“I hope not.”
“Uh, no.” She stopped. “I know how you work now.”
A heaviness lifted off his shoulders at the idea. “Oh, really?”
“You didn’t answer me. I caught it that time and am not moving off the topic until you deal with it.”
He put his hand over his heart in the closest thing to a pledge he could ever remember giving. “I have permission, but I don’t want to draw any undue attention to the house. Hence, we go down.”
“You think we were followed.” She rolled her eyes. “Not sure how that’s possible with the way you were driving.”
“Evasive maneuvers.”
“Gave me a good case of motion sickness.”
“You look fine. Great, even.” He tore his gaze away from her jeans and slim shirt as he mentally thanked Maddie for the fashion loan.
“Good to know.”
He pointed to the steps in front of her. “Be careful and get moving.”
“Answer my other question.” For a thin woman she managed to clomp as she walked down the staircase.
That was nothing compared to the sound he made. A hollow thud echoed around him every time he put his foot down. “You’re safe.”
She reached the bottom landing and looked around at the gray rock-lined walls and a stack of boxes blocking the way in front of them. That left an open space to the left and a narrow hallway to the right. “Not what I expected.”
“It’s a basement.”
“It’s not finished.”
“Which is part of why I’m working here.” The sole reason, actually. The Hamptons wanted to blow out the walls and add another usable floor to the house. Apparently, the nine thousand square feet aboveground were insufficient.
“Are you a building contractor and didn’t tell me?”
“Let’s just say I know my way around tools.” Something about working with his hands, having the freedom of not being tied to a desk, appealed to him.
Only problem would come with hanging up his gun, and he was nowhere near ready to do that yet. Fighting bad guys gave him a purpose. Throwing in with Recovery, taking Rod’s offer and running with it, let him funnel all his anger in a positive direction. Gave him a target when he desperately needed one to exorcise the ghosts that came with fighting in a war.
She dragged her fingers across the stones, then rubbed the dust on her pants. “I thought maybe there would be a pool or a bowling alley. The kind of stuff you see on TV.”
“What shows are you watching?”
She pointed in both directions and went right when he nodded that way. “Tell me about this side job.”
“When the government, led by Trevor’s brother, disbanded the Recovery Project as a sanctioned black-ops team, we were suddenly unemployed. While Claire and Luke formulated the plan to fund Recovery as you see it now, I did some work in my specialty area.”
“Which is?”
The narrow hall gave way to a large wooden door and the sitting room beyond. It lacked drywall and cement served as the floor, but one day it would be a media room. For now it was a makeshift rec room with a couch, a cooler and little else.
An electrician had run wiring, but the stark light bulbs hanging without cover from the roughed-in ceiling didn’t exactly match the pristine decor upstairs. But it was fine for Zach to use when he needed breaks on the job.
“Luke is the leader. Caleb is the science and forensics guy. Holden is our strategy and tactics guy.” Zach ticked off the job list on his fingers. “Adam clearly is our tech guy.”
“And you?”
“I blow things up.”
“Explosives?”
“Is there another way?”
“You’re planning on blowing up the Hamptons’ house?”
“Only that section.” He pointed toward a darker area off to the side through an open doorway. “For the very expensive wine cellar they’re building.”
“They hired you.”
She made that sound surprising but he refused to be offended. His job usually consisted of him, a wall and his tools. Having a witness, someone who could get in the way or be injured, made it hard for him to relax.
He stayed on the edge, his fingers clenching and unclenching in case he needed to do a diving catch.
“Their house manager did.”
She plopped down on the couch, ignoring the dust that puffed up around her. “And where is he?”
“Taking a vacation of his own while the boss is away. He left a message that he’d check in next week.”
“Until then?” She patted the seat next to her.
His legs refused to move. The muscles tightened like the ache in his chest. “The place is all ours.”
When he came closer, she dipped her head to the side and stared at him. Even in the low light, her skin glowed. Blond curls swept down over her breast.
Zach knew right then he was a dead man. Ignoring her in a room full of people had proven difficult. Resisting her when alone with no one to judge or stop them turned out to be impossible.
She crossed her legs and let her foot bounce around in the air. “You still think I’m Trevor’s mistress?”
“I never thought that.”
She frowned. “Zach, come on.”
If this were a true seduction, he’d just gloss over the truth and move on to what he wanted, but this was something else. Something deeper. She deserved to know the truth about his doubts. “I thought you were sleeping with him.”
Her foot stopped moving. “Isn’t that what I just said?”
“Your tag is wrong.”
“Tag?” She didn’t laugh, but amusement filled her voice, made it lighter.
“Since you’re both adults and neither are married, you wouldn’t have been a mistress. If you were sleeping with Trevor you weren’t doing anything wrong.”
This time she laughed. It was a rich, velvety sound that warmed the cool room. “So, you weren’t judging me.”
He regretted the truth now. “Well…”
“That’s what I thought.”
“Maybe a little. You probably haven’t noticed but I’m not a big Trevor fan.”
“You thought I was on the arm of a guy you hated. No matter what you call it the result is the same.”
“Not really.” Not in Zach’s head.
Cheating took the game to a whole new level. It made a statement about her boundaries and principles. Dating a guy like Trevor just meant she had felony-bad taste in men. Zach smiled when he realized neither was an issue.
“You know a lot about this subject, do you? About marriages and mistresses?” she asked.
“Some.”
“Meaning?” The flirty tilt of her head and lilt in her voice had disappeared.
“I was married once. Went off to war and she found someone else.”
Sela shifted to the front of the sofa cushions, all business now. “I’m sorry.”
“It happens.”
She opened her mouth and then closed it again before finally speaking. “Is it that easy for you to forgive her for not sticking around?”
“Never said I forgave.”
“Forgot?”
“Not so much.” It ate at him back then. He used the lesson now to keep the fury banked. He never wanted to return to that place where he challenged guys to bar fights just so he could beat out the frustration festering inside him through his fists. “But that’s not a bad thing. You learn.”
“What about me? Do you forgive me for working on the wrong side, for believing in Trevor?”
Zach gave up his position by the door and joined her on the couch. His thigh rubbed against hers; only two thin layers of clothing separated them. “Why do you?”
“He gave me a chance.”
“How?” Zach knew but he wanted the details from her.
The cumulative effect of running through two powerful bosses helped him create a mental image of her before they even met. The idea that the true circumstances differed so greatly from the sto
ry he’d woven in his mind brought both relief and frustration. If he couldn’t read people and assess their files, he wasn’t good for the team for much more than lighting a fire.
She fiddled with a string at the seam of the couch cushion between her legs, twisting it between her fingers, then unwinding it again. “I had trouble at my previous job. Trevor ignored the bad review and hired me, anyway.”
There had to be more to it than that. “Bad review?
Her head shot up. “You don’t sound surprised.”
“I can pretend if you want me to.”
“Ah, let me guess. You’ve investigated my background.”
There was no need to hide it. It was part of what he did for a living, and she had to have figured that out by now. “Of course.”
“I was set up.”
This time she lost him. Jumped right to another topic and left him behind. “I don’t understand.”
“I didn’t take the money.”
Zach thought he might have found one more piece that didn’t fit because he didn’t know where she was headed with this. “The story I got is that you were sleeping with the boss and had a bad breakup when he decided to go back to his wife.” It all sounded so stupid now that he knew her and tried to match the rumors to the woman in front of him. “Word was you didn’t take it so well.”
She dropped her head on the cushion behind her with a groan. “If I had half as much sex as the rumors said, I would be a very tired woman.”
Sex. Sela. Not a combination he was ready to tackle just yet. “So, that’s a no to the relationship?”
“No, Zach. It’s not true.” A flurry of heat moved into her voice, then out again. “The boss’s son embezzled some money. I figured it out while compiling documents for the company accountant.”
“Doesn’t sound like the kid was very good at it.” Zach half wished Vince would slip up that way. It would make everything easier to close this case. Holden and Mia could go ahead and marry.
Zach could…well, he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do. Returning to his empty apartment and holding everyone at a safe distance no longer sounded so safe. It sounded boring.
“Apparently it was easier to discredit me and bury the evidence than have the heir apparent embroiled in a scandal.”
Zach realized she’d been through it. Raced from one bad work situation to another. He wasn’t responsible for any of it, but that didn’t stop him from wanting to wrap his arms around her and make it better. That emotion was one he neither understood nor wanted to analyze.
So, he went with the obvious. “You don’t have the best luck with men.”
“You can say that again.”
“Once was probably enough.”
She laughed. “What about you?”
“My luck with men is fine.” He lifted her hand from her lap and put it on his. They laced their fingers together.
“You know what I mean, Zach.”
“I honestly don’t.”
She curled her legs under her as she crowded up against his side. “Are you going to be bad for me?”
“No.” He said it but didn’t totallty believe it.
“Does that mean you’re going to keep pretending you’re not attracted to me?”
He wrapped his free hand around the back of her neck and pulled her in even closer. “No, I’m done with that.”
His mouth covered hers in a kiss that fired through his nerve endings. Lips against lips, his heart thundered in his chest as his tongue slid inside her mouth to taste her as he’d been wanting to do for days.
By the time he had her lying back across the couch, his hands were moving over her shirt and unbuttoning the snap on the top of her jeans. She grabbed the bottom of his shirt and drew it over his stomach. His abs twitched and sparked to life as her fingertips brushed against his skin.
He broke contact with her mouth only long enough to sit up, his legs straddling her hips, and whip his shirt off and throw it in a ball on the floor. He didn’t want anything between them. With the problems at bay, he existed only to touch her.
Her hands toured his chest. Fingernails pinched his skin as her gaze devoured him in a flurry of need.
He had to have her.
He barely got the condom out of his pocket when he heard the rasp of his zipper. She had him out and in her hands before he could find the breath to talk. Words gone and his blood set to boil, he tugged off the rest of the clothes binding them. He touched the very center of her, hot and wet, until her head flew back and her breath rocked through her.
When she was ready, her breath raspy and her eyes and mouth begging for him, he ripped open the package. His fingers failed him as he tried to unroll the condom, but hers knew what to do, sheathing him, guiding him to where he longed to be. He pressed into her before one thought passed into the next.
His last memory was of her speaking his name.
TREVOR TURNED THROUGH the long cul-de-sac and pulled up to the gate surrounding his property. He refused to use a driver and contingent of guards to get him from one place to another. He could drive and didn’t need to be carried back and forth to work. To him that showed weakness. It suggested he was afraid and unprepared, and he was neither.
He tapped the button on his console to move the gate and get in, but nothing happened. Rolling down his window, he pressed the call button for his security guard. Nothing happened. No buzz. No voice on the other end. He dialed the house, listening with growing annoyance to the shrill ring.
He glanced up at the house looming at the end of the circular driveway. Light flooded the front yard and everything seemed normal. No one ran out to meet him, but those days were long gone. His ex had seen to that when she grabbed their son and all the cash she could transfer and left the house. She said he could rattle around the property until he died there, but she wasn’t going to join him.
Now his life existed on a very narrow plane. Burying his brother and losing daily contact with his son narrowed his social activities to work obligations.
The security guards and housekeeper followed his schedule and tonight he’d said he’d be late and not to make dinner. But there should be movement. He’d radioed to the guards a few minutes ago to let them know he was on the way. They’d answered then. Now he couldn’t raise anyone. Anxiety clenched at his gut. He reached over to his glove compartment and felt the cool metal of his gun against his fingers. Before he could grab hold, a hand shot through the open window and grabbed him by the throat with a shake. As he thrashed and banged on the horn with his elbow, the gun slipped from his fingertips and fell to the floor on the passenger’s side.
With his hands raking over the gloved ones of his attacker, Trevor tried to break the death grip on his windpipe. But the pressure didn’t let up. With his vision clouding, he fought to keep his eyes open and air pumping through his veins.
He blinked hard to block the enveloping mist and caught a quick glimpse of his attacker.
Vince smiled. “Consider this that call I promised.”
Chapter Fourteen
This time Sela knew she was humming. A love song filled her head and she let it flow through her body.
Staring up at the rock ceiling, she tried to work up an ounce of regret. She couldn’t do it.
This wasn’t about gratitude or proving a point about who she loved and how. Being with Zach signaled a return to a normal life. She’d spent so much time doubting her choices and trying to figure out what responsibility she had for the problems she faced. With him she could just be.
She was all woman, beautiful and strong, and they fit.
Making love with him had meant something to her. It was freeing and empowering. She’d known him for such a short time, but being together in the most basic way, without planning or a long dating dance, made sense to her. With Zach she felt safe and cherished.
She rolled over on the hard floor and pulled the homemade throw from the couch higher up on her chest. She wore his shirt but was otherwise bare. Rubbing her legs
against him wasn’t helping to ward off the chill. The humid D.C. air didn’t reach down here, so the cold stones acted like an ice bath splashed over her skin.
But studying him was no hardship. Dark stubble fell across his chin, adding a fierce layer to an already complex man. He kept his feelings close and his sentences short, as if protecting his heart from the tough outside world. But he was so much more than the quiet man in the corner.
He rushed in when most people would run away. He argued with her, even made mistakes in judging her past, but he reached her with the gentle touch of a man who respected women and reveled in their pleasure. All those harsh lines and rough moves faded when he ran his hands over her and pressed his mouth against hers.
She traced her fingers down his well-defined biceps and pondered how far she’d come in such a short time. No one would ever understand how a kidnapping had made her life better. There was no way to explain it or turn it around until it made sense. It didn’t. All the terror should have built a wall against Zach. Instead, it opened a door to let him in.
She didn’t believe in love at first sight. With the added doubts about Trevor, she barely believed in anyone right now. But she knew with a bone-deep certainty Zach was different. That his destiny wrapped around hers.
“How about sharing the blanket?” One of his eyes popped open and he stared up at her.
Her butt was almost frozen at this point, so no way was she sharing anything but body heat. “I think we should move to the couch.”
He wrinkled up his nose. “Smaller.”
“Warmer.”
He lifted up, balancing his upper body on his elbows. “I’d make a bad joke about keeping you warm but I’m not as young as I used to be.”
“Meaning?”
He glanced down his naked body. “Need some time.”
When she joined in his staring, his body twitched. “Don’t think so.”
With a groan, he sat up. “Man, this wasn’t the best place for this. Sorry.”
“I thought it was perfect.”
He dropped a hard kiss on her mouth. “Why, thank you, ma’am.”
The Big Guns Page 11