Hell on Wheels (Black Knights Inc. #1)(37)
For a moment, every reason why she shouldn’t be in his arms sprouted feathers and flew right out of his mind. For one delicious instant, he knew only the sensation of her body moving against him. Her arms around his shoulders, her fingers tunneling through the hair at his nape until goose bumps erupted along his skin.
Before he realized what was happening, he was kissing her back with all the passion and hunger that had been building inside him since that time he walked into the Morgans’ kitchen on a cool May morning and watched her swing a Pearl Jam backpack over her shoulder.
He remembered it like it was yesterday…
Because beyond all reason—she’d been just a girl, a senior in high school and he’d been a twenty-one-year-old man of the world by that point—he’d wanted her. With a force that had knocked him senseless. So much so he’d only been able to stare in narrow-eyed wonder and blink at her when he was introduced.
Then she’d bestowed on him her bright smile and laughed her sunny laugh, and he’d fallen in…lust. He didn’t believe in love at first sight, but something had certainly happened right then and there.
Grigg had instantly recognized the hot hunger gleaming in his eyes and had leaned in to whisper a phrase he’d repeated too many times to count over the long years to follow. Lay a finger on my baby sister and die, *.
And that was just the bucket of ice water Nate needed…memories of Grigg.
Shit! What am I doing?
“This can’t happen again,” he told her as he unwrapped her legs and set her feet on the floor before pulling away. Was that his voice sounding like gravel rolling around in a dump truck?
“What? Why?” She blinked up at him.
He had to turn away. He couldn’t look at her kiss-swollen lips or the color riding high in her cheeks and know he was responsible for both. “It just can’t.”
“That’s not an answer!”
“There are things you don’t know about me, Ali.” Things she’d hopefully never know…
“Okay,” she walked to the leather La-Z-Boy he kept in the corner and plopped down. Good Lord, they were baby blue. Baby blue panties. He got just a glimpse before she closed the edges of her robe and crossed her legs. “So, are you gay?”
He coughed. “Uh, what d’you think?”
She eyed the bulge behind his zipper and shook her head.
Yeah, that’s a big negative, little lady.
“Do you have some incurable STD?” she asked, head canted just so, like she was a loan officer interviewing a potential borrower.
This was getting out of hand. “No. Ali I—”
“Do you have a girlfriend or wife I’m unaware of?”
“Course not. If you’ll just—”
“Then there’s absolutely no reason why we can’t continue doing exactly what we were just doing.” She stood up to make good on her word, and he nearly stumbled backward when his heel caught on the rug.
He held up a hand to ward her off like she was some hungry jungle cat instead of one small woman.
One small, determined woman. Oh, yes, he recognized that look, as well.
He was losing the battle here. Time to quit jacking off and lay it all on the line. “I’ve done horrible things, Ali. Unforgivable things. You don’t want anything to do with me.”
“No,” she shook her head, her face softening. Christ, he was going to bust out crying if she continued to look at him with those softly sincere eyes. “I don’t know exactly what you’ve done, and I probably never will. But one thing I do know is there’s no shame in answering the call of duty and doing what must be done to protect the freedom and the way of life of all the people you love. You’ll never convince me otherwise. I’ll never see you as anything other than what you are, Nate, a hero.”
And that did it. Because, Jesus, she had no idea. Not one friggin’ clue.
Just how heroic would she think him if she knew he’d been the one to end Grigg’s life?
Chapter Nine
The first, soft pink rays of dawn spilled between the wooden slats of the blinds, and Frank tossed aside the covers. It was barely past oh-five-hundred, but it was beyond obvious he’d get no more sleep.
Too much to worry about. Starting with the fact that one of his men had involved them all in a situation absolutely reeking of foul play, and ending with the fact that Becky was under the hugely mistaken impression he’d let her join the team if she could prove herself Ozzie’s equal.
To put it mildly, no f*cking way. Over his dead body.
He rotated his trick shoulder and grimaced when it clicked into place and set up a steady throb like a bad toothache.
Getting old not only sucked, it suckety-suck-suck-sucked. Grabbing the bottle of ibuprofen from the nightstand, he threw two tablets to the back of his throat and swallowed.
Come on, you little chemical wonders, work your magic.
Twenty minutes later he was showered, shaved, and down in his office with a glazed donut in one hand, his telephone in the other.
Nearly oh-six-thirty DC time, which meant General Fuller was due for a little wake-up call. One the ol’ hard-ass would probably rather not take, but life’s a bitch and then you die.
Interrupting the General’s beauty sleep rated real low on Frank’s list of things not to do today, way under don’t kiss Becky and don’t start a war with the FBI or the CIA. And getting General Fuller up and cranking away on his end of this rank-ass deal would go a long way to allowing Frank to put big red checkmarks next to some items on his list of things to do today. Hopefully, right beside find out just what the hell Agent Delaney was investigating and find out why the hell there’s a spook on Grigg’s little sister’s tail.