“I need to find David,” she protested when he led her toward the front door.
“Oh no,” he growled. “Playtime is over for tonight.”
Josslyn tried to pull her hand from his, but he only tightened the grip until her fingers were numb. The chilly night air caused her to shiver when they exited the house. As if by magic, their car was waiting outside. He pulled open the back door and practically tossed her inside.
“Hey!” she cried. “You don’t get to decide when we leave. I have a deal with the director. You are not the boss of me.”
He leaned down so their noses were almost touching. She could just make out the tight lines around his mouth—a mouth that had done amazing things to hers a few minutes earlier.
“That’s your problem, sister. You don’t respect the rules. It’s a good thing for you your father isn’t in his right mind. Otherwise, he’d take you over his knee for that little stunt you just pulled back there. And I’d be right there, cheering him on.”
Josslyn’s lips moved, but she couldn’t seem to make any words come out. How dare he bring up her ailing father! She tried to scramble out of the car, but he was too quick for her. He shoved her legs back inside nearly slamming the door closed on top of them. The locks clicked almost immediately. He didn’t bother maintaining their cover as a couple, sliding into the front seat instead of joining her in the back.
“Doolittle is returning to the Crown,” he announced over the SUV’s radio.
Josslyn kicked the back of his seat.
“Buckle up back there,” he said. “Or the next time we go out, we’ll have to put you in a toddler seat.” He turned the radio to a hard rock station and let it blare.
She fumed the entire ride back to the White House. As they drove closer, passing through the security checkpoint at the south entrance, Josslyn’s throat became choked with emotion. She hated the sensation of being kept in a cage. It reminded her too much of growing up in her grandmother’s home. And she hated even more that the man seated in front of her could wound her just with a simple statement about her daddy. Her mission to expose animal traffickers wasn’t some sorority stunt. It was important and worthwhile. She was contributing something to society, damn it. And the Tower of Testosterone could shove it where the sun didn’t shine if he didn’t like it.
The car pulled up to the entryway, but her door remained locked to the marine guard who bent down to open it. Agent Lockett did the honors instead. There was no avoiding his extended arm without making a scene. William, the White House butler for the past twenty years, greeted them with a broad smile.
“Evening, Miss Josslyn.”
She was ashamed when the best she could manage was a nod. Her throat was so tight, she thought she might die of asphyxiation, but she didn’t dare let the man beside her know how much he’d affected her. They passed through the lovely Map Room and Josslyn attempted to extract her arm from his clutches so she could disappear upstairs with some of her dignity intact. Of course, he had other plans.
“Kill the videos in the China Room, Bennett,” he said as he pulled her to the right and into the room displaying the china from nearly every president to inhabit the White House. The preservation lighting gave the space a relaxing glow. Slamming the door closed behind them he thrust her into the center of the room and released her, finally. Josslyn rubbed the tender area on her forearm in an effort not to have to meet his hard stare.
“Now kill my mic.”
Josslyn did meet his eyes then. The man was talking to the air.
“I said kill it!” he shouted, startling her.
“Your brain is more scrambled than you let on if you’re talking to voices in your head.” She tried to slip past him. “You might want to get your crazy looked at by a professional.”
Once again, she underestimated his quickness. His arms were around her like a vice before she took two paces.
“Well, as they say, crazy recognizes crazy because you are one crazy-ass woman.” His arms pulled her body flush against his. “You don’t seem to understand that these people you’re constantly chasing don’t give a damn about lives. Animal or human.” He shook her gently. “When the shit hits the fan, they won’t care who your brother-in-law is. You need to end this little caper before someone gets hurt.”
Josslyn pounded her fists against his chest to no avail. “Caper?” she cried. “This isn’t some caper. Just like what you do is . . .” She sought for an argument, but his close proximity coupled with her anger had sucked out her brain cells. “What you do.”
She leaned her forehead against his chest with a bang. They stood there like that for a few heartbeats before he reached down and gently lifted her chin with his finger.
“I mean it,” he murmured. “No more sneaking into places. No more ditching your detail.” His mouth moved a little closer to hers. “Definitely no dinner with Tseng. And absolutely no more kissing.”
“Uh-huh.”
His nostrils flared when her tongue darted out to moisten her lips. And just like that, they were both doing what they’d seconds ago agreed not to. Pulling her body against his, he molded his lips over hers. He kissed her urgently, mating with her tongue as he invaded her mouth. Her fingers traveled up his neck to glide through his silky hair so she could bring them closer. A soft moan escaped the back of her throat when his fingers slid beneath her sweater to skim along her spine. She arched in closer, coming into contact with the proof of his desire. Shamelessly, Josslyn ground her hips against his, forcing a groan from deep within his chest. Their breathing became fractured as they both struggled to maintain an upright position.
“Damn it.” He ripped his mouth from hers and pushed her body out an arm’s length away from his.
Gasping slightly, Josslyn was grateful for his hands on her shoulders keeping her from staggering into one of the display cases filled with valuable dishes.
“Go to your room, Josslyn,” he whispered. “Get some sleep and forget all about this.”
She nearly raised her hand to slap him, but something stopped her. Probably the part of her that wanted him to kiss her again. And that thought made her angry.
“Like I said before, you’re not the boss of me. If you have an issue with how I live my life, step down from my detail. I’ll happily tell the director you’re not fit to protect me.”
He released her so abruptly, she wobbled on her booties.
Storming past her, he jerked open the door. “Go ahead.” He left without a backward glance.
Josslyn reached up and pulled out the medallion buried beneath her sweater. She sighed heavily as she brushed it over her kiss-swollen lips. He was calling her bluff and both knew it. The man knew too much about her now. Including the way she kissed. Her cheeks flushed with desire. She told herself it was embarrassment.
“Tomorrow is another day,” she said, replacing the medal and squaring her shoulders.
As she was straightening her clothing, her hand brushed against a piece of paper stuck to the back of her skirt. The sticky note was bordered with Chinese symbols, likely a stowaway from her close encounter with Agent Lockett on Tseng’s desk. She started to wad it up when she noticed part of the note was in English. Josslyn’s breath stilled when she recognized the name written on it.
Christian Sumner.
*
The water lapped at Adam’s shoulders. Dawn was beginning to break, leaving them vulnerable to snipers in the boats cruising the area searching for them. Not to mention the sharks that were starting to prowl for their breakfast. After nearly two hours of treading water, Adam could barely feel his legs. They had one life vest between them. Of course, he’d given it to the woman he’d been sent to rescue.
Josslyn’s eyes were closed, but he didn’t doubt for a minute that she was awake. He could feel the rapid beat of her pulse in her wrists resting against the back of his neck. Her lips were swollen from her constantly licking the salt water from them. Or maybe just from talking nonstop for the past couple of hours.
Adam wasn’t really sure. They looked pretty damn tempting, though.
Her body was nestled against his. The lithe legs wrapped around his waist did little for his sanity but a lot to keep him warm. The end of her ponytail sluiced through the water, her hair fanning out like a paddle. Adam should have been concentrating on keeping watch for the pick-up signal. Instead, all he could think of was plundering her mouth. Not to mention various other parts of her body.
She’s the president-elect’s sister-in-law, for crying out loud. There would be absolutely no gratitude hookup coming after this rescue. Not to mention she was willful, spoiled, and a freaking tree-hugger. The worst kind of woman for him.
But then his hand cupped her firm ass and all the noise about who she was and what he was disappeared. She was a woman and he was a man. Plain and simple. And despite his belief they would be rescued, he didn’t want to take the chance that if these were, in fact, his last hours on earth, he hadn’t tasted those luscious lips of hers. He leaned in to do just that.
“Tell me something about you,” she murmured before his mouth could make contact.
“Why?”
Her eyelids lifted slowly. “Because you already know everything there is to know about me. Everyone does. At least the me that both sides of the campaign defined me as—the love child of the widowed surgeon general and the ambitious Cajun medical researcher trying desperately to find a cure for the cancer that would eventually take her life. They conveniently leave out the part that I was supposed to be a means to an end. Except my umbilical cord didn’t hold the key they were hoping for. And in the end, all they had to show for their efforts was plain, old me.”
Adam could practically taste the bitterness emanating from her words. He kicked the water harder as though he could kick away her misery somehow.
“Come on, Jason Bourne,” she teased. “I dare you to tell me your life story. I doubt yours is anywhere near as tragic as mine.”
He wished he could say it wasn’t. But he didn’t talk about the first eighteen years of his life with anyone. Not even his closest buddies. As far as anyone knew, his life story began when he walked through the gates of West Point. And that was the way Adam preferred it.
She nuzzled his neck. “You need to keep talking so you stay awake.”
Hell, she was probably right. And what did it matter what she thought of him anyway? Their odds for survival were getting slimmer by the minute. Thanks to her dramatics on the whaling vessel, they were miles away from the designated rendezvous point. The first op that he failed at would likely be his last, a point his superiors constantly preached during training. Adam always believed he’d be the exception. Until now.
His legs settled into a relaxed rhythm keeping them afloat as Adam let the story sputter out of him.
“My mom died when I was a kid, too,” he began.
“Really?” she interrupted, her eyes wide, presumably surprised they shared a connection. “How old were you? How did she die?”
“I didn’t agree to play twenty questions. I’m just reciting the events of my life. Do you want to hear it or not?”
She eyed him warily before nodding. Women always wanted to pull out every piece of emotional baggage and examine it until everyone around them was bleeding. Adam was having none of that. Not now. Not ever.
“It was Lupus. I was eleven. My dad was in the army, so we moved around a lot. My mom was the glue that held our family together. When she was gone, things sort of fell apart.” He swallowed roughly at the memory. “Fell apart” was an understatement. Life as Adam knew it imploded after his mother’s death.
Josslyn mermaid kicked her legs between his, trying to take up the slack for keeping them above the water line. He appreciated her efforts, but rescuing them was his job, not hers.
“Save your strength,” he commanded. He left unsaid the part about her likely needing that strength should something happen to him. They both understood the potential scenarios facing them.
“Siblings?” she asked.
Adam cocked an eyebrow at her. Not that her open defiance of the rules of the game surprised him. She was a radical rabble-rouser by nature.
“One. A sister. Five years older. Before you ask, she’s dead.”
She seemed disappointed somehow. As though having a sister would make everything better. The soon-to-be First Lady was already a young mom herself when Josslyn was born. Perhaps the two were close. Adam didn’t know. He didn’t need to know. Whatever the outcome of this mission, their paths would never cross again.
“Turned out, my dad was a heavy drinker. At least he turned into one after my mom died. I’m not sure if he was angry at her for dying or if he was angry to be saddled with two kids. It sure felt like the latter.” Guilt seized Adam’s vocal cords for a long moment. “My sister escaped by falling in love. Except the guy was twenty and she was seventeen. My dad found out about it when he discovered the pregnancy test in the trash.”
A forlorn sigh escaped her lips.
“My sister knew a good thing when she saw it and she decided to run away,” Adam continued, surprised at how painful the words still were even after all this time. “I foolishly thought that maybe things would be better without her in the house. It would just be us two guys. My dad couldn’t complain about that. And just maybe things would settle down and he’d act like my dad again.”
Josslyn’s fingers dug into the back of his shoulders as though she could sense what was coming.
“My dad had different ideas. He was going to bring my sister back whether she wanted to come home or not.” Adam’s chest constricted painfully as the memories of that violent evening threatened to rip him apart again. “I tried to stop him. But I was twelve and while my dad found solace in a bottle, I’d found mine in multiple bags of cookies. It wasn’t a fair fight to begin with, but winning was everything for my old man. He beat me senseless and locked me in the storage unit behind our carport.”
The sea seemed to still around them. Josslyn wisely kept her mouth shut, but Adam could sense the energy it was taking her to hold back.
“It took most of the night, but my father located them,” he continued. “By this point, he was rip-roaring drunk. The poor kid tried to outrun my dad in a car. My dad chased him for two miles until he ran the kid’s car off the road into a ravine. It wasn’t until the cops showed up that my dad discovered my sister was in the car with him. They were both killed on impact.” Adam swallowed painfully. “My dad had some sort of breakdown. It was five days before anyone found me in the storage unit. I was shipped off to West Virginia to live with my hillbilly grandparents, who, at the time, could barely make ends meet. And my dad was sentenced to twenty years in a military prison for the vehicular homicide of three innocent people.”
Her mouth formed an O but no words came out. Probably a first for this woman.
“And that’s my story.”
Josslyn pulled her hands from behind his neck, treading water now to support herself. Tracing his jaw with her fingertip, she brought her mouth close to his.
“Not all of it. I have a feeling the best is yet to come for you,” she whispered. “But you definitely win tonight.”
Adam couldn’t help himself. He kissed her. Instead of ravishing her like he’d been contemplating moments before, he slowly explored the recesses of her mouth. Taking his time to savor the softness within. Best of all, she let him. Her lips gently welcomed the invasion, encouraging it even. He left her mouth to kiss her eyelids, her nose, her forehead before returning to her lips.
They grabbed onto one another, each one trying to keep the other from submerging beneath the ocean while their tongues tangled and their lips fused. At that point, if Adam had to choose between surviving and having this woman, he was sure he’d choose Josslyn. Time seemed to stand still until the shrill sound of the homing beacon bounced up from the water beside them.
*
With a start, Adam sat upright in his bed, the chime of his alarm reverberating through his ten
der head. He swiped at the beads of sweat along his temple, struggling to catch his breath.
Damn it.
It had been over a year since he’d dreamt about that mission. Silencing the alarm clock, he flopped back down onto the mattress. Kissing her last night had been the mother of bad ideas. But then, she started it with her cockamamie scheme in Tseng’s office. He could have backed off, but one touch of her tongue and his body was all in. Just thinking about it had him primed and ready for action.
Furious at his body’s betrayal, he tossed the sheet back and jumped out of bed. A shower would fix everything—a very cold shower.
Naked, he strolled to the bathroom adjacent to his room, checking the messages on his phone. His shoulders relaxed when he saw he and Agent Groesch were assigned to take over the Doolittle’s detail at the zoo this afternoon.
Adam wasn’t surprised that Josslyn’s threat had been an idle one. He was surprised at the pleasure he felt that she hadn’t outed him to the director. And he didn’t like the feeling at all. Turning the faucet to icy, he stepped into the shower. If five minutes under the spray didn’t exorcize his lust for the She-Devil, he’d ask the cute physical therapist out to dinner and hope she was up for dessert.
Once he had his libido in check, he could focus on the detail. Josslyn had seriously misplayed her hand by not getting him kicked off her team. Now, Adam knew the game she was playing. And no way was he going to let her search out the animal traffickers. If he had to shadow her day and night, he would. He told himself it was to keep her safe.
Chapter Six
Josslyn spotted him among the crowd of onlookers seconds after he entered the elephant house. She watched out of the corner of her eye as he exchanged a few words with one of the other agents who’d been assigned to her detail this morning. The two men shared a laugh. A residual smug smile remained on Agent Lockett’s face when his gaze finally locked with hers. The usual challenge was in his eyes. The force of it was doing strange things to her insides.
Shot in the Dark Page 7