“No, I didn’t,” she admitted sadly. “The explanation should have come before the reality of it kicked me in the gut, Joe. I watched you that night, pretending you didn’t know me, that I was nothing, as you danced with another woman.…”
“I never took my eyes off you.”
“Or your hand off her,” she reminded him.
“It was a fucking case, Maggie,” he snapped, a grimace contorting his face. “Do you think I wouldn’t have told you if I thought you would be there? After I saw you it was too late; I couldn’t jeopardize the case.”
“I cover the society page, Joe,” she yelled back, infuriated with his logic. “You should have known I would be there. You should have warned me.”
“How?” He pushed his fingers restlessly through his long hair. “What the hell was I supposed to do, Maggie? I was in the middle of an operation, I couldn’t just tell you what the hell was going on.”
“You could have warned me you had a job to do. That’s all I needed.” She jumped to her feet, anger surging through her. “I knew you worked for the DEA, Joe. I wasn’t stupid or incompetent. I wouldn’t have asked questions, but I would have been warned. Why the hell do you think you walked out of that party with all appendages intact that night? I didn’t strike out just in case you were working, rather than trying to fuck Miss Big Boobs hanging on your arm.”
“Then why are you still so pissed?” He was genuinely confused. “Why did you avoid me, Maggie? We could have worked this out.”
“Because you didn’t warn me, Joe,” she reminded him with false patience. “Because you expected more from me than you were willing to give, and every damned message you left on my phone proved it.”
“What?” He frowned back at her in confusion. “I asked you to call me.”
“You demanded I call you. You informed me, more than once, that I was being silly, childish, petulant,” she sneered. “No, Joe, I wasn’t. I expected no more from you than you would have from me, and you weren’t willing to give it. You would never have tolerated seeing me with another man; why did I have to endure seeing you with another woman? No warning. No explanation. No nothing.”
He was silent, staring back at her with narrowed eyes and stubborn features. His arrogance was one of the things she used to admire, that complete male self-confidence that drove her crazy and turned her on all at the same time.
“I didn’t expect that from you,” he ground out. “I would have explained.”
“The explanation was too late.” She tossed her hair back before smiling tightly into the growing anger in his dark eyes. “I’m not arguing this with you any longer, Joe. My relationship or lack thereof with Grant is none of your business. Just as your job and what it requires of you is none of mine. You’re here to do a job. To protect me, and to find out if I know where Grant hid your precious proof. Stick to the job. You’re good at that.”
With that, she stalked from the living room into the bedroom and slammed the door behind her. She really prayed he took the hint and left her alone. The hurt and anger she had buried when she had left Joe were rising inside her now. The lack of outlet over the years, and her determination to hide from her feelings for him, had kept her safe from the repercussions. Now the pain was flowing through her, the remembered shock and heartache when she realized how little she had meant to him, slammed into her with a force she hadn’t expected.
She deserved the same love she was willing to give, and her marriage to Grant had taught her that she wasn’t willing to settle for less. Especially not from Joe.
chapter 5
the bedside clock read two in the morning before Joe heard the deep, even breathing that indicated Maggie had slipped off into sleep. Within minutes, as she had every other night, she rolled from the edge of the bed to the middle, and her slender body tucked in against his.
He gritted his teeth against the arousal pounding between his thighs, and knew Craig wasn’t going to be happy to be pulling the extra hours of watch that he would be stuck with in the morning.
Maggie was unaware that Craig was watching the outside of the cabin. The other man slept through the day, then took up watch at midnight until Joe moved onto the porch each morning to indicate he was awake and on the job. Joe was getting up later every morning, though. Sleep was becoming harder with each successive night.
As Maggie shifted against him demandingly, he lifted his arm, allowing her to settle against his chest before he let himself hold her close. She felt right in his arms, but hell, she always had.
How many times had she slept against him like this? How many times had he awakened in the middle of the night, just to listen to her breathe, to feel the softness of her hair as he held her close?
He stared up at the ceiling, his lips compressing as he remembered the accusations she had thrown at him earlier that evening. Had he really expected more from her than he was willing to give?
Maybe he had. He had been so busy assuring himself that what they had was just an affair, that the volatile little redhead wasn’t getting beneath his skin, that he had missed the fact that she was firmly entrenched in his heart.
That was why he had jerked her out of the interrogation room when she had been brought in for questioning. That was why he couldn’t accept that she had been part of Grant’s criminal activities, despite the proof—pictures of Maggie handing Diego and Santiago Fuentes several envelopes at an upper-class restaurant, pictures of her greeting them at the door of their home, and exchanging small talk at several parties she had attended for the paper.
She had told Detective Folker she was unaware of what the envelopes contained. That she had run the errand for Grant simply because it was easier than fighting over it, and she had been going into that part of the city anyway.
The journal Grant had kept held pages and pages of accusations against Maggie. Implying that he had begun betraying the agency and his friends because of her spending habits, because of her determination to always have more.
But Maggie hadn’t dressed any differently than she had before her marriage to Grant. There were no expensive clothes, no fancy jewels, and she had never driven the new car Grant had bought her. So where was the money Fuentes had given him?
He buried his fingers in Maggie’s hair as he tried to work through the questions. After a week with her, his suspicion that she might have been involved was dissolving beneath his hunger for her and the knowledge that if money had been what Maggie was after, then she would never have cut him out of her life as she had.
He had money. A DEA agent’s pay sucked, but his family was one of the most influential in Georgia, and his trust fund would see any children he had into old age if they were careful. Not to mention what his parents would one day leave him. If Maggie had been after money, then she had missed a much easier opportunity than marrying Grant and becoming involved with the Fuentes family.
Instead of trying to snag him for marriage or money, Maggie had left him. Not that Joe claimed anything as his own. Money was accessible if he needed it. But his parents’ money wasn’t his own, and he refused to touch it. Still, that wasn’t the reason she had been so furious. She hadn’t forgiven him for not warning her before she saw the daughter of the man they were investigating on his arm.
He had been there to get information. He had gotten the information, but he had lost the girl. His girl. Was he willing to lose her again?
A soft moan slipped past her lips as she moved against him again, her lips pressing the bare flesh of his chest. Joe clenched his teeth against the heated pleasure of her soft little tongue stroking over the flat, hard disc of his male nipple.
Could he survive another night of her in his arms without touching her? God, it was getting hard. She was like a little kitten, pressing to get closer, her fingers curling against his abdomen, her nails raking his flesh and sending a flash of clenching sensation to seize his balls. Sweat popped out on his forehead and along his chest and thighs, and his cock tightened further.
&nbs
p; His erection was so damned hard, so sensitive, he bit back a tortured groan as the crest flexed against the material of his sweatpants. And there was no relief. He sure as hell wasn’t going to try jacking off with her in the bed with him, and doing it any other time was out of the question. Besides, the hollow release gained from the act wasn’t what he needed. He needed Maggie, her sweet, tight pussy enveloping him, burning him as he possessed her.
“Joe.” His name whispered past her lips, that sleepy little plea he remembered from the past, the throb of hunger in her voice that had once had him turning to her, slipping easily inside her as he awakened her fully to his touch.
Instead, he now lay still, tortured, tormented, as her silken hand moved over his stomach, caressing, raking her short nails over his flesh, and sending agonizing bursts of pleasure through his cock.
He breathed in slow and deep as her teeth raked over his nipple, a murmur of feminine pleasure vibrating from her throat as her hand moved lower.
Joe lifted his arm, his free hand gripping a slat in the headboard behind his head as he fought for control, as anticipation began to spiral inside him. He knew her like this. Drowsy, when she would awaken in the middle of the night, hungry for him, all kittenish and relaxed. And he wasn’t about to fuck this up. No way in hell. In those brief minutes between asleep and awake, Maggie had the most amazing habit of forgetting if she was pissed off with him. If she didn’t remember it right now, he wasn’t reminding her. Uh-uh. Was not going to happen.
“Maggie.” He couldn’t stem the hoarse groan that left his throat as her fingers played with the elastic band of the sweats.
He could feel his mouth drying out as anticipation began to build, his erection flexing in need as her fingers began to move beneath the band.
“Hmm,” she murmured against his chest, her teeth sinking against his flesh in a sensual, warning little bite, as he parted his thighs and let her have her way.
Hell no, he wasn’t reminding her of nothin’. If he did, then she was likely to turn away, to be embarrassed or angry. Whichever, it meant she would stop touching him, that the blazing heat of her hand wouldn’t …
Son of a bitch!
His hips jerked violently as she moved again. Slender fingers tried to encircle the raging shaft as she shifted against him again, her lips moving lower on his chest.
Oh hell, he knew what was coming. He remembered this well, and if she came to her senses while his dick was in her mouth, then she was likely to get violent.
But it wasn’t like he was encouraging her, he assured himself as he lifted his other hand to the headboard, determined not to guide her head lower. Hell no. He wasn’t going to stop her. She was a grown woman. If she wasn’t going to remember she was pissed, then he was not reminding her. Wasn’t going to happen.
He fought to breathe as he stared in dazed pleasure at the ceiling above the bed, nearly panting in lust as her fingers pushed his sweatpants down, struggling to guide the material over the erection.
“Good,” she mumbled with a soft smile against his flesh, as the cloth finally slid beneath the thick, iron-hard flesh rising eagerly to her touch.
Her fingers wrapped around him again, stroking slowly from his balls to his crest, as his hips arched involuntarily to her caress. Her fingers were like living silk as they rasped over the sensitive flesh. Her lips and tongue were hungry, heated as they moved below his chest, kissing, licking, taking sensual little nips from his flesh.
It always amazed him in the past when she would do this. That her need could so overtake her in those moments when she awoke that nothing mattered to her but being with him. Touching him. Tasting him. Destroying him with her hunger.
She was destroying him now. He ground his head into the pillow, bit back a violent growl that she hurry, and fought to enjoy as much as possible before she remembered she was supposed to be mad at him.
Two and a half years. He hadn’t had a woman since the last night Maggie had spent in his bed. And God, he had missed her. This was why no other woman had shared his passion, because he knew no other could compare to what he was finding at this moment.
Knowing he was making an even bigger mistake, he moved his gaze from the ceiling, looking down the line of his body, as the dim light that burned past the partially closed bathroom door fell on Maggie’s head as he watched her move lower. Lower.
“Sweet heaven. Maggie, baby,” he panted.
He couldn’t take much more. He was shaking, sweat pouring from his body as she moved to his abdomen, her tongue painting a path of fiery need across his flesh.
Closer. Ah, God, her tongue was so close. It was torture, the worst sort of agonizing pleasure, to have her silken tongue so close and yet so far away from his engorged erection.
Her fingers stroked his burning cock as her tongue came within inches, inches. He was shaking with anticipation, sweat building on his body and running in small rivulets down his chest as he fought to hold on to his control.
“Maggie. God, baby. Tell me you’re awake.” His hands clenched on the slats and he blinked back the sweat dripping to his eyes as he told himself to stop her. To put an end to the sweet torment before she took a bite out of him that he might not recover from. Maggie could be amazingly fiery, both in passion and in her fury.
He could move his hands. He could grip her head and force her to stop. But he was terrified that if he let go of the death grip he had on the bed, that rather than waking her as he pulled her from him, he would awaken her as he filled her mouth instead.
“God. Damn, Maggie.” His ragged cry filled the darkness as her tongue swiped over the head of his cock. The hardened flesh flexed, then spurted a hard stream of pre-cum to her waiting lips.
Shit. That wasn’t supposed to happen.
But her murmur of appreciation was followed by burning ecstasy. Her mouth enveloped the thick head, her tongue swirling around it, probing at the small eye as she greedily consumed him. Arching to her as another curse tore past his lips, he thrust deeper, feeling her lips tighten on him, her tongue lashing at him.
Ah God. He had to stop this. Didn’t he?
How? How the hell was he supposed to find the strength to make her stop?
“Maggie, baby … please…,” he groaned harshly as she began to suck him with slow, tight strokes of her mouth.
Nearly to her throat, only to retreat, her tongue laving with quick little licks before sinking down again, her lips meeting her fingers as she stroked the lower portion of his shaft.
She was going to destroy him. Tonight, she would steal his soul and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Once he spilled into her mouth there would be no returning to sanity. There never had been. He felt like an animal; reality receded and nothing mattered but spreading her thighs and both of them fucking into exhaustion.
“God yes.” He blinked again against the moisture stinging his eyes as his hips moved to her suckling mouth. Thrusting in and out, his scrotum tightening until pleasure was near pain and the need to come was torture.
“There you go, sweetheart,” he panted. “Hell yes. Suck it, baby. Suck it so deep and good. Your mouth is heaven, Maggie. Paradise.”
He strained in her grip, desperate to reach deeper, to thrust harder. He fought the need to climax, his head thrashing on the pillow as he fought it with every ounce of control he could hang on to.
She was unaware of what she was doing. Surely she was. She had gone to bed furious with him, hadn’t she?
Then she moved again, sliding between his thighs, one hand cupping the tight sack beneath his cock as she took him deeper, moaned, and her eyes opened in drowsy sensuality.
There was no shock. Green eyes stared back at him with drugged lust as her entire mouth caressed him, flexed around him, and he was lost. She knew what the hell she was doing. Just as she always had.
A hard growl tore from his lips as he drove hard against her grip and lost the last threads of control. He felt his semen exploding into her mouth, her lips mo
ving as she consumed him, accepting his release as her hands stroked, caressed. Her tongue milked at the underside of his cock, urging more of the creamy release to her mouth as she moaned in rising hunger.
“I tried.” His hands tore from the slats of the headboard. “God help us both, Maggie, I tried…”
chapter 6
she was so weak. Maggie cursed her weakness even as she let Joe bear her to her back on the bed. He was her weakness. His lips on hers, the sharp, fierce kisses that left her drugged as his hands pulled at her shirt. He lifted only enough to drag the material over her head and toss it aside before he was back.
Cool air rippled over the tender, aching tips of her breasts only a second before Joe’s heat enveloped her once again. He had that power, the power to warm her, to fuel a fire inside her so hot, so desperate that nothing mattered but his touch.
Maggie opened to him, her hands clutching at his back as the rasp of his chest hair stimulated her sensitive nipples and stole her breath with the pleasure. So good. It had been so long. Too long without him, without his touch. She had sworn she wouldn’t let this happen, but her own dreams and hunger had stolen her will.
She had dreamed of him every night that they had been apart. Aching dreams. Dreams of anger or of lust. Dreams of reunion or of parting. It didn’t matter which, she looked forward to each one, to touching him, to seeing him, if only in those dreams.
But this hadn’t been a dream. When she slowly awoke, forgetting for a few brief moments where they were, and the trouble she was in, Maggie had touched him. Her hand sliding over his abdomen. Her body heating with need. Just as quickly reality had tried to intrude. But Joe was there, tense but quiet beneath her touch, letting her lead.
He had never done that before. Never had he lain back and allowed her to set the pace of any part of their lovemaking.
Having that control had broken her resolve. That and her own hunger. God, such hunger for him. She couldn’t bear the longing whipping through her, the emotions tearing into her heart, filling her soul.