Hot Contract
Page 22
“Shit!” Keegan was back on his feet so fast his head spun.
Jen caught his wrist. “If you marry me, we won’t need condoms.”
His mouth dropped open. Marry? Jen wanted to marry him? Him?
She frowned at his abrupt silence. “Don’t look so anxious,” she said. “Surely the thought occurred to you. I’m not such a bad deal. I can’t cook—only eggs—but we can always get take-out. And I can learn, right? It can’t be that hard. I have a cookbook.”
“You want to marry me?”
“Okay,” she said, sitting up and shoving past him in her hurry to get out the door. To find her clothes and maybe some dignity. She brushed her hand over her eyes. Damn if she hadn’t done it again. “So you don’t want to marry me—”
“Of course I want to marry you.”
Jen paused with her hand on the doorknob, then turned around slowly. “You do?”
Keegan pulled her into his arms and tilted her chin. “Yes. I do. I want to marry you. I know a justice of the peace. She can do it now.”
“No,” she said.
He frowned. “No?”
“No.” She arched an eyebrow. “You are so not getting out of this room without making me scream.”
Keegan smiled, backing her against the door. “God,” he breathed. “I love you.”
He swung her into his arms and dropped her on the bed again. When he looked at her like that she felt beautiful. It was never just sex... he joined her and held her tight, kissing her with slow, languid kisses.
“I have a hot tub at home,” he said, brushing the hair out of her eyes. “Want to try it out later?”
Jen slid her arms up around his neck. “You have a thing for tubs?”
He brushed her lips with his. “I have a thing for you.”
Epilogue
Four weeks later, Hilo, Hawaii
Connor stared up at the torn aluminum overhang. Weeds hung from a hole in the gutter and there was kudzu growing out of the downspout. He'd read somewhere that you could eat kudzu, but he suspected that given half a chance, the kudzu would eat him instead.
“How old is this thing?”
“Forties,” said Keegan. He pulled a key from his pocket and wrestled the lock open.
“Not like that, man—like this.” Connor kicked the door open and walked into the cavernous hangar. “What a fucking dump.”
Keegan stepped inside and looked up. “According to Art, it’s a warehouse.”
Jet noise rattled the walls and startled a flock of birds into flying the length of the building.
“What the hell was that?” asked Connor. “A pigeon? We have birds in here?”
Jen joined them and slipped her hand into the crook of Keegan's arm. “You said you wanted more space.”
Connor walked the length of a gray metal receiving desk and counted the number of holes in the ceiling. Pigeons had crapped on everything and turned the walls white. “Not this kind of space!”
“It’s free,” said Keegan. “And for right now, we’re broke. Take it, say thanks, and get some contractors in here.”
He took Jen off to look at the loading dock. Sunlight hammered the dilapidated building, promising that as humid as it was now, it was going to get worse.
Quiet, measured steps stopped behind Connor and he turned to find Jen’s cousin, Tris, in the doorway.
Connor rubbed a thumb over the bandages on his wrist. “Art send you?”
“I do not run to my uncle’s bidding.”
Tris Stalling had some kind of weird accent that Connor couldn’t place and the flat, emotionless eyes of a killer. Yesterday, he'd been in Beijing.
“What are you doing in Hawaii?”
“I leave for Singapore next week. I need someone in place who will not arouse suspicion.”
“You have internal issues?” Since Connor was leaving for Singapore first thing in the morning, he suspected his ticket was the main reason Tris had shown up.
“I suspect internal issues,” corrected the head of StallingCo's intelligence division.
The sky behind him was a pale, clear blue and heat waves shimmered over the cracked asphalt. In less than five minutes the temperature had gone from hot to explosive. The look in his Stalling-dark eyes told Connor the man knew exactly what was going down. God save him from ever having Tris Stalling as his enemy.
He nodded. “Backup?”
Tris folded his arms over his chest. “A local operative—Jacey Chang.”
Thank you for reading Hot Contract. If you enjoyed the world of DalCon and StallingCo, and would like to receive a free copy of Connor’s story—Kill Velocity—simply send an email to jodihenley @ gmail.com with a link to your posted review of Hot Contract.
In October, I’ll send you a coupon code.
Visit me at jodihenley.blogspot.com
Other Books by Jodi Henley
The Taming of Lady Honoria (regency erotica)
Bound Desire (paranormal m/m)