HOT SECRETS
A Hostile Operations Team - Book 13
Lynn Raye Harris
Contents
Preface
About This Book
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
Also by Lynn Raye Harris
Who’s HOT?
About the Author
Preface
HOT Secrets: Sky & Bliss
© 2018 by Lynn Raye Harris
* * *
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About This Book
She nearly ruined his life. Now she needs him to save hers.
* * *
It was supposed to be a simple job for hacker Bliss Bennett: access confidential files and turn them over to the CIA. But something went wrong—and now Bliss has a target on her back. With no idea who to trust, she heads straight toward the one man she hopes won’t turn her away.
* * *
Sky “Hacker” Kelley is a badass Special Operator with lethal moves and mad computer skills. He hasn’t seen his former lover—former wife—in four years, not since she nearly cost him his military career. Her arrival on his doorstep in the middle of the night reveals a gut-deep truth—he might want nothing to do with her, but he still wants her. And as much as he’d love to slam the door in her face, Sky isn’t wired to turn away anyone in distress.
* * *
Protecting Bliss won’t be easy. The files she stole are at the heart of a dangerous conspiracy, and someone is willing to do whatever it takes—including kill—to get them back. It’ll take all Sky’s considerable black-ops skills to keep Bliss safe—and all his willpower to resist falling into her bed, and her life, ever again…
Prologue
Four years ago…
* * *
Get the goods and get out.
That was Bliss Bennett’s mantra. But as she rolled over in the night, her body satiated from lots of hot sex with the soldier lying next to her, she thought maybe spending a little extra time on this job wasn’t a bad idea.
She pushed the sheet down his body, letting her gaze explore the beauty of his long legs and lean muscles in the moonlight coming in through the window. Sky Kelley was a computer geek like her, but what a sexy geek he was. He worked at a special assignment in the Pentagon, attached to Major Michael Tucker’s network defense office. Sky was a hacker, but he was a good-guy hacker. It was his job to test the network for vulnerabilities.
And it was her job to find out what the major was hiding from his superiors. The people paying her really wanted access to Major Tucker’s personal computer. She aimed to give it to them—as discreetly as possible. But first she’d see what, if anything, she could get out of the delectable Sergeant Kelley.
She cuddled up to him, surprised at the sizzle of electricity zapping into her from the simple touch of skin on skin. Sleeping with him hadn’t been part of the plan—or at least not so soon—but when she’d made contact in the bar tonight, she’d been stunned almost speechless by the way her body responded to something as simple as his hand on her arm.
It was supposed to be easy. Get to know Sky Kelley. Get close to him. Get into Major Tucker’s house and hack his systems. She’d argued that picking up the major would be easier than going through a subordinate, but her bosses didn’t want it done that way. Tucker might get suspicious. His wife might get even more suspicious.
Bliss had budgeted for two weeks since the major was having a house party he’d invited his office staff to, but maybe she’d stick around for a while after the job was done. It couldn’t be bad if it went like this.
Sky made a noise in his sleep, then turned toward her and palmed her breast. Bliss melted as he came awake, mouth seeking a nipple, fingers trailing down her body to slide into the wet heat between her legs.
She pushed her fingers into his hair, arched her back as he sucked her nipple and tweaked her clit at the same time. Soon she was clinging to him as he rolled on a condom and pinned her to the bed, thrusting hard into her body, dragging the root of his cock against the sensitive nerves at the base of her clit again and again.
Her body splintered as her orgasm seized her. She gripped him tight and rode his hard length for all she was worth, dragging out the sensation as long as she could.
He chuckled in her ear. “Greedy. I like it.”
He took her over the edge two more times before he finally allowed himself to follow her, a groan tearing from his throat as he came. When he got up to dispose of the condom, she told herself that she should make an excuse to go. Because what if he tired of her after a night of sex and she couldn’t complete her job? She was risking a lot by not playing a little harder to get.
But he walked out of the bathroom, ab muscles taut and rippling, and her will just sort of died at the sight. Plus she had enough sensual tricks up her sleeve to keep him wanting more. Not that she had often deployed them—well, many of them not at all—but she understood what men liked because she’d seen just about everything on the internet at least once. That’s what a career in computer hacking did for a girl. It was surprising how much money adult entertainment sites would pay someone to test their vulnerabilities and tighten their security.
“You want to stay in bed or get dressed and go have breakfast?”
She dragged her mind from the abyss of adult entertainment—and the things she’d like to do to Sky Kelley—and focused on him. “It’s not even morning yet.”
“Does it matter?”
She thought about it. “No, I guess not.”
“So… Are you hungry?”
“After a night with you? Yes, I think so.”
“Then let’s go eat. Talk somewhere that we can’t have sex.”
She snorted. “Is that a challenge, soldier?”
“Do you want it to be?”
“Dunno. Might be fun to get it on in the IHOP parking lot.”
His gaze was hot. “Then I guess we’d better see how it goes, huh?”
Yes, perhaps they’d better.
Chapter One
Present Day…
* * *
Bliss sat at a table where she could see the window, back to the wall, computer open, coffee within reach. It was just another day at Starbucks, or would have been if not for the job. She checked the time on her phone, then looked up to watch the street.
He appeared at two p.m., just like her contact had said he would. Guy in a shirt and tie, slacks, black shoes. Except he looked rumpled, not professional. Another office mouse who was sick of the rat race. He had a backpack slung over one shoulder and a morose expression on his face.
He crossed the street, walked inside the Starbucks, and placed his order. Five minutes later, he was at a table, laptop open, coffee and muffin at his side. He pulled out a Wi-Fi device and powered it on. Bliss quickly sent a jamming signal to the device and then replicated the network on her own system. Then she waited for him to connect.
“Oh goodie,” she murmured as his hard drive unfolded in front of her. All his files, all his work—right there for the taking. And take she would. She hit the keys to start the transfer and then took a sip of her coffee.
She didn’t know why Mr. Jones—his name totally wasn’t Jones—wanted this guy’s files, but when the government came calling, she did the work. They didn’t pay as much as the private sector, but they still paid well. Plus she was helping the CIA keep sensitive information off the streets. She didn’t know what this guy was trying to sell, but she didn’t need to know. Get the contents of the hard drive, hand it over, get paid.
The guy was nervous. He tapped at his email, surfed Facebook, and generally screwed off. But he kept darting his gaze to the street as if he was waiting for someone. Jones had said that this guy—Bill Martin—had been cruising the dark net, looking for a buyer for his information. So maybe he was expecting someone. Not that Jones would tell her that.
And Bliss didn’t need to know. She did the work, did it discreetly, and got paid. When the download finished, she zipped it up, stuck it on a USB stick, and erased it from her download logs. Popping the stick into her bag, she slapped her computer closed and started to tear down and pack up. Bill Martin frowned as he stabbed at his computer. The Wi-Fi was gone, of course, so he’d have to log on again. Only this time he’d be on his own Wi-Fi since she’d stopped jamming it. Not her problem.
Bliss dumped her sleek little laptop into the Louis Vuitton bag she carried, fished out her car keys, and headed for the door. She beeped her way into her BMW, climbed inside, and accelerated away from the curb as she punched on the radio.
Cliff Richard blasted through the speakers on the Yacht Rock channel, singing about a devil woman with evil intentions.
Bliss laughed and pressed the accelerator a little harder. It took about twenty minutes, and then she was pulling into the garage of her neat town house in Arlington, Virginia. She turned off the car, gathered her bags, and keyed in the code to her alarm system on her phone as she walked toward the door.
The town house was brightly lit because she turned on all the lights as she entered, and soft music played to welcome her. She passed through the spacious kitchen with its high-end—and never used—appliances and went upstairs to the master bedroom where she walked over to the bookcase and pressed a hidden button. The bookcase swung out, and she went inside a secure room and dropped the laptop case on the counter. Then she headed back out, closed the bookcase, and flipped on the television while piling her hair on her head and walking in to turn on the shower.
She’d toweled off and dressed in jeans and a tank top when her house alarm chirped. Bliss frowned as she picked up her phone and quickly checked her perimeter. And there it was, a breach in the rear of the house. A moment later, something heavy hit the floor and clanged. She knew what it was. The only thing it could be was the bronze statue of a horseman that she kept on a table in the hallway downstairs.
Bliss ran over to the bookcase and opened it, then popped inside and closed the secret door behind her. Her heart raced as she snatched the desk chair and dropped into it to gaze at the computer screens. She had six cameras on the outside of the house and small cameras in each room.
A man moved through the lower level of her home, holding a gun, sweeping into each room and searching for her. He wore a ski mask. Clearly this wasn’t a social call.
“Shit,” she breathed as she watched him methodically search every room. She turned on the microphones and listened. Not that he was going to talk to himself, but you never knew. She wasn’t worried he could get inside the safe room. It wasn’t obvious there was a room behind the bookcase, and the lock was both hidden and secure. She pulled out a loaded Glock 19 from her desk drawer anyway. The police would be on the way when the home-invasion alert tripped at her alarm company, which should have been about two minutes ago. It wasn’t instant, unlike what alarm-company commercials would have you believe, but they’d show up soon. Long enough she could wait it out in the safe room.
She switched to the outside cameras. A dark car sat in front of the house. A man was in the driver’s seat, waiting. Meanwhile, the man inside was heading up the stairs. He swept the upstairs. It was creepy watching him walk into her bedroom and even creepier when he went inside the bathroom. He stood in the steamy room and frowned. Then he took out his phone.
“What?” he barked. A pause. “She’s not here, that’s what’s taking so long. Except she is fucking here because the shower’s still steamy and her car is in the garage. Unless you saw her leave for a run, which I’m assuming you didn’t because you’d have fucking told me, right?” The man frowned hard, then stuck the phone back in his pocket and muttered, “Asshole.”
He lifted his head and searched the corners of the room. He wouldn’t find the cameras because she was better than that, but he probably suspected something. Which meant this wasn’t your typical home invasion. Not that she’d believed that anyway. Not with the way he seemed to be searching for her.
“Come out, come out, little girl,” he said.
Bliss threw a glance at the bag where her laptop lay and swallowed. What the fuck was in those files? Because that had to be what this was about. What else could it be?
Her cell buzzed. She snatched it up and answered. She wasn’t worried the invader could hear her conversation. The walls were thick concrete, and the back of the bookshelf was steel covered with soundproofing. The only way she could get a signal in here was with a booster, but she’d planned for that when she’d had the room built.
“What the fuck is going on, Jones?” she growled.
“Why? Where are you?”
“Why? Because someone broke into my house just an hour after I got your files. I’m somewhere safe.”
“Where are you? I’ll send an agent to pick you up. We’ll take care of the situation.”
Her heart pounded as she watched the man in her bathroom walk into her bedroom and bend down to look under the bed. He was tall, broad, and dressed all in black. Having him not more than ten feet away was surreal, but she had to keep telling herself he wasn’t going to find her.
She wasn’t telling Jones where she was hiding. It wasn’t necessary. The cops would be along soon, and she’d wait until these assholes were gone before she came out. Then she was getting the fuck out of here until she handed over the goods. Not to mention that she didn’t trust anyone. Not anyone, not ever. That’s how you stayed alive. She’d learned that back in the hills of Tennessee when she’d been a kid and her stupid family dealt in marijuana and meth. You didn’t squeal. You didn’t trust. You kept your mouth shut.
The one time she’d inadvertently brought the law down on the Bennett clan, her mother had hauled her to her grandfather, the patriarch of the family, who’d scared her within an inch of her life. Don’t talk, don’t call attention to yourself, don’t trust the wrong person—or you’ll find yourself at the bottom of a well someday.
“No, I don’t think so. Take care of the situation by getting these people off my ass. I’ll make the drop when you let me know it’s good.”
“Briar,” he said, calling her by her hacker name, “don’t be an idiot. Let me know where you are and I’ll make sure you’re safe. How long have we been working together? Are you really telling me you don’t trust me by now?”
The man in her bedroom walked out. He went into the guest room and ripped open the closet.
“No offense, but I don’t trust anyone.”
“Briar. Come on.”
“Sorry, dude. Not happening.”
He sighed. “Fine. I’ll meet you at the usual place. Tonight. Eight o’clock.”
“See you there.” She ended the call. Where the hell were the police? They should have been here by now.
The man stopped looking a couple of minutes later and answered his phone again. “What now? … No, no sign of
her. … Well, he can fucking come over here and do it himself, can’t he? … You took care of the alarm, right? … Then I guess we stay. Pull around the corner. I’ll wait for her to come back.”
Took care of the alarm? Bliss frowned. What the hell did that mean? Ice dripped down her spine. You know what it means.
Unfortunately, there was only one thing it could be. Whoever wanted these files had enough power to cancel her alarm. They hadn’t done it by hacking into her system because she still had full control. She called up the app and checked the components. Sure enough, it was all hers.
But someone had planned this, which meant they’d known she was going after Martin. Which also meant there was a breach somewhere along the information pipeline. Someone had managed to insert themselves between her system and the alarm company. Which meant she was going to have to figure out a plan to get out of here all on her own. She eyed her phone. She could call Jones back. He’d fix it.
Or she could wait until dark and deploy all the tools at her disposal to confuse and redirect this man just long enough to escape. Which was a better plan because she didn’t know where the breach might be. Still, she thought about her options for a few minutes, examining all the angles. Option one was certainly the most expedient, but there was risk in exposing her location to anyone. Option two required patience and skill. Oddly enough, she thought of Sky. She hadn’t seen him in four years, but in the time they’d spent together, he’d always impressed her with his ability to be cool and controlled in any situation.
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