Taken

by Lora Leigh

  “You make me crazy,” he muttered, his hand dropping as he stared down at her before backing away. Hell, he wasn’t going to beg her to stay. He sure as hell wasn’t going to allow her to feel as though he were attempting to force her to stay.

  She truly did make him crazy as hell. Completely insane like no other woman ever had. There was something about her that drew him, confused him, and made him feel things he didn’t always understand. Things he didn’t want to feel.

  “I don’t mean to make you crazy.” She was breathless.

  Damn, he loved that sexy little edge to her voice when she became breathless.

  The sound of that edge of arousal in it had the power to make his balls tighten with the need to have her. The need to fuck her until there wasn’t a chance in hell she could ever deny him again rose inside him.

  “Hell, I can’t get enough of you.” He reached for her, and she backed away.

  Sheila had never backed away from him before. What the hell was wrong with her?

  His eyes narrowed. “What’s going on, Sheila?”

  Her chin lifted, and that little glimmer of feminine fire shifted from arousal to pure feminine determination.

  Ah, hell. This wasn’t a good thing. This meant he’d obviously done something completely male—and managed to either hurt her or piss her off.

  He was in trouble now, and Casey damned well knew it.

  “Nothing’s going on, Casey.” Her lips thinned and her eyes seemed to darken with the lie. Casey always knew when she was lying. And she only lied to him, according to her, when he should be able to answer his questions himself.

  He’d never seen denial in her eyes when it came to him, though. At the moment, there was pure rejection gleaming there.

  “Don’t give me that shit,” he growled. “We’ve never played games with each other. Not like this. I don’t want to start now. I won’t let you start now.”

  “I was never the one playing games.”

  Casey’s eyes narrowed. Every man in the world knew that tone of voice.

  Those violet eyes flashed again with the edge of anger, and Casey knew he was screwed.

  “What the hell did I do?” Pushing his fingers through his hair, he wished the damned hard-on would abate just a little bit. It was hard as hell to be demanding when all he wanted to do was fuck the temperamental little minx.

  She delighted in making him crazy, he decided. And she could make him crazy as hell faster than anyone he’d ever known.

  “You didn’t do anything.” She lifted her shoulder in a shrug that warned him he sure as hell had done something. And he better find “her” way, to fix it fast.

  See, this was what drove him crazy. It made him want to pull his own hair out because he couldn’t figure out what the hell he had done. She was obviously expecting him to know this time what he had or hadn’t done. Whichever, he probably had only moments to fix it before she walked out that door.

  “Look, just tell me what your problem is, and I’ll fix it.” He glared back at her as he crossed his arms over his chest, certain his erection would deflate any second. Surely his dick would get a clue and just give it up.

  It would have with any other woman giving him this kind of grief. Hell, it had never failed to deflate permanently with any other woman who dared to pull this shit on him.

  Especially when he didn’t know what he’d done to piss off his soon-to-be-ex-lover. So why the hell hadn’t it deflated yet? Why was he still standing there like a boob trying to figure out how to get her back in his bed?

  “Didn’t I do something right?” he demanded when that slender little hip cocked to the side and delicate fingers curved over it. The index finger tapped against her jeans silently. He’d only seen her do that a few times, and never with him. Until now.

  Yep, he was in trouble. He just wished he knew why. How. Or what to do to fix it.

  “You’ll fix it, will you?” she asked silkily as her thick lashes fluttered over her mocking gaze. “Why, Casey, I just can’t tell you how your offer makes my little heart beat faster.”

  Uh huh. He could tell. He really could. She was so damned sarcastic he almost winced.

  He quickly ran through the night once again, just to be certain. Just to assure himself he hadn’t done anything blatantly stupid. Because he really wasn’t a stupid man where woman were concerned.

  Had he gotten her a drink when she showed up at the bar?

  Check.

  He’d bought them all drinks and sent her a plate of the seasoned fries she liked as well. She and her friends sat in the corner booth and had a nice little visit. He had made certain they had everything they needed. And he’d paid for it all himself.

  He’d kissed her before he got her in the car?

  Check.

  Fuck, he’d been so hungry for her he hadn’t been able to keep from kissing her like he was dying for her.

  He’d been romantic about it?

  Hell yes.

  He loved the feel of her hair, so he’d slid his hand into it, along the side of her face in the way he knew she liked. He knew, because it always made her eyes a little darker, and her face flush with feminine need. And he’d started that kiss slow and easy while he’d held her on the dance floor.

  Once he’d gotten her to his apartment had he offered her another drink? Check there too.

  He’d even offered her a snack or a meal.

  He’d turned on the music, danced with her again, easing her slowly into the deepest flames of the arousal that began to burn inside them. Just because he loved the feel of her against him. Loved the way she rubbed against him.

  “Look, Casey, I just want to go home,” she informed him as she stepped to the door and gripped the knob. This time, he didn’t try to stop her. He wasn’t going to beg her. They weren’t kids. They were supposed to be adults. Adults didn’t play teenage games like this. At least, they shouldn’t.

  “Fine, when you feel in the mood to tell me what’s wrong with you, then you know where to find me.”

  “Of course I do.” He almost winced at the sound of her voice and the mockery that filled it. “Every night.”

  “Pretty much,” he agreed with a tight nod. “I’ve never been hard to find. Made sure of it where you were concerned.”

  That only seemed to piss her off worse. Her fingers tightened on the doorknob and for a moment he thought she just might actually say whatever the hell was on her mind. He was certain the adult in her was ready to give up the game and just be honest with him.

  Then her lips thinned again; she stepped through the doorway and slammed the door closed behind her.

  Casey winced at the sound of metal meeting metal.

  She had slammed the door on him. Hell, he couldn’t believe it.

  She might be more than just a little pissed.

  She was pure female pissed with a healthy dose of “done had enough” when she slammed doors. Sheila wasn’t normally a door slammer.

  It was cute as hell actually. It was even damned arousing, though the fact that he found it arousing confused him more than he understood.

  Running his fingers through his hair again, Casey did his best to try to figure out what he’d done. The funny thing was, she hadn’t even hinted at being angry until she’d left the bathroom.

  There was hurt in her eyes too.

  He couldn’t figure out how he’d hurt her.

  He was damned if he could figure any of it out.

  Casey rubbed his chest before moving back to the bedroom, his gaze going over the bed critically before moving around the room as though there might be an answer there somewhere. Some way to figure out how he could have hurt her, or pissed her off.

  She’d been just as hungry for him as he’d been for her when they had arrived at his apartment. Come to think of it, she had been just as eager for him as he was for her before they even left the bar.

  It always amazed him how easily she matched his need. Kiss for kiss, touch for touch, pure sensual, sexua
l need driving them both to the brink of sanity.

  Hot as fucking hell.

  And it hadn’t been any different than any other night. They burned each other alive.

  And no matter how often he had her, it was never enough. He was always left just as hard for her as he was the first time he fucked her. And he always cursed the sunrise whenever he saw it edging through his curtains.

  Because sunrise meant Sheila was going to awaken, and she was going to leave. It meant that unfamiliar warmth and the confusing yet comforting emotions he felt would disappear with her.

  This time, she’d left well before sunrise, though. And there he stood, naked, hard, and rather than feeling anger he just felt … alone.

  He heard her car start outside his window. The second floor afforded him privacy, but it also allowed him to keep his eyes and ears open.

  Not that he had a lot of enemies in this new life or in this new, fairly low-key job.

  He’d never seemed to make enemies as easily as he did friends, so there weren’t a lot of people who wanted to hurt him, yet.

  Yet, because he was involved in something that could possibly turn ugly if anyone ever figured it out. Or if they figured out exactly who Nick Casey really was.

  If they did.

  They hadn’t yet, and it had been quite a few years since he had come to Simsburg, Texas. He’d been there for five years, ever since his days as a super-secret special operations soldier had gone to hell when an extraction had turned ugly.

  He’d taken a bullet to his hip and one to his damned ankle. His reaction time was screwed then and his ability to endure the long hikes and hard runs required was forever behind him.

  But he’d made enemies during those days. And once he had taken Ethan Cooper up on his job offer to handle the security at his bar, he’d learned that some men could never retire from the life of an adrenaline junkie.

  Not him, not the men who worked with him at the bar, and sure as hell not his boss, Cooper.

  As he threw himself back in the bed and stared up at the ceiling silently, Casey admitted that being a special operations soldier had nothing on being a covert information gatherer and tattletale. The Broken Bar, Cooper’s bar, was a watering hole for the dregs of society, as well as the locals and tourists. And Cooper’s men were there to scoop up the scattered whispers, rumors, and gossip left behind. Posing as bouncers and bartenders, they heard it all.

  Ethan’s place was the only bar or nightclub coming from Corpus Christi. It was big, always busy, and drew a damned diverse crowd. A crowd that often held customers who mixed socializing with information and dropped tidbits of those secrets as they became more intoxicated through the night. More intoxicated and more self-important than they actually were.

  Iron, Turk, Casey, and Jake put that information together along with Ethan for the retired army captain who headed the southern section of the Covert Information Network.

  That same army captain was the father of the woman who had just left his bed. As though he had committed some horrible sin. A sin Casey had yet to realize was actually a sin.

  He grimaced again and shifted on the bed to relieve the ache in his hip. The result of several nights working overtime, piecing together the information that had come in after a strike overseas on a terrorist cell. That strike had been the result of information the team had gathered the month before, making these past few nights even more important.

  Sometimes, Casey wondered if they were even making headway despite the strikes the team was responsible for. Take one out, ten more slide in.

  He was beginning to wonder what he had left behind as he chased the adrenaline dream. What had he given up all these years? What had he missed that he couldn’t figure out the feeling Sheila made him feel? And what was he letting slip through his fingers now?

  From that first night he and Sheila had come together, he’d felt he had finally found a cure to the restlessness that plagued him. He’d finally felt as though he belonged somewhere. Or to someone.

  There was more to her than he’d had a chance to get to know, and more that swirled in that heart of hers than she allowed him to glimpse. Those secrets drew him. They made him hungrier by the day to know her better, to touch her more, to hold her tighter.

  And he wanted to see it all.

  Shockingly.

  Casey had never wanted to delve into a woman’s heart and soul at any other time. Not since the day his fiancée had cleaned out his apartment and his bank account when she’d heard he’d been wounded in action.

  She hadn’t stuck around to see how badly he had been hurt or cared if he had needed her. She sure as hell hadn’t cared that he might need his furniture, his cash, hell, his bed, when he returned home.

  Nope, she’d just cashed in everything she could and found greener pastures. His best friend’s pasture.

  That had been over seven years ago, nearly eight.

  Sheila was different, though. From the moment he’d stared into those mysterious violet eyes, he’d known she was more different than any woman he’d ever touched. So unique he was determined to keep her as his own.

  There was something about her eyes, something about the need he glimpsed in them whenever she gazed back at him that drew him. There was a warmth, a fire he longed for. All he wanted was to hold Sheila through the night.

  Every night.

  He rubbed his jaw, a frown working over his brow again as he wondered what had happened and why she had run on him. But even more, what was that edge of hurt he’d glimpsed in her gaze?

  How had he managed to hurt her when all he’d wanted to do was make love to her until they both collapsed?

  Until she didn’t have the strength, the will, or the desire to leave his arms again.

  chapter 3

  “sheila, did we get those reports in from team two yet?” Captain Douglas Rutledge stepped from his office, his craggy face creased into a frown as he stared at her with that affronted, irritated look of a man who knows he should have something and that it wasn’t there.

  His hair was mussed, his clothes slept in, and it looked like his socks were mismatched again.

  That was her father.

  Broody, impatient, and expecting perfection though he knew he wasn’t going to receive it. At least, he said he knew, she thought as she watched him fondly.

  “Not yet, Captain,” she assured him, using the title as her mother had before her. “I told you I’d let you know the minute they arrive.”

  Sheila hadn’t called him dad since the day her mother told her how he enjoyed the rare times she called him captain instead.

  She turned back to the computer and the completion of the final electronic copy from the past week’s reports. He was her parent and she loved him, but he was as demanding as any military man could be.

  Besides, things had been slow in the bars and nightclubs where the operatives under her father’s command worked. He wasn’t going to be happy about it either. Captain Rutledge took his job seriously and demanded results.

  Reaching up to scratch at his graying head, he glared at her again, drawing her attention.

  She glared right back at him. “I can’t snap my fingers and get it, Captain. You’re just going to have to wait for it, no matter how long it takes.”

  His brows lifted in surprise as she barely stopped herself from sighing in irritation. Dammit, he knew her too well, and snapping back at him never failed to start an inquisition. And that was something she really didn’t need right now.

  He stood staring at her, both hands buried in the pockets of his dark slacks as he continued to regard her silently. Questioningly. And she knew that look. He expected an explanation, now.

  Sheila considered simply going back to the reports she was putting together. Sometimes, the best thing to do was to ignore him. She wondered if that would work today as it had in the past.

  “Might as well tell me what the problem is,” he grunted. “You’ve been out of sorts for three days and I’m tired
of being your little whipping boy.”

  Whipping boy? Sometimes her father tended to exaggerate.

  “You’re not a whipping boy,” she muttered. “You’re a nosy old man.”

  She had been very, very careful not to be out of sorts. She would be damned if she would let Casey hear that she was in any way less than a terrific mood. And her father wasn’t above asking everyone they knew what was wrong with her.

  She simply couldn’t afford it.

  “Yes you have. I want to know why.” Her father strode across the small office to lean against the side of her desk as he stared down at her inquisitively. He wanted an answer and she knew by the look on his face he was determined to get one.

  The glare was gone, and that was an indication that the captain was now her father, and he was concerned. She could deny the captain, but it was harder to deny her father.

  Besides, she didn’t want him to be concerned. When he worried, he poked his nose into her life and made her crazy.

  “You have reports to go over, Captain,” she reminded him, barely restraining a roll of her eyes. “Not a daughter to raise. You already completed that particular mission admirably.”

  “You look just like your mother when you say that.” Nostalgia entered his tone, his expression. “She would try to lie to me just like that, too.”

  A wealth of love filled his voice as he spoke, as well as that ever present shadow of pain he carried. He had loved her mother, even after her death. So much so that he had never considered remarrying. He didn’t even date.

  “Mom never lied to you.” Sheila shook her head, barely restraining her smile. Because he was right. Her mother was very good at evasion, though not lying. And her father had always known when she was evading.

  “There’s no difference between an evasion and a lie,” he warned her as though reading her thoughts. He simply knew her that well.

  “Of course there is.” She laughed back at him. “When you don’t want to lie to someone, you evade. It’s perfectly acceptable.” That way they couldn’t get angry or accuse you of deceit.

  His brow arched. “So you’re not lying, you’re evading?”

  He had no idea.