by Trisha Telep
“And she’d remember you.”
Alexa heard a buzzing in her ears.
“Rafael Hunter.”
She stopped breathing. And in the dimness, she knew. Like a wild and heedless animal, she climbed the last two stairs and stepped into the carnage, the acrid trail of smoke biting her nostrils.
Rafael Hunter turned towards her, his eyes now blue black as he dared her to back down. Not Michael. Rafael Hunter. She saw his lips move but she couldn’t hear what he said over the thunderous storm in her head.
Desperately, her eyes searched his face, looking for the features that had been burned into her memory. The man who had killed her little sister, Danni, now stood before her, as remote and unfeeling as the weapon in his hand.
Turning away, she leaned over the ship’s rail, the cool air on her face, the ocean’s roil reflecting her own torment. What was wrong with her? She was lying to herself, denying that Hunter was the man in whose arms she had lain only moments before. Her skin crawled with loathing.
In the background, sirens, bright lights, a flotilla of small boats surrounding the Gabriella. Dear God, she didn’t have much time.
The back of her neck burned. Hunter was watching her. Slowly, she moved from the railing, eyeing the discarded weapons on the deck, lying between them.
“You want to kill me.” He said the words slowly.
Unable to look directly at him, she shook her head, her voice strangled.
“I didn’t let Daoud have you.” His voice was steady. “When it would have been so easy.”
In the background, men boarded the ship, moving like shadows. Bodies were dragged away, Daoud among them. Alexa’s confusion thickened.
“Don’t you want to know why?”
Even Coombs had been involved. Releasing the files, knowing that she would go after Hunter. She couldn’t think of that now. It was time to look up. Look into the face that was responsible for all the horrors of her childhood and beyond.
The cool wind caressed her face.
His eyes were darker than the blue of the ocean. “You don’t recognize me as Hunter, do you?”
It was true. She couldn’t remember. Or didn’t want to remember? He might have changed his appearance to remain unrecognizable in a dangerous world.
“Face your demons, Alexa.”
She couldn’t weaken now. Her throat closed but she forced the words from her lips. “When the time came, I thought . . .” She paused and swallowed hard. “I thought that I would remember. Recognize you . . . him.” Except that I don’t.
Images bloomed in her mind’s eye. Michael’s gentle hands on her bruised abdomen. Their escape from the Mexican ship. Michael refusing to give her up to Daoud. The moments under the night sky.
She’d responded to him like a flare going off in the dark. And he’d saved her life, not just once.
Who was this man, truly? “You’re not. Can’t be—”
He took a step towards her. “My name is Michael.” No hesitation. “Michael Burke. You’re the first person to know my true identity in five years.”
He waited for her to speak. She pulled her arms around her body, looking again at the ocean, rather than at him. His face was light and shadows. “I don’t know what to think,” she said finally, softly.
“The men boarding this ship, they’re DEA and they will tell you, if you don’t believe me,” he said, taking another step closer. “Rafael Hunter was taken into custody four years ago and I was put in his place.”
Her head snapped up. Then silence, as she absorbed his words. Pieces dropping into place like the tumblers of a lock. “You wanted to find who in North America was behind Hunter’s operation,” she said, her voice hoarse. “Only to find Zachary Coombs,” she finished silently.
Behind her, the gentle lap of the ocean, the wind warming her body. She let her arms drop and moved towards him, her past flying out, leaving her. He leaned forwards to meet her, pressing his mouth lightly against her forehead. His lips were cool from the night air.
Michael Burke sighed, and then breathed her in.
“I believe you,” she whispered against his chest.
“You can get all the proof, all the debriefing you want once we get back to Washington.” Alexa began to pull back, but he wasn’t about to allow her to move away. “And we can prosecute Hunter and everybody else connected with him, from North America to Afghanistan.”
And Danni would rest in peace. Finally.
Her voice seemed to come from far away. “It’s done. Over,” she said simply.
His arms looped around her firmly. “You believe me.” He smiled for the first time, a beautiful smile.
And she did. “I do,” she said.
His grin broadened. “That’s everything I need.”
“Where do we go from here?” she asked, not without some fear.
“Forwards,” he promised her, “with no regard for the past. Yours or mine. A fresh start.”
Alexa took a long breath and exhaled, summoning courage. His arms gathered her closer, blotting out the night sky, his lips claiming hers.
A Kept Man
Shannon K. Butcher
The pounding on John Augustine’s front door was loud enough to wake the sweet little old deaf lady across the street. He glanced at the red numbers glowing on his alarm clock, blinking several times to clear the grit of not-enough-sleep from his eyes.
Two in the morning. Pounding at two in the morning was never a good thing unless it involved a hot woman and a loose headboard.
The banging started again, more frantic this time. John let out a resigned sigh, flipped the covers back, grabbed his plaid robe and slid it over his naked body as he headed for the front door.
The old oak planks beneath his bare feet were cool, the air even colder. Another front must have blown through last night, taking the fragile warmth of spring with it.
The leaded glass window in his front door vibrated as his late-night visitor pounded again.
“Hurry up!” The muffled, distinctly feminine demand slid through the solid wood, and every hair on John’s body stood at attention.
He knew that voice. He’d dreamed about it often enough that for a split second he thought maybe he still was in his bed, dreaming all of this.
Brooke Stuart showing up on his front porch in the middle of the night begging to come in was definitely dream worthy. Wet-dream worthy.
John hurried the last few steps to the door and wrenched it open. Sure enough, Brooke stood there, bathed in his porch light, her pale skin glowing like a dream. Her strawberry-blonde hair was swept up in a complicated, elegant style that left a few delicate tendrils loose to caress her cheek. The twilight-blue evening gown she wore shimmered with startling glints of silver, matching her eyes exactly. A long slit in the fabric showed off the sinful curve of her thigh, and two thin straps were all that held up the daring neckline of her gown.
Right now, the only thing John wanted more than a taste of her sweet mouth was a sharp pair of scissors. Two snips and he’d see firsthand what he’d been imagining for more years than he was comfortable admitting.
“Brooke?” he finally found the sense to ask. “What are you doing here?”
“I need a gun.”
This was not how his dream was supposed to go. She was supposed to step inside, wrap her slender arms around his neck and kiss him. In those heels she wore, he was sure she’d be able to reach his mouth, and if not – gentleman that he was – he’d just slide his hands under the perfect curve of her ass and give her a boost.
Brooke stepped forwards and pushed past him, brushing her breasts against his arm.
John checked the tie on his robe to make sure it was firmly in place and that his instant erection wasn’t too obvious.
“I know you have one. You always had one. I need it.”
His sleep-deprived brain was having trouble catching up. He was still thinking about his hard-on, and she was talking about needing it. Those two wires crossed, and the spark
s created skittered over his skin. Suddenly, the air was no longer cool enough to keep the beads of sweat from forming along his spine.
He watched as she went through his house, flipping on lights as she searched for something.
“Slow down, Brooke. Start over.”
She whirled on him, and the look of utter ferocity on her dainty features startled the hell out of him. If this had been a dream, that expression would have woken him for sure. She didn’t look like a woman here for a few hours of fun; she looked like she was ready to kill.
And she wanted a gun.
Brooke grabbed the front of John’s robe in her fist and gave him a shake. The beaded surface of her evening bag clutched in one hand sparkled under his living room lights, matching the angry shards of silver glinting in her eyes. “There’s no time. They have Uncle Charles. I need a gun.”
Shock rattled him, and his sleep-deprived brain tried to make sense of her words. “Who has your uncle?”
“I don’t know. I don’t care. All I care about is getting him back. I got the money, but it may not be enough.” Her voice broke as if she was going to start crying, but she pressed a shaking hand to her mouth and seemed to pull herself together. “I need an insurance policy.”
Seeing her mad was one thing, seeing her afraid was simply unacceptable. It made him want to find what had scared her and beat the hell out of it. Twice.
Even though he’d promised himself years ago he’d never touch her, John broke that promise now. He wrapped his fingers around her naked arms to get her to focus on him. The feel of her warm skin against his palms made him shudder, but he hid his inappropriate reaction and tried not to think about how many rules he was breaking right now.
Brooke was off limits. Way off. Not only was she way too young for him, she was practically the daughter of a former client.
Six years ago, an injury had forced him out of the SEALs and, after a few months of recovery, he had taken a job as a bodyguard for a scientific genius working for the government – her uncle. Keeping his distance from Brooke had been easy then. She’d been a kid fresh out of high school, headed for college. He hadn’t even been tempted to look her way twice. And then, five years later, she’d come back home, looking like a woman, acting like a woman. One who wanted him.
John had left the same day. He couldn’t risk any more inviting smiles or accidental touches. He’d turned in his resignation a year ago and never looked back. He didn’t dare.
He’d walked away, his reputation and honour intact. All it had cost him was a small slice of his sanity.
And here she was again. In his home. Practically in his arms. All grown up and elegant, dressed like his own personal wet dream.
He steered her towards his couch and eased her down. “Start at the beginning. Tell me what’s going on.”
Brooke swallowed, nodded. “I was at an awards banquet for Uncle Charles tonight. He got his award, gave his speech, and I expected him to come back and sit at our table again, but he never did. I wasn’t worried. I assumed he’d met a colleague backstage and got wrapped up in conversation.”
That sounded like Dr Charles York – easily distracted. “OK. I’m with you so far.”
“The waiters brought out dessert. I was chatting with a woman next to me, so I didn’t notice.”
“Didn’t notice what?”
“There was a note sticking out from under my plate of cheesecake. A ransom note.”
John was officially awake now. “Do you have it?”
She nodded, and pulled a folded piece of paper out of the bodice of her gown.
John knew he shouldn’t touch it, that he might mess up evidence, but he did anyway. The need to help Brooke was nearly uncontrollable. And she’d probably already messed up whatever evidence might remain.
He unfolded it, touching it as little as possible and read the typed text.
Empty your uncle’s safe and bring the contents to me if you want to see him alive again. I will call with details to arrange the trade. Tell no one. I have informants on the police force. I’m watching you.
John felt a chill slide over his skin. Whoever had Dr York meant business, and knew well enough to connect Brooke to him, even though she hadn’t lived with him for several years. Chances were they also knew she’d have no means of defending herself.
Clearly, so did she, which was why she wanted a gun.
“We need to call the police,” he said.
“No. It was dangerous enough for me to come here. I don’t think I was followed, but I’m not about to take a chance that he’s telling the truth about being connected to the police. All I want from you is a gun. And your silence.”
John shook his head. “Not a fuckin’ chance.”
Brooke had clearly made a mistake coming here. She knew better, yet the urge to run to the one man who had always made her feel safe was too strong to resist.
John Augustine had been her one weakness since she’d been eighteen years old and he’d come to work for her uncle, and now that weakness might get her uncle killed.
She grabbed the note from his hands and stood. “I’m sorry I woke you.”
She was almost to the front door before he looped one thick arm around her ribs, stopping her. “Oh, no, you don’t. I’m not letting you run off in the middle of the night to deal with this alone and unarmed.”
Brooke felt him at her back, warm and hard. She’d never been this close to him before, and despite the mess she was in, every cell in her body was vibrating with acute awareness of John’s touch.
Her stomach fluttered with a mixture of fear and excitement until she was sure he could feel it beneath the thin satin of her gown. “Does that mean you’ll give me a gun?”
“No. It means we’re going to talk.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. I need to go. I have a lot of cash and a bag of loose diamonds in my car. I don’t want to leave them unattended for long.”
His grip tightened slightly, and she couldn’t help but cover his bare arm with her fingers. Prising him away would have been an exercise in futility – he was too strong for that – so she simply wrapped her fingers around the hard curve of his forearm and enjoyed the feel of his bare skin.
“How much cash?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I didn’t count it.” She couldn’t care less how much it was as long as it was enough to buy her uncle’s safety.
“We need to call the police.”
“No. You read what he said. He’ll know if we do.”
“Fine, then the FBI.”
“No,” she forced the word out strongly, when, inside, she felt like a mushy puddle of fear. “I’m not taking the chance.”
He gripped her waist and turned her around to face him. Brooke tipped her head back to look him in the eye. He had such nice eyes – dark like his hair – and they tilted down slightly at the corners, making him look sad.
As a girl, she’d wanted so much to find a way to make him happy. As a woman, she’d never had the chance. He’d walked away, taking all her girlish fantasies with him.
Brooke had always known she wasn’t woman enough to attract a man like him. She’d been painfully thin and flat-chested all her life. Boys her own age never looked at her – at least not until the boob fairy had come to visit her junior year of college. It was like a switch had been flipped, and her childish body had morphed into that of a woman almost overnight. After that, male attention was easy to come by.
She’d been sure when she went home for the summer that, as soon as John saw her, he’d stop looking through her and see how much she wanted him, but she’d been wrong. Oh, he’d seen her all right. He’d looked right at her from the top of her ponytail to the bottom of her Skechers and back again. Then he’d turned on his heel, marched into her uncle’s office and turned in his resignation.
Brooke hadn’t seen him since, and if it weren’t for the listing in her uncle’s address book, she would never have known where to find him.
“Have yo
u told anyone?” he asked.
“No, and, clearly, I shouldn’t have told you either.”
“You did the right thing coming here. We’ll sort this all out.”
“All I need is a gun,” she said.
“Do you even know how to use one?”
She nodded, unable to speak a lie while he was looking her in the eye like that – like he could see inside her head.
“Who taught you? What type of weapons have you been trained to use? Handgun? Shotgun? Rifle?”
Brooke lifted her chin. In for a penny . . . “All of them.”
“Which do you prefer?”
“A handgun.”
“What type?”
There were different types? “The biggest one you have.”
The corner of his mouth kicked up a quarter-inch. “You are such a bad liar.”
Yes. She was. The jerk. “Fine. Show me how to use one then. How hard can it be?”
He shook his head. “Not going to happen. I won’t be responsible for arming you when you’re clearly distraught.”
“Distraught? I’m pissed off, scared to death and worried as hell.”
“And I’m not adding armed to that list.”
The crushing weight of disappointment bore down on her, making her feel trapped and helpless. She was going to have to take her chances that whoever had kidnapped her uncle had enough honour to uphold his end of the deal. She had nowhere else to turn, and she didn’t think wielding a tyre iron or golf club was going to intimidate anyone.
Her body deflated, and she gave John a resigned nod. “Thanks anyway. If I don’t call you tomorrow, feel free to call the police and tell them what happened.”
“Like hell,” said John. “If you think I’m going to let you walk out of here, you’re crazy.”
She gave him a glare that told him she meant business. “I won’t let you stop me.”
“You say that like you have a choice.”
“Of course I do.”
“And I have handcuffs. I’ll chain you up before I’ll let you leave.”
Anger slid through her, momentarily brushing aside her fear for her uncle. “Kinky is fun, but we’ll have to play later, John. I’ve got plans tonight.”