by Aimee Carson
His words came out a throaty rumble. “I was affected.” He bunched her dress to her hips and positioned her over him, leaving her holding her breath. “Very affected.”
Helpless in his arms, she arched her back as he began to slide inside.
“God help me,” he groaned, filling her inch by delicious inch as he went on. “I still am.”
Try as he might, Hunter couldn’t hold back the moan of pleasure as he entered Carly. Her body was more than ready. Beyond welcoming. Wrapping him in a warmth that was less about heat and more about alleviating the years of ache within. Overcome by the sensation, he paused for a moment. With him embedded deep inside her, she cupped his face for a kiss that was part healing balm, part all-consuming need, and a very big part an emotion he refused to name. She pulled her lips back a fraction, hands on his cheeks, her warm amber gaze locked with his, and he began to move.
Their hips rocked in unison, slow yet sure, as they savored every sensation. And Carly let out a sigh, her eyes growing darker.
Somewhere along the way the teasing tones and the playful challenge had been left far behind. All that remained was his need to lose himself in Carly. The selfless way she matched his rhythm, held his face and looked into his eyes, mended the cracks he’d sworn were too massive to be repaired. The doubts and misgivings he’d clung to in order to preserve his sanity were slipping. His heart was now too large to be contained in a cynical box. The woman was a seductive mix of sassy strength and endearing vulnerability, but it was the caring in her gaze that drew him in. Called him to wade further, venture deeper.
Death by drowning didn’t seem a bad way to go, so long as it was Carly he was submerged in.
Giving himself over to the sensation, he wrapped one arm around her waist, the other hand low on her back, and closed his eyes, burying his nose at her neck, immersing himself as he succumbed to the spell she cast. Turning himself over to the sensation, he basked in her citrus scent, her soft skin and the emotion she shared so readily. So freely. And so honestly.
The unequivocal return of passion in her hips as they met his urged him on. Every savoring thrust increased his greed. Wanting to claim it all, to absorb the very essence of this woman, he fisted his hands in her hair, raking his teeth across the pulse pounding at her neck. His breath turned ragged against her damp skin and she clung to him, each of them lost in the other. Although he maintained the unhurried pace, the slow, strong strokes of his shaft grew rough, rugged. And needy.
Until Carly let out a soft cry.
The brutally frank need built higher. Both frightening in its intensity and healing in its authenticity. Weakening him and strengthening him at the same time. And as her cries of surrender turned into a call of completion the start of her orgasm gave him a final push. He took the leap with her, following her off the cliff and plunging headlong toward the ocean. And then the pleasure hit hard and closed over his head.
Well, it wasn’t quite what she’d envisioned, but there was no denying it now.
She was in love.
Carly’s chest hitched on a painful breath as she lay next to a sleeping Hunter, staring up at the ceiling of the hotel room. For years she’d wondered how the emotion would feel—perhaps like double rainbows with pots of gold, or frolicking unicorns, or any other number of mythical, magical things she’d heard of through the years. It was supposed to leave her believing she could leap tall buildings in a single bound, not longing to hide out in a basement.
She’d expected to feel energized and ready to take on the world, not left flattened in its wake.
Carly squeezed her eyes shut, blocking out the fear and forcing her breaths to come at a more doable rate—one that didn’t make her feel quite so dizzy or panicky. She turned her head to look at Hunter—which didn’t help her lightheaded sense of anxiety either. The masculine edges of his face looked relaxed in sleep, as did the sensual lips that had minutes before consumed hers. This time had been different. He had made love to her as if all the barriers were gone. As if desperate to satisfy an emotional need via a physical one.
Or maybe that was her being naive again. Because sex was just sex, and with Hunter it had always been good, so what did it really mean?
Confused, she covered her eyes with her hand. Love hadn’t brought the kind of harmony and feel-good vibes she’d always imagined. And how could she rely on a feeling of closeness in bed to mean anything? Perhaps, for Hunter, it really was all about the physical?
But she couldn’t get beyond the feeling that facing his old colleague had brought all the old memories to the surface. That he had turned to her in a moment of pain—trusting her to see him through, having faith in the two of them.
And maybe pots of gold and frolicking unicorns were real and waiting for her right outside the hotel room.
With a subdued sigh, her doubts and fears too loud to be silenced, she rolled out of bed and quietly changed into jeans and a T-shirt. She combed her hair, slipped out of the room, and wandered down the hallway and into an elevator, pushing the button for the ground floor. As she descended Carly stared at her reflection in the mirrored wall, looking for the radiant glow that women in love were supposed to emit.
But where was the inner peace? The empowering sense of resolve? Or, for God’s sake, at least her usual confidence? According to the generally accepted unwritten rules of romance she was now supposed to be an über-strong, formidable woman, endowed with the heroic ability to overcome all manner of obstacles simply with the power of the love in her heart.
All she felt was an overwhelming sense that she was no closer to breaching Hunter’s mighty defenses than she had been before she knew she’d taken the emotional fall—but now failing to lure him out of his shell wasn’t just about his happiness, but hers too.
Because, with those cool blue eyes, there was no way of being certain about anything.
The elevator doors opened and Carly made her way into the lobby, coming to a stop beside the marble fountain in the center. Feeling lost, she scanned the elegant scene. And then she spied obnoxious agent Terry Smith at the lobby bar.
A wave of discomfort settled deep in her belly. No surprise that he lacked the imagination to seek out one of the many Las Vegas establishments that offered more than canned elevator music, hardwood floors, and an elegance so subdued it bordered on bland, generic posh.
She chewed on her lip, staring at the agent. He might lack imagination, but one thing he did have was knowledge about Hunter’s past. All those tidbits Hunter hadn’t shared…like the fact his former girlfriend had been a reporter.
Her heart and her brain crashed into one another again, leaving her struggling to adjust.
That little nugget of news about his ex had been relentlessly chugging around in circles in Carly’s mind since she’d first learned the truth. Was there a link between Hunter’s break with his girlfriend and his reasons for quitting the FBI? So far she had considered the events to be unrelated, but now she had a strong suspicion they weren’t. With his ex being a reporter, it made the incidents a whole lot more likely to be connected.
And why hadn’t he trusted her enough to tell her?
The ache returned, leaving her feeling vulnerable, and suddenly her need to know overwhelmed everything. She didn’t require the nitty-gritty details, she didn’t want a blow-by-blow account—though she would have gladly accepted both from Hunter if he’d suddenly decided to quit hiding behind unbreachable emotional barricades. She just wanted the answer to one question: had Hunter’s girlfriend been involved with the leak that had led to him leaving the FBI?
And the only way to find out was to ask. She stared at the redhead, his scalp gleaming beneath the buzz cut.
Don’t do it, Carly. Don’t do it.
But, damn it, Hunter’s past was about more than just his life now. It was about hers too. Love might not endow her with superpowers, but it did provide one indisputable truth—he held her future happiness in his hands.
Fear gripped her, more powerfu
l than ever before. Retreating to what she did the best—seeking out answers, nosing out the truth—was the only way she knew how to take back a little of the massive control that had just been handed to Hunter. He now held her heart on a platter.
With a renewed sense of determination, she headed in the direction of the agent.
As the hotel elevator descended, Hunter cursed himself for conking out so fast. The late nights had caught up with him, and while Carly had slept in to make up for lost sleep Hunter had been up early, attending lectures at the conference. Still, the lost shut-eye had been a small price to pay for making love to Carly. Tonight, even after they were done, he’d pulled her close, wanting to stay awake and enjoy the sensation that had permeated every muscle in his body, making them slack. Loose. Unrestricted by the tension that had kept him bound tight for so long he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so relaxed. The deep feeling of contentment, of rightness, came from holding Carly close. From making love to the woman who had wormed her way under his skin in a way that he’d never thought possible.
With her quirky love for the bizarre, her sense of humor, and her sexy, spirited love of fun, Carly had charged into his life and powered his way into his heart in a matter of weeks. Despite all his efforts he’d fallen so fast he was still struggling from the force of the impact. Life without her in it had become unthinkable. And the way she’d made love to him tonight suggested she felt the same way.
So why had he woken up alone?
Eager to be near her again, even if it was to inhale the fresh scent of her skin, to feel the warmth of her body sleeping next to his, he’d left the room with one purpose in mind: to tell Carly how he felt. That the stark emptiness that had threatened to swallow him whole was now filled with the smell of citrus…and the smile of a woman that filled gaps in places he hadn’t known there were holes.
When the elevator doors parted on the ground floor Hunter exited and headed into the lobby. Pleasure hit when he spied Carly leaning against the counter at the bar. But the sense of well-being crashed when he spied who sat opposite her …
Special Agent Terry Smith.
The sucker punch to the gut almost dropped him to his knees. The emotional hit was so hard it knocked the air from his chest.
Heart pumping painfully, Hunter stood, frozen, staring at the two of them as the familiar, nauseating swell of betrayal set fire to his previous lighthearted thoughts, incinerating them in an instant. There was only one thing the two of them had in common. Him. And Hunter was one hundred percent certain he was the topic of conversation.
Instantly several memories flashed through his mind: Carly using her blog to rake him over the coals—subsequently making him the current subject of interest for the Miami press. Carly winning her boss’s approval to do an in-depth piece on Hunter. And Carly making love to him—the first two times leaving him wondering what she had to gain.
Until tonight, when it had felt so different, so raw, it had lulled him into a sexually induced state of lethargy. Yet when he’d woken…she was gone.
Now she was talking to his former colleague. A man who knew every sordid detail about Hunter being duped by another woman. The duplicity, the slur on his good name, and the humiliatingly degrading days of being the subject of an inquiry by the department he’d sworn to serve.
Why was she talking to the FBI agent?
Hunter couldn’t see beyond the most obvious answer. His story.
His vision tunneled and the edges grew gray, enveloping him in a black cloak that cut off every thought outside of confronting Carly Wolfe.
“Here you are,” Hunter said from behind her, his voice encrusted with frost.
If she’d been a cat, his tone would have shaved several lives from Carly. She turned, and the look on Hunter’s face left her frigid, chilling her to the core. Her heart thumped hard, forcing the blood through her frozen veins at an astronomical rate.
Terry Smith responded before her mouth could locate her tongue. “Hunter, come join our party. And just to prove there are no hard feelings—” the agent’s smile was empty “—I’ll buy you a drink.”
Hunter’s gaze remained fixed on Carly. “I’m not interested.”
Carly’s heart pumped harder and the strained atmosphere grew taut, the air dense from the tension. Was the anger on his face directed at his old coworker…or her? She had the horrible sinking feeling she was the cause.
The agent’s grin lacked humor. “After you’ve paid my mixed-up hotel bar bill all these years, I owe you several hundred rounds at least.”
“You don’t owe me a thing,” Hunter said.
His emphatic words about the yearly prank again left Carly with the impression that Hunter had done the hacking and Pete had done the paying.
“Not even one bourbon for old times’ sake?” Terry said.
“I didn’t want to drink with you back then,” Hunter said, his tone lethally even, “and I don’t want to drink with you now.”
The agent refused to shut up. “Come on, Hunter. All Carly’s been doing is asking questions about you.”
Hunter’s face went dark, and Carly’s heart sank like an anchor. She opened her mouth to refute Terry’s exaggerated claim, but the agent went on.
“So it wasn’t like I got to enjoy a nice chat with your girlfriend,” he said, and the up-and-down perusal the man gave Carly came dangerously close to a leer.
Up until now he’d been almost pleasant, and certainly not inappropriate. Carly had the impression Terry’s offensive look was more about making Hunter angry than anything else.
The agent’s words as he went on confirmed her theory. “Tell me—is she worth it?” Terry said. “Maybe if I found the right angle she’d offer to sleep with me for a story too.”
Before Carly could fully register the insult, Hunter’s fist connected with the agent’s chin with a loud snap. One moment Terry Smith was sitting on a barstool, and the next he was sprawled on the floor. The gasps from the guests were loud, and a waitress dropped her tray, shattering glasses on the hardwood floor. Silence followed. The whole room was shocked into momentary stillness.
The two bartenders rounded the bar and Hunter took a step back, hands raised in a non-threatening gesture. His gaze pivoted from Terry—still lying on the floor, rubbing his chin—back to Carly. “No need to remove me, gentlemen,” Hunter said to the staff, his slate-blue gaze on hers, so empty the negative pressure threatened to suck the very life from Carly’s soul. “I’m done here.” And, with an air of finality, he swiveled on his heel, heading toward the lobby.
The murmurs of the guests at the bar returned as a bartender helped Terry to his feet. The agent was sullen as he angrily waved the help away. It took Carly all of eight seconds to recover fully from the incident before she took off across the lobby, chasing after Hunter’s retreating form.
“What are you doing?” she said.
He didn’t stop walking. “I’m leaving.”
“Where are you going?”
He didn’t slow his pace. “Home.”
Her patience was rapidly growing slimmer. “What is your problem?”
“Apparently my ability to choose who I sleep with. Did you find out anything good?”
Frustrated, and more than a little annoyed, Carly struggled to keep up, her legs stretching to match the longer length of his. “I didn’t get a chance to ask him much of anything. You barged in and dropped him with a lethal right hook before I got a chance.”
“Sorry to ruin your interview.”
Anger flared. “Damn it, Hunter,” she said, grabbing his arm. But he was bigger and stronger and powered by a fury that was almost frightening. The momentum of his emotion and his strength carried them both forward as she clutched his arm and went on. “It wasn’t an interview.”
“Then why were you talking to him?”
She bit her lip, her steps still carried forward by her grip on his arm as he made his way to the elevator. Dismayed, she struggled for a way to explain.
>
Curiosity hadn’t killed the cat, because death would have been too easy.
In the end, the truth was all she had. “I wanted to ask him a question.”
He stopped to face her and shook off her arm, stepping closer. “What question?” His eyes were iced over, his face hard, and he looked so distant it was difficult to remember anything other than this coldly reserved Hunter.
“I wanted to know why you left the FBI,” she said. He stared at her, as if sensing there was more. “And I wanted to know if your girlfriend had anything to do with it.”
“You could have asked me.”
“I did ask you, but you said it wasn’t important.”
“Sorry I wasn’t cooperative enough for you. I didn’t mean to ruin your plans. Or maybe this was your plan all along?”
Her patience lost so much weight it disappeared. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Your plan to lull me into sleep with a good round of sex and then slip away to find Terry. Get the story you’ve wanted all along.”
Carly was proud she didn’t stomp her foot, and even more amazed she didn’t slug him with her fist. But his jaw was so set, his expression so stony, she would have broken her hand while he would have hardly registered the tap to his face. Instead, hope died. Her heart burst. And her soul curled up in the corner and immediately began to lick its mortal wounds.
He’d made her feel worth protecting. But that was a reflection of him. That was who he was and what he did. It was no reflection of his belief in her. He’d faced down two supposed thugs because he would shield anyone who was threatened. He’d slugged a man because of a vile insult, but not because he considered her honorable. The need to defend and protect was simply hardwired into his being. He didn’t trust her. Had absolutely no faith in her. And he never would.
The tears stung, but she’d had years of practice fighting them back. “You’re not even going to give me a chance to explain.”
The old feeling of helplessness, of abandonment, came rushing back. First Thomas, then her father. And now Hunter.