“Come here,” he said with a smile that meant only one thing. “Let me take your mind off your troubles for awhile.”
Men. She shook her head. The man looked like he needed a nurse, a pill and a nap rather than sex.
“Seriously? You want to fool around? Now? You look like you need a fistful of medication.”
“I need something...but it’s not a pill. Come here.” His grin tugged at her heartstrings. “Stop worrying about whatever’s going on outside these walls. You said you’d take care of me.” He arched a challenging eyebrow. “Come on, babe. I need some care.”
She laughed at the ridiculousness of their situation before tossing her cell phone on the table and walking toward him. “Hmm...care, huh? Would you like to define that?”
“Oh, I’m confident you know exactly what I’m talking about.”
She sighed, saying no to him wasn’t an option after missing him so desperately for all these months. With slow deliberation, she unbuttoned her blouse without taking her gaze from his face. Some things never changed and she hoped they never would. She enjoyed seducing him—making his eyes turn a deep brown, seeing him bite his lower lip, watching him squirm.
She skimmed her fingers between her breasts and over her abdomen before shrugging the shirt from her shoulders and letting it slide from her arms. She took another step closer to him as she unsnapped her jeans.
“God, I’m happy to be home,” he muttered, his gaze watching her fingers as they slid beneath her waistband.
She twisted her hips slowly from side to side as she moved the jeans down her legs. With a wink, she kicked them from her feet and took another step closer to him but still out of reach.
“You’re bruises are fading,” he said, eyes clouding with a mixture of desire and anguish. “Stop playing with me and come here.”
With a shake of her head, she undid her bra and tossed it behind her. “I’m not taking one more step until you tell me why you look like a ghost today.”
His eyes widened, obviously shocked at her manipulation. Then he laughed, his gaze raking over her with wanting. “I stopped taking my medication...thought I needed to be alert while all of this is going on. I want to get off of it anyway, don’t want to become some drugged out vet who can’t get his shit together. Now get over here.”
“There’s no chance of you becoming a drugged out anything. You’re too strong for that.”
“You have so much faith in me...freaks me out a little.”
“You? How can my big, badass Marine be freaked out by little ol’ me?”
“Yeah, right.” He laughed and flicked his finger for her to come closer. “You’re one intimidating redhead, Shane, and you know it. Stop playing with me and get over here. Now.”
“There you go...ordering me around again.” She looped her thumbs in the corners of her silk panties, feeling love so powerful that it surged through her bloodstream like an electrical storm. “You’re going to take your meds until the doctors wean you off of them. Deal?”
He licked his lips before smiling and stretching his hand toward her. “Deal. Now get naked already.”
She removed the panties with the same slow deliberation, enjoying his moan of torture, before straddling his legs.
He moved his hands from her hips to her breasts with the reverence of a sculptor appreciating a fine piece of art. His fingers played with her nipples until she squirmed with need.
She eased his shirt off, her fingers again tracing the outline of the tattoo covering the right side of his chest. Never would she tire of touching him, of loving him. Briefly, she imagined what life would be like when they were old, having lived a life and raised a family, fought and laughed. She knew that, even when she looked across the bed and saw his lined face, she’d trace this tattoo and remember forever being grateful that he’d come home.
“You look sad.” He cupped her chin and forced her gaze up to his. “I’ve got some skills I haven’t shown you yet. Want to see?”
“Skills, huh?” She grinned and moved her hands over his shoulders. “I’m always up for a demonstration of your skills.”
Muscled arms encircled her waist as he twisted her into an abrupt move so that she laid beneath him in what reminded her of a wrestling trick. Hands braced above her head, he struggled with his motionless left leg until he rested comfortably between her legs.
She laughed, hands gripping his shoulders, as he grinned down at her. “What are you doing?”
“What do you think I’m doing?” He caught her lower lip between his teeth, gaze locked with hers.
She knew what he was doing and loved every second of it. She couldn’t stop touching his shoulders and arms as he braced himself above her.
“I knew you could do more than you let on. Knew it.” She smiled against his forehead as he kissed her neck.
“Yeah, well, sex wasn’t part of my physical therapy, but maybe it needed to be. Motivation, you know.” Breath hot against her neck, he braced himself on an elbow while using his free hand to unsnap his jeans.
“You’re not going to hurt yourself?” She wanted to give him pleasure, not pain.
“I really hope you stop worrying about my meds and pain one of these days. It ruins the mood. I’m trying to be sexy here. Give me a break.” He kissed her with a slowness that had her arching her back and sinking her nails into his shoulders.
She used her toes to work the jeans lower on his hips. The man didn’t need to work at being sexy; he was a natural.
She moved her hands down his sides, the feel of his muscled chest more intoxicating to her than any drug. His erection pressed against her lower abdomen, but she wanted him inside of her. Fingers slipped beneath his briefs and worked them down without breaking the kiss.
Eyes wide open and mouths clinging together, they stared at each other as he lifted himself slowly before easing himself into her. Achingly. Slowly. Using his upper body to help, he moved against her.
“You’re going to hurt yourself,” she said against his open mouth.
“Worth it.”
The slow rhythm of his body over hers was almost hypnotic. She ran her hands over his back, his sides, his ass, and his chest. She couldn’t get enough of him. Her legs wrapped around him, soles of her feet pressing against the back of his thighs, conscious of the fact that he could only feel her touch in his right leg. It didn’t matter to her, though. None of it mattered, not his scars, not his partial paralysis, not his attitude, not the long journey ahead.
She gripped his hips and arched up to meet him. Mouths again joined, they kissed as if the only thing that mattered was loving one another. Waves of sensation rolled over her skin and inside her body. Every nerve ending snapped with life.
Her hands kneaded the small of his back, working out the knots she felt forming there. Breath caught between their lips, eyes wide open to each other as they both laughed and came in unison.
“I love you, Hope Shane Cedars,” he said against her swollen lips.
“I love you, too, Colonel Michael Sean Cedars.” She linked her ankles together behind his thighs and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Any more skills you want to show off?”
He pressed his forehead against hers, elbows propping himself up. His smile churned her up inside. “Maybe later. I like surprising you.”
“I think you’re surprising yourself, too, aren’t you?” Her fingers tangled in his hair.
His eyes shadowed even as he nodded. “Yeah, I guess I am.”
The abrupt ringing of her cell phone sounded overly loud in the quiet loft. The signature song, Pink’s ‘Raise Your Glass’, indicated that it was Devon finally returning her messages. Reluctant to separate from him, she gnawed her lower lip and slanted her gaze toward the offensive device.
“You’d better answer and I’d better take my meds. That was the deal, right?” He pushed himself up on the palms of his hands, giving her room to slide out from beneath him.
The chill of the air shocked her skin as she reached
for the phone. “Dev, it’s about time. I’d begun to wonder what happened to you.”
“Check your email,” a graveled, distorted voice said before hanging up.
A chill that had nothing to do with the air crawled across her skin. She held the phone against her face long after the call had disconnected.
“What’s wrong?” Michael asked while straightened his clothes behind her.
“Everything.” She glanced over her shoulder at him, the gravity of the situation weighing her down with the force of a thousand bricks.
* * * *
He tee-peed his fingers in front of his face as Hope and Agent Wulf sat in front of her computer to open her email. At least she hadn’t protested when he’d insisted she get the FBI from next door before opening anything on the computer. Right now they had some secrets that no one outside of this building could know about and the FBI lurking next door was one.
The email from Devon’s phone sat there in bold print waiting for a click.
Hope glanced over her shoulder at him before turning her attention back to the screen. A video opened, the scene unpleasant.
Devon laid unconscious on a dirty mattress on a floor, her hands tied to what looked like a pipe that had been lined up with her shoulders. The video panned to Marshall, who mirrored Devon’s pose on the floor next to her. A masked man, completely covered in black, the holes of the mask hidden by sunglasses, stepped in front of the camera.
“Kill the story or we kill your friends. Easy. Show this to your FBI pals, we kill your friends. Easy. See how this works, Shane? I’m giving you the power of life or death. What’re you gonna do, bitch? We’ll be in touch in an hour to tell you where to bring what you’ve got. Then we expect you to disappear. Leave Denver. If you don’t, well, we’ll take out your war hero next. Easy.” The masked man snapped his fingers before ending the video.
“We’ll get on this, have our forensics team analyze it. You stay put.” Wulf reached around her to take over the keyboard. He replayed the video once...then twice...before she shoved away from the desk and walked out of the office.
She paced in the bedroom, face tilted downward, while she absently twisted her hair into a braid. Energy zapped around her like a force field.
“You’re not going to stay put, are you?” he asked, even though he knew the answer.
“I think I know where that is,” she whispered without looking at him. “I can take them by surprise, probably. I’ve got a key.”
“A key?” He squinted, not liking where this conversation was going. “Give it to Wulf then.”
“He’s about as subtle as flamingo in Alaska,” she said, smiling a bit at the reference. “You stay here, keep that gun I gave you handy just in case.”
“Like hell I’m staying here while you go do something idiotic.”
“Shh...” she glanced at the open door, “don’t argue with me.”
“Oh, I’m definitely arguing with you about this.” He purposely raised his voice until she frowned at him. “I’m the secret weapon, remember?”
And then that’s when he saw in her face the very thing he’d hoped never to see...doubt.
“There’s a lot at stake here.” She looked away as if conscious of what her expression had conveyed.
“Right. A lot at stake. You think I’m a liability after all, don’t you?”
“I need to sneak around, move quickly.” She looked guilty as hell when she met his gaze. “Don’t back track on me, not after all the progress we’ve made. Be realistic.”
“Realistic, huh? Sure thing, babe. I’ll stay here with the feds and play nice with your puppy while I take my medication like a cooperative patient while you go take care of the nasty human traffickers, sounds like a great plan. I wouldn’t want to be in your way.” He squeezed the arms of his chair. “Better yet, maybe I’ll go back to the institute where the nurses can tuck me in at night because I’m such a lost cause.”
Damn, this reminded him of that last day in Afghanistan. She was headed straight into trouble with a single-minded focus that had always terrified him.
“I thought we were beyond this self-pity crap of yours,” she said with a shake of her head. “You’re being ridiculous. What’re you going to do? Wait in the jeep while I prowl around? What’s the point in that?”
He had no idea what he would do, but, yeah, maybe he’d wait in the jeep. He gritted his teeth together and stared at her profile as she rummaged through her bag for some elusive key.
“Everything okay in here?” Agent Wulf stepped into the doorframe. “Going somewhere, Shane?”
She sighed and shot them both a look that would have shrunken lesser men. Both just stared back until she stopped moving.
“I have a hunch, that’s all,” she said with an annoyed toss of her head.
“Your hunches are usually right,” Wulf said as he leaned his back against the wall and crossed his arms across your chest. “You want to play hard ball, huh? Go in on the offense? We could follow at a safe distance as long as you’re miked, give you a lead, and stay back until you give a code word.”
“Oh my God, you can’t be encouraging her?” he asked the agent, certain that he’d never understand civilian life. The rules he’d lived by seemed not to apply. “They’ll kill her, you know that right? These people she’s dealing with are murderers. For all we know, Devon and Marshall are already dead. It’s not like they were conversing on the video. C’mon, am I the only sane one in the room? If I am, that’s fucking terrifying.”
She shoved her hands into the back pockets of her jeans and looked between the two men like a cornered animal searching for escape.
“Don’t do it, Hope. Please. Whatever you’re thinking, let it go.” He swallowed the familiar sense of failure he’d lived with for the past several months, even though she’d basically confirmed it just now.
She squeezed her eyes closed and bent her head, hands still stuffed in her back pockets and braid snaking over her shoulders. Without saying a word, she debated the pros and cons. He knew her too well...which is why he’d tried so hard to get her to let him go...why he knew her main concern right now wasn’t to go or not to go, but what to do with him. He’d become the liability he’d always known he would be. That hurt worse than the shrapnel that had splintered his body.
Chapter Twenty-Four
She talked out the plan with Special Agent Wulf and tried desperately to block out Michael’s presence in the loft next door where she’d left him fuming. Standing in the empty space that had been meant for dreams, she worked out a plan with the FBI. She was playing it safe this time and didn’t want any more blood on her hands.
“We’ll make sure you’re not followed, get in the way of anyone who might be shadowing you,” Wulf said as he finished taping the wire to her skin. “What’s the code word for us to come in?”
“They might not be there, you know,” she whispered. “I could be wrong. What if I’m wrong?” She twisted her head around to look at her new ally. “What if this is a gigantic waste of time?”
“Then it is what it is.” He shrugged his narrow shoulders, eyes hard. “Listen, none of wants any more blood on our hands. You’re not only a reporter breaking a story, Shane, you’re our star witness at this point. Do you want to take these guys down?”
“With a passion.”
“Then think of that, think of those women being forced into sex slavery, those kids that have been murdered, Angel who died trying to save her sister.” He squeezed her shoulders. “Think of what these bastards have done to your own family. If your hunches weren’t right, they wouldn’t care less about threatening you off their trail.”
She reached into her pocket and handed him a flash drive before meeting his gaze. “Just in case...”
“Just in case.” His hand folded over the flash drive that contained the entire story as she’d developed it so far and copies of her notes. “Head out of the parking ramp like normal, we’ll pick you up a few blocks down so it’s not obvious. Give
me a five minute head start to get to the car.”
“Got it.” She swallowed the sudden panic slamming against her ribcage.
This reminded her of that last day in Afghanistan when she’d disregarded Michael’s protests and had gone straight into an ambush. She pressed her fingers against her forehead and fought off the bad memories. That wasn’t now. That was the past.
She walked in sync with Wulf to the elevator, refusing to look at the door of the loft she shared with Michael. She could hear the increased volume of the television. Hockey. She shook her head, hoping he would lighten up after a beer and pain med combo.
She didn’t speak to Wulf as they descended in the elevator. With a sigh, she zipped up her leather jacket and stuffed her beaten up hat onto her head. Her hand encountered the remote for the hidden camera still attached to the zipper of her jacket. Between the wire and the camera, no matter what happened this afternoon, the bad guys were going down.
In silence, she walked to the parking ramp, careful to look around her for anyone lurking in the shadows. Keeping her eyes scanning the perimeter, she walked to the Jeep and beeped it unlocked.
She froze at the driver’s door, a combination of fury and confusion and…relief overloading her system. Michael sat in the passenger side, his gaze intent on hers through the glass.
She practically ripped open the door. “What the hell are you doing here? How’d you get here?”
“I’ve got skills you don’t know about, remember? Did you really think I’d let you leave me behind?”
His wheelchair had been stuffed haphazardly in the backseat as if he’d forced it there, which she was certain he had by the look on his face. He’d grabbed a sweatshirt and stocking cap, too.
“Stubborn son-of-a-bitch,” she said between clenched teeth as she strapped herself into the driver’s seat. “Pain in the ass, that’s what you are.”
“The feeling’s mutual.” He tapped his fingers against his jean-clad knee. “I have the weirdest sense of deja-vu right now and it’s not the good kind either.”