Читать книгу The Complete Red-Hot And Historical Collection - Ким Лоренс, Kelly Hunter - Страница 57

HE WAS WAITING for her when she stepped from the building and started down the stairs to the footpath. Rowan quickened her step and tried to ignore the acceleration of her heartbeat. His car was sleek, black, expensive, and parked in a no standing zone—and he leaned against the gleaming paintwork as if he had all the time in the world.

He wore battered jeans, a shirt with a collar and a black leather jacket, and he’d look like every muscled guy she’d ever seen in the movies but for the sheer beauty of his face and the fierce intelligence in those midnight-blue eyes. Two of his younger siblings had genius IQs. Jared had been tested too, in his younger years, and those tests had been re-analysed again recently. There was some reason to believe that Jared had screwed those tests up deliberately.

Brains, brawn, an ingrained disrespect for authority, a taste for revenge and utter loyalty to his family. As a director, Rowan had no idea how to handle him. As a woman she had an unhealthy desire to get under his skin and become important to him in ways they’d both regret.

Not exactly a comfortable headspace to be in.

He opened the car door for her as she approached, and she slid him a careless smile and got in.

‘Where are we going?’ she asked when he took the driver’s seat.

‘Some place nice.’

‘Some place neutral?’

‘My father keeps an apartment here for family use. I haven’t been in it for over two years and I probably haven’t stayed there for close to five years. Is that neutral enough for you?’

‘I guess we’ll see.’ She gave tacit agreement to the plan. ‘How far away is it?’

‘It’s in a hotel complex near here. There are several restaurants to choose from—or, if you prefer, Room Service. You’ll have immediate access to other people should you decide to leave the privacy of the apartment. There’s a concierge who can call you a taxi if you need one.’

‘Am I going to need one?’

‘I don’t know. Either way, you’ll have a swift and easy exit available.’

‘Thank you.’

She leaned back against the leather seat and closed her eyes. Her last meeting of the day had been difficult. Jockeying with other section heads for project priority was always taxing. When it came to having dinner with Jared, she’d barely had time to think beyond the fact that she’d agreed to it. That he’d gone ahead and taken the time to plan the evening carefully, with both her physical and emotional comfort in mind, was a very welcome bonus.

‘How did your meeting with the management go?’

‘It threw up some … unexpected career opportunities.’

He could have said more but he lapsed into silence and Rowan didn’t push him. Sharing information didn’t come easily to this man. Trust had to be built slowly.

She opened her eyes and looked in his direction, instantly captivated by the play of shadows across the hard lines of his face and those perfectly formed lips. He was so very beautiful to look at. She doubted she’d ever tire of doing so.

‘I patted a puppy this afternoon,’ he offered next, with a wry smile in her direction. ‘It wasn’t my puppy, mind, but I figured it counted as far as taking your advice was concerned. Do you have any pets, Ro?’

‘My grandfather has a tortoise. Apparently I’ll inherit.’

He laughed—and there was a sound to make a woman sit up and take notice, for it was a good laugh. Rich and rolling. Infectious.

The hotel he took her to looked unimposing from the outside—nothing more than a single set of oversized wooden doors with a black-suited doorman attending them—but the inside was a different matter altogether. Anyone would be able to see this place was on the seven-star side of exclusive the minute they stepped through the doors. Assuming you were allowed through the doors at all.

Jared had to hand the doorman a plastic swipe card and then face a camera and be photo-IDd. Rowan had to be IDd as well, for this hotel clearly took the security of their guests and visitors extremely seriously.

‘Your family keeps an apartment here and no one uses it?’ she asked as they stepped into a gilt-edged lift with bronze handrails and mirrors. The kind of lift a princess or a president might be acquainted with.

‘My grandfather bought it. My father keeps it mainly for sentimental reasons, I think. Occasionally he uses it to impress. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t profit from it. We have an agreement with the hotel whereby they have the authority to put guests in the suite when we’re not using it.’

The apartment he took her to was a three-bedroom penthouse, complete with a ten-person dining table, a bar, and an exquisitely furnished lounge area. It was the kind of suite that foreign dignitaries and heads of state stayed in. It was the kind of hotel that afforded its guests several extra layers of security.

‘This do?’ Jared asked as he shut the door behind them.

‘Yes!’ Opulence, privacy, and service at their fingertips. ‘You knew it would impress.’

‘No. I just hoped it would fit our needs. I have no idea what would impress you.’

‘Loyalty. Intelligence. Self-awareness. I’m impressed.’

For a fleeting moment he looked boyishly pleased, and then he shrugged and added a few more words to the mix. ‘Vengeful, destructive, inaccessible …’

‘Trifles,’ she said. ‘You’ll grow out of it.’

He laughed at her words, his eyes warm and his expression boyishly unguarded. ‘We’ll see.’ He crossed to the bar. ‘What can I get you to drink?’

‘Cool, clear, bubble-infested water.’

‘Do you ever drink alcohol?’

‘Occasionally. I don’t dislike it. It’s more a matter of being permanently on call.’

‘That’s a strong service ethic you have there, Ro.’

Maybe he meant it as a criticism—she didn’t know. ‘Plenty of people have one.’

He nodded and handed her the room service menu, then tucked in shoulder to shoulder with her while she read it. She didn’t push him away. He felt good and smelled better, the faintly woodsy tang of his aftershave teasing her senses.

‘Veal for me,’ she decided after careful perusal. ‘With the creamy fennel sauce and greens—and I absolutely do want the wattle-seed and bush honey crème brûlée afterwards.’

‘I’m having the rib-eye,’ he said. ‘With fries, cracked pepper, salad to make it look healthy, and a beer to wash it down with. I’m a simple soul. And I’m not on call.’

He picked up the hotel phone and put the order through.

‘Someone’s coming to sort out the dining area and bring bread and tapas for us,’ he offered when he’d finished.

‘Good service.’

‘Always is.’

She cocked her head to one side. ‘You’re used to this level of wealth?’

‘I don’t need it,’ he said with a shrug. ‘I can exist on a lot less. But, yes. I was born into wealth. I’ve never wanted for playthings. What about you?’

‘I’m used to less.’

He crossed to the entertainment console and moments later the soft strains of a well-played acoustic guitar filled the room. A little bit Spanish … a little bit alternative.

‘Your choice?’ she asked.

‘Probably Damon’s—although I recognise who’s playing. Sounds of my youth.’

‘Do those youthful memories relax you? The ones you had before ASIS?’

‘Yes. There are good memories there. My teenage years were good ones. I thought myself invincible and thought that the world revolved around my every whim. Because it did.’

‘See? Told you—you’ll grow out of things.’

This man could have done anything. Been anything. Yet here he was.

‘Why did you join ASIS?’

‘I think I was looking for a cause. A way to combine adrenalin-junked-up dangerous activities with righteousness.’

‘What did your father say to that decision?’

‘Nothing.’ Jared shrugged. ‘It’s not that we don’t get on. We just never saw much of him after my mother’s death. Damon and Poppy got the worst end of that stick. They barely know the man at all.’

‘Do they care?’

Jared shrugged. ‘Can’t speak for them, but I like to hope that even if our father wasn’t around much while they were growing up they didn’t miss out on having family who loved and cared for them. Lena’s good at binding people together. Love, concern, support—just being there for people in the day-to-day. She’s bossy as all hell, mind—and so was I. But the four of us kids held together as a family. We still hold, even though we’re scattered across the globe.’

‘I’m glad you have them.’

‘Trig’s a part of the family too. I’ve been thinking about something he said the other day. A question he asked me. You and me … if we get together … how will that affect your career? Are you looking to me to enhance it?’

He crossed to the bar, poured himself a Scotch and stared down at it, frowning.

‘Because I have to tell you, Ro, that I’m considering finishing up with special intelligence altogether—so if you have some notion that you and I could team up at some point … be some kind of power couple within the organisation … I’m not on board with it.’

It had been a long time since someone had managed to shock her so thoroughly, and it must have shown on her face because Jared suddenly grinned.

‘A power couple?’ she echoed flatly. ‘In what way?’

‘Management offered me a black ops crew of my own choosing—provided I also chose you for your expertise and experience. They spoke of grooming me for the top job. Your name was mentioned. In a partnership. A working one. A personal one. I felt as if they were handing you to me on a plate.’

It took a lot to make Rowan lose her cool, but she was getting there. She sipped at her water and set it carefully on the bar-top while she tried to stem the angry tirade of words that wanted to spew forth.

‘If you want to stop working for Section, then stop.’ She kept her voice level and her gaze steady. Good job, Rowan. ‘Believe me when I say that whoring myself out to you—or anyone else—in order to gain power is not on my list of things to do. If I want more power I’ll damn well go after it on my own, thank you.’

Okay, now she was getting snappy.

‘You have vastly underestimated my self-respect.’

‘You’re sexy when you’re riled.’ Jared smiled again, his big body relaxing infinitesimally.

She speared him with her meanest glare. ‘No. You don’t get a free pass on this. You believed them. You thought I was in on it.’

‘I never said that.’ His mouth hardened. ‘I told you what they said and then I told you what I was thinking. There’s a difference.’

‘And now you know what I think.’

‘Exactly.’ He lifted his glass and drained it. When his voice came again it was raspy. ‘I still want to know you, Ro. It feels good to explore your boundaries.’

A knock sounded on the door, accompanied by a softly spoken ‘Room Service …’

He crossed to the door and let in a man and a woman in black and white service uniform. Rowan watched in muddled silence as the two attendants set silver-domed serving trays on the table before crossing to the sideboard and opening it to reveal everything a well-dressed dinner table would ever need. Thirty seconds, tops, and the table had been expertly set for two and a candelabra lit.

‘Your main meals will be with you in fifteen minutes,’ the older man informed them with a smile, and then left.

‘You can leave any time,’ Jared offered quietly, but Rowan took a steadying breath, crossed to the table and took a seat instead.

‘I’m hungry. I need to eat and relax and I like your company. Will you join me?’

‘And make small talk?’

‘You could always try telling me about yourself,’ she murmured as he took the seat opposite, candlelight and shadows making him even more beautiful.

‘When I was eight I wanted to be a submariner,’ he said as he reached for the bread. ‘When I die I want to be fed to the fishes.’

‘Do you think about dying a lot?’

‘I think about surviving more.’ He broke his bread, put it in his mouth and chewed.

‘When I was eight I wanted to be a foreign correspondent news reporter,’ she offered.

‘Seriously?’

‘Yes. I grew up an only child in a very serious household where news ran twenty-four-seven. Foreign correspondents were my rock stars. I guess you had to be there.’

‘Chances are I wouldn’t have stayed there. I like being outdoors—anything to do with water and swimming in the rain.’

‘Is this a song?’

‘Feel free to add your own verse,’ he offered generously.

‘I like scalding hot showers, with multiple shower heads.’

‘Hedonist.’

Their conversation continued, sporadic and easy, as they ate their way through plates of truly excellent appetisers.

The fact that Jared wanted to be open and honest with Rowan didn’t mean that it came effortlessly to him. It had been years since he’d last shared pieces of himself with anyone, even if she did make it easy for him.

And then their main meals arrived, and he tried not to let the silence ratchet up his tension again. Every scrape of cutlery on a plate fed his senses. Every taste and touch—every glance—branded straight through his skin to enflame the beast beneath.

When she pushed her plate aside at the end of the meal and leaned back in her chair to study him he was hard-pressed not to start trembling, his need to reach out and take was so big.

‘Ro …’

He wished his voice worked better, but all he could manage was a gravel-scrape across the vowel. He needed to lose himself in sensation, sink so deeply into it that there was no thought for anything but pleasure, no thought of anything but sex. No room for memories, no way to screw up.

‘How do you like your sex?’

And she looked at him with those all-seeing eyes and just knew where he was going with this.

‘Soft and sweet not really going to cut it for you?’ she asked.

‘No. And I don’t want to break anything. You, especially.’

‘I’m hungry,’ she murmured. ‘It’s been a while for me. If we do this, I don’t mind getting a little reckless.’

She was saying all the right words, and her delivery was malt-whisky-smooth. Then again, she’d read his psych report.

‘I’m trying to be honest here.’ And maybe—just maybe—he was trying to avert disaster. ‘I’m touch-starved, apparently. And I’m hungry for you. I’ve been sitting here fighting the need to reach for you. And it’s big, this need, and I’m struggling to control it. If we start this … If you want to … I need to know that you’ll be okay if I get a little greedy.’

He needed more from her than a simple touch, more than a simple caress, and he didn’t know where this would take them or how it would end.

‘I usually lead during sex—I take control. But—’

The thought of bringing two years’ worth of abstinence to the table and not being able to control himself …

She stood and crossed to the bar, poured him another whisky and brought it to the table, leaning into him and brushing her breasts against his shoulder as she did so. She threaded her fingers through his hair and he closed his eyes on an indrawn breath, unable to do much more than ride the spark of heat that shot from head to groin.

‘There is another way we could do this,’ she whispered. ‘A way to take all that fear of breaking things right out of the equation. Shall I tie you up, Jared? Would that help?’

One hand was still in his hair and the other was tracing a slow trail around his neck. He swallowed hard and nodded as a tremor ripped straight through him.

‘Yes.’

She kissed him then, slow and careful—until he framed her face with his hands and let the hunger lick through him.

‘Get up,’ she whispered, so he did.

And somehow they made it to the bedroom without breaking anything.

She undressed him and kept his tie in her hand. He knew that silk was strong—he’d trusted his life to it on more than one occasion—but if she thought one necktie was going to hold him she was mistaken.

The knot she used to bind his hands together in front of him was impressive.

‘On your back, on the bed, arms above your head,’ she said next, and then crossed the room and reached for the thick silk rope that held the curtains back.

That was more like it …

He groaned, his dignity in tatters, because … yes.

She tied his hands to the bedhead—the very centre of the bedhead—and she had to straddle him and lean all over him to do it. Or maybe she didn’t have to. Either way, he wasn’t complaining. He twisted beneath her, seeking skin with his lips—the soft inner skin of her upper thigh—and tasted salt and sweetness, felt the give in her as she momentarily melted against him, the strength in her as she redoubled her efforts to secure his hands.

The scent of her … he breathed it in. Skin—he wanted more of it. She obliged by lifting her dress up over her body to reveal two lacy scraps of underwear and then she leaned forward again, so that the skin across her ribs was within reach of his lips, and sighed her approval when he went there, and then higher, to the underswell of her breasts. Higher still as she pushed the lace of her bra aside and gave him access to her nipple. He took his time with that, played her soft and sweet, until finally he clamped down and sucked hard, deeply satisfied by the dark flare that lit her eyes. Yes, she’d take more of that.

And then she pulled away and leaned over him again, testing the strength of the ties by curling her hands around his wrists and pulling until the cords drew tight. She trailed her hands along his arms and over his shoulders, slid her body down his and went to work on him. Mapping him with her hands and with her lips, every ridge and valley, she explored him until he was little more than a straining, moaning mess.

‘Good?’ she whispered.

‘Yes.’

And then she blanketed him with her body and started kissing him, languid, messy, got-all-the-time-in-the-world kisses, while her body learned the shape of his and how best she’d fit against it. She kissed him until he was iron-hard and straining for release, slick with promise … He hadn’t come from just the touch of a body against his since he was a teenager, but tonight he thought he might.

Would.

If she didn’t stop.

His kisses grew harder and more biting—a warning, in the same way his bucking up against her, unseating her, was a warning.

‘Rowan,’ he growled, and strained at the ties that bound him. ‘Don’t you make me come like this. I won’t forgive you.’

‘Relax.’ She slid off him, taking away the heat and the warmth of skin on skin, her eyes assessing. ‘What do you want next?’ Her fingers teased him and he bucked again. ‘Ask.’

‘Want your mouth on me,’ he rasped. ‘Want my tongue buried inside you.’ He wanted his sex dirty, filthy and glorious, and he wanted Rowan as unhinged as he was.

She did it with a whimper—swivelled around and settled over him—and he’d never felt the lack of hands more as she held herself above him, barely letting him lick at her, let alone feast.

‘More.’

She gave it, little by little, and he tried to be delicate with her even as his hunger roared, and then she lapped at him, and flicked her tongue over his crown, and that was the end of any restraint he might have conjured.

There. Right there. Flicking and sucking. And there was nothing else in his world but the taste of her as he feasted. Rowan’s scent, Rowan’s taste, Rowan’s whimpers. Ro … Her name was a litany inside his head, and when her mouth came off him with a gasp, and she rested her face against the crease of his pelvis and started swearing, he knew she was close to orgasm.

She came on his tongue, and every muscle in his body was strung so tight he could hardly breathe. He needed his own release the same way he needed air, but not yet … He was nowhere near ready to end this yet.

And then she was turning around again, lining him up and taking him in in tiny increments, and that was exactly the way he wanted her—he wanted to feel everything. The burn in his shoulders, the tug of her teeth scraping against the underside of his jaw, his breath leaving his body on a groan as he thrust up into her.

He’d have had her on her back by now if he hadn’t been restrained. He’d have been out of control, too hard for her to handle, too far gone to hold back. But this …

This was exquisite.

She sat up, hands to his chest, and with her eyes never leaving his face steadied herself and used what little weight she had to push his body back against the bed. She scraped her nails across his nipple, paused with one of them between the nails of her finger and thumb, and then pinched it hard. The stab of pain hit his brain like an aphrodisiac.

‘So full of you,’ she whispered. ‘You’re everywhere. And I’m almost there again.’

He snapped up into her and was rewarded by another bolt of pain, courtesy of her fingertips digging into his ribs.

This time it did nothing but drag him further out of himself and into that place where only sensation existed.

‘You still with me?’

He had to concentrate in order to understand her words.

‘Yes.’

‘You still want this?’

‘Don’t you stop now. Don’t.’

‘Do you want to come now? Like this? Tied up and on your back? So you can only take what I’m willing to give? Is this the kind of sex you need tonight?’

Heaven help him, it was.

‘Yes.’

The sounds she made as she started to move mirrored his own … pleasure and pain and utterly intoxicating. And then she leaned back a little more, set up a little roll of her hips on each downward stroke, closed her eyes and went to town.

And that was the end of him.