Convincing Alex

by Nora Roberts

  “You think I’d turn Bobby on to her?” Arrogance was sidelined as fury snapped into Rosalie’s voice. “I owe her.”

  “What?”

  “Respect,” she said, with an innate and graceful dignity that had Alex softening. “She had me eat at her table. She even said I could stay in her extra bedroom. Like a guest.” Her lips thinned at Alex’s expression. “Don’t sweat it, honey. I didn’t take her up on it. Sure, she’s paying me, and maybe you don’t think that’s any different than me taking money from some slob off the street. But she treats me like somebody. Not some thing, somebody.” Embarrassed by her own vehemence, she shrugged. “She doesn’t have the sense not to.”

  “She’s got sense, all right. Not all good.” Alex’s lips twitched, even as Rosalie’s did. “Maybe she hasn’t gone so wrong here. I just don’t want her hurt.”

  “Neither do I.” Rosalie tapped a scarlet nail on his chest. “You got a bad case, cop. Stars in your eyes.” The little wisp of envy came and went, almost unnoticed. “Make sure you keep them in hers, or you’ll answer to me.”

  His grin flashed before he could prevent it. The charm of it nearly had Rosalie changing her mind about cops. “Yes, ma’am.” Like Bess, he wanted to say something that would stop her from going back on the streets. Unlike Bess, he accepted that there was nothing that would do it.

  “Maybe I see why she’s so stuck on you.” When he moved his blocking arm, she stepped into the elevator, turned. “You be good to her, Stanislaski. She deserves good.”

  The elevator doors clunked shut. Alex stood studying them a moment before he turned and wandered down the corridor to find Bess.

  She was bent over the keys, rapping out a machine-gun fire of words onto the monitor. Her fingers moved like lightning, but her eyes were far away. In Millbrook, he thought, smiling to himself.

  She had her legs crossed under her, up on the chair. The way her shoulders were hunched, he imagined her muscles would complain loudly the moment she came back to earth.

  She was wearing a skirt again, a little leather number in bold blue that was hiked high up on her thighs. The hot-pink blouse she’d tucked into it should have clashed with her hair, but it didn’t. The blouse looked like silk and was carelessly shoved up to her elbows. A half-dozen gold bracelets clanged at her wrist as she worked. Rings flashed on her fingers, and the big Gypsy hoops she wore at her ears peeked out of her tousled hair.

  His heart ached with love for her. And his loins… Alex let out a little breath. He wanted, quite simply, to devour her. Inch by delicious inch.

  What the hell was he going to do, he wondered, when she tried to slither out of his life? He was sure she would, as she’d done with others before. He could lock her up, carry her off. He could beg or threaten. He already knew he would do whatever he had to in order to keep her in his life.

  What had ever made him think he would one day find some nice, pretty woman with simple tastes and a quiet style? Someone who would be content to sit home while he worked his crazy hours? Who would have and help him raise the houseful of children he so badly wanted?

  With Bess, nothing was simple, nothing was quiet. She would never be content to sit home but would badger him incessantly, picking at him until he gave in and talked about the darker aspects of his work, those pieces of his life that he wanted to keep locked away from everyone who mattered. As for children… He didn’t know how the devil to get and keep a ring on her finger, much less ask her to help make a family.

  Being in love with her left him helpless, made him stupid, brought him a kind of fear he’d never faced as a cop. Not fear for his life. Fear for his heart.

  He could only take his own advice and leave things as they were. Handle each day until she was so used to him she’d want to stay.

  As he watched, she stopped typing, lifted a hand to her neck for a quick, impatient rub. Her skirt hiked higher as she shifted. It took all his control not to lick his lips. She punched a few buttons, had the machine clicking. A moment later, the printer beside her began to hum.

  With a smile on his face and lust in his heart, Alex closed the door quietly at his back. Locked it.

  She jumped like a rabbit when his hands came down on her shoulders. “Didn’t anyone ever teach you to sit in a chair?”

  “Alexi.” She pressed a hand to her galloping heart. “You scared— Oh…” Her sigh was long and heartfelt as he massaged away the aches. “That’s wonderful.”

  “You’re going to do permanent damage if you keep sitting like that all day.”

  “I was planning on soaking in a hot tub for two or three days.” She leaned into his hands.

  “Where’s Lori?”

  “She wasn’t feeling too terrific.” As the printer continued to rattle, Bess closed her eyes. “I told her I was leaving, too. Then I snuck back. I wanted to make a few changes for tomorrow.” She brought her hand up to one of his, skimming her fingers over it to the wrist. “You said you might have to work late.”

  “Lead fizzled. We’ll work on tracing the heart necklace down, but that’s better during business hours.”

  “Trace it down?”

  “Hit the jewelers,” he explained, “see if we can track down to when it was bought. Long shot, but…”

  “Do you think the heart has a personal meaning for him?”

  “Like some woman broke his heart, so he gives them a symbol of it before he whacks them?” He gave a little grunt as he continued to knead her muscles. “It’s a little too obvious to dismiss. Psychiatric profile figures him as sexually inadequate on a normal level, so he pays for women to perform. He wants them and detests himself for that, as much as he detests them for being available. The fact that he goes through a short courtship routine shows that—” He broke off as she reached for a pad. “Hold on, McNee.” He gave her shoulders a hard squeeze. “I don’t know how you do it. One minute I’m thinking about getting you out of these clothes and the next you’ve got me talking about a case.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “No notes.”

  Her fingers retreated from the pad, but with obvious reluctance. “I like hearing you talk about your work. I want you to be able to talk to me about anything.”

  “Apparently I can. Even the stuff I don’t want you to hear. I’ve got a problem with you, Bess. You won’t let me tuck you into that nice safe corner where I want you to be.”

  “You only think that’s where you want me to be.” Smiling, she tugged his hand around so that she could kiss it. “You like me right where I am.” Turning his hand over, she pressed her lips to his palm. “I’m going to stay there.”

  She felt his fingers tense, then relax slowly as he spread them over her cheek. “I was watching you while you worked.”

  A rippling thrill raced through her at the words and at the shimmer of desire she heard in them. “Were you?”

  “And thinking.” His hands slid down over her breasts, sampled their weight, molded them. “Fantasizing.”

  Her head fell back against the chair. Her breathing quickened. “About?”

  “The things I’d like to do with you.” Through layers of silk, he caught her nipples, tugging gently. “To you.”

  When she tried to shift in the chair to face him, he increased the pressure, held her still. Her dazzled eyes focused on the monitor. She could still see the ghost of herself there, and his hands moving. Sliding. Stroking.

  Impossibly erotic to see, and to feel. Dry-mouthed, she watched his fingers undo her buttons and saw the dark shadow of his hair as he pressed a hot mouth to her throat. She lifted a hand, hooked it around his neck as she tilted her head to offer more.

  “I can shut down in thirty seconds.”

  He bit her lightly, just above the collarbone. “I’m not going to give you a chance to shut down.”

  She laughed shakily, even as she lifted her other arm to capture him in a reverse embrace. “I meant the computer.”

  He would have laughed himself, but he’d stopped breathing. “I know what
you meant.”

  “But I—” He slipped a hand under her skirt, and it was so sudden, so searing. Before she could gasp out in shock, he had driven her ruthlessly to the peak.

  “I watched you.” Each word burned his throat as she poured into his hand. “I wanted you.” Half demented, he whipped her up again, pressing his face into her neck as her body shuddered, shuddered. “Do you remember the first time I found you here?”

  “What?” She couldn’t remember her own name. There was only this need he was ruthlessly building inside her again. “Alexi, please. Come home with me. I need—” This time she cried out as the third high, hard wave swamped her.

  “I wanted you then.” In one violent move, he spun her chair around and dragged her to her feet, and her already weakened system went limp at what she read in his face. “Let me show you exactly what I wanted.”

  This wasn’t the smooth and patient lover of the night before. This man with the fierce eyes and bruising hands wouldn’t cuddle her and whisper exotic endearments. This was the warrior she’d only glimpsed. He would plunder. Whether or not she was ready, he was showing her that dark, reckless side of him that he kept so tightly controlled.

  In the moment when he stared at her, the look in his eyes hot and concentrated, she understood that excitement took a twist into the primitive when it carried a touch of fear.

  He fisted a hand in her hair and yanked her against him. His body was like rock, vibrating from deep within, as if from an erupting volcano. For that moment, there was only the strength and the fury of the inevitable.

  His mouth burned over hers, his tongue diving deep, while his free hand tugged the snap of her skirt free. He wanted her flesh, craved it. That heated silk, those alluring curves and taut muscles. Time and place had lost all impact. There was only here. Only now. Only her.

  Shivery fingers of fear ran up her spine. She hadn’t known what it was to be wanted this way. It was so huge, so violent, so glorious. Before, he had given her more than she had ever dreamed of. Now, he seemed compelled to give her more than she had ever dared dream.

  Beside them, the printer stopped its practical clatter and dropped into a hum. The low, waiting sound was drowned out by the thundering of her heart. The bright working lights overhead seemed to dim as he took her hips and pressed her hard against him.

  “You make a war inside me,” he muttered as his teeth scraped roughly down her throat. “There’s no end to it. No peace from it. Say my name. I want to hear you say my name.”

  “Alexi.” When his lips crushed down on hers again, he felt her breathe it, warm, into his mouth. “Take me. Now.”

  The wild need slammed into her so that her mouth was as turbulent, her hands as frantic. Dozens of tiny explosions burst inside her body, merging into one huge tumult of sensation that battered, bruised and bewitched. She was all but sobbing with it as she tugged and pulled at his clothes.

  She was quivering for him. Couldn’t stop. The power and pressure growing inside her was all but unbearable. And the heat, the furnace blast of heat, had her skin slicked and her head spinning. Glorying in it, she brought her mouth to his bare shoulder, savoring the taste of flesh. His busy, bruising hands had her bearing down with teeth and nails. His breath hissed in her ear as she reached down to curl impatient fingers around him.

  Confused and tangled phrases whirled in his mind. He heard them burst from his lips to hang on the thick air as he fought to catch his breath. On an oath, he gripped her shoulders and hauled her back.

  Her face was flushed, her eyes were glowing. He’d marked that ivory skin. He could see where his fingers had pressed, where his roughened cheeks had scraped. But the part of him that would have been shocked by his lack of care was far overshadowed by a dark and desperate desire to conquer, to consume. To mate.

  He saw them now as brands, signs that made her his. Only his.

  With a jerk of his head, he tossed his hair back. The way it swayed and settled had new emotion burning her throat. Naked, muscles bunched as if to fight, he looked so magnificent he dazzled her eyes.

  Then he looked at her, and the smile that had nearly formed on her face froze into wonder.

  “No one makes you feel like this but me.”

  His accent had thickened, and the sound of it sent chills along her heated skin. She could only shake her head.

  “No one touches you like me.” He took his hands from her shoulders and gripped the bodice of her chemise. “No one has you, ever again, but me.”

  “Alexi—”

  But he shook his head. He could feel her heart pounding under his hands, and his own chest was heaving. “Understand me. You’re mine now.” Her eyes widened with shock as he jerked his hands and ripped the chemise in half. “All of you.”

  He pushed her back against the table, watching the play of stunned excitement over her face. Yes, he wanted to excite her. And shock her. Stagger her.

  His fingers dug into her hips as he lifted her. He was braced, straining like a stallion at the bit. “Hold on to me,” he demanded, but her fluttering hands slid off his sweat-slick arms. His breath heaved out, his fingers dug into her smooth, taut flesh. “Hold!”

  She met his eyes then, and felt that wild whip of power. Drunk on it, she gripped his hair and wrapped her legs around him. When he plunged inside her, her body arched back, absorbing that first rocketing flash of heat. It was like being consumed from the inside out.

  She felt the cool surface of the table against her back first, then his weight on her. Greedy for more, she tightened around him, matching his fast, frantic rhythm, dragging his mouth back to hers so that they could echo the intimacy with their tongues.

  He lost himself. There was only her now, and the need to possess her. The desperate craving to be possessed by her. Images reeled through his brain, all dark and sharp-edged, until he thought he would go mad.

  And went mad.

  In a frenzy of movement, he dragged her farther onto the table, crushing papers, knocking aside empty cups, scattering pencils. He couldn’t take his eyes from her face, the way her eyes clouded, like fog over moss, the way her lips trembled with each gasping breath. There was a bloom on her skin now, a rose under glass. He was hammering himself into her, empowered by a rabid fury of emotion that had its razor-tipped fingers around his throat.

  Too much, she thought frantically. Never enough. The harsh overhead lights fractured into rainbows that blinded her eyes. They seemed to arch around his head, but she didn’t think of angels. His eyes were so dark, so fiercely focused. Even as her own grew leaden, she refused to close them.

  Oh, to watch him wanting her. Taking her.

  She couldn’t understand the words he murmured, over and over again. But she understood what was in those eyes. They were tearing each other apart, and they couldn’t stop. The animal had taken over, and it had diamond-sharp claws and jagged teeth.

  There was nothing left but the sound of their mixed labored breathing, the solid slap of flesh against flesh, and the heady scent of hot, desperate sex.

  She felt his body go rigid, felt the rippling muscles in the arms she gripped turn to stone. He groaned out her name as his eyes sharpened like daggers. When he poured himself into her, she cried out in triumph, then again in wonder as he drove her over that crumbling edge with him.

  The strength that had screamed through him switched off like a light, and he collapsed, panting, his full weight on her. Fighting for breath, he wallowed in her hair, drawing in the scent of it and the fragrance they’d made together. He couldn’t find his center, the focus that was so vital for survival. He no longer had one without her.

  God, he could feel her vibrating beneath him, shuddering from the aftershocks. And there were tears mixed with the dew of sweat on her face.

  With breath still burning his lungs, he levered himself on his elbows and shook his head to try to clear it. At the movement, she made a small, whimpering sound in her throat that both aroused and dismayed. Trying to find the gentleness
that had always been so easy for him, he shifted their positions and began to stroke her hair, her shoulders, her back.

  Murmuring apologies, he cradled her like a child. “Milaya, I’m sorry. I hurt you. I must have hurt you. Don’t cry.”

  “I’m not crying.” But, of course, she was. He could feel the tears fall even as she ran kisses over his face and throat. “Just tell me you love me. Please tell me you love me.”

  “I love you. Shh.” He covered her mouth tenderly with his. “You know I love you.”

  “I love you.” She pressed those wet, shaky kisses to his cheeks, to his jaw. “You have to believe that I love you.”

  A hot fist clenched in his gut, but he kept his hands gentle. “Just let me hold you.”

  Tearing up again, she pressed her face to his shoulder. “Even now you don’t believe me. Alexi, what more can I do?”

  “I believe you.” But they both knew he said it only to comfort. “You belong to me. I believe that.”

  “You’re everything I want.” She relaxed against him, satisfied that he would take that much.

  “No more tears?”

  “No.”

  He tilted her chin up to search her face. “How badly did I hurt you?”

  “I don’t think the results will be in for days.” She smiled a little. “How badly did I hurt you?”

  His eyes narrowed, and her smile widened. “You’re not…upset?”

  “About what?”

  “I was an animal.” With a hand that had yet to steady, he brushed her tumbled hair out of her face. “I took you on a table like a lunatic.”

  “I know.” After one long, satisfied sigh, she slid her body lazily over his. “It was wonderful.”

  “Yes?” Guilt began to turn to pride. “You liked it?”

  After being so thoroughly ravished, it wasn’t difficult to stroke his ego. “It was like being dragged off by some barbarian. I couldn’t even understand what you were saying. It was exciting.” She kissed his cheek. “Frightening.” And the other. “It was also the most erotic experience of my life.”