Standing in the Shadows (McClouds & Friends #2)(56)

Every instinct screamed to just let go, fill her with his come.

He wrenched out at the last possible instant and spurted across her damp, trembling body.

God, that had been close. More intense every goddamn time.

He sank down to trembling knees and pressed his face against the amazingly soft skin of her inner thigh. The warm, rich sea smell of her sex was intoxicating. He trailed his fingers over her cleft, caressing the soft fuzz of damp ringlets. She was still shaking. Her fingers were tangled in his hair, stroking him. He could lose himself exploring her body, and never get tired of it. He could eat her again right now. Just bury his face in her beautiful, juicy cunt and worship it.

Then it hit him, what was waiting for him, behind that door in his mind. The phone call. He'd been better off in the drugged haze of sex.

He stood up. She started to follow, and he pushed her back down onto the bed. "Stay there," he said.

"But I have to—"

"I'll wash you," he told her. "I just need a minute alone. Please."

He stumbled into the bathroom and winced at the mirror. His eyes looked crazed. He looked like a guy who heard impossible voices in the night, who mixed up dreams with reality. A guy who would kidnap a vulnerable girl, drag her off to a secluded hotel room and f*ck her all night long. How many times—nah, no point in counting. One just blended into the next. It was one long f*ck session, interrupted by conversation and the odd nap. And the occasional death threat from a homicidal maniac, of course. Just to liven things up.

He choked on his own bitter laughter, and hunched over the sink. He washed his cock and splashed water on his face, then took a deep breath, and put his hand on the doorknob.

He stopped, running over that goddamn phone call in his mind. It was improbable, ridiculous, to think that Novak could have found them here. No one had known. He had only decided himself at the last moment. But the alternative was even scarier—at least to him. That what he'd heard wasn't real. He turned on the water and splashed his face again. He was afraid to go out and face her. Ashamed that she might think that he was…

No. He turned his back on the unthinkable. He couldn't afford to doubt himself. He shook it off, a fierce, angry shudder of refusal.

He had promised to wash her. He ran hot water over one of the washcloths hanging on the rack, and shoved the door open.

Erin was perched on the bed, knees drawn up to her chest. He knelt in front of her and sponged every trace of his come off her belly, her breasts. She stretched and smiled, opening to his touch. He wanted to sponge her between her legs, too, but the washcloth was sticky. He flung it aside. His tongue was warm and wet, and would do just as well.

She gasped as he pushed her legs open and put his mouth to her again. "Connor! For God's sake—"

"Let me." God, she was juicy and sweet.

Erin sagged back onto the bed. She was tugging at his hair, saying something urgent, pleading, but it degenerated into shocked gasps of pleasure soon enough. He owed her an orgasm after his latest caveman performance. It was a matter of pride.

He laved her with his mouth, every precious pink fold, every delicate detail. He fastened his lips and tongue around her clit, and the taut, swollen nub thrummed against his mouth. He suckled and nibbled and insisted until she came, right against his face.

He slid up into her arms and hid his face against her breasts. She pulled the blankets over them, murmuring sweet words that almost untangled the knot of fear in his chest.

The world was getting weirder by the minute, but this, at least, was amazing and sweet. He would take all the comfort he could from it.

He waited until she was fast asleep, and gently untangled himself from her slender limbs. He propped his back against the headboard and stared with hot, suspicious eyes into the ominous shadows. Sleep was a million miles away. His gun was inches from his hand. He monitored the soft rise and fall of her breath with his other hand.

He had come down here to guard her, so by God, he would do it.



Tamara stretched her perfect body, well aware of the effect she made in the rumpled sheets. She smiled through her lashes at the man lying beside her. He was playing with a strand of her fiery hair, his face relaxed and calm, but that could change in an instant. A raised eyebrow, a smile that struck him as false, and the world could explode.

She was well used to living in several different realities at once, but this was the finest line she had ever walked.

She channeled the emotional energy of that rush of fear into a sensual wiggle and a satisfied smile, and struggled to remember why she had decided to do this, why it had seemed so incredibly important at the time. Usually she loved risk, even craved it. But as the days with Novak crawled by, she was loving it less and less.

Stultifying tedium looked very attractive to her right now.

"You were inspired tonight," she murmured. Her voice was throaty and relaxed. Whore's talk had always come easily to her.

"Perhaps Nigel's report inspired me." His lips curved in a dimpled, deceptively sweet smile. "He could hear McCloud halfway down the corridor. Like a wild boar in rut. Poor Erin."

She chuckled. "Surprising. I would have thought that your phone call would put a damper on things."

"Not at all. He reacted just as I would have expected. Fear and anger leads directly to the desire to conquer and punish and control." He wrapped the lock of hair around his finger and tugged it. She winced, and cried out. She had learned, to her cost, that hiding pain was a big mistake. "I studied him, you know," he went on. "I profiled him, just as he has profiled me. We have a great deal in common."