by Lora Leigh
“Who else could get hold of her schedule?” he asked. “Who would have reason to know each time she left the estate?”
The look Ivan shot him was rife with fury. “I’ll find out,” he swore, and Riordan knew he’d just do that. The question was whether he could do it before the danger Riordan felt gathering around Amara struck.
“There’s also a reason why she’s stopping at the coffee house so often, despite your warnings that she could be in danger,” Riordan continued. “Amara has no desire to tempt her own death, no matter what that psychologist believes. She’s waiting on someone. Someone she believes will show up while she’s there. And it’s not those two men following her.”
It wasn’t a lover—he was sure of that. But he was just as certain there was someone. He’d seen her eyes, her expression when he accused her of it, before Ivan appeared. That had been guilt and fear he’d seen there. She was up to something and she was scared to damn death that someone would figure out what.
“What in the hell is that girl up to?” Ivan snarled, pushing his fingers through his hair in frustration. “Damn her. She has only to tell me what she wants, what she needs. I would make certain it was taken care of.”
Riordan stared at the other man in surprise.
“She’s not five, Ivan,” he grunted. “I’d suspect she’d like to take care of a few things herself from time to time. Though, in this instance, I wish she’d tell one of us what she’s up to.”
The look Ivan threw him wasn’t exactly agreeable. “Things such as choosing one of her bodyguards for a lover?” he questioned, his tone rather insulting.
Riordan grinned back at him. “I’d say that would top her list,” he agreed. “At least she has good taste.”
He had been her lover, and he would be again. No matter Ivan’s objections. Hell, no matter Amara’s objections. Because she could object until Hell froze over and it wouldn’t matter. She wanted him. Just as damn bad as he wanted her.
She might not remember him, but the months he’d spent in her bed hadn’t been entirely forgotten. Not deep in her soul.
“You have a rather high opinion of yourself,” Ivan growled. “I’m not so certain it’s not a character flaw, Riordan.”
The brooding glare Ivan shot him was more amusing than anything else.
“Hmm. Grandpops can assure you otherwise.” He shrugged. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go make certain that daughter of yours isn’t tying sheets together to slip down from her balcony. The mood she’s in, anything’s possible.”
“With any luck she’s loading her gun and preparing to put a hole in your hide,” Ivan muttered as he passed. “One could only hope.”
He could keep hoping, Riordan thought without comment. Amara might threaten to shoot him, but he knew she wouldn’t actually pull the trigger.
At least, he hoped she wouldn’t.
chapter eight
The next evening Amara logged into the social media account of the coffee house and scanned the posts and various pictures, hoping to find the waitress she’d been trying to get the chance to talk to.
There were plenty of pictures of the owner and many of the employees, but there wasn’t a single picture of the young woman she was looking for. And now, she could forget going back and attempting to talk to her. Riordan was way too suspicious, and she had no doubt he’d already alerted her father that she was up to something.
Bodyguards! She couldn’t trust a single one her father hired. Even Elizaveta and Grisha weren’t completely trustworthy. They could hold a few minor secrets, maybe convinced to make an unscheduled stop here and there, but that was about it.
Finally, after several hours of scanning the coffee house’s page as well as that of employees listed as contacts of the establishment, she sighed, pushed her fingers through her hair, and held back the curse she wanted to spit out.
She’d spent six months completely in the dark concerning the memories she’d lost. In the past months she’d been surprised more than once by the knowledge that she’d forgotten important events. Her mother had gotten married to her longtime lover, her father had dumped the mistress he’d had for several years. Who else had she forgotten? What else had she forgotten besides her abduction? And her lover.
Shutting down the computer and rising from the comfortable desk chair, she glanced around her office before shaking her head wearily and leaving the room.
Locking the office door behind her, Amara retreated to the family room and the large fire Alexi had burning in the fireplace. He’d pulled the heavy curtains closed, darkening the room except for the firelight, and partially closed the double doors.
She hadn’t slept well last night, which contributed to her headache and the irritation she felt building inside her.
Curling into the corner of the couch that faced the fire, she stared at the flickering flames, felt the warmth easing around her, and wished she could draw it inside her. There was no dispelling the chill that seemed deeper than before and had her pulling the cashmere throw on the back of the couch around her.
Kicking off her shoes, she drew her feet up beside her on the cushions beneath the long, dove gray skirt she wore and rested her head against the back of the couch. The throb in her temple wouldn’t relent throughout the day, and she knew it didn’t bode well for the rest of the night.
Sometimes, she wanted nothing more than to slip into one of those deep, dreamless sleeps of years past. The ones where she woke feeling refreshed and ready to take on the world. Now, when she did sleep it was in a series of brief naps, or she awoke amid her own screams.
“Amara?” Elizaveta’s soft voice, nearly a whisper, had Amara opening her eyes to see the other woman standing at the end of the couch watching her worriedly.
Shoulder-length dark blonde hair framed her cousin’s kittenish features and emphasized her wide gray eyes. At five-six, she was slender and deceptively fragile, but amazingly resilient. Amara had seen Elizaveta and her brother sparring, and knew well the girl was no weakling.
“Are you well?” her cousin asked. “Can I get you dinner? You did not eat much during the meal.” Her Russian accent was slightly stronger than Amara’s father’s, due most likely to Elizaveta’s recent trips to Russia to visit her family.
“I’m fine,” Amara assured her, then patted the couch next to her. “Sit with me for a few minutes.”
She and Elizaveta hadn’t had a chance to really talk in weeks. There was a time when they’d sit up long into the night, laughing, discussing her father’s machinations and her mother’s continual interference in his life.
“I am off duty for the night, I was going to have a drink,” she said hesitantly. “Would you share one with me?”
The memory of fine Irish whiskey teased at her taste buds.
“Only if you can steal a shot of that Irish hooch, Malone…” she began, only to stop when Elizaveta turned on her heel and hurried from the room. No doubt she was going to ask Riordan for the whisky.
Amara dropped her head to the couch with a groan. Just what she needed, Riordan Malone harassing her further. After the day before, she was hoping to put a few days between another confrontation with him.
That didn’t mean she didn’t like looking at him, though, because she did. The way those snug-assed jeans fit him just right and paired with his scarred leather boots and button-down shirts with their sleeves rolled back to his forearms as he strutted around the estate like King Cock, attitude and all. He wore the tough-male persona like a cape. It wasn’t even a conscious thing. It was an attitude born of winning more fights than he’d lost and refusing to bow down to anyone.
It wasn’t a prick attitude, though she imagined he could easily act the prick when he felt a situation warranted it.
He was dominant. Sexually, personally, and every other way she could imagine.
He was the type of man who would dare a woman, challenge her, completely push her sexuality … And that was exactly what he was doing to her.
&n
bsp; A sleepy smile tugged at her lips as the image played within her imagination. Him pulling her to him, his lips on hers, devouring her kiss. His tongue stroking, thrusting past her lips for a lick, a taste, before retreating then moving in again.
Her heart began to race, her body began to weaken, soften as she imagined what he’d do to her if he wanted her.
Her breasts swelled, nipples peaking beneath the loose sweater and lacy bra she wore. Between her thighs she could feel herself melting, growing slick and damp as a heavy daze of sensuality washed over her.
The image flashed to their naked bodies straining against each other in his bed. His muscular chest pressing against her breasts, the rasp of his chest hairs against her nipples, then the rasp of his tongue.
The image was so crisp, so clear.
Watching his kisses at her breast, then the sight of his lips opening, covering the hard, distended nipple awaiting him … sensation lashed from her nipple to her sex, causing her stomach to clench involuntarily and her breath to hitch in hungry need.
“Want more, pretty girl?” his voice whispered around her, causing her eyes to jerk open, her gaze to become locked with his blue sapphire one as imagination and reality clashed.
* * *
Fuck.
Riordan stared into the flushed, sensual features of Amara’s face and he damn well knew where she’d been as she leaned in the corner of the couch, her head against the cushions, held within the embrace of cold leather but dreaming of an entirely different embrace.
Dreaming, or remembering.
Her lips were parted, her breathing rough and choppy as drowsy sensuality filled her expression.
And he was supposed to resist?
Hell.
He was barely aware of placing the glass and bottle he’d carried down with him on the table next to the couch. All he could think of was tasting her kiss, tasting whatever memory she was allowing herself to experience.
Her hand lifted and curled around his neck as he watched her soft gray eyes darkening with the deepening passion he knew was filling her.
Memory.
He saw it in her eyes, in her face as she drew his head down, met his lips with hers, and fucking seared his senses.
She wasn’t asleep, she wasn’t wholly awake, but lost instead in some memory she allowed free—and she was going to burn him alive with it.
Because he couldn’t help but give her what he knew she wanted.
Sliding his fingers in the back of her hair, he clenched the shortened strands, gave her a brief taste of the burn, and took the kiss he’d been dying for.
He followed her as she slid down into the couch, her arms coming around his back, tugging at his shirt to reach bare skin. And he let her have what she wanted. Remaining just above her, letting her sink into whatever memory had her. He didn’t push her.
God, he couldn’t push her, couldn’t let this slip away, not yet.
He’d been tortured by his own dreams of what they’d shared while recovering. Tortured by a hunger that ravaged him when he allowed himself to think about it while awake. This, the melding of lips, of tongues, of deep, desperate pleasure was like nothing he’d known in his life.
Her hands pushed beneath his shirt, found his back, and smoothed up to his shoulders. A whimpering little moan filled the air around them—her moan filled with hunger and need.
Breathing harsh, he pulled back, nipped at her lips, at her jaw. The smooth line of her neck drew him, the memory of its sensitivity causing his body to tighten as he fought to ensure she remained locked in whatever vision she was allowing herself to have.
“Please…” she whispered, arching to him, one hand smoothing along his side before sliding from beneath the shirt and reaching for his arm. “Touch me. Oh God, Riordan. Touch me again.”
Touch her again.
He let her tug at his arm as he braced his knee between her thighs, and he let her pull his hand to her waist, beneath the soft material of the sweater, to the swollen curve of her breast.
Cupping it, he molded his hand to her flesh, his fingers stroking, caressing, releasing the front clasp of her bra and spreading the lace apart.
He was fucking dying.
She was going to come to herself any minute. But until she did, her hands were in his hair again, her neck arched as she tugged at him, pulling his head down until his lips were brushing the tight, hard peak of her nipple.
“Please…” she breathed out, arching, pushing the little bud between his lips.
He was a hungry man and he admitted it. Desperate. A son of a bitch for not pulling back and letting her know this wasn’t some dream she was experiencing.
Instead, carefully, so carefully, he let his lips close around the bundle of nerves and drew it into his mouth. His tongue raked over it, the subtle taste of that edible dusting powder she used hit his taste buds and slammed into his senses.
How could he have forgotten that? The sweetness of it mixed with the elusive taste of feminine need made him drunk on her. Made him draw on the tight little peak harder, hungrier.
His dick was spike hard, pressing against the denim of his jeans, demanding release. Her hips were arching to him, pressing into his thigh as it slid between hers, grinding the soft pad of her pussy against him. Slowly rubbing against him, whispered little cries left her lips as her nails scoured his back.
He could feel a rivulet of sweat tracing down the side of his face as he burned for her. The effort of holding back, of keeping each touch, each draw of his mouth from pulling her out of her fantasy was killing him.
He had to touch her. God forgive him and pray she didn’t shoot him, but he had to touch her.
His hand slid to her thigh, the silky flesh revealed from where her skirt pooled above was so damn soft. Softer than he remembered—warm, real. He wasn’t dreaming anymore. He was touching her, dragging his lips from one nipple to the other as he stroked her thigh, moving with tortured stokes until his fingers brushed the damp silk of her panties.
And in that moment, he knew he was going to fucking burn in Hell, because he couldn’t stop himself.
* * *
She was locked in the pleasure, the fantasy of every touch she’d dreamed of for months as well as the pleasure she’d found the night before. His body was covering hers again, heated and so strong, his lips drawing on her nipple, creating fingers of lightning-fast, incredible sensation, racing through her senses.
She forced her eyes open, knowing the fantasy would be gone—it always was when this desperate need to see him overwhelmed her …
The sight of his lips drawing on her, his fierce expression filled with hunger and naked need met her gaze. At the same moment, the feel of his fingers brushing the dampness at her panties, stroking over the swollen folds of her sex sent sharp, pulsing waves of heat straight to her womb.
Her clit throbbed, the building intensity growing in the little bundle of nerve endings was shocking …
And it was real.
It wasn’t a fantasy. It was real. He was touching her, his hard, corded body warming her, braced over her, each touch, each caress making her needier.
It wasn’t a dream.
It was Riordan …
His fingers were pushing beneath her panties, callused fingertips caressing her flesh. And they were in the sitting room.
Any second Elizaveta could return.
Oh God, her father could walk in … “Stop.” The word tore past her lips, panic suddenly tearing through her. “No.”
His hand paused. A final, lingering kiss to her nipple, and then he was pulling swiftly back, his expression savage with lust. His black hair was mussed, falling around his face, giving him the look of a dark sex god come to life. And he was aroused. Her eyes widened at the bulge in the front of his jeans as he jumped back from her, then to his feet. His eyes burned like molten sapphires in the flickering firelight, his gaze raking over her before he turned his back to her.
“Fix your clothes,” the snarling demand h
ad her looking down, eyes widening.
The dark gray sweater she wore was unbuttoned, her bra undone and spread to the sides. Her nipples were rock hard and glistening with moisture.
A cry escaped her and she pushed herself up, fighting to fix her clothes with trembling hands and failing miserably. No matter how hard she tried, the clasp of her bra slipped from her shaking fingers.
“Dammit,” his curse had her jerking to him, flinching as he reached for her.
Those broad, callused fingers clasped her bra, then just as efficiently buttoned her sweater before pushing her skirt down her legs.
His hands paused at her knees. His head lowered, his jaw flexed furiously at the side of his face.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, unable to look at him as he released her and sat down on the couch, propped his elbows on his knees, and raked his fingers through his hair. “I was dreaming…”
He snorted at the attempt to explain and reached for the bottle of whiskey as he gave his head a hard shake. Uncapping it, he poured the shot glass half full then tipped it to his lips and finished it in one gulp.
“I didn’t mean—” She tried to make sense of what happened.
“Save it,” he growled, replacing the glass back on the table with a thud. “There’s the whiskey you wanted. Keep it.”
He refilled the glass but left it sitting as he slapped the bottle back in place and rose to his feet.
“I want to explain…” she tried again to make him understand whatever had happened.
“And I don’t want to hear your lies, goddammit,” he all but yelled, the furious words silencing her. “Lie to yourself if you have to, but do us both a favor and stop fucking lying to me. You’re mine, Amara. You were mine before the abduction and nothing has changed. And by God, you better remember that much as least. Fast.”
With that he turned on his heel and stomped from the room, anger vibrating around him like an invisible aura. And all she could do was stare after him, her heart racing, need burning through her as panic threatened to fill her senses.