by Karen Foley
He made a small growling sound of encouragement and then both hands were cradling her head, tilting her face for the full, sensual assault of his lips and tongue against her own. He tasted faintly of beer and smelled like crisp soap and a hint of something spicy. His fingers against her face were strong and warm, and the sensation of his tongue stroking her own caused a heat wave of desire to crash over her.
She’d had an immediate physical reaction to Rafe Delgado the first time she saw him, but the reality of touching him and having his mouth on hers was beyond anything she could have imagined. Sara didn’t consider herself a prude. Far from it, actually. But her former boyfriends had been writers or musicians, and had been more dreamy than dangerous, more moody than masculine. But there was nothing tempered or hesitant about Rafe’s kisses. He plundered her mouth as his fingers buried themselves in her damp hair and held her still.
He eased her back against the arm of the sofa and she went willingly, drawing him down on top of her until the delicious weight of his body pinned her against the cool leather cushions. He lifted his head briefly to search her face with eyes that glittered hotly in his dark face.
“Okay?” he murmured, his breathing uneven.
“Oh, yeah…” she whispered, and drew his head back down to hers, spearing her fingers through his short hair and reveling in the velvety texture and the warmth of his scalp. Shifting restlessly beneath him, she managed to curl one leg around the hard length of his thigh and he settled into the cradle of her hips as if he had been made to fit there.
She wound her arms around him, stroking the long muscles of his back until she encountered the bottom edge of his shirt, and slid her hands beneath it. His skin was like hot silk beneath her fingers and she stroked higher, admiring the strength and power of his body.
He tore his mouth from hers and dragged his lips along the line of her jaw until he reached the tender skin beneath her ear, and then he bit her flesh lightly before soothing it with his tongue. Sara shivered, feeling a bolt of pure heat lash through her. She throbbed where his hips pressed against hers and she had to resist the urge to rub herself against him.
As if sensing her need to get even closer, Rafe slid a hand along the slope of her shoulder and downward, and then boldly cupped a breast beneath the soft fabric of her sweater. Sara gasped as he gently cupped and kneaded her, then rubbed his thumb across her hardened nipple.
“You feel great,” he rasped, and skated his tongue lightly along the curve of her ear.
Sara opened her eyes, thrilling at the sight of his broad shoulders and dark head bent over her, feeling his big hand caress her as she arched helplessly upward. The small part of her brain still capable of coherent thought argued that she knew next to nothing about Rafe Delgado. She’d never had sex with a stranger. In fact, she’d never even considered becoming intimate with someone with whom she wasn’t in a committed relationship, but she was contemplating it now.
His hand followed the curve of her waist to her hip, and then swept beneath the edge of her sweater to smooth over the bare skin of her stomach. When he cupped her breast again, there was only the fragile barrier of her bra separating his palm from her skin.
“You’re so damned soft,” he muttered, and before Sara realized his intent, he pushed the sweater up and bent his head to draw on her nipple through the sheer fabric of the undergarment.
The moist heat of his mouth caused a rush of wetness to her center, where she ached for him. She gave an inarticulate cry of pleasure and held his head to her breast, even daring to take his earlobe between her teeth and nibble gently. Her action seemed to arouse him further, and he pushed her bra down until he freed one breast.
“Gorgeous,” he breathed in a reverent tone, and covered her with his hand, teasing and caressing the beaded tip until Sara writhed beneath him. Only when she moaned softly did he bend his head and close his mouth around her, drawing sharply on her nipple.
Sara stroked her cheek against the rough velvet of his short hair, breathing in his scent. She pressed upward, feeling the hard thrust of his arousal behind the zipper of his jeans. She’d never been so turned on or so acutely aware of her own body. Every nerve ending was vibrantly alive and cried out for fulfillment.
When he released her breast and began to trace a path downward, she sank back against the leather cushions and let the pleasure of his touch consume her. His hands reached the waistband of her jeans, and she held her breath, waiting for him to work the fastening. Instead, he abruptly pulled away from her. Cool air wafted across her bare skin and Sara opened her eyes in bewilderment. He sat up with her leg still curved around his hips, and scrubbed his hands over his face. His breath came in aggravated surges. Disoriented, Sara adjusted her clothing as Rafe carefully disentangled himself from her legs before standing up.
“We need to talk,” he finally said, sliding her a meaningful look. “There’s nothing I want more than to take you right here, right now. But I don’t want you to think the only reason I asked you to stay with me for the next week is so that I can have sex with you.”
Right now, at this moment, Sara couldn’t think of a better reason to stay with Rafe. Her breasts ached and her body thrummed with unfulfilled need, but she pushed herself to a sitting position and tried to focus on what he was saying…when what she really wanted to do was reach for him and encourage him to finish what he’d started. Swiping her hair back from her eyes, she turned to face him, self-conscious and wary. His expression was grim. Sara couldn’t imagine what must be going through his head.
SARA STARED AT HIM with eyes that were still hazy with pleasure, her hair tangled around her face and her sweetly decadent mouth swollen from his kisses. More than anything, he wanted to drag her jeans from her body and bury himself in her welcoming heat. He’d been so close to doing just that, when some last vestige of sanity had surfaced. Even then, he’d been tempted to ignore the warning sirens going off in his head. Instead, he’d drawn on every bit of restraint he had, using his marine training to rein in the rampant lust that had consumed him. He’d backed off, but it had been several long, uncomfortable moments before the red haze had cleared enough for him to control his rioting impulses.
“I know why you asked me to shadow you for the next week,” she said, her voice soft. “Because everything I said about you is true, and this only proves it.”
He slanted her a questioning look, trying not to notice how sexy she looked, or the way she regarded him as if he was her own personal hero. “What do you mean?”
“Your insistence that I shadow you for a week has nothing to do with my writing a story about you. You made my being here a condition of writing the story because you wanted to protect me. How is that not heroic?”
She was right; he couldn’t give a shit about her story. In fact, despite what he’d promised Sara to get her here, he’d never planned to answer her questions about the rescue at all. Did that make him a hero?
“Sara, listen to me,” he said carefully. “There was something about those guys who were following you. They were hit men.” He drew in a deep breath. “I’m almost certain they wanted to kill you.”
Sara blinked at him, uncomprehending. “What?”
He sat down beside her, reminding himself that she had no experience with the dark underbelly of society. She’d probably never had anyone say so much as a cross word to her, never mind deliberately try to harm her.
“Why would you think that?” she asked in bewilderment. “There’s a big difference between someone following me into an alley and someone wanting to kill me.”
“Think about it.” He paused for a moment. “You saw Edwin Zachary with a woman who is a call girl. If that wasn’t bad enough, she leaves her appointment book in your car and that book not only contains the initials and sexual preferences of her clients, but also contains the phone number of the woman responsible for running an exclusive sex ring.”
“But how would anyone know that?”
She was so naive that Raf
e couldn’t help but give her a quizzical smile. “Sara, you called her. You gave her your name. If the Feds really were tapping her phone, it wouldn’t take long for them to figure out who you are. Within five minutes of you revealing your identity, there wouldn’t be an aspect of your life that the Feds didn’t know about.”
Sara waved her hand for him to stop. “Yes, I get all that. But why would the Feds want to kill me? I have nothing to do with the Glass Slipper Club.”
“I’m not saying it’s the Feds, but if anyone has the means to kill you, someone in Zachary’s position would. You’re a journalist, Sara, and he knows that. There’s no telling what he might be willing to do to keep you from exposing his involvement with this club.”
Slowly, Sara leaned forward and covered her face with her hands. “I don’t believe this,” she breathed. “I felt someone watching me while I was waiting for you back at the café. But the man I thought was staring at me turned out to be a father waiting for his wife and child.”
Rafe’s lips compressed in sympathy. “These men didn’t want you to notice them. From the way they moved and communicated, I’d say they have some military background.”
“But why do they feel they have to kill me? Why don’t they just warn me off?”
“At a guess, I’d say they want to keep you from sharing whatever information you have.”
Her gaze shot to him in alarm. “What do you mean? What information? Why would they think I have any information beyond what they might have overheard during my telephone conversation with Juliet?”
Rafe sharpened his gaze on her, instinct telling him that she was hiding something.
“You write for a popular magazine,” he said, carefully. “You have Colette’s date book. Even if you can’t prove who her clients were, you happened to see something the other night that could incriminate Edwin Zachary and perhaps even cost him his bid for the presidency. At the very least, if you decide to share your story with the world, people will begin asking questions and his reputation would undoubtedly suffer. Perhaps he wants to avoid that. At any cost.”
Dropping her hands, Sara stared at him in disbelief. “I don’t stand a chance, then. I mean, what do I know about evading someone with that kind of experience?” She gave a bitter laugh. “They probably know where I am right now. I’ll be dead by morning.”
She was so obviously freaked out, that Rafe decided not to tell her about the shorn bolts on her balcony. Sometimes, ignorance really was bliss. He would just need to be extra vigilant and make sure that she didn’t do anything or go anywhere without him. But first he needed to gain her trust and make her feel safe.
“That’s why I brought you here,” he said, returning to sit beside her on the sofa, although he was careful to keep some distance between them. “Nobody is going to harm you, Sara.”
Sara looked at him, and, although her face was pale, a ghost of a smile touched her lips. “You’re just one man. Even with your background, what can you do if someone as powerful as Edwin Zachary wants to get rid of me?”
He allowed himself a smug smile. “You’d be surprised.” Seeing her uncertainty, he sobered. “You’ll have to trust me. I will protect you, even with my body if necessary.”
“Why?” she asked. “Why are you doing this for me? You don’t even know me. I’m pretty sure you don’t even like me very much.”
Rafe couldn’t tell her why he viewed journalists with suspicion without admitting to his role in the rescue of the aid workers. “Let’s just say I have a mistrust of journalists.” He let his gaze drift deliberately over her features. “Especially pretty ones. As long as you’re not trying to interview me, I like you just fine.”
He watched as color seeped back into her face and she reached blindly for her beer, taking a hefty swig before setting the bottle back down with a thump.
“Well, don’t forget those men saw you, too. They saw you sitting with me at the café and they saw you kiss me. They probably already know who you are. Maybe they think we’re romantically involved.” She cast a wild look around his townhouse. “What if they’ve already surrounded the place, and are just waiting to make their move?”
Rafe frowned, realizing she was teetering on the edge of a full-blown panic attack. Moving quickly, he crouched in front of her and took her hands in his. Her fingers were cold, and he rubbed them between his hands. “Hey,” he said quietly. “Look at me.”
She did, her eyes dark with whatever imagined horrors were going through her head.
“Nothing is going to happen. If they’ve figured out who I am, then they know better than to come after me. Especially in my own home.”
“What if we go to the police?” she asked hopefully, ignoring his words. “They could help us.”
“If their intent really is to kill you, then you’d be dead before you reached the station,” Rafe replied flatly. “And our only proof is initials in a book. Our best bet right now is to stick together and figure out a way to make you more valuable to them alive. But nothing is going to happen to you while I’m here. Okay?”
Sara nodded and dropped her gaze to where he still held her hands. She’d relaxed fractionally and when she spoke, her voice had lost some of its tight anxiety.
“Okay. But I still don’t understand why you’re doing this. I’m not your responsibility and I’m sure you have better things to do than act as my bodyguard, especially considering you’re supposed to be on leave right now. You know, rest and relaxation?”
Up close, he could see her eyes weren’t a pure blue, but a mixture of blues and grays, ringed in black and startlingly vivid in her pale face. Aside from her mouth, they had been the first thing he’d noticed about her. Rafe thought he could easily spend hours staring at her eyes, and wondered how many other men had fallen under their spell. Sara seemed to have little idea of just how stunning she was. She wore almost no cosmetics and did nothing to draw attention to her unusual features, or her curvy figure. In fact, she seemed out of place in a city as sophisticated as Washington, D.C..
Then Rafe remembered Ann Lonquist had been sweet and pretty, too. Or so he’d thought. She’d completely duped him with her damsel-in-distress act, and, while Sara Sinclair might not bear a strong physical resemblance to Ann, there was no denying the similarities between the two women. Dragging his gaze from her, he stood up and turned away, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. He’d made a mistake in getting involved with Sara, but he’d never been able to walk away from an unfair fight, and there was no way Sara could handle this particular battle on her own. Whether he liked it or not, he was committed to seeing this through to the end.
“I’m not doing this for you,” he finally responded, knowing he was lying through his teeth. “Let’s just say this is what I consider rest and relaxation.”
8
LONG AFTER SARA HAD SAID good-night to Rafe, she lay awake in his guest room, unable to stop thinking about the events of the day. She still had a difficult time believing that anyone would want to harm her because of what she had witnessed, but deep inside, she knew it was true. There had been something in Rafe’s eyes when he’d told her about the men who had followed her that had left her in no doubt as to the sincerity of his words. Even if Rafe hadn’t told her about his suspicions, her own gut instinct had told her the same thing.
Curling on her side, she bunched the pillow beneath her head and listened to the unfamiliar sounds of Rafe’s townhouse. A clock ticked very quietly in the guest-room, and she could hear the soft whir of his dishwasher downstairs. She’d left her bedroom door open just a crack and a bar of light from the hallway fell across the floor. She knew that Rafe was just across the hall; she’d lain motionless as he’d come up the stairs and gone into his own room. Part of her had wondered if he would stop by her door or maybe come into her bedroom, and how she would react if he did. But his footsteps hadn’t paused or even slowed in front of her room.
Just remembering the heated intensity of his kiss and the scrape of his callused
hands across her bare skin and she was aroused all over again. She knew now that Rafe was attracted to her, but he probably had some innate sense of honor that would prevent him from acting on his desires. He was probably old-fashioned enough to believe that would be taking unfair advantage of her, when he’d claimed that she would be safe with him.
She should be grateful that he had enough respect for her not to expect her to sleep with him in return for saving her life. Of course, he was gorgeous enough that he probably had women throwing themselves at him without having to do a thing. With a groan, Sara rolled onto her back, feeling tight and uncomfortable in her own skin. The truth was, if she was even a little more assertive or confident, she’d be one of those women.
How would he react if she walked across the hallway to his room, and asked if she could stay with him? If she stepped out of her own comfort zone and became the aggressor? Would he turn her around and gently send her back to her own bed, or would his eyes flare with hunger as he drew her into his arms?
Just the thought of having sex with Rafe—of having his hard, male body inside her own—caused heat to swamp her limbs. Her breasts ached and she shifted restlessly beneath the sheet. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d experienced such intense need. Everything about him turned her on, from the expression in his coffee-dark eyes when he looked at her to the strength and grace of his body. She recalled the few times he’d actually smiled and how that brief flash of humor had transformed his face. Even his voice was sexy, with its low, rasping quality. Most of all, she liked how he made her feel—fragile and feminine.
Safe.
Sexy.