Midnight Man (Midnight #1)(50)

Suzanne was his. No other man was ever going to get within two feet of her. John realized he’d kill to keep it that way.

He sipped his coffee, needing to get his emotions under control, get his voice calm. Rage wasn’t a productive emotion. He sipped again and forced himself to concentrate.

“What about your family? Does your father do any sensitive work? Your brother? Sister?”

Suzanne shook her head. “We’re a small family. I’m an only child. My father is a retired college professor of literature, an expert in Chaucer. My mother is—was—a high school French teacher. She’s half French herself. They retired to Baja California, where Dad is writing what he fondly considers will be the Great American Novel. They’re perfectly pleasant, utterly harmless people.”

Another dead end. Shit. This wasn’t getting them anywhere. Frustration was an unusual emotion for him and he didn’t like it one bit. John pinched the bridge of his nose.

She’d answered his questions calmly, but he could tell she was upset. He didn’t want her upset.

What the hell?

How was it that all of a sudden Suzanne’s serenity was more important to him than information? This had never happened before. He’d never ever had any difficulty in keeping emotion separate from a mission. But there it was—he couldn’t stand to see her unhappy.

There was no precedent for these feelings in his life. What was going on? He needed to pump her, to push her harder and…he couldn’t.

There she was, at his table. Heartbreakingly beautiful and forlorn. A unicorn at the edge of the forest. He didn’t want her worried and he didn’t want her sad.

He’d walked knowingly into danger more times than he could count. He’d faced hostile gunfire. He’d even once defused a bomb. There wasn’t anything he’d back down from, anything he feared—or so he’d thought. And yet seeing Suzanne sitting in his kitchen chair, looking sad and frightened was more than he could bear.

He’d have sworn he didn’t have a heart, but there it was, clenching tightly in his chest.

Moving fast, he scooped Suzanne up in his arms and placed her on his lap. After an initial cry of surprise, Suzanne slumped in his arms, and put her head on his shoulder. They sat there in the calm quiet morning light. Just the feel of her in his arms, listening to her quiet breathing, pressing her head against his shoulder, calmed down something sore and inflamed deep down inside of him.

He ran the back of his forefinger down the sleeve of her nightgown, and then fingered it. It was an excuse to keep his hands on her. “That’s a pretty color. You look great in blue.” It was true. But then any color would look good on her.

“Thank you.” She turned her face up to him and smiled. “But it’s not blue.”

John looked at the pinch of material in his hand. It was blue. He raised his eyes to hers. She shook her head. Okay. Not blue. He looked back down. Yes, it was. Dammit, it was blue.

She covered his hand with hers. She was smiling up at him, looking for a moment like the woman he’d first met. Confident. Sexy. He loved seeing her like this. He’d give his right arm to keep that expression on her face.

“You have problems with colors, John. You need to learn the names, the nuances. For example, this nightgown isn’t blue, it’s robin’s egg. There are so many blues around—powder, peacock, navy, denim, Wedgwood…”

He was trying not to smile. “Okay, okay, I get it.”

“The world has a thousand colors.” She ran her hand over his bare chest, down his arm. “Let’s take your skin. You’re very tanned. I’d say your skin color is…” she cocked her head. “Earth. Maybe bark where you get more exposure to the sun. But here…” She traced a finger along his biceps, and then around to the paler skin beneath, “here I’d say you’re more a suede. I can see all sorts of different colors in you, from your hair, which is definitely ebony, with traces of pewter along the temples, to your eyes, which are gunmetal. Mouth.” Shifting in his arms, finger over his lips. The smile had changed and was no longer amused, it was pure temptation. That was the smile that got Adam into so much trouble with the snake. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Your mouth is…oh, I’d say cinnamon.” Her finger caressed the outlines of his lips. Her finger dipped into his mouth and he sucked the tip. His tongue swirled around it, exactly as it did to her nipple and he knew that’s what she was remembering by the way her lids lowered over her silvery gray eyes.

She had pure devil in her expression and he—there was no way to hide it any more—he was excited as hell. She looked down at his lap and—what a witch she was—licked her lips. His hard-on lengthened. It occurred to him that she was going to use sex as a way to forget her troubles.

Great. Worked for him.

There wasn’t anything that needed doing that couldn’t be put off for an hour. Or two. Or four. He could get into sex, big time.

Both her hands were in his hair now, fingers curled around his head. She ran her tongue around his lips and he obediently, eagerly opened his mouth. Her tongue rubbed against his.

“Mmm,” she whispered, angling her head, kissing him deeply.

Oh, yeah.

She pulled away just as he moved to pull her closer.

“Ah, ah,” she admonished, lips so close to his he could feel her warm breath, running her hands down his arms to pin his hands to his side, “no touching during the color lesson.” She exerted a little pressure on his wrists, as if to say—stay put.