The Espionage Effect(72)
“Not one.”
“Not even a fellow agent?”
“No.” He rolled to his side too, facing me, eyes narrowing as he whispered, “Not even an asset.”
My head jerked back a fraction. “Is that what I am? An asset?”
He gave a slow headshake. “Not even close.”
“What am I, then…a fellow agent?”
“Not exactly. You don’t work for EtherSphere. And I’ve never worked with an agent like you.”
“Female?”
He fought a smile. “Attractive. Intelligent.” He cocked his head. “Worldly, yet not fooled by it. Educated, but untaught, even with all you’ve learned. Alive, but only barely…and now for the first time, finally living.”
My gaze drifted down to those lips again, where the hint of a smile still played. “But you have had sex with agents.” I arched a brow as my gaze met his.
“I have.”
“And assets.” Something within me needed to quantify this, push to define whatever was developing between us.
“Yes.” He gave a slight nod, then propped up onto an elbow, looking down at me. “Assets too.”
“But I’m neither.”
A slight headshake. “You, Devin Hill, are a great mystery to me. Not an acquaintance. Not a coworker.”
“A friend,” I offered. I hadn’t had many. Anna was really the only one who qualified by time and depth. He’d become my second.
“Friend is too casual a word, don’t you think?” His gaze held mine. “Friends are kind, confide secrets, grant favors. Friends don’t have sex.”
“Not repeatedly, anyway,” I teased.
“True. Because if we’d kept it to just the once, then we could remain friends.” Mischief sparkled in his eyes as he mocked right back.
“Lovers, then,” my tone deepened, heavy with suggestion. I pushed my body off the mat. “We’re done here, right?”
His brows drew together as he rotated onto his back again to stare up at me. His confused expression gave him a rare adorable quality. “With our conversation?”
I half shrugged, then grabbed the borrowed T-shirt I wore at the hem and dragged it slowly up over my body, allowing the material to rasp over my nipples, hardening them. Then I pulled it over my head and tossed it aside. “Our training. Surely, I’ve proven myself. And this body needs to rest if you want it to perform at its optimum.”
He didn’t reply. All he did was stare, his face stricken with fascinated wonder as I tugged loose the knot cinched at my waist and released my hold, letting the soft fabric of his lounge pants slide down my thighs to pool at my feet.
“You have a bathtub, I’m hoping?”
“A Japanese soaking tub.” He blinked heavily. “Beside the shower.” He pointed toward the bathroom area nearest his bedroom, where we’d showered so intimately the night before, chastely if only in body.
I had no idea what the “Japanese” part meant, but I had every intention of finding out as I counted seconds off in my head. One one-thousand…two one-thousand…
A distant low thump in the room behind me almost made me laugh. For all the grace the man had exhibited during his kata and the stealth he’d employed while sneaking up in attack during our training, after offering him my nakedness with no expectations, he’d suddenly become a clumsy kid.
My earlier blindfold-training served me well as I rounded the corner into his bath area. Deciding not the switch on the lights, I stepped into the dimly lit bathroom right as the air current changed in my wake, stirring as he closed in behind me.
Heat followed, a subtle warmth teasing the fine hairs on the backs of my arms seconds before he brushed his body against mine. He stood naked behind me, with me, bared on the outside, but the effect touched far deeper, even if neither of us was ready to admit just how far.
I stopped before the soapstone Japanese tub, a thick-walled vessel more vertical than horizontal, barely large enough for the both of us.
With a slight shift, his skin grazed over mine, his chest to my back, as he leaned over and grasped the faucet lever. He rotated it until a thick vertical stream of water flowed from a hole in the ceiling.
When he straightened, he rested his hands on my shoulders, then gently spun me to face him. Unsure of what to say, but never more certain of anything that held a glimmer of light in my life, I skimmed my hands around his trim waist, settled my fingers over the sexy depressions above his ass, and pressed a kiss to his chest as he pulled me close.
A single finger tucked under my chin, gently tilting my face upward. My gaze clashed with his and held. So much intensity shone in those depths. A thousand words that didn’t need to be spoken. “Lovers, then,” he rasped out. “But—”
Filled with sudden urgency, I bounced up on my toes and kissed him before he uttered another syllable. The impact of the intimate contact surprised me—even though we embraced naked—searing an ache from my mouth through my chest, then tingling lower, settling between my legs. His mouth softened under my pleading lips, opening for me with a low moan. The erotic sound reverberated through me, quivering into my bones.
When I eased away, I closed my eyes and relaxed, leaning more of my weight against him. Our labored breaths filled my ears. The corners of my mouth twitched, a smile threatening to break free with the raw joy of the moment.