Kick A** Heroines Box Set: The UltimatumFatal AffairAfter the DarkBulletproof SEAL (The Guardian)

by Karen Robards

  “The events since that time have gone a long way to sober me up.”

  She held out her hand. “Doesn’t matter how you feel, Quinn. Your blood alcohol level is probably still over the legal limit. You don’t want to get arrested for murder or driving while under the influence.”

  He jingled the keys and glanced down at his Honda. “Can you manage a bike this size? It’s not your little scooter.”

  She snorted. “Hop on the back.”

  Rikki handled the bike like she handled everything else—with confidence and ease. He did have to help her hoist the bike onto its kickstand, but she’d been right about taking the wheel—or the handlebars. He’d been an idiot to take a chance like that on the bike, no matter how sober he felt, but he couldn’t stand to see her waltz right out of his life just after he’d discovered she’d survived the ordeal in North Korea.

  How the hell had she escaped that torture?

  As they approached his front door, Rikki hung back. “You didn’t leave your place unlocked again, did you? We’re not going to find Alice waiting in your bed, are we? Or worse?”

  “I can dispense with Alice easily enough, but if that man who had you at gunpoint has any friends, we want to make sure he hasn’t ID’d me and dispatched one of his cohorts to wait for us.”

  Rikki’s brown eyes widened as if the thought had never occurred to her. If it hadn’t, her spy skills needed some refreshment.

  Where had she been since escaping from North Korea?

  He tucked her behind him. “Wait here while I give it a quick check.”

  Her hand grabbed his side, and she lifted her abductor’s gun from his waistband. “Now I’m armed, too. We’ll take ’em on together.”

  “I forgot who I was dealing with.” He unlocked his door and pushed it open slowly with his foot. When it stood wide, he entered his apartment with his weapon sweeping the room.

  Rikki closed and locked the door behind them and crept in beside him, peeling off to check out the back rooms. She called out, “All clear.”

  Quinn peered over the counter into the kitchen. “All clear here.”

  Rikki joined him and blew out a breath. “How would that guy have ID’d you? He barely got a look at you before you took him down.”

  “If he knows who you are, he might make the connection from New Orleans to me and me to you.”

  “There aren’t many people who knew what we did in Dubai.” Her lashes fluttered, and she got busy putting away the spare gun. “I mean, that we…hooked up. I don’t think some random person from intelligence is going to make that link between me and you.”

  “Intelligence? Is that who that was? You said it yourself earlier. The CIA thinks you’re dead.”

  She raised her shoulders to her ears. “I don’t know who he was, and more important, he didn’t know who I was.”

  “Are you telling me that was some kind of random abduction?” Quinn shook his head. “No common street thug is going to get over on you, Rikki, especially when you have a gun and cuffs on you.”

  “I didn’t say he was a common criminal. The guy had mad skills himself and I’m not downplaying your heroic rescue, but he’d let his guard down by the time he got me outside the Gator Lounge. He wasn’t expecting anyone to come riding to my defense.”

  “You think he was from the Company?”

  “I don’t know. We didn’t get that far in our acquaintance, but he did not know who I was. He asked me.”

  “Maybe I am still drunk.” Quinn massaged his temple with two fingers. “If he didn’t know who you were and he was some kind of spy, why was he abducting you and why were you meeting him?”

  Rikki hopped on a stool, straddling it, knees wide. “First, you. How did you know I was going to the Gator Lounge when I left here?”

  “I didn’t know you were going straight there when you took off, but I saw the text message come through.” He clicked his tongue. “Careless, Rikki. I was looking straight down at your phone, but then maybe you wanted me to see that message.”

  She shot up on the stool, her back ramrod straight. “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Now you. Who were you meeting at the Gator and why?” He held up one finger. “And don’t even try lying to me.”

  She slumped, her shoulders rounding, her hands on her knees. “I don’t know exactly who I was meeting. We had a series of clues for each other, a back-and-forth, starting with his Dodgers cap.”

  “That guy was wearing a Dodgers cap. What happened?”

  “I spotted him at the bar, everything on track. I ordered a beer, using the agreed-upon language, but he didn’t reciprocate. He went off script. My contact didn’t know who I was and wasn’t supposed to ask, but this guy…” She waved one hand in the air.

  “You figured he wasn’t your guy or maybe your guy had been replaced? What did you do?”

  “I admitted nothing to him and was getting ready to abandon the mission. I must’ve telegraphed that because the next thing I knew, he had his gun poking me in the side.”

  Quinn crossed his arms, curling his fingers into his biceps. “Did he ask you any more questions at that point?”

  “Nope. Started marching me away to God-knows-where.” She captured the unfamiliar brown hair in one hand and curled it around her fist.

  Quinn’s gaze locked onto the dark, silky strands. Even without her wavy red hair and bright blue eyes, he’d recognized Rikki in a flash. Why wouldn’t he? She’d been in his dreams nightly.

  He tugged on a lock of his own hair, which he’d grown out since his previous deployment. “Is that a wig? It’s so…different.”

  Her mouth formed an O and released a little puff of air. “I thought we were talking about my abductor.”

  “We are, we will, just wondering about the transformation.” The warmth from his chest began creeping up his neck.

  Even discussing a violent incident and a mystery, Quinn couldn’t tamp down his attraction to Rikki. He could take her right now, across that kitchen counter, bent over that stool, and not give another thought to her mysterious meeting or the man he’d beaten down in the alley.

  What did any of it matter with this woman back in his life, sitting right in front of him, inches away?

  She tossed her head, and the dark hair flowed over one shoulder. “It’s not a wig. I had my hair straightened when I had it colored. It’ll last for several weeks—as long as I need.”

  Quinn ran both hands over his face as if waking from a long, drugged sleep. “As long as you need to do what, Rikki? What are you doing in New Orleans? What was that meeting all about?”

  “The man I was supposed to meet had something for me, something that might help me clear my name. I need that. I need something before I can go to the CIA and reveal that I’m still alive—and no traitor.” She blinked and rubbed her nose with the back of her hand.

  The Rikki he knew, the woman who’d dumped him in Dubai, never cried. But that woman had been a trusted CIA operative at the top of her game and still on the rise.

  When she’d succumbed to him, knowing her superiors would frown on her conduct, knowing she could be reprimanded, she’d spun out of control. Their desire for each other had been so great they’d both thrown caution to the wind. They’d made love in glass elevators high above the glittering city, coupled in the warm waters of the Persian Gulf in a place that frowned upon spouses holding hands in public.

  And during all of it, the kick-ass CIA operative who could disarm a man without breaking a sweat and interrogate a suspected terrorist for twenty-four hours straight had relinquished control to him in every way. She’d waited for his commands, done his bidding, which was really her own. She could pretend to herself that he’d mastered her mind and body, but in reality he’d been the captive. She’d enthralled him. Still did.

  Quinn launched forward and crouched beside her. His thumb sw
ept her bottom lashes where a single teardrop trembled, although she’d willed it not to fall.

  “You deserve that life back, and I’m going to help you reclaim it. What did your contact have for you?”

  “A-a flash drive containing some information. I don’t think he even knew what the info meant, but he was going to pass it along to me.”

  “On whose authority? Who’s your contact at the agency? Who sent him?”

  Rikki swept her tongue along her bottom lip. “Maybe it was all a setup. Maybe the goal of the plan all along included my capture. The flash drive a ruse to lure me out.”

  “Who sent him? Not some anonymous source? You didn’t trust some anonymous CIA drone, did you?”

  “It was Ariel.” She hunched forward, her nose almost touching his. “You know Ariel, don’t you?”

  “The head of the Vlad task force. Several of my SEAL team members have been on assignments controlled by Ariel—and they trust her, or him.”

  “Her. Ariel is definitely female.”

  “How do you know that? I think one of my team members actually spoke to her, but we’re not even sure it was the real Ariel.” Quinn’s eyes narrowed. “You know her?”

  “Ariel was my mentor at the CIA when I started. You know, one female spy to another in a department dominated by men.”

  Quinn sat back on his heels. “You mean, you know the real Ariel? The actual woman behind the clever pseudonym? From what I understand, the Vlad task force is controlled by Prospero, Jack Coburn’s black ops organization. Ariel, Prospero—from the Shakespeare play.”

  “Yeah, I remember my Shakespeare and yeah, Ariel is with Prospero now, recruited from the CIA several years ago.”

  “Her real name?”

  Rikki ran her fingertip along the seam of her lips. “Ariel.”

  Quinn jumped to his feet and paced in front of the window. “You don’t owe her anything if she set you up.”

  “I can’t be sure she did. She’s the one who discovered I was in the labor camp and not dead. She’s the one who helped me escape, get back to…get out.”

  “Maybe she did all that so she could dial in the CIA and have them recapture you. Maybe she didn’t want you hobnobbing with the North Koreans, possibly passing them intel.”

  “I don’t believe that, not…Ariel. If that’s what she wanted, my contact at the bar would’ve followed through with our assignment without alarming me, and then she could’ve sent the FBI to pick me up and arrest me.” Rikki slid from the stool and edged around the counter into the kitchen. “That’s not how this went down.”

  “Maybe the contact himself went rogue. Maybe he recognized you.”

  She made a half turn from the fridge, a bottle of water in her hand. She raised it. “In this getup? Just because you had me figured out immediately doesn’t mean some CIA agent is going to recognize me from a photo in a briefing on spies within the Agency. Dark hair, dark eyes…” She patted her hip. “A few extra pounds. This is a damned good disguise.”

  When she touched her body, Quinn’s gaze followed her hand. Rikki had always been long and lean. He tracked up the curve of her hip to the loose blouse draped over her form, brushing the ample swell of her breasts.

  He swallowed hard. He’d always enjoyed Rikki’s slim, athletic build—especially given their marathon lovemaking sessions in…unusual places and circumstances. But for the first time this crazy evening, he noticed the new softness of her body—the way her jeans hugged her derriere and thighs, the seductive sway of her hips when she walked, the way her blouse pulled tight across her breasts when she spread her arms or gestured. His erection pulsed again.

  Then he blinked. Rikki hadn’t just escaped from a North Korean labor camp. She’d been recuperating somewhere.

  Quinn cleared his throat. “God, it’s late. You’re bunking here tonight, and I don’t want to hear any arguments.”

  She snapped her mouth closed and chugged some water from the bottle. “Okay, but just so we’re clear you’re sleeping in the bed and I’m taking the couch.”

  Quinn’s erection ached for relief, and he tugged on the hem of his cargo shorts. “Yeah, of course, but I have a sofa bed in my office and you can have that.” He opened his mouth in a pretend yawn. “We can try to figure out what happened to your contact tomorrow. If you still trust her, get in touch with Ariel.”

  Rikki sloshed some water in her mouth before swallowing. “Do you happen to have an extra toothbrush?”

  “I’m on leave, and you’re in luck because I just went to my dentist two weeks ago. I think he’s under some misconception that the Navy supplies me with one toothbrush every two years, because he loaded me up. They’re in the second drawer on the right. This place has two bathrooms, so you’re welcome to the other one.”

  “I’ll take the water with me to bed.” She swept her small purse from the counter. “This is good. I’ll get a good night’s sleep and regroup in the morning. I’m sure Ariel will have an explanation for me.”

  “If you think you can trust her.”

  “I do.” She turned at the entrance to the hallway. “Thanks for your assistance tonight, Quinn. Maybe I did want you to see that text after all.”

  “You can always ask me, Rikki. You can ask me for anything.”

  A smile trembled on her lips, and then she disappeared down the hallway.

  Cocking his head to the side, Quinn listened as she got a toothbrush from his bathroom and then shut herself in the other one.

  He sprinted down the hall and ducked into the second bedroom. He pulled out the sofa bed, darted to his bedroom, snagged a pillow from his bed and tossed it onto the sofa bed. Despite his best efforts at a quick assembly, Rikki hovered at the door of the office as he dragged a blanket across the bed.

  “Just making up the sofa bed. Did you find the toothbrush and toothpaste okay?”

  “Yep.” She ran her tongue along her teeth.

  “Okay, then. Tomorrow.” His gaze darted to Rikki still propping up the doorjamb. She didn’t expect him to squeeze past her, did she? He couldn’t handle that.

  A few seconds later that seemed like minutes, Rikki pushed herself off the door. “Nice apartment. I had memorized your address from…before. I was hoping you still lived here.”

  He spread his arms. “Still here. Sleep tight.”

  He practically ran from the room, slamming the door behind him. Sleep tight? What did that even mean, anyway?

  He brushed his own teeth and studied his reflection in the mirror. He needed a shave—and an attitude adjustment. Rikki didn’t want him anymore. She’d made that clear before. And after he’d gone on a mission to assassinate her? Yeah, pretty much killed any thread of a chance he had left with her. Now if he could only send that message to his body.

  He yanked the covers back from his bed and pulled off his T-shirt. He unzipped the fly on his shorts and hooked his thumbs in the band of his briefs as he started to take them down with his shorts. He usually slept naked, but maybe leaving on his underwear would protect him from lustful thoughts about Rikki.

  He crawled between the sheets, rolled on his side, then the other side, and then flopped onto his back, one arm flung across his face. Briefs, no briefs, fully clothed, suit of armor—didn’t matter. Rikki Taylor was in his blood, and now she was back in his life.

  About an hour later on the edge of another feverish dream, Quinn bolted upright in bed, his heart racing. He paused and heard the noise that had awakened him.

  Someone pounded on the door again.

  Quinn rolled out of bed and grabbed the gun on his nightstand. He crept toward the front door and paused, holding his breath.

  The pounding resumed, following by a groan and a shout. “Quinn? Quinn, you there?”

  Quinn drew his brows over his nose and released the locks. He eased open the door, and a man fell across the threshold, bruis
ed and bloody.

  “Quinn, you gotta help me. They’re gonna kill me.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  With her blouse pulled on over her panties, Rikki tiptoed to the office door, the gun Quinn had taken from her abductor clutched in her hand.

  She opened the door a crack and sucked in a breath as the men’s voices, Quinn’s and someone else’s, carried down the hallway.

  Had he called someone to take her in?

  She rubbed her eyes. If that were the case, the guy wouldn’t be banging on the front door in the wee morning hours. She pressed her ear to the gap in the door, wrinkling her nose. She couldn’t hear a damned thing.

  With the gun leading the way, she edged down the hallway and tripped to a stop.

  Quinn looked up from tending to a badly beaten man stretched out on his living room floor. “Put down that gun and soak some towels with water.”

  The authoritative tone of his voice had her jumping into action. She placed the weapon on the kitchen counter and scurried back to the hallway, where she rummaged through a few shelves, sweeping towels into her arms.

  In the kitchen, she ran two of the towels beneath the faucet until they were soaked and dropped next to Quinn attending to the injured man.

  As Quinn checked the man’s injuries, Rikki dabbed the cuts on his face with the corner of a damp towel. “Who is he?”

  “CIA.”

  Rikki dropped the towel and jerked back. “You called him?”

  Quinn spit out between clenched teeth, “I did not. He just showed up on my doorstep like this. I don’t know what the hell he’s doing here, but he’s a friend, and I’m not turning him away.”

  “O-of course not.” Rikki grabbed the towel and continued cleaning the man’s facial wounds. “What happened to him?”

  “I don’t have a clue. He appeared and collapsed.”

  The man moaned, and Quinn leaned in close. “Jeff, Jeff. What happened?”

  Jeff peeled open one puffy eye, caked with blood. “Got the jump on me. Beat me up.”

  “Who? Street robbery? Do you want me to call the cops?”