Bad Attitude

  Steele pulled her hand to his lips so that he could nibble her sensitive fingertips as he watched her ride him slow and easy. Nothing had ever been sexier to her. She began to move faster against him as she felt her pleasure building. Steele lowered his hand so that he could thrust against her, driving her even closer to the edge.

  When she came, she bit her lip to keep from crying out in relief.

  Steele cupped her cheek in his hands as he watched the pleasure on her face. The sight of her combined with the spasms of her body around his succeeded in pushing him over the edge too.

  He growled deep in his throat as he exploded inside her. Fully spent, he didn't want to leave her. She was beautiful straddling him. He could feel the short, crisp hairs of her body tickling his skin, while her breasts were still puckered from their play.

  Their bodies still joined, Syd leaned forward to cover him. Truly there was nothing better than the sensation of her bare breasts resting on his chest. All the pain of his injuries was completely forgotten.

  But more than that, the pain of his past seemed to be dulled too, and that made no sense whatsoever to him.

  Steele held her quietly as he simply enjoyed the sensation of her body covering his. Of her silken limbs entwined around him. It was one of the most peaceful moments of his life. He never wanted to get up and leave this bed.

  Syd had never been more satisfied in her life. Completely sated, she was suddenly terribly tired. She closed her eyes to rest, and before she knew it, she was sound asleep.

  Steele smiled at the soft little snore. Well, that was a first. He'd never had a woman do that with him before. Usually they bitched when he fell asleep on them.

  But then they'd had a long day, and she, unlike him, hadn't had a nap.

  As gently as he could without waking her or hurting his arm or shoulder, he wiggled out from under her. She sighed sleepily before she readjusted herself on the mattress. Her naked body was flushed from their play, her lips swollen from his kisses.

  Steele took a minute to lie there beside her and just watch her. An unexpected tenderness flooded him as some foreign part wondered what it would be like to spend the rest of his life like this. Syd was a unique kind of woman.

  Closing his eyes, he buried his face in her silken black hair and inhaled the sweet fragrance.

  He was lying there lost in thought when all of a sudden he heart a sharp, unmistakable pop.

  It was a gunshot.

  Fourteen

  S teele grabbed his pants from the floor and hurriedly dressed. He glanced at Syd, who was still asleep. Damn, she really was tired. Maybe he'd been mistaken about the sound and what had caused it. It hadn't been particularly loud.

  Still...

  He reached for his handgun before he opened the door and made his way down the hallway, toward the command center.

  With his weapon held out before him, he crept forward, ready for anything. He pressed the lever at the end of the hallway and waited expectantly as the door opened.

  Steele's jaw went slack at the sight that greeted him.

  Jack was in the process of cleaning blood off the floor. "You smart-ass bastard," he grumbled. "You couldn't just sit there, could you? Oh, no, you had to go and make a mess for me to clean up. I ought to shoot you in the head again, just for good measure."

  "Jack?"

  His expression completely irritated, he looked up. "I know you're there, kid. I'm not deaf or stupid."

  Steele relaxed as he moved forward and saw the body on the other side of the couch. "What happened?"

  He made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. "Syd had me loosen the ties on him 'cause she was afraid I was going to hurt him, and he was pretending to sleep. I was getting ready for bed when the bastard lunged at me. He thought the little old doddering man couldn't hold his own. Well, I showed him. Now I'm sure Syd'll have my head for breakfast. But it wasn't my fault. What was I supposed to do? Let him kill me?"

  No doubt, Syd would be pissed. Jack really had made a mess of the guy. "Yeah, she did want to question him."

  Jack paused to look up at him. "Do you really think he would have told her anything useful?"

  "Not in a million years."

  "Exactly."

  After putting his gun away, Steele helped him clean up the mess, even though his shoulder protested greatly. As Jack bent to drag the body away, an awful thought went through his head.

  "Hey, Jack?"

  He paused to look up at him. "Yeah?"

  "I'm having a bad Soylent Green moment."

  Jack frowned. "Soylent Green? What the hell's that?"

  "You know the cheesy science fiction Charlton Heston movie where they have a new food source for an overpopulated planet, and no one knows what's in it? And at the end when he finds out what it is, he screams, 'Soylent Green is people.' Please tell me the steak I ate wasn't the other guy you killed earlier."

  Jack grew silent.

  Too silent.

  Steele's stomach turned. "Jack, you didn't..."

  Jack's solemn expression ended in a smile. "Nah, I didn't think that fast, but you know...not a bad thought, except I don't like the taste of people. Too gamey."

  Steele wanted to think he was still toying with him, but with Jack you couldn't be too sure.

  "Cletus is the one with the taste for human."

  Steele looked over to the dog, who was on the floor, gnawing a bone. Yeah...

  Unlike Petey, Cletus didn't look particularly vicious. But then you never knew.

  "So what did you do with the other body?"

  Jack shrugged. "I got it stashed in the freezer where I keep deer meat in the winter."

  Thank God for small favors. "What are you going to do with the bodies?"

  Jack paused as he thought about it. "I got a backhoe and a hundred acres. Guess I'll bury them out near the road."

  Steele didn't know what was worse, the freezer or the ground. "Leave them in the freezer for the time being. I'll call Andre tomorrow and see if they have a way of hiding this mess and turning the bodies over to the authorities."

  Jack scoffed. "Take all the fun out of this, why don't you? You know, in my day, you just ground them up in a wood chipper, and you got the bonus of fertilizer for your lawn. Made it really green in the spring."

  "Yeah, but I don't want you to go to jail for something I caused."

  Jack harrumphed as he seized the body and started hauling it toward the hallway that Steele had used earlier to go up to the surface.

  He moved to help him.

  "Don't even think about it," Jack snapped at him. "You're shot. Go on back to bed and let me take care of this."

  "Okay. Um, there's just one problem."

  "And that is?"

  "I gave Syd my bed."

  Jack gave him an irritated grimace. "Fine, my bed's--"

  "I'll take the couch," he said, interrupting him. There was just something gross about taking a man's bed away from him, especially if the sheets hadn't been changed.

  "You sure?"

  "Yeah. Where are the extra blankets?"

  "Bathroom closet."

  "Thanks, Jack."

  Steele headed for the bathroom, but before he entered, he couldn't keep himself from checking on Syd again. She was still asleep, right where he'd left her.

  Jack was right, he should just crawl in beside her, but she was so paranoid about anyone knowing they'd been together that he thought it best they keep up the appearance of not sleeping together.

  You are such an ass.

  Yep. He wouldn't argue that. Stupid and Steele went hand in hand. If he had a single brain cell, he'd curl up right beside that beautiful naked body and wrap himself around it. God, he couldn't imagine anything better than waking up with her in his arms.

  Sighing, he left her and went to get his blanket to make a miserable night on the sofa.

  Syd woke up with a start as she tried to remember where she was. Then suddenly her memories rushed forward, and she remembered falling
asleep in Steele's arms.

  She glanced around her bed to find herself alone. A strange sense of sadness filled her. As she sat up in bed, her gaze fell on a small note that was folded on the nightstand.

  Frowning, she picked it up and opened it.

  Morning, Angel,

  Don't worry, no one knows about us. Jack either. It's just a sweet memory for the two of us alone.

  Josh

  Syd bit her lip at his note as she literally choked up. It was a pithy, stupid note, and yet it touched her deeply.

  But even more significant than the words was how he'd signed it. Josh.

  "I hate you," she breathed. Because with that one simple gesture, he had shattered the part of her that wanted to keep him at a distance.

  The man was evil incarnate. Aggravated at him, she gathered her clothes and went to the bathroom to take a quick shower before she changed into a pair of jeans and a top.

  As soon as she was dressed, she headed for the command center, where Jack was busy working at one of the keyboards.

  He looked up as she entered and motioned for her to be quiet. It wasn't until she drew even with the couch that she understood why.

  Steele was asleep.

  Syd crossed the room to reach Jack. "Why's he on the couch?" she whispered.

  "He said he gave you the bed, and he refused to take mine."

  She felt terrible about that, especially since the man was wounded. "I didn't mean to kick him out of the bed."

  "Yeah, well, that's what he gets for being an ass."

  "How so?"

  He winked at her. "If I'd have been him, I'd have made you share."

  She blushed, until she realized something. "Where's the guy we captured yesterday?"

  Jack looked suddenly sheepish.

  "Jack?"

  "He's dead."

  She turned at Steele's groggy voice to see him watching her. "Dead?"

  "He tried to kill me," Jack said defensively. "It was total self-defense."

  She looked at him doubtfully.

  "It was," Steele corroborated. "And you should learn to wake up when you hear a gunshot, Agent Westbrook. I shudder to think what could have happened to you had Jack and I not been here."

  Now that was ludicrous. "I did not sleep through a gunshot. There's no way."

  "Yes, you did," the men said in unison.

  She actually felt the blood drain from her face. There was no way she was that tired. Was there? "Are you serious?"

  By their faces she could tell that they were. She felt her face drop at least another three shades. "I can't believe it."

  "Believe it," Jack said. "I did what I had to. I make no apologies."

  Syd believed him, but she still couldn't believe that she hadn't heard a gunshot. "I know you did, Jack." She returned to the couch. "How you feeling this morning?"

  "You know the pain doesn't really set in until the next day, right?"

  "True."

  "Then you can imagine how I feel. But I'm more than ready to go face Randy and kick his ass."

  Problem was, she wasn't so sure about that. The last thing she wanted was to see him hurt any more.

  "What time is it?" she asked.

  "Ten past ten," Jack answered.

  She let out a slow breath. "We don't have much time."

  "No," Steele agreed, "we don't."

  Syd looked up at him. "So what's our game plan?"

  He looked stunned by her question. "You're actually asking me this time?"

  "Yes, but don't tell anyone, okay?"

  Steele didn't know what surprised him most, her words or the fact that right after she said them, she walked over to him, leaned close enough to press her cheek to his and whispered, "Thank you, Josh." Chills spread over him, especially since she pressed her lips to his cheek before she withdrew.

  And that just made him hard all over again. Damn, what was it with this woman and his hormones? He hadn't been this out of control since his teen years.

  And what fond memories those years weren't.

  He pushed himself up from the couch and tried not to groan too loudly. "Let me go shower, and we'll talk about it when I get out."

  Syd grimaced at the pained way Steele was moving. "Jack?" she said after he'd left them alone. "Is there some other way you can think to get inside APS without using Steele?"

  "Why you asking?"

  "He needs to rest, and the last thing I want is to see him shot or stabbed again."

  Jack scratched his chin as he thought about it. After a few minutes of silence, he shook his head. "As paranoid as those bastards are, no. I can't see any other way in either."

  She supposed a miracle was too much to ask. Oh, well, it was worth a try. Hoping for a better day than yesterday, she went to the suitcases, pulled out a change of clothes for Steele, and went to the bedroom where she'd spent the night.

  She was laying them on the bed when he entered the bedroom behind her.

  Her breath caught in her throat at the sight of him wet and dripping with nothing but a blue towel covering him. The light glistened against the sleekness of his shoulders as he brushed a hand through his wet hair.

  His bandages were gone, leaving his red, puckered skin all too obvious. But even so, he was gorgeous.

  It was all she could do not to cross the room and rip the towel from him and lick every inch of that divinely masculine body.

  "You keep looking at me like that, Syd, and we're not leaving this room today."

  Heat crept over her face, especially since she could see proof of his desire.

  "Sorry. You should have warned me you were heading in here."

  Smiling, he sidled up to her and pulled her into his arms. She could feel his hard cock against the center of her body, and it made her ache for him even more. "I like catching you unawares."

  She closed her eyes as he nuzzled her neck, and chills went over her. "You have to stop doing this, Steele."

  "Josh," he murmured.

  "Josh," she repeated, savoring the fact that he let her use it.

  He cupped her rump and pressed her hips to his so that she could feel the large bulge of him even more. "If I live through today, promise me that I get a taste of you again as a reward."

  Syd slid her hands down until she pushed his towel to the floor. She cupped him gently in her hand before she slid her hand to the tip of his cock so that she could coat her fingertips in his moisture. Steele hissed in response.

  She fingered the wet tip of him before she brought it up to her lips to taste it. "You live through today, and tonight, I'll get a taste of you."

  He actually whimpered at that. "You are cruel, Agent Westbrook."

  She smiled wickedly. "I know, but it's a great incentive not to get yourself killed today, isn't it?"

  "Yes, it is."

  She rose up on her tiptoes and gave him a sizzling kiss as she rubbed herself against his erection.

  Pulling away from her was the hardest thing Steele had ever done. But unfortunately, they didn't have any more time to waste. They had an all-too-pressing engagement with a lunatic.

  M Street was still crowded, but at least this time a car pulled out a few feet from the front door of APS. Syd deftly slid their BMW into it.

  She glanced over at Steele with a worried brow. "I still wish you'd wear a wire."

  He just gave her a droll stare. "It didn't help us yesterday."

  "I know." And she did, but still she hated to send him in alone.

  He leaned over and kissed her. "Keep the engine running, just in case." He reached around her back and pulled her gun out. He tucked it in beside her thigh.

  She frowned at him. "Paranoid?"

  "No, I just want to make sure nothing happens to you."

  His concern warmed her. "Don't worry. I can handle myself."

  Steele nodded before he got out of the car. He sauntered down the street as if he owned it. In the event he was being watched, he wanted Wallace to know that he had no fear of the cheap-ass punk.


  He opened the door to the office and narrowed his eyes on the receptionist. "Hi, Agnes. Buzz Wallace and tell him his three-thirty appointment is here."

  She looked a bit surprised to see him, which played into his thoughts about her yesterday. She must know what it was that they really did for a living.

  Before she could press the button, Wallace's voice sounded over the intercom. "Buzz him in, Agnes."

  Steele looked up at the camera and gave it a mean, shit-eating grin before he headed toward the door. As expected, the bruiser was there again, waiting for him.

  "Don't even look at me, asshole. In the mood I'm in, I'll break your neck in half."

  Bruce didn't say anything as he escorted him from the hallway up to Wallace's office.

  Just like the day before, the prick sat at his desk with a stony look on his ugly, chubby face. "Still alive?"

  "No. I'm a walking corpse. Can't you tell?"

  Wallace snorted. "You know, just because you're here proves nothing. For all I know you just ran away from my contractor."

  Steele gave him an equally deadpan expression. "You didn't tell me I had to prove anything other than to be here today."

  Wallace glared at him as he reached for his phone and picked up the receiver. Steele crossed his arms over his chest as he watched him dial it.

  Two seconds later, the cell phone in his pocket vibrated. Steele pulled it out and flipped it open. "Lee Perry can't come to the phone right now, since he's unfortunately suffering from a fatal dose of lead poisoning. If you would like to leave a message for him, I suggest you see a priest or a psychic."

  He hung the phone up and tossed it to Wallace, who actually paled. "You satisfied?"

  He nodded glumly.

  "So do I have a job or not?"

  Syd couldn't stand not knowing what was going on. Her nerves were completely racked. She didn't like being out of touch with Andre, and she really hated being out of touch with Steele.

  She kept glancing at the clock, then the door, then the clock again. What was going on in there?

  Finally, after what seemed like forever but was really only fifteen minutes, Steele headed out of the offices with a grim look on his face.

  Syd popped the lock on the car door as he reached it. He jerked it open and got inside. "Well?"

  "We're in."

  Joy tore through her. "Really?"

  "Yeah, but before you get overly excited, don't." He handed her a small Vaio laptop.