by Susan Sey
Her entire world focused, constricted, and nothing existed except his big, hard body pressing hers hotly into the wall and the primitive surge of want that weakened her knees and had her arching mindlessly into him. Her eyes drifted shut as his lips moved over hers in a silent demand she had no thought of resisting. She opened to him, giving him everything he asked and blindly offering more. Her wrists were in his hands, pinned to the wall on either side of her head, and the solid heat of him against her from breasts to thighs had the keys sliding to the floor. Her fingers twitched restlessly with the urge to touch, to caress, to possess, but he held her relentlessly still.
He surrounded her, invaded her, dominated her in every possible sense. The seeking thrust of his tongue, the subtle rasp of his whiskers against her lips, the hot, clean scent of him on every gasp she managed, it all rolled into a dizzying wave of desire, and even as it pulsed through her, she wanted more. Wanted him closer. Wanted him deeper. In her, over her, under her. Whatever it took to slake this aching need he’d created in her.
He answered the arch of her body with a noise she didn’t know how to interpret except that it stroked every nerve she had to a quivering awareness. She slid one knee up the outside of his thigh, drew him deeper into the cradle of her hips. He pressed into her with a slow deliberation that had shock waves rippling through her entire body. He rocked against her, and even through the froth of her dress, she could feel the hardness, the heat of him. She squirmed against the layers of clothing between them, made a desperate noise when he dragged his hot mouth down the side of her neck to nip at her collarbone.
“Liz,” he said, and he sounded as ragged as she felt. She slid her wrist free from the manacles of his hands, laid it against the hard plane of his cheek and tilted his face toward hers until she could look into his eyes. They glowed like blue fire, passion weighting his lids, his mouth. He had her caged between his arms, her back to the wall, her dress rucked up where one of his thighs had insinuated itself between hers.
Every point where he touched her throbbed and ached for him—her wrists, the tips of her breasts, the V between her thighs. He was stunningly, potently male. Aroused, dominant, unapologetic. And it damn near set her on fire to see it all in his face, in every line of his beautiful body, in the exquisite care he took when he brushed back a stray lock of her hair, then cradled the curve of her jaw in his big, warm palm.
“Liz,” he said again. This time it was undeniably a question, one she didn’t want to answer. She wanted him to just tumble her to the floor, toss up her skirt and keep ravishing her. No responsibilities, no questions asked, no time to answer anyway. She wanted to lose herself in satisfying the urgent, visceral demands of her body, the demands that only he seemed to provoke.
She shook her head, trying to clear it. But he took a sudden step back, frowned and said, “Liz. How long was I kissing you?”
She shoved a hand through her hair, found it as rumpled as she felt. “God, I don’t know. A few minutes?” Whole lifetimes could have slipped by while he was kissing her and she wouldn’t have noticed, but now that cold reason was reasserting itself, she didn’t feel that was an appropriate thought to share.
“Why isn’t your security system going off?” he asked, searching out the blinking red light that would indicate an armed system awaiting the access code. “Please don’t tell me you didn’t set it.”
She frowned, tried to focus. “Of course I set it. It should have been beeping from the minute you opened the door.”
“It didn’t,” he said.
“Yeah, I realize that now. I might have realized it sooner if you hadn’t been mauling me.”
He quirked an eyebrow. “Guy’s got to make his move.” She ignored him, because Lord knew she’d been making a few moves of her own and didn’t want to discuss it. “Is it in silent mode? Are the cops going to pile into the driveway any second and haul me off to jail for kissing you?”
“I wish,” she snapped. “But, no. It should have been making a god-awful racket by now.”
Patrick frowned at the serene green glow of the light beaming from the box, indicating a manually disarmed system. He took her by the arm and shoved her through the open door onto the front porch. “Stay here,” he said shortly. “And call the cops, will you? Tell them you’ve had a little unauthorized company.”
Liz stared in disbelief as he turned on his heel and slid into the darkness of the living room like the shadow she knew he was. Then she snapped her mouth shut and said, “Fuck that. I am the cops.”
She yanked open her little evening bag, pulled out her gun and followed him in.
FIFTEEN MINUTES later, Liz leaned against the doorjamb of the kitchen and watched Patrick putter. The guy moved with such a fluid, masculine grace that he made putting on a pot of coffee look like some kind of high-class performance art.
“Anything missing?” he asked without turning to her. She jumped guiltily, lost in the poetry of watching him, then pulled herself together.
“No. Some tampering with the alarm system, of course, and a pro tossed the place, but nothing’s missing.” She moved into the room, sank onto a stool at the high counter that constituted the eat-in portion of the kitchen.
He poured water into the top of the coffee machine with a steady, methodical flow. “This kind of thing happen often?”
“Nope. I’ve been with the Bureau eight years now and this is a first.” He hadn’t yet met her eyes, but Liz folded her arms on the counter and leaned forward to give his back a searching look. She wished he would look at her, damn it. She wanted to see his eyes. “Doesn’t surprise me, though.”
“Why’s that?” he asked as the first fragrant drips of coffee sizzled into the carafe.
“Don’t screw with me on this, Patrick,” she said wearily. God, she was sick of pretending. Villanueva had been inside her house, for God’s sake. She knew it, and Patrick most likely did, too. The difference was she was under orders to keep her secrets. He wasn’t. “First your sister’s place gets broken into, then mine. Not a robbery, though, just a search. A thorough, methodical, professional search. Both occur in the two weeks since you got here, both victims are known to be your relatives or acquaintances.”
He still hadn’t looked at her, and she desperately wanted him to. If he looked at her, maybe she could see what he was thinking. What this meant to him. What she meant to him.
“As of this moment, I’m officially done politely accepting lame excuses about paparazzi. Somebody followed you to Grief Creek, Patrick, and the only questions I have are who and why.”
He spread his hands on either side of the coffee machine, bowed his head and leaned in. Talk to me, she pleaded silently. Just trust me with this. Tell me what’s going on and I can help you. She was practically leaning over the counter with the effort to reach him on some level, but when he finally turned to her, there was such rage twisting his face that she jerked abruptly back.
“Why do you do this?” he snarled, with nothing like his usual upper-crust drawl. This was fury, raw and primitive, and it hammered at Liz along with a vicious slap of self-disgust. God, she thought, there she went again, trying to pull thorns out of lions’ paws. As if she didn’t know by now to steer clear of wounded predators.
“Do what?” she asked, careful to keep her voice cool and neutral.
“This job.” He spat the word like it was toxic, and a fresh wave of unwelcome hurt rolled through her at his contempt for the work that meant everything to her. “For Christ’s sake, Liz, there could have been a killer in here tonight. And you just traipse right in with your high heels and your gorgeous dress and your gun and all that beautiful, fragile skin. Skin that isn’t fucking bulletproof, no matter what Quantico’s told you. Why the hell do you do it?”
“You’re concerned about my job? Being too dangerous ?” She stared at him in wonder. “Remember the time Lenny Andrusco tried to take me apart like a Barbie doll? Guy had to weigh a good three bells. Charged like a bull once he finally figur
ed out we were wired.”
Patrick nodded tightly. “I remember, Liz.”
“Then you should also remember how you stepped aside while I took his ass down.” She leaned in, gave him a good, hard stare. “You weren’t overly concerned about the dangers of my job then. So why now?”
He shoved an impatient hand through all that rumpled black hair. “Andrusco was about as bright as your average second grader, Liz. He was big and pissed but he wasn’t dangerous. This is different. This is—” He broke off, shook his head.
“This is what?” Liz asked softly. “Tell me what this is, Patrick.” Please.
He shook his head. “You should have stayed on the porch.”
Disappointment pooled heavy in her chest, but Liz folded her arms and cocked a hip. “Some jerk breaks into my house and I should let you kick his ass?”
“Yes.”
She frowned at him, an unwanted warmth stealing in to mix uneasily with the confusion. All this fury, simply because she hadn’t let him protect her? “I’m good at my job, Patrick. Nobody needs to shield me, not ever.”
He shoved the other hand into his hair now, frustration in every line of his face. “I’m not saying you aren’t good at your job, Liz. But why the hell do you have to do it?”
She frowned at him, taken aback. “What do you mean, why do I have to do it?”
He turned back to the counter, propped his elbows on it and leaned on them, dropping his head. “I grew up surrounded by violence and crime because that’s all that was available,” he said quietly. “And I think we’re both clear on how that worked out for me.”
She closed her eyes briefly. “I don’t think you’re a malformed human being, Patrick. I know I said as much the other day, but I didn’t mean it that way. You’ve made some wrong choices with your life, but I don’t think you’re an evil influence on the world.” She hated herself for taking the chance, but she couldn’t stop herself from rising, from going to him. She laid a light hand on his shoulder. “There’s good in you, too.”
His shoulder was tight under her hand, but when he glanced up at her, his eyes were wry, self-mocking. Normal again. Or what passed for normal. And she hated herself for wondering with such a violent curiosity which man was really Patrick O’Connor.
He said, “Let’s just say that by now, I am what I am. Any choice I had about it is long in the past. But you, you’re different. You had prep schools and debutante balls and I’d bet you’re still sitting on one hell of a trust fund. You have a closet full of vintage cocktail dresses for God’s sake. Why do you insist on rolling around in the gutter with the absolute worst the world has to offer day after day?”
Because somebody had dirtied his hands pulling her out of that gutter twenty years ago. But Patrick didn’t need to know that. He could just keep right on believing in her silver spoon.
Liz shrugged. “When you have all those things,” she said slowly, “it’s never clear what you’ve earned and what you’ve been given. But this job doesn’t care who my people are or where I went to school. I earn my way through each day with nerve and courage and strength, and I need that kind of clarity. But I’m also obligated. Just by virtue of my family connections, I’ve had opportunities lavished on me that other people won’t see in ten lifetimes. Maybe because I have more than most people, I owe more, too.”
“Bullshit.”
Liz stared at him, eyes round, heart suddenly pounding. She’d given that speech dozens of times. Nobody had ever questioned it. It was exactly the kind of sound bite the FBI loved.
“Excuse me?” she asked warily.
“I said bullshit. Come on, Liz. Noblesse oblige?” Patrick shook his head and gave her a half chuckle. “We’re both too familiar with the breed to believe that growing up rich invests you with a sense of obligation. Entitlement, yes. But obligation? I don’t think so. If that’s the story you tell your parents, fine, but don’t lie to me. Why do you do this really?”
She glared at him as the ground crumbled underneath her feet. What the hell did he want her to say? That she’d been not only a victim, but the most famous victim of a generation? That she’d dedicated herself to protecting the vulnerable as a way to reassure herself every day of her own invulnerability? That carrying a badge was the one thing in her life she was proud of? The one thing she knew she’d earned all by herself? The proof of exactly how far she’d come?
He just waited, watched. Finally, she said, “I wasn’t born rich, Patrick. That came later.” Let him make what he would of that because she wasn’t adding a word.
Patrick blinked, clearly surprised. Then he said, “Ah,” but nothing else. Liz refused to look away, just stared back, daring him to push. But he didn’t. When he did speak, it was only to ask, “Will you call the cops now about the break-in?”
Liz sighed and pushed both thumbs into the headache brewing at her temples. “How many times do I have to tell you? I am the cops.”
“If you don’t call them, I’m sleeping on your couch tonight.”
She pushed harder against the headache. “Fine. I’ll call. Maybe they can give you a ride home.”
She could hear the smile in his voice when he said, “That would be lovely, thanks.”
Chapter 14
TWO NIGHTS later, Liz tracked Mara down in the kitchen of Brightwater’s. The usual mélange of chaos, steam and cursing slapped at Liz’s innate sense of order the instant she pushed through the swinging doors, but she spotted Mara almost at once. Dishes crashed, flames leapt and lethally sharp knives flashed, but Mara was happily, serenely at home in it. She had a pimply kid hanging on her every word as she demonstrated some intricate knife work that had Liz tucking her own fingers safely into her pockets and wincing in anticipation. She waited for a plate-laden waitress to sail past, then barreled into the gap and headed for Mara.
“Let the knife do the work for you, Sam,” Mara was saying to the kid, who gazed at her as if she were the second coming. “It’s a tool, like any other. Picking the right one for the right job’s half the battle.” She glanced up to see if the kid was getting it and caught sight of Liz.
“Agent Brynn,” she said. “I’ve been wondering when you’d drop by.”
Liz felt her brows lifting. “You have?”
Mara handed the knife off to the kid, who accepted it reverently, then nudged Liz toward her office. “Of course I have.” She clicked the door shut behind them and waved Liz toward one of the folding chairs while she dumped herself into the creaky office chair behind the desk. “Oh Lord, it feels good to be off my feet.” She flipped off her plastic clogs and dug her thumbs into one stockinged foot. “I’m getting too old to work double shifts.”
Liz watched her warily. “Why were you were expecting me?” she asked.
“Aside from the fact that I got stung for a couple thousand in counterfeit hundreds on Saturday night?”
Liz winced. “I’m working on that.”
Mara tipped her head and gave her a long, deliberate look. “I heard about your break-in,” she said. “One for you, one for me. You’re not a moron, Liz. You think this is connected to Patrick.”
Liz leaned forward, elbows on knees. “What do you think?”
“I think it’s a damn good possibility.”
“What does Patrick say?”
“To me?” Mara chuckled wearily. “About what he’s said to you, I’d imagine.”
“That would be nothing,” Liz said.
“Exactly.” Mara looked at her, and that sharp, mobile face reflected everything Liz herself was feeling: frustration, worry, determination and a good dose of honest irritation. It was enough, Liz thought, to justify the risk of sharing some information.
“What do you know about Jorge Villanueva?” she asked.
Mara closed her eyes. “Ah, crap,” she said. “That’s a name I’d hoped never to hear again.”
“And yet you don’t look surprised to hear me say it.”
“I’m not.”
“Why not?”
>
Mara’s eyes flicked open, and there was both irritation and fear in them. “Listen, I don’t know how normal families work, but mine wasn’t big on affection, okay? My parents sure as hell didn’t love us kids, and until I heard about the deal Patrick cut with you to keep my ass out of jail, I’d have said the same about him.”
“You’d have been wrong,” Liz said quietly.
“Yeah, I know.” Mara lifted her hands, let them fall. “I love him, too. I always have, and I wish he’d just . . . let me.”
“Let you love him?”
“Yeah. I mean our folks are gone, right? So Jonas, Evie and Patrick, they’re all the family I have. And had it not been for Patrick, I wouldn’t have even that much. My happiness, my marriage, my kid, my career? I owe it all to him.” She shot Liz a wry smile. “And to you, too, I suppose.”
Liz shifted, uncomfortable. “Hardly. Patrick bought you a second chance. You earned your own way after that.”
“Regardless, he deserves a little more than a quick thank-you note. He deserves to be part of the family he allowed me to create. A family that wants him, understands him and loves him. My family. He should be here, with me, not sequestered in that sterile McMansion of his out in California.”
Liz lifted a skeptical brow. “Any luck with that?”
“Do you see him visiting at Christmas?”
“Uh, no. But maybe this thing with the counterfeiter—”
“Oh, please. You think this is the first time I’ve trumped up a minor business issue into a major drama to see if he’d come running?”
“No?”
“Damn straight. I’ve been crying wolf at least once a quarter for the past three years, and he ignores that the same way he ignores any and all invitations, pleas, threats and bribes. So when he suddenly turns up in town and hops into bed with the FBI, you think I’m not waiting for the other boot to drop?” She rubbed her pinched brows. “I just wish like hell that boot didn’t have Villanueva’s name on it.”