WhereDangerHides

by Desiree Holt

  “Not good at all.” Taylor swallowed some of the coffee trying to collect her thoughts. “John says he doesn’t think the plant in Idaho exists at all. At least in that location. He said he made some phone calls—John gets more information by phone than any ten people I know—and there’s nothing where the plant’s supposed to be except forty unoccupied acres. He’s convinced it’s located in Mexico. He says he can trace money to accounts in Geneva and the Bahamas and back and forth to a specific location in Mexico.”

  “Mexico?” Noah’s eyebrows lifted. “I wonder what they’re hiding.”

  Taylor gripped her coffee mug so hard her knuckles turned white. “Arms. John thinks they’re making arms and selling them to terrorists and paramilitary groups.”

  She went on to explain the paper trail John had followed, ferreting out information few people could find, tracking it from point to point.

  “He also said there are two dummy suppliers that are being used to channel the income from the arms sales.”

  “That has to be what Josiah discovered on the plane trip.” A muscle jumped in Noah’s cheek. “Whoever’s behind this knew about it and arranged to have him killed.”

  “I either need to go to the ranch or get to a fax machine so John can send me his summary.” She pushed herself off the bed, wrapping the sheet around herself like a toga.”

  Noah’s eyes flashed. “Modesty? There isn’t a part of your body I haven’t seen.”

  Taylor felt heat bloom on her cheeks. “And maybe that’s the last look you’ll get at it. I need to shower. When can we leave?”

  Noah’s fisted tightened where it gripped the counter. “We can’t go to the ranch. No matter how well-protected it is, until we know everyone involved in this, it isn’t safe. Will you trust Jocelyn to pack a bag for you?”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Of course. But why?”

  “I think we should go to Mexico. We need to see that plant for ourselves and if possible blow it up.”

  Taylor’s mouth dropped open. “Did you say blow it up?”

  Noah lifted one shoulder. “We can’t kill the supply train but we can cripple it if we take out this facility and make the buyers waste time looking for other suppliers. Meanwhile we can turn them over to Interpol to track.”

  “And Paul and Kate?”

  “If they’re there, we’ll bring them back and turn them over to Homeland Security. I want Arroyo’s slate cleaned in public if possible.”

  Taylor shivered but not from a chill. “I’m going. You’re not leaving me behind on this.”

  “God knows I want to.” His voice was edged with frustration. “But leaving you alone isn’t an appealing alternative.”

  “Damn it, Noah…”

  “Damn it, nothing. We have no idea what’s waiting for us and the last thing I want is for the next bullet to hit you. Anyway, John can send stuff to the fax on the plane. Call Jocelyn and tell her what you want, then give me to Greg. I’ll have him pick us up here.”

  Chewing her lip in frustration, Taylor made her call, then handed the phone to Noah while she headed for the bathroom.

  The hot water felt good on her poor abused body. Her muscles inside and out ached with a soreness that wasn’t all that unpleasant although it made her movements stiff. As she let the stream beat down in her she tried to find the answer to what she’d do about Noah. Something had changed inside him last night, something that made him suddenly withdraw from her after days of intense sexual heat and an abundance of sexual activity. Maybe last night had finally given him enough of a taste of her but she didn’t think it was that. Not when he’d pulled out of her mouth and slid his cock into her with such ferocity.

  No, something else was bothering him. Until she could find out what, she’d have to avoid any more intimacy. It clouded her mind and her judgment.

  She had nothing else to put on except Noah’s shirt which she’d carried into the bathroom with her, so she slipped it back on over her head.

  “Lie on the bed facedown,” he ordered as soon as she was back in the room.

  Her eyes popped open and her body tensed. “I beg your pardon?”

  Muscles clenched along the line of his jaw. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to fuck you, although against all common sense and reason that’s exactly what I want to do. But you’re sore from last night and if I don’t rub some lotion into your muscles you’ll feel even worse.”

  She pulled the shirt tighter to her body. “I don’t think…”

  “Good. Don’t think. Just lie down.”

  And against her better judgment she did just that, barely protesting when he pulled the shirt from her. Something warm and liquid trickled onto her back and at the first touch of Noah’s hands she felt her body react automatically, threads of sexual pleasure rippling through her.

  Damn! Hell and damnation.

  He knelt behind her, muscular thighs straddling her, firm hands working the lotion smoothly into her with a technique the finest masseur would envy. He worked the muscles of her neck, shoulders and arms first, stopping now and then to add more lotion that he warmed in his palms. His lean fingers kneaded every inch of her spine, his hand spreading to rub her lower back. When he reached her buttocks she jumped but his hands on her gentled her.

  “Easy. Nothing intense going on here. But I’ll tell you now I have some oil to rub into your rectum because it’s the first time you’ve been stretched. If I don’t give you something to ease it you’ll have a lot of discomfort. I don’t think you want to be worrying about that with what’s going on right now.”

  Taylor’s mouth was suddenly dry and she forced herself to swallow. “A-All right.”

  Why don’t I just tell him to take his lotion and tell him to go to hell? Because the only place I ever want him is right here with me. And when did that happen? Shit, shit, shit.

  So she lay there under his ministrations, feeling the soreness ease from her.

  He touched one still sore globe of her ass. “Take a deep breath, Taylor and let it out slowly.”

  When the fingers of one hand spread her ass cheeks she sucked in as much air as she could. Then she felt the tip of something pressing against her anus. Warm oil trickled inside her, burning at first and then soothing. Noah slide first one then two fingers inside her, scissoring them to spread the oil. At first her tissues tried to reject him but then the oil began to do its work. Noah was right. The burning disappeared and as she let out her breath she began to relax again.

  And remember how aroused she’d been the night before. Recalled the pressing of the metallic wand and the low vibration is sent through her dark channel. The heat that streaked through her body straight to her womb. She had to clench her fists to keep from pushing back and urging him to do more than cure her with oil.

  Silently he withdrew his fingers and worked the muscles of her thighs and calves. Then he reached his hands under her and turned her over.

  “I think I’m fine now,” she protested. “Thank you.”

  “I’m a better judge of that than you. Just think of me as an impersonal eunuch.” But there was heat in his eyes that he couldn’t disguise and something else. She couldn’t define it but whatever it was flared like the propulsion tail of a rocket.

  What are you hiding, Noah Cantrell? What do you really feel and what’s put up those shields again?

  It took every ounce of willpower she had to lie still while he soothed the rest of the lotion into her. Muscles, breasts, nipples all got the same attention.

  Please don’t let me get wet. Please don’t let me think about those magic hands and the incredible sensations they elicit.

  She did fine until he nudged her thighs apart again and began to massage the oil into her mound, along the length of her slit and into her very tender vaginal sheath. She felt liquid begin to gather and seep from her, that was how easily she responded to him. She hated it and wanted it at the same time.

  Fuck me. Now. Don’t think, just do it.

  “Noah,” she b
egan.

  “Just don’t talk, all right?” He deliberately turned his face away until he’d completed his task.

  By the time he was finished and moved away from her she was sure she could just ooze across the floor. But he was right. The hot shower hadn’t fixed by half what his treatment had. So what did they do now about the familiar throbbing that started in her womb or the impossibly large erection straining against the fly of his jeans?

  Before either of them could say anything, they heard the whap! whap! whap! of the helicopter rotors and beyond the large window she could see Greg setting down in the clearing.

  “I’ll wait in the bathroom.” She swung her legs off the bed, pulled the shirt back on and headed out of the room.

  She heard the low murmur of voice then a knock on the bathroom door. When she opened it Noah handed a small overnight case to her.

  “Jocelyn packed two cases for you, one for the trip and one for right now. She thought you might want something comfortable to travel in and we have no idea what kind of clothes you’ll need when we get to Mexico.”

  Taylor silently blessed Jocelyn Hart for her foresight and sensitivity. She’d sent a pair of jeans and a soft shirt along with soft leather loafers she could just shove her feet into. Skipping makeup and pulling her hair back into a ponytail, she zipped up her case and opened the bathroom door.

  Greg and Noah were standing in the kitchen area, talking while Noah finished putting the coffee things away.

  Noah turned at the sound of her steps. “All set? Good. We need to get going.”

  Before Taylor could quite realize what was happening they were in the copter lifting off and heading toward San Antonio International Airport. When he had the bird leveled off, Greg picked up a folder stashed between the front seats and handed it to her.

  “Your guest said for you to get started on this,” his voice said over the headphones.

  Taylor began studying the sheets of paper, each one bringing worse news than the one before. No wonder Josiah had been killed. He was about to rain on someone’s very profitable parade. The fake Idaho plant was carried on the books since it had been a project Josiah asked for to begin with. But it had never existed there. Instead someone had built a facility in the heart of the Mexican state of Chiapas.

  Following the paper trail as no one else could, John had determined the plant manufactured a variety of small arms and shoulder propelled rockets. The reports Josiah got each month were nothing but a fairy tale. A certain amount of money went into the Arroyo coffers, but the bulk of it went to two dummy corporations with offshore bank accounts. John had traced money from there back to Mexico and was now working on nailing down solid connections to both Kate Belden and Paul Hunter.

  “He said he’d have more by the time you got to the plane,” Greg told her.

  “Thank you.”

  Then Noah’s voice same over the headphones. “I made some calls while you were dressing. I know some people who can give us a good read on where this factory is likely to be and what we might find. I don’t want to fly in blind.”

  She could only begin to imagine who Noah might have called. She wouldn’t be surprised if he had either the CIA or a band of mercenaries waiting for them when the landed.

  When Greg landed almost next to the Arroyo plane the jet engines were already whining. Noah hustled Taylor and himself out of one machine and into the other, Greg following with suitcases he handed in. Holding up one finger, he hustled back to the copter and returned with two other flat leather cases.

  “Your laptops,” he grinned. “I figured you guys couldn’t function without them.”

  Noah nodded, then pulled up the stairway, Greg waved and the plane began to taxi toward the runway.

  “I told the pilot to file a flight plan for Costa Rica,” Noah told her. “Just in case anyone was curious. We’ll make a correction once we’re in the air.”

  “Good.”

  “Buckle up. We’re about to take off.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Once the plane reached cruising altitude, Carlos served sandwiches and drinks and Noah brought Taylor the faxes John Martino had sent. Together they pored over each summary, Taylor drawing diagrams on a pad of paper and inputting information in the boxes. Finally she threw down her pencil and leaned back on the couch.

  “It’s all there, plain as day, if you know where to look for it like John did. Paul drew up all the paperwork for the real estate and the bank accounts as well as the dummy corporations. Kate negotiated for the land and the construction and set up the contracts with buyers.”

  Noah nodded. “She spent several years working for a corporation in the Middle East. I’m guessing that’s where she made all her connections. The rest was easy. They fed Josiah just enough money and information to keep him in the dark.” He slammed down his own faxes onto the pile. “Damn it, her pre-hire investigation came back clean but I should have pushed and dug harder. If some of this stuff had turned up then Kate Belden never would have seen the inside of Arroyo again.”

  Taylor poured herself another glass of iced tea from the pitcher on the table. She was working very hard at maintaining composure. Thanks to Noah’s expert ministrations the worst of the soreness she’d woken with was gone. Her buttocks still smarted slightly from the spankings but the worst of it was the state of arousal in which she found herself. If last night was supposed to finally extinguish the all-consuming fire burning them it had done a very bad job. And despite his attitude this morning, Taylor knew without a doubt that Noah had been affected far more than he wanted to let on.

  She pulled her mind back to the current conversation. “Why would he ask questions, anyway? He trusted her. Maybe not Paul but certainly Kate. He had no reason to be suspicious until the insurance review turned up the discrepancy.” She stirred sweetener into the tea. “She couldn’t have him write insurance on a non-existent facility. Besides, he’d have to have it inspected and she’d have to give him a copy of the payroll for worker’s comp.”

  “Handling everything herself made sure her little secret was secure.”

  “The division manager has to be part of this too,” Taylor mused. “It would be impossible to pull this off without him.”

  “People will do a lot of things for money,” Noah pointed out, then shifted subjects. “I’ve got people meeting us in Mexico with maps and manpower,” Noah told her. “Tomas called while you were dressing and said Kate and Paul were both frantically trying to find you after last night. They were asking too many questions and this morning neither of them are in the office.”

  “On their way to Mexico to make sure their resources are safe,” Taylor guessed.

  Noah nodded. “Rounding up their own troops and making plans to eliminate you.”

  Noah called John Martino on the satellite phone, put it on speaker and he and Taylor listened while John fed them more definitive information. He’d been going back over past Arroyo financial statements and production records as well as accessing the personal files of Paul and Kate with the passwords Noah had given him.

  “I guess that answers all of our questions,” Taylor said when the call disconnected.

  “At least the ones we have right now. Let me make one more call.”

  That one was to an agent with Homeland Security Noah apparently knew very well. He spoke briefly but when he was finished he told Taylor the agent would be meeting with his bosses and they’d proceed to get the necessary paperwork to bring this thing down.

  “That doesn’t kill the Hydra, though,” he pointed out. “Only closing down this factory and seizing all the records so we can destroy the tentacles will do that.”

  “And that’s why we’re here.” Despite herself Taylor felt a little nervous thrill clutch at her.

  “That’s it exactly.”

  They both fell silent after that. Taylor fiddled with her drink. Twisting the glass in her hand as she worked up the nerve to ask Noah what had been brewing in her mind all morning. Not to mention t
his morning’s massage that had left muscles relaxed but her body humming. She took a deep breath.

  “Noah, about last night.”

  His face closed up like the door to a vault. “I think that’s a subject better left undiscussed.”

  Taylor clenched her put down her drink before she spilled it and fisted her hands in her lap. “I don’t understand why. I didn’t ask anything of you that you hadn’t said a hundred times you wanted to give. And you couldn’t fake your response to me.” Her teeth caught her bottom lip. “What’s wrong, Noah? Why are you acting the way you are?”

  He busied himself stacking the papers together. “We’re going into a dangerous situation. It’s best to keep focused on that.”

  “And because it’s so dangerous I don’t want anything unresolved between us. If something happens to either one of us today, I, at least, want to have answers. I want to know what’s wrong and I want to know now. You owe it to me, Noah.”

  Still he sat, silent as a sphinx, emotions too fierce to even name chasing themselves across his face.

  “Damn it, Noah. I may be dead by tonight. I have a right to know what the hell is going on between us and where this attitude came from.”

  Before last night I could say, yes, it’s just sex, so take it and go away. But now you own a piece of my soul. Now I’m in big trouble.

  Noah rose from the couch and walked to one side of the cabin, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. The line of tension in his body was like an electric guy wire, taut and ready to spring back if someone released it. Taylor forced herself to sit quietly, waiting for whatever was coming. Something had happened last night, to both of them and sex was the least of it. They’d each crossed unintentional boundaries and she wasn’t about to let Noah hide behind his walls anymore. Nor was she about to run from what she was feeling for him, whatever it was.

  “My father was a seventh generation Texan, descended from one of the original Spanish conquistadores. His family had a huge estancia where he raised cattle for generations but when he married my mother his father disowned him.”