Extreme Danger (McClouds & Friends #5)(96)

He stared silently at the list. “Yeah,” he said faintly.

The silence got longer, heavier. It started to make her nervous. “Um, Nick? What are you thinking? What could this mean?”

He shook the dark thoughts that had gripped him away with a violent shudder, like a dog shaking off water. “Was there paperwork?”

“I didn’t find anything like that in the room. But in the seat of her car, there was a package for a digital voice recorder,” Becca said. “Probably she dictated notes into it. And then stuck it in her pocket or her purse.”

He nodded, pulled out his wallet and tucked the scrap of paper carefully inside. Then he pulled out his cell phone and dialed a number.

“I have another name,” he said into it. “The mistress. Diana Evans. Some kind of health professional. Doctor, nurse, lab tech, something like that.” He looked at Becca. “Got a plate number for her?”

“It was a black PT Cruiser, if that’s relevant,” she told him. She recited the plate number to him. He relayed it and hung up again.

Becca had to gather her nerve to ask the question, with the creeping dread she felt on her neck. “Nick? Do you have any idea why…or what? About these blood and urine samples?”

“No,” he said flatly.

“Nothing good, though, right?” she whispered.

Nick shook his head. “No. Nothing good. You can count on that.”

The unspoken possibilities hung between them in the dark. Becca’s skin prickled and crawled. She wondered, wistfully, if she could ask him for another hug. Maybe her luck would be better if she just jumped on him, and took her hug from him by force.

If she did, she would probably find herself flat on her back with him about three miles inside her body before she knew what hit her. Which was fine. She was up for it.

He got up, moved towards her, eyes gleaming. Abruptly, the energy shifted. Out of nowhere, she was on the defensive again.

“So,” he said. “We’re done with the debriefing? Anything to add?”

She shook her head. “That’s it.”

“Excellent. So we can move on to the next item on the agenda.”

Her toes tightened, then her chest, then her thighs. “Which is?”

“Which is the burning-in-hell agony you put me through this evening. And exactly what you’ll have to do to make it up to me.”

“Fuck you,” she said sharply. “Is this necessary? Do you have to put things in those terms? Do you really need the upper hand so badly?”

“Yes, I do.” His voice was matter of fact.

She was mad. Her face got hot, and her breath got short. The manipulative bastard. “You can’t have it,” she snapped. “You’ve already pissed me off. Anyway, what exactly is it that you want from me?”

Nick seized the chair, and placed it facing the one spot of blank wall in the room. Then he took her wrist and placed her before him, back to the wall. He slowly sank into the chair, slouching luxuriously.

“You’ll see,” he said lazily. “First…strip.”



It was a risk. He knew this kind of head game would piss her off, wound up as she was, but he couldn’t stop himself. He was pissed off, too. They both needed this.

Besides, he knew, in a deep part of his brain, what got her off. She liked it when he came on strong, liked being overwhelmed. She liked extreme. Almost as much as he liked dishing it out to her. God, look at her. Following that bastard’s mistress, stealing the woman’s stuff out of her car, impersonating her to get into her room—Becca had nerves of steel. She was an adrenaline freak. Just like him.

He could see it, arousal at war with pride on her flushed face. His dick ached, looking at it. Time to nudge and push some more.

“Scared?” he taunted her.

Her chin went up, her eyes sparkled. “Hah. Not of you. Jerk.”

“Then get your clothes off,” he ordered. “Before I tear them off.”

She tossed her hair with a sniff, and took off her glasses. Tossed them on the desk top, trying so hard to look nonchalant.

Her awkward, fumbling striptease was unself-consciously erotic. He could feel his own thudding heartbeat in his engorged cock, pressing painfully against the crotch of his jeans.

She peeled off the tank, revealing a retro-looking bustier made out of skin-toned satin. Rocket-launcher-pointy bra cups that propped her tits up high and offered them to the observer’s eye like the gift of God that they were. She shimmied and twisted to undo the hooks of the tight black skirt, and then wiggled out of it.

The rest of the formerly frigid lingerie made his mouth go dry. Sheer silky stockings, hooked up to a satin garter belt. French cut satin panties with ribbon ties holding the front and back panels together over the smooth curve of her hip. A transparent chiffon garter belt stretched over her belly, trimmed with satin ribbon, accentuating the alluring curves of her thighs, how they hollowed into her groin. Sheer silk stretched over her plump mound, the dark swatch of hair showing through. A web of tangled satin ribbon strips, holding the whole thing onto her perfect, sexy, lickable, f*ckable body.

He was speechless. She was so beautiful, it killed him.

And she’d gone out and bought all that stuff today. For him.

She stood before him, hands moving helplessly, like she wanted to cover herself but was too proud to admit to feeling vulnerable.