Lucy frowned and sat up. “Maybe the killer only recently learned she spoke to the police?”
He huffed out an unamused laugh. “Funny how that happened after I gave the PFA a DNA profile to run through their system which gave us our first real suspect.”
Lucy blinked at him. “You think someone in the local federal police force is feeding information to the kidnappers?”
He didn’t want to think that. “It seems quite the coincidence that the day we actually get a suspect name, our only witness to the vehicle exchange is found murdered. And who was Abigail scared of?”
“Do you think Alberto did it? Someone tipped him off and he went and killed Abigail?” Lucy’s eyes grew huge. “Maybe that’s where he went after we lost him today?”
That was exactly what he was thinking. “He was determined to lose any surveillance. How hard would it have been for him to make his way to La Boca from that apartment we tracked him to in Boedo?”
“It’s only a few miles. He could have walked or jumped in a cab.”
“Yeah,” Max added. “Killed Abigail and then disappeared back to wherever the girls are being held, waiting for his cut of the ransom money.”
“That’s despicable.” Lucy drew her knees up to her chest.
Max took a left, loving the car even though his heart was heavy with regret.
“Where are we going?” She registered their surroundings for the first time.
“It’s almost five.” He glanced over at her. “Regan wanted me to spend some time in my room while he checked your Mini for tracking devices, remember?”
“It slipped my mind.” A shudder ran over her hunched shoulders.
“You could go get a meal in the restaurant. You don’t have to be in my room.”
Something flickered through her eyes. “No. If it helps to pretend we’re in a relationship, I’m happy to do it. I don’t want the Russians getting suspicious, especially if they are involved in the kidnapping.”
Because then they’d probably be responsible for Abigail Blanco’s death, and they’d almost certainly have informants in the local federal police force.
“I’ll order room service and we can eat something for a change.”
“I’m not hungry.” Lucy’s stomach made a noise of protest. Then her expression changed, and he knew she was thinking about the crime scene again.
“Don’t,” he said quietly, taking her hand in his and squeezing her fingers. “Let’s concentrate on taking care of the basics, doing our jobs and catching these bastards.”
She nodded but it was clear she wasn’t even close to being over this.
He valet parked, hoping that Regan and his team knew what they were doing. He wrapped a protective arm around her shoulders and walked her to the elevator. When they entered his room, he turned her around to face him and placed a tender kiss on her forehead. That was for the cameras.
It felt wrong to enjoy the contact, but he did anyway.
She closed her eyes. Clutched the front of his shirt.
He was aware of unseen eyes cataloguing his movements. His skin crawled at the idea of spending any time in this luxurious space.
His cell rang. Making Lucy step away from him.
Regan. “It’s done.”
“But I just got here,” Max complained loudly for show.
“If I were you, I’d go catch a few hours’ sleep while I could. Looks like it’s gonna be a long night.”
“Fine. I’ll call you when I’m done there.”
“Don’t bother. I’m planning on getting some sleep myself.” Regan hung up.
Max brushed Lucy’s hair off her forehead. “Sorry. I have to run out and grab something.”
She caught his fingers. “Stay with me again tonight.”
Her eyes held his and seemed to promise more than the spare room. But he was being fanciful. And hopeful. She was good at this.
He nodded, strangely unable to speak. They got out of there, slamming the door on the way out.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Despite her resistance, Max picked them up a burger and fries from a fast-food restaurant on the way back to her apartment. Once they got there, she opened a bottle of merlot and poured them each a large glass as they stood in her kitchen and picked at their food.
Lucy tried to swallow a fry, but it got stuck in her throat. She washed it away with a gulp of wine. She coughed.
Max rubbed his hand down her back. “Are you all right?”
Suddenly tears flooded her eyes, and she pulled her glasses off and tossed them on the counter. She covered her face with her hands. He drew her to him, his palm cradling the back of her head.
Maybe it was the lack of sleep over the last few days. Or the stress. Or the horror of seeing Abigail Blanco’s beaten body, but Lucy’s system had hit overload and she couldn’t hold it together any longer.
The desire to confide everything to this man almost overcame her. But then he wouldn’t be holding her this way. Then he wouldn’t be comforting her. Instead, he’d be pushing her away and questioning her and it was so long since anyone had held her. Fifteen months, one week, two days, to be exact.
He lifted her in his arms and carried her towards her bedroom. Placed her carefully on the bed. He kissed her forehead again and she wanted more.
“Sleep,” he said.
When he went to withdraw, she caught his hand. “Stay.”
He pressed his lips together in a line of reluctance. Then he nodded and climbed into the bed. He sat against the headboard and pulled her to his chest as she tried to dry her damp eyes on his shirt.
His hands soothed her arm and her back. The heat of him warmed her through to her bones.
Shadows danced against the white walls as she listened to his heart beating solidly in his chest. The shades were still drawn, a consequence of rising before the sun that morning.
The distant sound of rush-hour traffic lulled her.
She found herself drifting off to sleep but, the moment she closed her eyes, the image of Abigail’s face flashed into her mind. She jerked and Max’s hands tightened on her arms.
“What is it?” he asked softly.
“I see her whenever I close my eyes.”
He snuggled Lucy closer. She looked up and met his dark gaze. She felt herself free falling. Then his eyes dropped to her lips and her breath hitched.
He wasn’t supposed to see her in this way. His pupils weren’t supposed to dilate as if they liked what they saw when they looked at disheveled Lucy. His nose wasn’t supposed to flare slightly as though the scent of her called to him the way his did to her.
He stared into her eyes, and her heart hammered. Her nipples tightened. Desire coiled inside her low and tight. She thought he was going to kiss her. Instead, he said quietly, “I should leave you alone.”
“Why?” Her voice squeaked.
“I don’t want to take advantage of you.”
She played with his shirt buttons as she remembered how he’d told her he often mirrored words to build rapport. “Advantage of me?”
He swallowed audibly. “You’re upset.”
“Upset?” She shifted as she said the last, straddling his hips and pressing herself against him.
He groaned. “Lucy.”
She pressed a kiss to the side of his mouth. “What?”
His hands sat on her hips, unmoving. “We can’t. You’re distressed,” he repeated.
“I’m trying to take my mind off being distressed.”
He groaned again. “That’s my point exactly. You’re not thinking straight. I don’t want to hurt you.”
She drew the pad of her finger down the side of his beautiful face. “You won’t hurt me.” She would happily swap even physical pain for the grief and guilt currently shredding her insides.
His hands unconsciously moved her against him even as he tried to talk himself out of this. But she wanted him. She wanted this.
“I’d love to forget some of the nightmare the last few days
have been by having sex against every surface in this room. It doesn’t have to mean more than that.” Her voice caught, and he pulled her closer against him, one hand sinking into her hair and the other anchoring her against his hips.
He kissed her quickly, hungrily, then pulled back. “I want to, shit, Lucy, I’ve been thinking about this ever since we were sitting in that room together reading those police reports yesterday.”
She laughed. “Seriously?”
“Wrong of me, I know.”
It was perfect. She stretched against him and nipped his chin. She could feel his resolve evaporating. “Show me what you’ve been thinking about.”
He hesitated, staring deep into her eyes as if he could see into her soul.
She thought he’d back away then. Run from what he saw.
Instead, he began undoing the buttons of her blouse. She started to shrug out of her jacket, but he used the material to trap her and draw her closer. He nuzzled her neck, the sensitive skin where her pulse throbbed. Then lower, over her collar bone and the soft flesh of her breast. He licked her through the lace, the friction of his tongue, the roughness of the material against her nipple making her toes curl. She moaned as she raised her face to the ceiling.
“I wasn’t the only one noticing you either,” he whispered.
“You don’t have to lie to me.” She laughed shakily because of the riot of sensations he was creating. “I was there.”
“And yet,” he murmured, “you are blind to those around you.”
That was crazy. Old Lucy had observed men noticing her. New Lucy had spent a lot of time perfecting her disguise. “No one notices me when the likes of Agente Ramon are around.” She was proud of the fact she could hold a conversation when her world revolved around what his lips were doing to her body.
“They don’t notice you the same way I notice you, but they are aware.” He turned his attention to her other breast and the throbbing between her legs intensified.
Why did Max see her when others didn’t? Was this real…? How could she ever trust in real again, especially when she was the one deceiving others?
He twisted until she was lying on the bed, still trapped by her ugly clothes, him lying alongside her. Max slid her skirt up to reveal a lace thong and he held her still while he looked his fill. He cupped his hand over her sex, and she pressed up against his palm, desperate to relieve the ache.
“No offense to your suit, but your underwear kicks some serious ass.”
Her lingerie was a weakness, a means of clinging to some part of her old life in a way that she’d assumed no one would ever discover.
She pressed against him again, and he dipped a finger beneath the lace, brushing her clit and tracing her opening and making her gasp. He did it again. And again. She lay there trapped and quivering and feeling as if she could come from the slight brush of skin against skin.
But it still wasn’t enough. Not now. The floodgates of desire had opened and only having him inside her would be enough to satisfy her now.
She wriggled and he released her with a reluctant smile. She shrugged out of the confining shirt and jacket while he found the waistband of her skirt and undid the button. Lucy slipped the skirt off and tossed it away. She was in her underwear and he was fully clothed, but instead of making her feel vulnerable, she finally felt his equal.
She dragged his shirt out of his pants and quickly helped him undo the buttons. He climbed out of bed and hung his clothes over her vanity chair, proving his brain was still functioning while hers seemed to have been turned to mush.
This was just sex for him. A quickie.
For her it felt as if she’d escaped a dark prison that had held her captive for far too long. It felt like a revolution. It felt like a coup.
His body was unbelievable. All carved muscle with a sprinkling of black hair over his excellent pecs that arrowed down into his boxers. But it wasn’t his abs that had finally drawn her back into the light. It was the way he saw her, the way he treated her, as if she mattered, as if he really cared. She didn’t kid herself he felt more for her than that. He was a good person. A beautiful soul, inside and out. Right now, she was appreciating the out.
He climbed on to the bed and sat against the headboard. “Come here, Lucy.”
She straddled his legs. Touched him through his shorts, hot and hard. She wanted him inside her. She wanted to experience that feeling of fullness, of completion.
He kissed her again then pulled his head back slightly, a grin on those full lips. “I dreamt about you last night.”
“Me?” She blinked in surprise. “What did you dream about?”
“About this. About you. Doing things to you that were not entirely appropriate given we work together.” His eyes were intense. He was trying to figure out whether that turned her on or repulsed her.
She leaned closer to his ear. “I couldn’t sleep for thinking about what this might be like between us. I touched myself thinking about you being so close.”
The muscles in his jaw flexed. “I guess I can feel a little less guilty about what happened in the shower this morning then.”
“What happened in the shower?” she asked with a grin.
“I’ll show you later.”
That sounded delightful.
She went back to touching his body. Running her hands over his collar bone and across his deltoids. The pulse in his neck throbbed, and she leaned down and kissed the tender skin and watched his heart speed up.
He skimmed his finger across the top of her breasts, and a wave of gooseflesh formed in the wake.
He frowned. “You are so beautiful.”
“I’m not.”
He was going to ask her questions about her appearance again, and she didn’t want to answer them. Not now. Not later. Not ever.
Did he deserve to know the truth? Under normal circumstances, he deserved nothing but pure honesty. But this was a matter of national security and, if anyone had been taught the potential dangers of pillow talk, it would be her.
She kissed him instead. Took those lips of his on a test-drive. It didn’t take much coaxing on her part before he’d forgotten the questions that must be in his mind. Like how did a wallflower morph so quickly into a sex kitten?
It wasn’t much of a secret. Most wallflowers were sex kittens in disguise.
Her fingers traced the taut muscles across his stomach. “You keep in good shape for a negotiator, Supervisory Special Agent Hawthorne.”
His hands curved around her waist and lifted her off him, then dragged her down the bed until they were lying side by side.
He kissed her fingers one by one. “I never know when I might have to go hand-to-hand with a member of the Foreign Service.” He leaned over. “Or mouth to mouth. Or mouth to neck…” He kissed his way down her body and, by the time he was finished, he’d named and kissed every part of her anatomy.
She was quivering with sensation. And the horribly tender sense that Max was possibly the best person she’d ever met. With Sergio, she’d believed he was too good to be true and had been proven correct. With Max, she knew he was a wonderful and kind human being. She hated that what had happened with Raminksy was now tainting everything else in her life, including this interlude with Max. She didn’t want him to hate her when the truth came out. But he might.
He rolled up and off the bed and, for a frantic moment, she thought he was done with her. He left the room and she raised herself up on her elbows. She heard rustling.
Then he came back with a smile on his face and a strip of condoms in his hand which he tossed on the bedside table.
She raised a brow and he grinned back.
“As I’ve said on several occasions, I don’t generally hook up when I’m working. However, as a former SOF soldier I always carry condoms as part of a survival pack.”
She laughed. “Nice save.”
“It’s true.” He came down beside her, his grin igniting a feeling inside her that felt almost out of control. It wasn’t
lust. It was something she’d rather not examine but thought she might hoard as a memory until she was old and gray.
“Then again, I am good at talking my way out of difficult situations, or so I’ve been told.”
“You should turn it into a career.”
“I’ll look into that.” His hand rested on the curve of her waist. His skin was dark beside hers, making her look washed-out and pale. He kissed her again. “This is one situation I don’t want to talk my way out of.”
The shadows were deepening as dusk fell. It made it easier to pretend that they might have a chance at more than this. Maybe a proper fling. She knew it wouldn’t happen. They might have an hour or a night or a couple of days but, as soon as Kristen’s kidnapping was resolved, he’d be gone.
She cupped Max’s jaw and pressed her thumb to his lips before leaning leisurely forward for another taste. Then he took control of the kiss, rolling her onto her back and settling between her thighs.
He kissed her and stroked her skin, learning every sensitive inch, unclipping her bra and tossing it aside. Cupping her breasts and suckling until her eyes closed in pleasure. She tried to touch him, to speed it up when she couldn’t stand it anymore, but he grabbed her hands and pinned them above her head with one of his while he continued to drive her crazy.
“Max.” Her voice was pleading.
His other hand slipped lower and he touched her sensitive flesh, slipping one finger, then two inside her. She pressed her feet into the mattress and bucked against him.
“I don’t think I can wait any longer.” His voice was deep and gravelly.
“Then don’t.”
He chuckled as he released her and reached for a condom, quickly rolling it on while she kicked off her panties.
Then he was back, and she opened for him, welcoming him inside her, needing this. As he pushed deeper, she held his gaze, drowning in the liquid depths of his eyes, letting him see who she really was even if she couldn’t tell him. That he was a man she could give her heart to. He was a man she could love if she’d had the chance.
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