Anthology - Kick Ass

by Maggie Shayne, MaryJanice Davidson, Angela Knight, Jacey Ford

  "So you went through the full training course at The Farm? I didn't realize that. I'd been told that you were just an informant. How were you able to explain such a long absence from your modeling job?" Jake asked, glancing into the rearview mirror and narrowing his eyes as if that might help him see into the utter darkness behind them.

  "I went through a special accelerated program so the Agency could get me into the field right away. I was only at The Farm for three weeks." Lauren had thought it strange that she was the only agent going through this accelerated training at the time, but Martha had explained that it was a pilot program the Agency was testing. They wanted to see if they could get agents who already had some fieldwork behind them up and running faster than new recruits who had no experience. Since Lauren was the first to graduate from this special training program, she felt an even greater pressure to succeed on this op. Lauren hated to think that her handler's faith in her had been misplaced.

  "There's no—" Jake began, but was cut off when a bullet hit the dead center of their rearview mirror.

  Lauren threw herself back onto the floor before Jake could instruct her to get down. She knew the drill. "Is there anything I can do?" she shouted.

  "Just sit tight," Jake yelled back. "We're almost to the main road. We might be able to outrun them once we get there."

  Lauren nodded and remained crouched on the floor. If this were the movies, there would be several cans of gasoline in the back of the jeep that she could empty out behind them and then set on fire to blow up their pursuers. Unfortunately, even if there had been extra fuel in the back, she didn't have a match to light it.

  Guess I'm going to have to take up smoking, she thought.

  "There's the main road. Hold on," Jake warned.

  If they'd been on pavement, the jeep's tires would have left a trail of rubber on the concrete as they shot out of the jungle and turned a hard 90 degrees to the left. Since the road was hacked out of the dirt, though, the tires spun wildly, seeking traction in the soft earth. The rear of the vehicle fishtailed, and Lauren peeked up over the passenger-side door as Jake fought to keep control of the vehicle. There was a steep drop-off on the other side of this narrow mountain road, and if they were going over, she at least wanted to know beforehand that she was going to die.

  A wave of dizziness washed over her as she looked down onto the treetops a hundred feet below. Okay, maybe she'd been wrong. Maybe she didn't want to know.

  Beside her, Jake swore and pressed hard on the accelerator. The engine protested his abuse as the right rear tire of the jeep spun in the empty air. Fortunately, the other three tires sank into the dirt and pulled the vehicle back onto the road. Jake didn't let up on the accelerator as the jeep pitched forward.

  Lauren wrapped her arms around her beach bag as they skidded around a bend in the rutted road. "Do you think we can outrun them?" she asked. From her seat on the floor, she couldn't tell how close the rebels were.

  Jake's face hardened, and Lauren saw him turn his head to glance behind them and then look forward again. "Well," he said, "I think we could have, but they must have radioed for help. Now they're coming at us from both directions."

  "Damn," Lauren said, sounding a lot calmer than she felt.

  "Yep," Jake agreed.

  "Only one thing to do," Lauren said with a nod. She reached out to brace herself to avoid getting slammed into the dashboard again.

  "Yep," Jake agreed again.

  "Back into the jungle we go." Lauren held tight as Jake jerked the steering wheel to the left again. They were immediately swallowed up by the jungle. Jake had to slow down so he wouldn't ram into any trees, and Lauren heard the faint noise of men shouting behind them. They had maybe a five-minute lead on the rebels.

  She closed her eyes and pictured the satellite photos of the island in her mind, trying to pinpoint their location. The helicopter tours she had taken had helped. Although it was dark, she was able to imagine the terrain they were traveling through; the thick leafy trees with hanging vines draping off of them like elegant scarves, the occasional coconut tree that hadn't yet been overshadowed by a larger, more aggressive tree, the flowers that somehow managed to bloom in the smallest patch of sunlight.

  The sound of their engine was dwarfed by the constant roar of rushing water, louder here than it had been even back in Rafael Santos's camp, and suddenly, Lauren knew exactly where they were. They were approaching the waterfall at Nuevo Rios.

  Even better, she had an idea about how to get the rebels off their trail.

  She pulled the multipurpose tool that Jake had handed her earlier from out of her beach bag and, without hesitating, flipped open the knife and cut her arm. She smeared the white clothes in her bag with blood and then reached up to untuck the T-shirt clinging to Jake's taut abdomen.

  Startled by her touch, he took his eyes off the jungle for a second. "What the hell—" he began.

  "I have a plan," Lauren interrupted. "Just keep driving straight, toward the river."

  Jake grunted, which Lauren took as agreement. She hastily jabbed several ragged holes in Jake's T-shirt and then pulled off one of her sandals and eyed it ruefully. She hated to sacrifice it—it was a Sesto Meucci that had set her back two hundred and fifty dollars for the pair. But it had to be done.

  The roar of the waterfall got louder as they approached the river. When Lauren had flown over the area a few days before, the sight of millions of gallons of water a minute dropping 125 feet into the lake below was awe-inspiring. The sound of it was no less impressive tonight, although she guessed that they were still some distance from the actual falls because, while the constant hum of rushing water was loud, it wasn't as deafening as it would be up close.

  Jake abruptly slammed on the brakes and Lauren lost hold of the knife. She felt around on the floor for it, her fingers tightening around the cool metal as she raised herself up onto the seat. The jungle had ended without warning, the river brutally stealing its path from the heavy vegetation that grew right up to the water's edge.

  "I hope you're not going to suggest that we go over the falls," Jake said, sliding a sideways glance in her direction.

  Lauren grinned. "No, but that's what I want the rebels to think we did."

  "You think they'll buy it?" Jake asked. He turned to face her, his right arm draped over the back of the seat as if they were having a casual conversation and not running for their lives.

  Lauren took comfort in his calmness. He behaved exactly the way she expected a field agent to behave. He was cool under pressure, his mind focused on the mission as he logically assessed each problem that arose. She took a deep breath and tried to emulate his attitude. "Yes," she answered. "I'm sure they've seen all the movies where people routinely go over the falls to save themselves."

  "But you don't think we should do that?" Jake asked, lifting his hand to scratch under his chin, where a hint of coarse beard was just beginning to show.

  "Not if we want to live to die another day," Lauren said, stealing a line from her favorite Bond movie. "There's no way we'd survive. I suggest we send the jeep down the falls with our clothes in it. The rebels will find the jeep and our mangled clothes will wash up farther downstream. They'll most likely assume we were thrown from the jeep and drowned, and we'll have bought ourselves some time."

  "And how do you suggest we get out of this jungle without the jeep? It'll take us days to walk out of here."

  "We won't have to walk," Lauren said smugly as she stepped out of the jeep and tossed her sandal and the white outfit onto the passenger-side floor. "Take off your shirt," she ordered, half-expecting him to argue.

  He didn't. Instead, he stepped out of the jeep and stripped off his shirt, his skin glowing golden in the moonlight overhead. At first, all she could see was hard muscle covered with all that smooth skin. But then, as he bent to twist his shirt around the steering wheel, Lauren noticed the purplish bruises covering his back.

  She flinched. So, while she had been pacing around her
tent in the camp, Santos's goons had worked Jake over. Rather thoroughly, it appeared, judging by the number of dark spots splotching his skin.

  Jake straightened and their gazes slammed together. The look in her eyes must have been easy to read because, without looking down at the bruises covering his torso, Jake said, "Yeah. And it hurts like a son of a bitch, too. I'd sell my soul for some painkillers right now."

  Lauren tried to smile, but she was certain it came off as a more of a grimace. "Aren't you supposed to tell me that it looks worse than it is?"

  "I'm not that good a liar," Jake said cheerfully. Then he leaned over the driver's side door, put the jeep's transmission into drive, and walked around to the back of the vehicle. Lauren followed him, digging her feet into the ground as she helped him push the jeep into the fast-moving river. It would have been a more poignant moment had they stood on the bank of the river and watched as their only means of transportation disappeared downriver, but they didn't. Instead, they found a hiding place in some leafy bushes behind a tree and hunkered down to avoid being spotted by the rebels who were following them.

  Lauren held her breath as the sounds of shouting drew nearer and didn't realize that she had scooted closer to Jake on the floor of their makeshift camp until her shoulder bumped his arm. She was sitting on her beach bag, the canvas rough through the thin fabric of her swimsuit. Jake sat beside her on the ground, wearing nothing but his tan cargo shorts. He shifted positions, and his hair-roughened calf rubbed against her own freshly waxed one. His feet were bare and dirty, but he hadn't seemed to mind going barefoot. Lauren wondered how he'd managed to toughen up the soles of his feet. She must have missed that tip in her Secret Agent's Handbook.

  They remained silent as the rebel troops searched for them, and Lauren hoped they'd soon spot the jeep at the bottom of the falls and call off their hunt. Rather than cooling off as midnight approached, the air in the jungle seemed to be getting warmer and more humid. Or perhaps it was simply her proximity to Jake that was heating the air around them.

  Lauren started to shift away from him—all that smooth hard skin so close to hers was making it difficult to draw a deep breath—but Jake stopped her by sliding his arm over her shoulders and pulling her even closer. With one strong hand, he pushed her hair away from her face and leaned in to whisper in her ear. Lauren's heart was pounding so hard that she found it difficult to comprehend what he was saying over the blood rushing to her head.

  It's just the adrenaline, she admonished herself, attempting to rein in her libido, which had suddenly appeared out of nowhere. She forced herself to listen to what Jake was saying.

  "Close your eyes," he whispered.

  Lauren did so, but turned her head an inch to the side and whispered back, "Why?"

  "The whites of the eyes are easy to spot in the dark," Jake answered, his warm breath stirring the wisps of hair at her neck and making her shiver. He must have taken that to mean she was cold, because he pulled her closer and enveloped her in his own body heat, which just made Lauren's desire grow even stronger.

  She kept her eyes firmly shut, lecturing herself the entire time Jake held her. She was not going to have reaction-to-danger sex with him. She wasn't. No, no, no. She was going to resist the temptation to lean into him, to let herself relax in the comforting embrace of his arms. And she sure as hell wasn't going to rub her bare thigh against the rough material of his shorts. Or splay her hand across his firm abdomen. Or turn and raise her lips to his in a kiss that was as heated as the jungle air surrounding them.

  Okay. So she was lying. She was going to do all those things. And Jake was going to react by fisting his hand in her hair and kissing her back with such passion that Lauren felt as if she were being consumed by the heat.

  He thrust his tongue into her mouth and Lauren sucked him in with equal fervor. She hadn't even realized that he'd lowered her to the ground until she felt the hard seam of her beach bag digging into her shoulder. She slid her arms around Jake's back, her fingers gently kneading his taut skin, mindful of the bruises Santos's men had inflicted upon him.

  It dawned on her then that Jake found it easy to spin his tales of danger and excitement because those stories weren't really about him. When the threat was real, he accepted his duty stoically, without fanfare or heroics. He simply did what needed to be done to complete his mission. Afterward, he might glam it up—make it seem as if he always knew he'd make it out alive—but perhaps that was just his way of dealing with the fear that came with knowing that every op might be his last.

  Jake grunted when she passed her hand over a particularly deep bruise, and Lauren felt a rush of tenderness that was quickly replaced with want as he untangled his fingers from her hair and ran his hands down the length of her sides, making her shudder. The evidence of Jake's desire pressed into her through the thin fabric of her bikini and Lauren opened her legs to him, rubbing against his erection until he groaned into her mouth.

  "Lauren, we've got to stop," he whispered roughly, but his hips pulsing against hers belied his protest.

  "Do you have protection?" she asked, her hands gripping his firm buttocks while she squirmed against him. She wished she could believe that her instantaneous response to Jake was a result of her being forced to run around nearly naked all day, but she knew it wasn't. Jake had shown himself to be a man she truly admired, his quiet strength and sense of humor giving her the confidence she needed to push her own limits. And never once had he treated her as if she were incapable of keeping up, as if she were nothing but a lame-brained liability. Instead, he'd listened to her opinions and treated her like an equal.

  There was something awfully sexy about that.

  "Condom. Right rear pocket," Jake said, his voice sounding strained, as though he were struggling to speak.

  Lauren chuckled breathlessly and pushed Jake off of her as she dug into his pocket and pulled out the foil-wrapped packet she found there. They lay on their sides, facing each other, and she reached out, hearing Jake's sharp intake of breath when she moved her hands to his zipper, her fingers tickling the hard muscles of his abdomen.

  Around them, the jungle quieted, the thick foliage of the bush they were hiding under cocooning them in their own private world. The humid air licked languorously at Lauren's skin, while Jake's tongue did the same to the sensitive spot just below her ear. Time seemed to slow, then stop altogether as Jake untied the knot at the nape of her neck.

  Lauren arched her back as the ties holding her swimsuit top in place dropped, leaving her breasts exposed to Jake's searing gaze. He skimmed his hands slowly up her rib cage, the rough skin of his palms on her skin sending shivers down her spine.

  "You're so beautiful," he whispered, and Lauren looked up to find that he wasn't looking at her breasts, but was, instead, watching the expressions flitting across her face.

  Instead of dismissing the compliment as she usually would have, Lauren smiled. "Thank you," she whispered back. Then she gasped with pleasure as Jake slid his hands up to cup her breasts. He moved his fingers slightly, the pads of his thumbs brushing against her aching nipples.

  Lauren closed her eyes, waves of pleasure washing over her as Jake lowered his mouth to tease her nipples with his tongue. She felt a throbbing between her legs and was overwhelmed by a primal need to do something to ease the pressure building inside her. With a purr-like sound, she put one leg over Jake's hips, opening herself to him and smiling with satisfaction when she heard him groan.

  Her smile turned to a chuckle when Jake grabbed the condom from her and growled, "Give me this damn thing, you tease. How much longer do you think I can wait?"

  Jake ripped the packet open with his teeth, trying not to get distracted when Lauren "helped" him by sliding the zipper of his shorts down over his engorged cock. God, it felt good when she touched him like that.

  He closed his eyes, the condom forgotten as she sucked her index finger into her mouth and then slowly circled the tip of his penis. If she didn't stop, he was going to
come right now—and to hell with the condom.

  Jake reached down to pull Lauren's hands away from him. No, he definitely didn't want his first time with her to end like that. Not with her as ready for him as he was for her.

  He sheathed himself in the condom and then turned his attention back to Lauren, surprised to find that she'd already shed her tiny, tantalizing bikini bottoms. She lay there in the darkness, her glorious hair spread around her, one bare foot sensuously gliding up his leg, the warm heat at the juncture of her thighs driving him wild with need, and Jake ignored the voice inside his head that kept asking, "Why me? She could have any man—any rich man—she wants. Why would she settle for me?"

  Fuck that.

  He didn't care why she wanted to have sex with him. It was enough right now just to know that she did.

  Then all thoughts fled from his mind when Lauren put a hand on his shoulder, gently pushed him to the ground, and then straddled him, burying his throbbing cock all the way inside her heat. Jake tried to hold back as wave after wave of hot pleasure washed over him, tried to slow Lauren's movements as she rode him, her head thrown back as she murmured his name over and over.

  He felt the tension building inside himself and knew he couldn't last much longer, and he grabbed Lauren's hips to steady her, to keep her with him as he bucked against her, lifting, reaching for release. She pulsed against him then, her legs clenching his sides tightly as she spasmed around him. That was all Jake needed to let go, his own world going black with the force of his orgasm.

  And then, it was over, their muscles giving out as Lauren rolled off him. Jake kept his eyes closed as, with Herculean effort, he threw one arm over Lauren's shoulders and pulled her to him, her spine against his stomach, her hips nestled against his crotch as they both breathed deeply to regain their strength.