"I'm not drunk," I insisted, still in shock that he'd found me, that he was here, and that he smelled so damn nice.
"Not sober either. I spotted you downin' at least fifteen shots, three beers and barely any chips."
"Eight shots, two beers and I'd already eaten," I threw back.
"This ain't a negotiation. You can't drive when you've had that much piss."
I glared at him. "Who the fuck are you?" I demanded. If he was Roan's, then why the lecture? If he wasn't Roan's, then what the hell?
"Well, I ain't your fairy fuckin' godmother, that's for sure," he said, sounding a little angry. He shook his head, as though dumbfounded about something. He was quite clearly insane, and now would have been a good time to knee him in the balls again and run away.
I stood still and just looked at him.
"OK," I said eventually, wrapping my arms about my body. "How much is he paying you? Maybe I can better the offer?"
Ben's granite chipped eyes came up to stare at mine. For a moment he seemed to lose all train of thought, then with another shake of his head, he said, "You can't pay me what he pays me. I'm outta your league."
And OK, so I didn't have much money left, but still, a couple of thousand's got to be more than he'd get on this one retrieval job.
I started reaching into my satchel, hunting around for my wad of cash. A tearing sound broke the stillness of the air, as I opened up one of the hidden compartments where Dad's money was kept.
"What are you doin', red?" he drawled beside me.
"Finding you some money, so you can get on your way."
"Not gonna make a blind bit of difference. I can't be bribed."
"Everyone has their price."
"I'm not 'everyone'," he growled.
"Well, I'm not going with you!" I almost shouted, pulling my hands free of my bag and placing them on my hips instead. "And no matter what you think you saw in there, while you were spying on me, I'm more than capable of decking you, bud. I've done it once, I can do it again."
"Woman!" he rasped, stepping up to place his nose practically against mine. I could feel the hot wash of his breath across my lips. It took everything in me not to lick them. "I'm already breaking all the rules for you. Don't push me!" The last was an almost inaudible whisper, his voice so low and rough.
I stared at him some more. It wasn't hard to do, to be frank. Even frustrated, as he clearly was right now, he was gorgeous. I blinked a few times to get my head back in the game, now was not the moment to lose sight of why I was running. "What rules?" I asked, to stall for time so I could get my mind clear and act appropriately. "I didn't ask you to break any rules."
He took one more step towards me, which brought him so far into my personal space I could actually feel the heat from his body. I'd never thought that possible, to stand so close to someone that you could feel their warmth. He towered over me too, and I'm not exactly short, but somehow his whole presence made him seem like a giant.
Inappropriately my father's words flashed through my mind. Befriend a giant and he'll stand between you and the monsters knocking on the door. But that was stupid, this giant was the enemy, not a protector to stand between me and the monster that is Roan McLaren.
"No," he said, voice so low it sounded like it was scraping across the tarseal at our feet. "You didn't ask, but I am." His head tilted to the side slightly, as though he was assessing me in some way. His eyes held no colour at all, in the dim light of the street, just black chips of granite staring at me intently, as though he could see right through my skin and tell who I really was. "Are you worth the risk, red?" he asked. I didn't know what to say to that, so I said nothing. Did nothing. Just stood there like a dork and waited for the world to spin off its axis. "I think you might be," he whispered. "But I'm not sure."
OK, so this was bizarre. If he was Roan's, then he should be bundling me into a van and securely tying me up with tape, to haul my arse back to Wellington. He wasn't, so that left a couple of possibilities. Option one: He was still Roan's, but he had an ulterior motive. Perhaps use me to get something he wanted from the drug lord. In which case, I was still screwed.
And the other option? He wasn't Roan's, but another contender for the 'trap Sarah Monaghan' job. But why? Who else would want me? Who other than Roan Fucking McLaren would want to track me down and do... what?
I had no friggin' idea, but both options sounded pretty bad. I was quite sure I couldn't pull off another knee to the gonads moment, he would be expecting it now. Even reaching into my bag and retrieving my can of mace had a slim chance of success. He was flush against me, his hands held loosely at his sides, but within snatching distance should I make a single move.
Somehow he'd gotten through my defences. Somehow he'd bamboozled me with his smile and rough, sexy voice and totally out there statements. In all the years of being on the run, not one tracker had got this close before. What was with this man? And how did I fight it?
My heart fluttered in my chest like a trapped butterfly. I could feel the delicate pulse at the base of my neck match the pace. My breaths were short and sharp and totally out of control. My skin tingled, adrenaline coursing through my veins again. All of these sensations I've had occasion in the past to experience. But never had they felt like this.
I was alive. More so than ever in my life before. The noises of a quiet small town back street sounded crisp and clear to my ears. The rustle of leaves in a nearby tree, the creak of a gate swinging on its hinges. The distant roar of State Highway One and the odd late night traveller. The pungent smell of cooked chips and battered fish from the air vent at the back of the pub just down the road, mixed in with the yeasty smell of beer on tap.
And the scent of the man before me. Cologne; spicy, musky, masculine. And him. Everything was alive, present, omnipresent. I knew if I reached out and touched him, my fingers would dance across sensations I'd never had before. The desire to do so shocked me. I didn't know this man. I didn't trust him and he clearly didn't trust me. But I wanted him. I wanted him with every fibre of my body and being.
I even swayed involuntarily closer to his body until my breasts brushed the broad expanse of his chest. He sucked in a deep breath, which only made his pecs push harder against my nipples, making them throb. Making me throb. I closed my eyes briefly and licked my lips.
His hands grasped my wrists painfully and he hauled them up between our chest.
"What are you playing at?" he demanded in a guttural voice. "You think I don't know how you operate? How you toy with your marks, use them to get what you want? I've been watchin' you for a while now, red, and you are some piece of work." He gave me a little shake to send those last words home. A small sound escaped my lips unintentionally. It was pained, but not because he was particularly hurting me. His hold was firm and strong, but not nasty. It was his words that did it.
Oh, I knew he must have been tracking me for a while. I'd felt that itch for close to three weeks, getting stronger and stronger until I couldn't ignore what it was anymore. The cologne, the persistent erotic dreams associated with that scent; warnings I had ignored. It had to have been him. So, that didn't surprise me, and if I'm honest, his assessment of me didn't either. But what did surprise me, hurt me, was that I didn't want this man to think that was all I was.
What the hell was wrong with me?
"You don't know me," I said on a whisper, but the words were strong. Steel in my bones. "You know nothing about me. No matter what he's told you, it's all lies."
"I think I'll trust him over you any day," he said through clenched teeth and then suddenly released my wrists and stepped away. A gaping hole existed between us; a ravine, a chasm, that felt chillingly, achingly, wrong.
"So what now?" I spat back. "You've found me, so why aren't you wrapping me up and handing me over like a gift? Or do you have other plans? How best to use Roan McLaren's little obsession? What would a man like McLaren give you for me?"
Ben looked at me intensely for several long se
conds. I don't think his chest moved the entire time he stared. He was a statue before me, so still, so silent. But coiled strength and menace lurked beneath the hardened shell. I should have been scared. He was here because Roan sent him. He was my enemy. Instead all I could think was how glorious it would be to crack that shell. To make him lose control. To be the one that pushed him over the edge.
I wanted to be the one.
Shit. Those dreams had really done a number on me.
When the seconds turned into a minute, I decided it was time to high-tail it and hitch a ride out on State Highway One. It wouldn't be the first time I'd thumbed a lift in the middle of the night. It probably wouldn't be the last. And how depressing was that thought?
I turned away and started walking down the street. He could follow. He could reach out and grab me. He could yell a few obscenities at my back. Anything would be better than the statue that just stared.
It took him at least two minutes to make his move. Longer than I had expected. I'd even made it back up to the intersection that led down the main drag in Huntly. I was about to cross over and head out onto the highway when I heard his footfalls at my back. He didn't say anything, he just fell into stride beside me, as though he was escorting me to my next ride.
"Who the fuck are you?" I repeated my question of before, this time it sounded exasperated.
He let a harsh breath out, it sounded as frustrated as I felt. Then he ran a hand through his short dark hair, the muscles across his chest flexed and I pictured the Tiki tattoo under his jacket sleeve bulge with that simple movement. Everything this man did caught my eye and fuelled my imagination.
"Why are you runnin', red?" he asked eventually.
"Well, that has to be the stupidest question I have ever heard!" I exclaimed with a wave of both hands up in the air to emphasise my frustration.
"It's a simple question," he replied, then repeated, "Why are you runnin'?"
"Because I don't want to be caught?" I said facetiously. "That's normally why people run," I added in a mumble. Well, in my world, it was.
"Why don't you wanna be caught?" he persisted. His voice now was level and low, it rolled over my skin like a comforting blanket. Oh, he was very good at this, wasn't he?
"I like my independence." I gave him the answer that would make the most sense. "Roan would take that away." And not nicely either.
And why was I answering this guy? This man who was my enemy. I supposed it was because it wouldn't change the outcome. He would still take me to Roan, if I didn't get away first. Surely my answers weren't that much of a surprise. Or did he think Roan represented the job of a lifetime?
"He's not everything you think he is, you know," I added and actually felt Ben stiffen at my side. I shook my head. Yeah, a lot of the guys who worked for Roan had been sucked into his god complex. They believed the bull he spewed out.
"How can you say that?" he asked, truly sounding astounded at my words. "How can you not see him for what he is?" Ben's voice had risen on that last question, frustration and outrage lacing his tone.
I stopped walking and turned to look at him, arms crossed over my chest, frown in place.
"How can you be so fooled?" I demanded. "You're just like all the rest. I didn't take you for being a mindless sheep." God knows why, but I thought he had a few brain cells to rub together, I'd obviously thought wrong.
"Right back at ya, sunshine," he said, leaning forward to deliver the words in my face. And sunshine? Where did that one come from? "Clearly you're as delusional as the rest of those fucked up piss-ants."
My eyebrows rose up my forehead.
"Oh, really? If I was so fucked up why did I escape at aged eighteen? And what the fuck's a piss-ant?" I demanded, hands back on hips, my body leaning forward into him to deliver my words in his face.
His finger came up and jabbed me once in the chest. "You. Obviously. Sold on the propaganda of a low-life drug pusher."
My finger came up and jabbed him in the chest once. "I'm not the one running back to the boss to hand over a non-compliant woman! Who's the one sold on Roan's propaganda?"
He stepped closer, chest to chest, his frowning face staring down at me from such an angle I had to lean my head right back to look him in his granite-chipped eyes.
"Why the fuck did you have to be part of that world?" he demanded in a growl.
"I can't help where I was raised," I growled back. "But at least I got the fuck out of there. You didn't!"
He opened his mouth to deliver some sort of pearl of wisdom and then slammed it shut again with a snap. His brow furrowed, his lips tipped down in a scowl and then finally he said, voice barely more than a whisper, "What the fuck?"
"Arghh!" I exclaimed inarticulately, throwing my hands up in exasperation all over again. Before they had a chance to lower, Ben had grabbed them and pulled me hard against his chest.
"Tell me this one thing, red, and for once don't lie." I blinked up at him, not even attempting to tug my hands free or step back from all that delicious heat. "Why are you running?" He said each word slowly, carefully, in case I didn't understand the - repeated - question.
I frowned up at him, but considered his words. Or more appropriately, the reason why he may have felt the need to repeat them again. Because this didn't make any sense at all. I felt like I was missing something and he clearly felt the same way. A strange feeling washed through my body. It wasn't exactly hope, I think I lost the ability to hope eight years ago, but it was something monumental. Something I never thought I'd experience ever again.
"You're not one of Roan's men, are you?" I asked and received one short shake of his head to say no.
I breathed. It was all I could do. I knew there could be other big, bad people out there who may have wanted me for some nefarious reason. And let's not forget Roan has enemies, if they cottoned on to his obsession with me, I would be a valuable tool in whatever fucked up war they had going on with him. But something alien, something deep down inside yet so foreign to me, made me think Ben wasn't one of those men. I had no evidence, no proof, that the emotion was true.
Except his strange reactions tonight. An almost self-righteous indignation that made me think he was sure he was on the right side of this equation and I was not. The kind of self-righteousness people get when they know the full might of the law backs them up.
"Are you CIB?" I asked, thinking maybe he was a detective in the Criminal Investigations Bureau, but just received another of those short, sharp shakes of his head.
"Then what do you want with me?" I asked, truly lost in more ways than I could count.
"That's three questions to my one, red," he pointed out softly. A tone I hadn't heard from him before. My eyes flicked up to his. Still chips of unforgiving granite, but somehow not. "How about you answer mine first, before I answer any more of yours? Only fair," he added.
I was still flush against his chest, still clasped tightly in his hands at my wrists. I felt warm in all the places you want to feel warm. And for some inexplicable reason, I felt safe.
I'd not felt safe for eight years. Even when my father looked out for me while I was still back at the Compound. Fear and anxiety had become my constant companions, from the night Roan visited me in my room.
But I had felt safe in my dreams. Dreams, I was beginning to realise, that featured this man.
"He wants me," I said, feeling like my world was tipping over sideways. Gone was the clarity of before, in its place a hazy murkiness that buffeted me from everything I knew I should be feeling, but wasn't. "I don't want him," I added, because Ben had gone silent statue again.
Then I admitted the one thing I had never, ever, admitted to another soul in the past five years.
"My Dad told me to run and hide. So I am."
Then Ben did the strangest thing. He released my wrists, but didn't let me go. Instead he wrapped me up in his strong arms and held me close.
It was the most beautiful thing anyone had ever done for me.
C
hapter 7
Finally Got The Chance To Act It Out
The sound of an eighteen wheeler roaring past the intersection at Mach 5 brought us both out of the bubble we'd been floating in. Ben stiffened first, then jerkily pulled away from the embrace. Another hand went through his dark hair.
I shifted the shoulder strap of my satchel to get more comfortable and for something to do with my hands. Before I'd settled it into position, Ben reached out and tried to remove it from where it rested.
"Don't," I said, jerking my shoulder out of reach. I never let anyone else carry my bag. It had my life inside it. All that was left of me.
Ben scowled at me, but didn't push the issue, just thrust his hands in his jeans pockets, bringing my eyes to his groin. I hadn't meant to look there, the movement caught my attention, nothing more. But for some reason I couldn't seem to look away. It's not that I was seeing anything in particular, but apparently some part of me was aware of what lay beneath.
I really needed to get laid. It had been a while.
Fucking medication.
Ben cleared his throat, when my eyes finally lifted to meet his, amusement graced his face. I threatened the blush that started, with imminent death and hoped the tactic worked. His grin grew into a smirk.
I took a deep breath in and let it out slowly, then asked, "So what now? If you're not Roan's and you're not CIB, what do you want with me?"
Strangely he chuckled. I had not expected a chuckle. It sounded nice.
"Truthfully?" he said and I just nodded, what else could I do? "I have no fuckin' idea." I grunted a not so amused sound out at that. His eyes flicked up to mine and I watched as they trailed over my face and then my hair. "I prefer the red," he said out of nowhere.
"Bully for you," I shot back. I preferred it too, but beggars can't be choosers and all that.
"Do you even remember what your natural colour is?" he asked and the conversation started to take on that bizarre quality again.
Sweet Seduction Shadow Page 7