No Place to Run (KGI #2)(39)

“Always pays to be prepared.”

She shook her head. He was feeding her a line of crap. Someone had to have packed the truck for them. Probably one of his many team members.

“Come on. I’ll help you into the tub and then leave you to it,” he said as he guided her toward the bathroom.

She stopped and put a hand on his arm. “I can do it. I’m okay.”

He stared at her a moment, then nodded. “Okay then. I’ll take care of the bags and getting food.”

She didn’t spend as much time in the tub as she had at Sam’s mom and dad’s. She could hear him outside the bathroom, and she was filled with a restless urgency to get back to him.

Other than stiffness and a little residual soreness, her wound didn’t bother her as much as she had thought it would, given that she’d been shot. She tested the ridge of the stitched seam with her fingers and examined it in the mirror. It was slightly puckered, a little swollen around the sutures, but there was no angry redness to denote infection. Those antibiotic shots Donovan had given her had done the trick.

She towel-dried her hair and then realized that Sam hadn’t brought in a change of clothes for her. Her baggy pants and T-shirt lay on the floor soaking up the water she’d dripped from the shower.

With a sigh, she wrapped a towel around her and cracked open the bathroom door. She didn’t see Sam, so she pushed farther into the room, craning her neck to see around the doorway.

She saw Sam the same time he looked up and saw her. There was a spark in his eyes, and he quickly looked away but then lifted his gaze once more as if he couldn’t resist.

“I uhm don’t have any clothes,” she murmured.

He moved to the bed and rummaged in one of the bags there before pulling out a pair of jeans, underwear, and a shirt. He circled around the end of the bed and stalked toward her with purposeful steps.

She almost backed away. She felt small and vulnerable, and he was looking at her just like he’d looked at her all those nights they’d spent in another hotel.

He stopped just a foot in front of her, so close that his heat reached out and circled her like the damp towel she wore so close to her breast.

The clothes were in his hand, but he didn’t move to give them to her and she didn’t reach for them.

His gaze was so intense. So penetrating. She felt naked. So itchy and alive. She swallowed, but nothing she did ridded her of the knot in her throat. It ached like she ached.

The clothes dropped silently to the floor. His hands cupped her bare shoulders. His fingers caressed her skin.

Slowly and with infinite tenderness his mouth descended over hers. His breath danced across her skin, and then he captured her lips in a long, hot kiss. Time melted away like ice on a summer day. She was back in his arms in the hotel room where they met after she left the bar each night.

He’d always waited for her, pulling her into his arms as soon as she walked through the door. Their clothes flew and they reacted desperately to the passion that existed between them.

She’d give anything to go back to those precious nights she’d spent in his arms. But she’d always known she couldn’t have forever.

Yet now, under the heat of his lips, she clung to him, wanting him so badly that the ache far surpassed the pain of her injuries.

He jerked away and took a step back, running his hand through his hair in agitation. “Goddamn it, Sophie. What you do to me.”

Her lips pursed and she stared at him, hoping he’d shrivel under the force of her glare.

“I didn’t make you kiss me. You wanted me every bit as much as I wanted you. Don’t make excuses. Shut up and take responsibility.”

He lifted one eyebrow and then his gaze smoldered. He took a step forward, and she instinctively backed away.

His hands smoothed up her shoulders, carefully skimming over her bandaged arm, until he cupped her face in his palms.

“You’re absolutely right,” he murmured. “I’ll own up to the fact that right now I want to make love to you more than I want anything else. It’s stupid. Insane, even, but there you have it. For now I’ll take responsibility for the fact that I’m going to kiss you again.”

She swallowed the lump in her throat just as his lips descended again. She melted into his arms, giving herself fully to his embrace.

A low moan rose from her throat, swelling painfully before it rushed into his mouth. She wanted to touch him, to hold him against her, to know that nothing bad would ever happen to her while she was in his arms.

“Tell me we can’t make love, Soph,” he murmured against her lips. The pet name he’d used so many times when he was on top of her, inside her, beside her or wrapped around her, sounded so sweet to her ears. She was starved for him. “There’s too much unresolved between us. We shouldn’t—we can’t—make love.”

She sighed unhappily and stared up at him as his thumbs caressed the corners of her mouth. Her face was still tenderly cupped in his hands, and she didn’t want to break that connection for any reason.

“Why can’t we?” she whispered. “I’ve missed you so much, Sam. I’ve stayed awake so many nights aching for you to hold me again, to kiss me and make love to me like you did before.”

He closed his eyes and leaned in until his forehead rested against hers. “You’re hurt. This is crazy.”