“Tell me what you want.” Sebastian breathed the demand into her skin, her soul.
“You.” Kat twisted under him, arched her hips to meet his, intent on merging so there could be no separation. What she wanted was impossible. Absurd. That nothing could come between them, not truth, not lies, not secrets. Her whisper and the dance of need to need urged him to action, to seduction. “This.”
He gave in, fusing his open, wet mouth to hers, tasting the heated recesses with a dying man’s hunger. Threading his hand into her hair, he surrendered to the erotic simplicity of a kiss. The tangled mating of lips and teeth and tongue. The feral, voracious search for answers. Sebastian enjoyed the act of kissing, the slippery, intoxicating glide of sensation.
He’d never kissed a woman before. Not so his head spun with the scent, the texture, the flavor of her—not so that he could break apart in the act.
In the bright room, he rose above her, determined to see her. His Kat, her body bowed in longing. Elegant, golden lines dipped and flowed, and he thought of a sculpture he’d taken in Senegal, a goddess too ethereal for this world, too earthy for heaven. Lush and delicate, invincible and fragile. His Kat.
Too greedy to wait, he ripped at the worn material of her top, rending the fabric at the seams. Bending, he licked voraciously at the pouting crests. Creamy, flawless breasts filled his eager hands, his teasing nips drawing them into delicious points that begged for his mouth.
Kat shook with astonished plea sure, her body a taut line of nerves, a mass of sensation. Impossibly, he touched her everywhere, a serration of teeth at her waist as her borrowed scrubs loosened and disappeared, a ribbon of wet heat as he sampled the line of her thigh, the sensitive skin behind her knees, the shadows at her core. Hard, callused hands soothed and skated across her naked flesh. Shocked, overcome, aroused, she reared up, to hold on, to hold fast.
She wanted more, craved all. Turning, she straddled his tight, rigid waist and yanked his shirt over his head, his bottoms down, the cotton dropping to the tiled floor. Laughing, she tormented with tiny, fierce bites at the flat male nipples that rose under her ministrations. When he trembled, she skimmed her tongue over the tangy skin that shivered for her. For her.
The heart that forbid entry drummed, his breath quickening as she marveled at the piquant flavors of steel and flesh. “You want me.”
“Always.”
Entranced, she sampled the cord of muscle at his waist, the mound at his bicep. Moans broke from the vault of Sebastian’s chest, singing her into headier discovery. Panting, she slanted desperate kisses along the mysterious line of hair, this time following its path to the turgid length that jerked beneath her explorations.
“Kat.” Sebastian felt his undoing and hauled her away. They rolled together, bodies sliding in exotic counterpoint, angles nestling curves, soft seeking hard. Blood raged and drove him to thrill. To suckle and caress until aches became plea sure became a fantastic despair that consumed them both.
With care, Sebastian readied her, drawing the moist response that swam in his head like a fiery whiskey. He tightened, seduced by the rhythms of snaking hips, the lure of steamy skin whose scent enthralled. Overwhelmed, he struggled for the distance that made sex pleasurable and physical, with no question of commitment. Of love.
He couldn’t find it. Could only grasp the lure of advance and retreat, of a joining that seemed endless, weightless, forever. Needing to give her ecstasy, he stroked at the taut nub that slicked beneath his touch. Frantic to devour, he savored her, building a dangerous fire with careful motions, entering in triumph as her nails sank into his skin, demanding speed and consummation.
“More. Sebastian, more.” Kat writhed in glorious anguish, too close, too ready.
“Look at me.” Sebastian eased out in a slow, endless motion, waiting until her eyes opened, focused their amber passion on him. Unable to stop himself, unwilling to lie, he murmured, “Let me love you.”
She cradled his head, brought his mouth to hers, and understood what he didn’t yet. “Yes.”
He thrust deep, control broken, shattered. Again and again, deeper and hotter and further than fantasy.
With urgency, she accepted him, fascinated by the power, and for a moment, she wavered, wondering if she was prepared. In the next second, she knew she could never be.
Kat moved beneath him, her body too full to stay motionless. Theirs mouths coupled, imitating the dance that frenzied her limbs, wrapping her into him.
Sebastian flew above her, driven to claim and imprint himself forever. He nuzzled her breast, finding the wild beats, and pressed a kiss just there, sealing his fate.
He stretched her, drained her, completed her.
She surrounded him, took him, filled him.
Together, the coming overtook them, flung them beyond the tangle of bodies, beyond the desperate desires of heart. Into everything.
Kat propped her chin on Sebastian’s damp chest, the teak flesh stretched taut over ridges of muscle. Sated, she struggled to keep her eyes open, refusing to succumb to the drag of sleep. She turned her head to see this man, now her lover. Lover. A word she’d used to describe men before, but not too often and never like him. Like Sebastian. “Sleepy,” she murmured.
“You can sleep, honey.” His hand traced idle patterns along her naked back, his mind racing. Thinking about how natural she felt, beneath his arm, beneath his mouth. A sensation disturbingly similar to contentment wound lazily through him. “But not yet.”
“Sebastian?”
Their lips met, and he rolled her beneath him. “Sleep later, Kat. Much, much later.” Slowly, methodically, deliberately, he kindled fire, built longing and joined them together, determined to imprint himself on every fiber, every pore.
“Sebastian!”
“Fly with me, Kat.” He tasted and reveled in the breaking of her breath as he kissed every secret place. Groaned in delighted agony with the aches she created and eased as she feasted on his flesh.
Again and again, in the dark, they came together, drawn to find answers. To find satisfaction. Finding each other.
Chapter 19
“Katelyn.”
Naked, Katelyn inched forward, searching out the solid, sleek engine of a body that had pleased and ravished her for endless, blissful hours. Blindly, she patted at the still-warm place where Sebastian had lain. Her questing hands tapped an empty mattress, and the fog of her mind registered his absence with sleepy dismay. “Where’d you go?”
“Kat, wake up.” An ungentle smack to her sheet-covered bottom pushed her into alertness. “We’ve got company.”
Kat’s eyes flew open and met the imperious stare of Senora Martinez. Discarded aqua scrubs and a flimsy, torn top dangled from the matron’s fist. Mortification washed over Kat in waves, and she jackknifed up, clutching the sheet to her breasts. “Senora. Hello.”
The greeting tumbled out, and she wished fiercely that the methanol in the lab would explode and distract the censorious gaze. Kat swept an accusing look at Sebastian, who stood on the other side of the cot, looking smug. He, somehow, managed to be fully dressed and sipping from a cup of coffee. When he offered no rescue, she barely resisted the urge to snarl and instead pulled a ragged cloak of dignity about her. Clearing her throat, Kat smiled wanly at the woman who’d known her since childhood.
“Uh, Senora. I didn’t expect to see you.”
“That, my dear, is obvious.” Leaning in, Senora Martinez dropped the bundle of clothes into her lap. Their eyes met, and Kat could have sworn she saw a twinkle of pride. “You might want to clean up. We have much to discuss.”
“Sí, señora.” Without waiting for either to move away, Kat scooched to the end of the cot, dragging the sheet with her. One hand clutched the wad of fabric, and standing, she filched Sebastian’s coffee away with a muttered comment on his parentage. He opened his mouth to retort, but one look had him stepping away in demurral.
“Senora Martinez, perhaps you’d like a tour of the facility. We can
begin way over there.” Sebastian extended his elbow to the lady, a courtly gesture that drew her amusement. And her attention away from the fleeing Kat.
After the door to the shower slammed shut, the senora thumped his arm playfully. “You are a scoundrel.”
And exactly the right match for her Kat. When she’d come through the tunnel door, she’d caught Sebastian standing near their bed, watching Kat as she slept. One hand wound through the sleeping woman’s tousled brown curls, a baffled look playing over his face. In the instant he raised his head at hearing her, she glimpsed a raw terror. In a man like Sebastian, that fear had came from an undeniable source.
“You could have woken her,” she chided him now.
“I am a scoundrel, Senora.” Sebastian led her to the lab table where he and Kat ate. “But my mother insisted on teaching me manners.” He dragged out a stool and helped her to sit. “See?”
“They are not too rusty,” she acknowledged, settling onto the high stool. She teetered precariously, then, with a muttered imprecation, stood up again. Her fluffy curves would fare better standing, she decided, rather than falling to the tiled floor. The stools had been made for the hipless, not for women of her proportions.
Felix had insisted upon the barest of essentials in his hideway. Looking around, she remembered the day he’d shown her what his guilt had demanded and his millions had built. That day, like many others, he’d sworn her to secrecy. Oaths she would break today. She looked over at Sebastian, who’d risen gallantly when she stood. “I do not need a tour. You know well that I have seen this place before.”
“Given your stealthy appearance, I have to assume you also knew why Estrada constructed it. And that your visit today isn’t because of nostalgia.” Sebastian walked over to the burner, where a pot brewed. “Coffee?”
“No, gracias.” Senora Martinez looked around, taking in the place she had last visited ten years before. Her Josef had never come inside, did not know about Felix’s exploits. As his best friend, she knew, and because of that bond, she would care for his niece. Glancing up, she watched pensively as Sebastian returned with a black cup that steamed gently.
“I had visitors this afternoon. Three men in a police car.”
“Describe them.” Sebastian nursed his cup, listening intently.
“A tall one who had a mean look about him, he was the leader. There was a fat one who carried a knife and a boy in the car.” Her hands quivered once as she spat out, “The mean one asked about Felix. When I refused, the fat one pulled out his knife and would have come through the door. I shot him in the knee. I had no choice.”
He covered the wrinkled fist and squeezed. “They are the men that killed Felix.”
“Good. It is good that I hurt him then. But I did not shoot the others. The recoil,” she rolled her shoulders where the butt of the gun had slammed. “I had not shot for a long time, not since my grandfather.”
“You did well, Senora.”
Appreciating the easy acceptance, Senora Martinez patted the young man’s hand where it covered hers. “Gabriela. For these times ahead of us, I am Gabriela.”
“A lovely name.” He glanced at the bathroom door. Sebastian spoke quietly, listening for the roar of the shower. “Kat intends to follow in Estrada’s footsteps.”
Gabriela pointed to the whiteboards filled with Kat’s equations. “She is smart, our Katelyn, no?”
“Brilliant. And determined. She’s done what he couldn’t She figured out the formula and created the Cinchona.” Sebastian scrubbed at his eyes, abruptly, brutally tired.
“The elixir was a myth, I thought. Felix knew otherwise. He was a stubborn, foolish man.”
“He was right.” Dropping his hand to the marble slab, he uttered a curse. “Kat promised him that she’d return the Cinchona to its rightful owners.”
“The Mutambo.” A woman who understood more of the world than she’d seen, Gabriela understood the shadows clouding the lustrous dark eyes that held hers. The mother in her wanted to soothe, but she too had made promises. “Felix came to see me four months ago. He’d found a diary, he told me, in a monastery. The diary of the priest who wrote the Cinchona. The monks were reluctant to part with their treasure.”
“Because they’d sworn to protect it.” At her sharp look, Sebastian explained, “Estrada kept a journal.” He pointed to the desk and the computer. “On that. He coded it pretty well, hid it under layers of junk, but he wanted a record of his deeds.”
“Misdeeds,” Senora Martinez corrected blandly. “Felix was no altruist. He was a hot-blooded, passionate, selfish man who blamed himself for deserting his parents and squandering his wealth and youth. Always chasing something better, grander, more exciting. Never standing still long enough to appreciate what he’d found.”
“He was in love with you. Until he died.”
Sebastian saw the flicker of response, the softening of her mouth. Heard the almost inaudible, “Perhaps.”
Giving her a moment, he lifted his cup and drained the contents. He picked up the story, pretty clear on what happened. “Estrada goes to the monastery and convinces the monks to part with the Cinchona. I imagine they were not aware of their revised decision.”
She chuckled richly. “No, they were not. By then, Felix had compiled a formidable collection of ingredients. The green house, you have been inside?”
“Yes. Kat tells me that many of the plants only grow in the Amazon. I’ve never seen their equal.”
“Felix loved the beautiful, the exotic. Plants, sculptures, fine art.”
Beneath a hooded gaze, Sebastian gauged her reaction. “But he was obsessed with the Cinchona. That’s the one possession he died for. Nearly got his niece killed for.”
“Not on purpose!” Senora Martinez slapped at the table in disgust. “Felix was a dilettante, but he was not careless with her life.”
“The evidence begs to differ.”
“I thought you smarter, Sebastian. Evidence tells the story the listener wants to hear.”
“Then what is the truth? Isn’t that the question of the hour, Kat?”
Kat startled, wondering how he’d heard her when she made no sound.
“Come on. You need to hear this.” With a quick, emotionless look, he waved at her to join them.
She’d traded her black tank top for a white one, and the green scrubs rode low on her hips. Her hair curled wildly around her shoulders, the locks dark with water. The wanting he’d imagined sated returned with vicious force. The time, however, for satisfying his baser urges had passed. Reality had intruded when Gabriela Martinez entered the bunker. From now on, he mercilessly reminded himself, Kat and her luscious, agile body was off-limits.
Kat brushed at her wet, lanky hair. She’d brought a limp towel from the bathroom, wishing for a blow-dryer. But if wishes were horses, she thought bleakly, trying not to stare at Sebastian’s blank expression. Tension coiled through her, reminding her of his ample warnings. Sex and love were not the same for him. Hadn’t he been brutally honest?
She couldn’t blame him for the cool stare he leveled at her because she had no right to expect more.
As she’d been doing since landing in Bahia, Kat shoved aside the tempest of emotion and walked forward. The floor was slick beneath her damp feet, cold to the touch. Halting an arm’s length away, she repeated his query. “What is the truth, Senora Martinez?”
“You must understand, Katelyn. Felix blamed himself for not being here for your grandparents. He’d taken his inheritance and frittered it away, playing at archaeology and art and anything that captured his imagination. His one repentance had been medical school, but he’d not been trying hard. Then his father was diagnosed, followed in months by his mother. Your parents offered to return, but Felix was the older son. It was his duty.”
“He was too late. They were sick, and he couldn’t cure them.”
“No one could have.” Gabriela shook her head, remembering the arguments with Felix, the pleas for logic. “He got it into
his head that if he’d gone to medical school sooner, he might have known they were sick.”
“Impossible.”
“Of course it was. What he meant was that if he’d been around more, he’d have seen the signs.”
Kat mourned silently for the family she hadn’t met. “It wasn’t his fault.”
Unable to stop himself, Sebastian pulled Kat in front of him, her crown tucked beneath his chin. Silently, he plucked the towel she carried from her nerveless fingers and began to dry her hair slowly, methodically.
“Tell her about Borrero’s diary, Gabriela.”
Senora Martinez moved away, recounting how Felix came to her with his find. “Felix read the diary from cover to cover. Father Borrero’s instructions to the monks mandated that the diary and the manuscript remain separated. But there was no mention of where the Cinchona had got to. When Felix started studying Borrero’s order, he determined that the Brothers of Divinity had sent the Cinchona to a monastery in Cuzco.”
Sebastian continued to rub the water from Kat’s hair, her unnamable scent teasing his senses. To distract himself, he asked, “What happened?”
Senora Martinez clicked her teeth together and stopped at the lockers. “In Cuzco, Felix was followed. He got the Cinchona, but in his hotel room, a man attacked him. That’s how he knew his secret had been revealed.”
“Burge knew where he was going.” With a jerk of his thumb, Sebastian pointed to the computer. “I assume Burge tipped off his colleagues.”
“Felix needed help from this Dr. Burge. Despite his wealth and his experimentation, Felix was an amateur. But he’d stayed in contact with a friend from medical school. Burge agreed to review Felix’s data and help him.” Gabriela shook her head. “Felix was worried about whether Burge would reveal his plan. He gave me instructions, in case of trouble.”
Secrets and Lies Page 20