by Roz Lee
Past time to go.
He found his clothes, what little there was of them, and slipped them on in the dark. He had to hand it to Sean’s brother. He’d certainly thought of everything when it came to having a good time. When all you had to worry about was a sarong, creeping out in the pre-dawn hours was easier than finding a STD in port.
Only this morning, he’d stopped before opening the door and returned to the bed. He couldn’t remember the woman’s name and that had bothered him. His eyes adapted to the near total darkness, a skill he’d found useful in his former life. He brushed a strand of hair from her face. She slept deeply, her features lax and porcelain fine. Her lips were full, and he recalled how they looked after he’d kissed her—swollen and a deep russet that matched her auburn hair. Her nipples had the same coloring, and had been as responsive to his touch as the rest of her.
He placed a kiss on her parted lips. Nothing much, just a touch, but the contact had singed his system as if he’d touched his tongue to an electric fence. She stirred, and her pink tongue darted out to wet her lower lip.
For the first time he could remember, he left a woman sleeping, rather than wake her and fuck her senseless, as his body had urged him to do. It was a complication he didn’t need, not with Celeste back in his life.
Drew stared unseeing at the blank screen. He needed to focus on his job, but no matter how hard he tried, his thoughts veered off course like a ship without a rudder.
His feelings for Celeste hadn’t changed. Every time he thought of her, he got a warm feeling in the pit of his stomach, and something in the region of his heart ached like a son-of-a-gun. If it wasn’t love, he didn’t know what else it could be. The last thing he needed was to be involved with Celeste’s partner. Absolutely nothing good could come from that.
That thought brought him full circle to wild imaginings about what Sean was doing to Celeste. He’d seen enough of them together when they’d been a team, working behind the scenes gathering intelligence for the DIA, to know something about their sexual relationship. Sean was a dom, and Celeste had been his sub. They thought they hid it, but it crept into their professional life in small ways, and Drew had picked up on the signals easily enough.
He’d fantasized about showing Celeste another way to find enjoyment in the bedroom, his way, but he wouldn’t have ever acted on his fantasies, not as long as she was with Sean. Then, they’d been captured, and in a moment of insanity, he’d spilled his guts to Sean. He couldn’t regret it. They’d all believed they were going to die that day, and Sean had offered him a moment’s peace, buried in Celeste’s sweet ass. He was certain Sean had made the offer more for Celeste’s sake, as a way to distract her from the inevitable, but he’d seized the opportunity to have any part of her before he departed this world. She’d accepted his loving for what it was, a declaration of unspoken love and a farewell.
Drew swallowed the lump in his throat. Everything would have been fine if the Marines hadn’t rescued them. Living had screwed up all their lives. He didn’t know what had actually happened between Celeste and Sean when they all returned stateside, but it was pretty easy to figure out why Sean had demanded she choose between them, and why she had run.
Celeste was here now, and for some crazy, inexplicable reason, he thought she might make that decision now. What it would mean to the three of them, he couldn’t imagine.
He shut down the part of his brain that could imagine what was going on right now. Down that path lay nothing but insanity.
He’d brought the first of that night’s offerings up on the big screen when the office door opened. The woman from last night, the one he now knew to be Agent Bree Stanton, stood framed in the doorway, her features obscured by the flickering light from the big screen. She wore the short passenger-issue sarong that left her shapely legs silhouetted against the harsh hall lighting behind her. A buzz started along his spine, at the base of his skull, and shot like lightning to the small of his back, and from there it was a short trip to his groin.
She took in the poorly done porn, and Drew alone in the office, watching it. She shook her head, and then, as if she wasn’t entirely certain she should stay, stepped inside and shut the door. Drew noted the way she leaned against the door, clutching the handle. It hadn’t been all that long ago her pretty little hands had been wrapped around his cock.
“Disgusting.”
He slammed a mental door on his previous thought. This wasn’t a social call.
“True. The porn industry has nothing to fear from this group.”
She let go of the door and moved further into the room. He took it as a good sign.
“You misunderstood. I wasn’t talking about them, I was talking about you.”
Drew flicked to the next video in the queue and tried to ignore the unveiled insult. If that was the worst she had to say about him, then he’d consider himself fortunate. “What brings you down here?”
“Agent Hamilton told me you would be here.” She sat in the other desk chair and rolled around to sit next to him, facing the screen.
That explained her lack of surprise at finding him here. He wondered what Celeste had told her about him, about them. A cold chill replaced the flash of heat he’d experienced at seeing her. “You didn’t tell her about. . . . ”
“No, but I think she may have an idea. Why didn’t you tell me you were the security officer?”
“I didn’t think it mattered. Why didn’t you tell me you were FBI?”
“Same reason.” She changed the subject. “She said you were supposed to be looking for the eco-terrorist.”
He made the mental shift from personal to professional without stammering. “I am.”
“Really?” He didn’t mistake the scorn in her voice. Her tone warned that what had passed between them the previous evening wasn’t going to be repeated, or discussed any further. He certainly wouldn’t have fucked her if he’d known who she was. He’d never been one to dip his cock in the government alphabet soup, especially when it spelled FBI.
“I have been, but this is part of my job too. You can help, if you want.”
“I’ll pass. What have you done about identifying the suspect?”
“We have photos of all the staff members, as well as all the passengers. I understand you’re familiar with most of the members of this group, so I thought you might look through the photos and see if anyone rings a bell.”
“It’s a place to start. We don’t know who they sent. It’s more likely to be a new recruit, someone expendable if they get caught, but I can take a look.”
Drew set her in front of monitor and programmed a slideshow of the passengers for her. He turned his attention to the amateur porn again and tried his best to ignore her. It proved impossible. Every breath he took brought with it her scent, something light and airy, overlaid with a floral perfume that in no way reminded him of sweet innocence or alphabet soup. She smelled like sin. Exotic, hot, wild, fuck me carnality. Impossible to ignore.
He flipped through the videos, uninterested in any of them. A private video played through his mind. Bree, naked, open to him, begging. Ah yes, she’d begged, more than once in the course of the evening they’d spent together. Drew closed his hand over the roller-ball mouse and instead of cold plastic, his hand remembered the warmth and weight of her breasts, and the way they fit perfectly into his palms. His cock stirred at the sweet memory.
Drew shifted in his seat and tried to focus on his job. It was useless. He returned the screen to the usual random pattern of live security cameras, and swiveled his chair around to the woman whose presence was driving him out of his mind.
“Anything?”
“No. I’ve been through about a quarter of the passengers. So far, no one looks familiar.”
“Like you said, it’s a long shot. If they have any sense, they sent someone they can disavow knowledge of if they get caught.”
She turned to face him. The bluish glare from the monitor made her facial features appear fragile.
Her lips looked like a ripe plum, one he wanted to take inside his mouth and suck. He shook his head. What the hell was the matter with him? She’d brought an iceberg with her tonight, and that was a stop sign he’d always obeyed. Until now.
“Drew?”
A hint of uncertainty, or was it warning, tinged the single syllable. Whatever it was, it went unheeded. Drew moved. One hand curved around the back of her neck, the other closed over the arm of her chair. He swung her around, chair and all, and his lips covered hers.
She made a sound. It originated from deep within and vibrated up and along her lips. All Drew knew was that it wasn’t a protest. A second later she was in his lap, her legs draped over his, his hands on her waist, hers splayed like iron bands around his skull. She opened her mouth over his and his tongue plunged inside. Hot. Sweet. Not an ice cube in sight.
He considered himself a tender and considerate lover, but there was no hint of either in the way he devoured her. For every liberty he took, Bree responded with one equally bold. Her sarong brushed against his calves as it slid to the floor, taking with it every reason he could think not to have this woman. She was willing, and he knew from the night before, able.
His hands found the perfection of her breasts, and at his touch, another musical tone vibrated through her and to him via their connected lips. Their breath came in matching pants. Drew broke the kiss and transferred his lips to her right breast. Bree wrapped her arms around his head like a shipwreck survivor clinging to a bit of flotsam.
She tasted like honey. In the garish light from the monitors, her breasts were mystical objects. Translucent orbs tipped with ripe plums. Drew took what he wanted from her. His teeth grazed her tight buds, his tongue soothed, his lips claimed.
Bree arched her back. Her head fell back, exposing her long neck to him. Her fire-red hair burned his hand where he supported her. She was sleek in the right places, all soft curves in the others. He couldn’t get enough of touching her. His lips went where they would, and his hands followed. Sometimes he could feel her eyes on him, but then he’d find that certain spot, and her gaze would dim and she’d surrender to him.
He lived for those moments. She wasn’t one to submit, and he’d never been one to dominate, but in those rare flashes when she was totally his, he knew what it was to be a king, in command of all he could see and touch.
When he lifted her from her chair and dropped her butt on the Formica desktop, she made no protest. When he stripped her panties away and stepped between her muscular thighs, she leaned against the console and propped her feet on the edge of the desk. One small hand slipped across her mound, and two blood-red tipped fingers spread her outer lips for him.
His heart stopped. His cock throbbed. He had to have her. Here. Now.
Drew lost whatever shred of decency he had. He found a condom amid the desk clutter and rolled it along his aching cock. He glanced at her face, hoped to God she hadn’t changed her mind. Her tongue rimmed her parted lips, an invitation if he ever saw one. He guided his cock to the opening she’d framed with her fingers, and nudged forward enough to hold his cock in place. His hands found her knees, and he froze there for the span of a heartbeat, all the time he would give her to change her mind now.
His heart thudded again, and his grip tightened on her raised knees. He flexed at the waist and drove his cock balls-deep inside her honeyed channel. A hoarse cry escaped her throat, and her blood-red fingertips moved to her clit. A fingernail scraped his groin.
“Shit.” Drew pulled away and plunged into her again, hard. He set a rhythm, and Bree met him thrust for thrust. Her fingers worked her clit like a harpist, tweaking and stroking, building to a crescendo.
Drew wrapped his arms around her legs, imprisoning her. He dragged her to the edge of the desk so he could go deeper. He’d never needed to be inside a woman the way he needed to be inside her. He jerked her body against his in a futile effort to go deeper. Her inner muscles twitched, and he clenched his teeth against his rising orgasm. He wouldn’t finish without her. He might be a son-of-a-bitch for fucking her on a desk, but he could damn sure hold off until she found satisfaction too.
Her body tensed. The eruption, like an undersea earthquake, shook him to his toes. Her pussy clenched around his cock. She folded herself against him, and he let her legs go so he could wrap his arms around her. Her teeth clamped on his shoulder, and he lost what little control he still had. He slammed his hips against her, and held her against him as his cock answered her earthquake with a tsunami that threatened to sweep them both out to sea.
Drew clenched his jaw against something inside he couldn’t name, didn’t want to name. Naming it would give it too much significance. He allowed himself a silent stream of curses as her bare feet slid off the edge of the desk, down his hips and thighs, and dangled next to his knees. He dropped his arms, and with his hands at her waist, lifted her away from him. He settled her on the desk and picked up their clothing.
He tossed her wrap in her general direction and fastened his around his hips, discarding the condom with practiced efficiency. Without a backward glance, Drew left her sitting in the otherworldly glare of the security monitors, alone.
Drew took the service stairs up one deck to the aft kitchen. His shoulder stung where she’d bitten him. He touched the area with light fingers and found small indentations where her teeth had sunk into his flesh and muscle. Damn. If it didn’t go away, he’d be wearing a shirt for the next few days. Normally that wouldn’t raise eyebrows, but on the Lothario, it certainly would. He grabbed a kitchen towel and slung it over his shoulder as he made his way through to the crew deck beyond.
The aft crew deck was mostly deserted. Few crew members were off duty at this time of night. Besides the obvious, this was the time a lot of behind the scenes work took place. Beds were turned down, laundry done, dishes washed, trash sorted and burned, to name a few. It was just as well. He wasn’t fit company.
He leaned against the railing. This was as close as you could get to the waterline and the giant screws that propelled the ship. The roar of churning water was deafening, making conversation impossible. Just what he needed. He stared beyond the reach of light from the upper decks, to the ink black ocean. What the hell happened back there? One minute he’d been obsessing over what Sean was doing with Celeste, and the next he was fucking another woman.
Not just any woman. Agent Bree Stanton. Fuck.
Last night, she’d been simply another passenger, another way to pass the time, a way to forget Celeste was onboard. Her red hair had attracted him from the start, and she’d been soft and willing in bed. Nothing like the explosive fireball he’d screwed on the desktop. He’d wanted her from the moment she opened the door to the security office and stood there, outlined by the hall lighting. But she wasn’t for him.
He loved Celeste. Always had. That didn’t mean his anatomy ceased operation though. Clearly, his cock hadn’t gotten the message about Celeste. In less than twelve hours, she would be his again, for a whole day before he had to turn her over to Sean again. Insanity. The whole thing was insane—bouncing Celeste between them like a ping-pong ball. Leave it to Sean, the mud-fucker to come up with an idea like this.
Drew moved away from the railing and dropped into a chair. Cold wire mesh bit into his bare ass beneath the short wrap. Crew comfort wasn’t a high priority, obviously. He considered going to the passenger decks where the comfortable deck chairs lived, but that would mean seeing people, possibly the two people he was determined to avoid for the next eleven hours and nine minutes. Not that he was counting.
He raised his arm to run his hand through his hair, but a sharp twinge in his shoulder brought him up short. Images came to mind—Bree’s hands wrapped around his forearms, hanging on as he drove into her. Her head thrown back as she absorbed him into her body. The thatch of fire-red curls between her legs. The first time he’d seen her naked, those curls had been the equivalent of a red flag in a bullring. He could appreciate a neatly trimmed mound
, but the wild, natural look Bree sported, turned him into an animal.
Shit. What was he doing thinking of her again? And wanting her? He’d had her twice, and she’d been two different women each time. Soft and compliant the first time. Wild, and out of control tonight. If he had her again, would she morph yet again?
He rubbed the sore spot on his shoulder. This couldn’t happen again, no matter what his cock had to say about it.
Chapter Six
Her hours with Sean were drawing to a close. After he’d come in her mouth, they laid there, skin to skin for the longest, absorbing the feel of each other. Sean had been tender then, taking her with infinite care and attention. For a few short hours, they’d dropped the whole dom and sub agenda and just been lovers. As she watched him now, his long, lean body slicing through the warm salt-water lap pool, her body hummed with need.
Wrapped in a beach towel against the pre-dawn chill, her body warmed at the memory of Sean’s heated skin sliding over and into her, over and over again. He was a magnificent specimen, and he had stamina to equal it. Somehow, he found the strength to get in his morning workout, when it was all Celeste could do to stand without falling. Somewhere in the long night they’d shared, her legs had ceased to work. Sean had carried her to the edge of the pool, covered her with the beach towel, and ordered her to stay. As if she could walk away.
She knew it wasn’t fair to Sean, but her mind wandered to Drew, and what he was doing. In a few short hours, Sean would turn her over to his best friend, and possibly make an enemy of him by doing it, if he hadn’t already. If she slept with Drew, would Sean accept it, or would it be a wedge between them too?
What she wouldn’t give to turn back the clock and change that one decision. If she’d simply said no when Sean asked her to share herself with Drew, none of this would have happened. She would have had the last five years with Sean, and perhaps by now they would have had a child, maybe two. A burning coal took up residence in her chest, somewhere near where her heart should be. Before the capture, before that last mission, they’d talked about the possibility, and they’d both wanted it when the time was right. It had made walking away that much more difficult. She wondered if Sean felt the void the same as she did, or if he’d simply moved beyond it.