to remember when I’m done working that body of yours, Elisabeth Faraday. Vick.”
Before she could respond—not that she had a clue as to how—her phone chimed with an incoming text. “You...you need to let me look at that.”
“I need my cock inside you, is what I need.” His teeth scored her bottom lip in a stinging nip, but he straightened nonetheless, giving her space to breathe for the first time in what felt like decades. She rose on unsteady legs, belly quivering with lust he’d planted with his dirty talk, and collected her phone from inside her purse.
Desire drained away at the message.
Open your door. Now.
Of all the arrogant, high-handed—Stalking to the front door, she released the chain and bolts before flinging it open. “Next time, say please.”
Tobias Faraday stepped past her into the apartment, hanging his heavy winter coat on the hook next to hers and dropping the stylish leather overnight bag from his shoulder to the floor with a careful flourish, making her space his own in under five seconds. He didn’t bother to look at her. “You’ve proven more responsive to direct orders than to suggestion over the years. I was merely acting in accordance with past-precedential cues.”
Shutting the door with more force than necessary, Beth glared down at the bolts as she locked them in once more. Snooty bastard.
Topping out at an even six feet, Tobias was all sleek lines and lean strength cloaked in a divinely tailored three-piece suit of charcoal Italian wool. From the top of his perfectly coiffed dark head to the polished toes of his classic wingtips, his appearance screamed, You can’t begin to afford me. Part and parcel of being the public face of Faraday Industries, Beth supposed grumpily, but did he have to wear his I-Graduated-Harvard-Law-At-Age-Twenty-One persona so loudly?
Though of course his voice, when he spoke, was coolly modulated. “I’m told your name isn’t Wendell Martin,” he said without preamble, assessing the shirtless, bandaged Vick in one cold sweep.
“It isn’t.” Vick held out a hand. “Raleigh Vick, MI6. Until recently, that is.”
Tobias returned the handshake, unruffled by the change in situation. “I spoke with Casey on the ride here.” Shifting to include Beth in the conversation, he continued, “I’m up to speed, but we have a great deal of work ahead of us in the next eighteen hours. Beginning with clean lines of communication.” Smoothly extracting two slim cell phones from the inside pocket of his suit jacket, Tobias handed one to Vick and one to Beth. Hers was pink, and she hated that she liked it. “The pertinent Faraday numbers have been programmed in, but even though these are untraceable, you need to follow the usual protocols—no calls longer than forty-five seconds, no more texting, no connecting to the internet. I’m your first point-of-contact if anything goes wrong, followed by Casey, followed by Adam.”
“Great.” Sliding the new phone into her purse, Beth slipped into her beloved Louboutins. “You two have fun figuring out how to save my bacon. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to work.”
“Like hell you are.”
Her eyes narrowed on her spy. “I’m sorry, did you think I dressed up for you? It’s a weekday, pal, and I have a job that I can’t simply not show up for.” Stalking over to where Vick stood, still shirtless, still blatantly sensual, she poked him in the middle of his bare chest, trying to ignore the shimmering warmth of his skin beneath the pad of her forefinger. “No, scratch that—I don’t have a job. I have a career.” A career she refused to jeopardize, even if there were a bunch of soggy Englishmen out there prancing after her with silenced pistols.
He glowered at her. “Fine. You want to go to work, darling? Let’s go to work.”
“Oh, no. No, no, no.” She whirled to face Tobias, though why she thought getting him on her side meant that Vick wouldn’t follow her to the museum regardless, she had no idea. “I don’t need a babysitter.”
From behind her, Vick snapped, “Bit of a difference between a babysitter and a bodyguard, love.”
“Both get paid by the hour, so fuck off,” she retorted hotly. To Tobias, she said, “You know I’m capable of taking care of myself. I mean, seriously. I saved his ass last night, not the other way around.”
Vick snorted but wisely said nothing.
Spine stiff, she folded her arms over her chest. “Besides, he doesn’t have anything to wear. His shirt is covered in blood.”
“Not to mention in the waste bin,” Vick chimed in helpfully.
Tobias studied Vick for a moment. “I have a dress shirt he can borrow.”
The shoulder seams of which Vick will rip if he so much as sneezes. A muscle-bound soldier-spy her brother was not. “Please,” she pleaded hoarsely. With every passing second, her new normal was trickling away, like a gelato dropped to the pavement in July. “Please.” She only wished she knew what, precisely, she was begging her brother for.
But Tobias, man of ice, remained unyielding. “You’re too smart to think going anywhere alone is an option until this situation is resolved, so it’s either him or me, Beth. Choose.”
“God. All right, him.”
Tobias’s too-shrewd gaze speared her for a handful of heartbeats before he turned his attention to Vick. “I will talk to my sister. Alone.”
Half of her wanted to stomp her foot and insist that whatever Tobias had to say to her, he could damn well say it in front of Vick. But the other half of her—the half still smarting from the revelation of just how long Vick had allowed her to live with his death on her conscience—was scared stupid at the idea of trusting him again.
She’d trusted him once without ever knowing who he was or where he was from or what he was doing whenever he showed up in the same city as her during a job. All that trust had gotten her, after Kabul, was a broken heart and a tormented conscience.
What was wrong with her that she had almost felt worse over killing him than she did over causing the deaths of those children? Weren’t the innocents more worthy of her sorrow, her shame? No way in hell was Vick an innocent...yet she’d barely been able to reconcile the outcome of Kabul with her bruised psyche a year after the fact.
So when Vick glanced to her, as if to make sure that speaking alone with Tobias was what she really wanted—as if, should she say otherwise, he would refuse to leave her side even if it meant coming to blows with her brother—she attempted a casual shrug. “Family stuff,” she said, by way of explanation. Not that she owed him an explanation to begin with.
Gaze flicking to Tobias before returning to her, he nodded. “I have a go-bag stashed across the street with a change of clothe
s. I’ll go collect it, then.”
Strange that she heard a question in his voice, though he’d been making a statement. It really was as though he didn’t want to leave. Did he worry she wouldn’t be here when he came back? Did he think last night’s shooter would find his way over to her side of the street, and do Vick’s final job for him?
Except that Vick didn’t strike her as the worrying sort. She gestured encouragingly toward the door. “Go for it. I promise not to shoot anyone while you’re gone.”
Tobias arched one supercilious brow. “I’m the only one here to shoot.”
Without bothering to glance at her brother, she gifted Vick with a tight smile. “So you understand exactly how much of a sacrifice I’m making with this promise. Hurry back.”
Humor tugged at Vick’s mouth, twinkled in his blue eyes. “I will. Lock the door behind me.” A heartbeat later, he was gone, Tobias flipping the bolts back into place.
“You’re going to lecture me.”
“I believe Casey has already done so.” Straightening his cuffs, her brother walked across the room to stand next to her at the window. Together, they watched Vick cross the street and disappear into the narrow alley between his residence and the tall limestone townhouse next door.
“It was mostly swear words,” she murmured distractedly. Wherever he’d hidden his bag of belongings, it obviously wasn’t in the upstairs unit she’d been in the night before. “Can mostly swear words even be a lecture?”
“It can if it comes from Casey.” A pause. “We should step away from the window.”
Beth didn’t move. “I’m safe enough at the window for now. You already know Vick believes we have a while here before T-16 mobilizes the next assassin on the list.” The laugh that slipped past her lips was the furthest thing from amused. “An assassin for the assassin. Poetic.”