Читать книгу A Breath Away - Wendy Etherington - Страница 8

JADE FOUGHT TO ignore her rapid heartbeat. She forced herself to drag clean air into her lungs, to expel it and to calm her erotic thoughts.

She failed miserably.

Instead, she imagined her client’s body beneath her, his erection pressed against the pulsing need between her legs.

They’d been that close a short time ago, but now she envisioned their clothes disappearing. His body would be hard and sleek. Ripples of need and heat would surge through her. His hands would pleasure her beyond her wildest dreams. She’d satisfy an itch she didn’t even know she had until she’d met him.

“It hardly matters if we want each other,” she said, humiliated to find herself breathless. “We’re both professionals, so we’re not going to do anything about it.”

He smiled, his gaze locking with hers. “Aren’t we?”

As he rose and started toward her, she froze. She ordered her feet to move, but they didn’t. The look in his eyes needed no explanation as to his intent, and though the professional remained lurking inside her—the one usually front and center—the desire rolling through her body was overwhelming her instincts.

When he stopped in front of her, he cupped her cheek in his hand and angled her face toward him. “If you’re going to shoot, shoot to kill, because I’m not backing away.”

Then his lips were on hers, persuasive and demanding, but still soft. Her heartbeat accelerated as he slid his tongue inside her mouth, drawing her more deeply beneath his spell, causing the final vestiges of restraint to fall away.

She pressed her body against his, molding herself to the hard planes of his chest, his hardened penis against her stomach. Desire pooled between her legs.

Inhaling the scent of his expensive cologne, she let him lead her to hunger and need, to fan the flames of their attraction and send the temperature from simmering to red-hot.

He was a virtual stranger, not to mention a client, and she watched herself from a distance, not really believing she was touching him and letting him touch her in return. She felt energized in his arms. And exhilarated. And safe.

It was the thought of safety that brought reality crashing back.

She was supposed to be protecting him. She was supposed to solve his case, help him get his life back under control, then send him on his way.

She wrenched herself out of his arms. Breathing hard, she held out her hand. “We can’t do this.”

He grabbed her hand and jerked her against him. “I sure as hell don’t see any reasons not to.”

“Sure you do. You’re just ignoring them.”

“Sex releases tension.”

“Sex complicates.”

“You don’t like complications?”

“No, and I don’t have sex with clients.”

“Is that a hard and fast rule, or just a guideline?”

She braced her feet apart and glared at him. “Don’t make me prove I can take you down anytime I want to, Tremaine.”

“Back to last names, are we? Maybe I should prove how quickly I can have you moaning—even screaming—my name.”

“Dream on.”

“How about I demonstrate instead?”

Bang, bang, bang.

They jumped apart and darted toward the door.

“Room service!” came the cry from the hall.

Jade had her Beretta in her hand as she positioned herself against the wall next to the door. “You order anything?”

“No.”

Her client had drawn a small pistol—from his ankle holster, no doubt—and took his place behind her. “Surely I’m not being stalked by someone with bad aim and a complete absence of originality. Room service,” he added in disgust.

Jade silently agreed, though she was pretty sure she recognized their waiter’s voice. She peered through the peephole and did, indeed, see David Washington and Mo Leger. They waved.

Stifling an eye roll, she said, “They’re mine,” then holstered her weapon and opened the door.

“Hey, boss,” David said, saluting. Tan, handsome and lean, his six-foot-six body was way too long for the waiter’s uniform he wore.

Mo—every bit as tall, plus considerably heavier and darker—pushed a white-tablecloth-covered cart into the suite. He’d opted for a maintenance man’s gray jumpsuit. “You might wanna hold back lookin’ through the peephole, Chief. We coulda blasted you.”

“I recognized your voice,” Jade said with a trace of annoyance. Because of their sense of timing? She didn’t want to go there.

She supposed it was too much to expect these two to stop treating their cases like elaborate games. But of course, to men like David and Mo—and probably Remington Tremaine, as well—chasing the bad guys was a game. One they played with deadly seriousness at times, but one they still found humor and enjoyment in.

She wished she could say she still had fun. Somewhere she’d lost the fire and passion, though she never considered doing anything else. It was all she knew and all she had.

After she made introductions among the men, David asked Tremaine, “So, you’re NSA?”

When Tremaine hesitated to confirm, Jade said, “If you want our help, my people have to have information. I told them what was in your dossier.”

“What little you have?”

“Keep it up, Mr. Fancy-art-dealer, and I’ll find your would be assassin just so I can swear my allegiance to him.”

Mo and David gave her strange looks—she couldn’t recall a time they’d seen her banter with a client—so before their curiosity got the best of them, she said, “His trouble isn’t about a case. It’s about his former profession.”

Hell, she’d kissed the man and guilt—or attraction or weakness—already had her glossing over the fact that he used to take other people’s stuff for a living.

“Sit down, and I’ll fill you in,” she added.

“Over breakfast,” David said.

Jade glanced at the cart. “You brought food?”

Mo and David exchanged smiles. “Among other things.”

OTHER THINGS turned out to be computers, surveillance equipment and instruments Remy couldn’t begin to identify.

He was only marginally competent with computers, but he certainly recognized the weapons, ammunition clips, binoculars and communications devices—including headsets, microphones, cameras and bugs. But there were also black boxes that lit up or emitted a series of beeps, a control that looked suspiciously like a detonator and handheld wands that might be lasers.

If somebody had told him he was going to learn to swing a light saber, he wouldn’t have been surprised in the least.

While he used technology to his advantage on occasion, his strength was his ability to get personal, to read body language, to discern the significance of expressions and reactions. He liked touching things and people. Reading an electronic gauge or tracking some blip on a radar screen held no appeal for him.

Mo, however, was clearly in his element. As he checked out the information on the disk Remy had provided, his walnut-colored hands commanded a laptop keyboard the way the best teenage techno-geek could only dream of doing. Since he was extremely fierce-looking, the thought of him as a geek made Remy smile.

Remy’s amusement faded when his gaze slid to Jade, leaning over David’s shoulder as she pointed to one of the mysterious black boxes on the dining room table. His attraction—correction, his overwhelming need—was interfering with the case. As much as he’d looked forward to finally meeting her, he hadn’t anticipated that complication.

This case was about his life. And while there were many people who couldn’t care less, he certainly placed a high value on his own skin.

But when he was near her, he forgot about the shooting and old scores and professionalism and rules—though he was admittedly never big on those, anyway. She made him forget his goals and purpose, something no one had done for a long, long time.

“You could run a small war from this room,” he said in an effort to focus on the business at hand.

Jade glanced over her shoulder. Those intense green eyes focused briefly on his face. “We are. The bad guys want to take you out. We’re not going to let them.”

Direct. To the point. Where he knew the situation had layers of problems and complications—admittedly ones he hadn’t completely shared with her—she broke things down to their most basic pieces. “Do you always see things so simply?”

“Mostly. I have a simple job.”

He indicated the technology-strewn table with a sweep of his hand. “Seems pretty complex to me.”

“That’s because you still work for our blessed but flawed federal government.” She shrugged and turned away. “David, you want to tell Mr. Tremaine what our job is?”

“Get them before they get you.”

Remy laughed, moving around the table to sit across from them. “A good philosophy.”

“It works for us,” Jade said, frowning at him. “I thought you were going to get some rest.”

“I tried, but I can’t seem to relax. Probably too much caffeine.”

Actually, every time he closed his eyes all he saw was the two of them naked and tangled in the sheets of his bed.

Her eyes heated for a moment—with anger or maybe the same desire simmering in his veins. Probably an reluctant combination of both.

“You really need to sleep.”

“Trying to get rid of me?”

The yes was obviously on the tip of her tongue, but she swallowed it. “You’re a big boy. Do what you want.” She picked up an ammunition clip and checked it, adding, “You’ll be here for the next few days anyway. Plenty of time to recuperate.”

Even as he admired her I’ll-slip-this-in-when-he-won’t-notice strategy, he wasn’t complying. “I don’t think so, Agent Broussard.”

“I’m not an agent, and you’ll do what I say.”

“I’ll do what I please.”

“Not if you want my team protecting you.”

His body responded to her order by hardening like a rock. He wanted her when she was angry and defiant. He wanted her soft and vulnerable. Was there any situation where she couldn’t—literally—get a rise out of him?

He did realize that forcing his point would get him nowhere. She’d never back down in front of her team.

“Could we discuss this in my office?” he asked as he rose.

“Office? You don’t—”

“How about the room I’m currently sleeping and working in?”

She sighed—heavily. “David, continue to run the equipment diagnostics. Mo, keeping working on those names and background checks. I want the most likely suspect ASAP. I’ll be right back.”

She stalked toward Remy’s bedroom door, crossed the threshold, then stood at the end of the bed with her feet planted shoulder-width apart, her hands braced on her hips. She looked as though she planned to go ten rounds with the heavyweight champ.

He was tense, as well. It was both heady and annoying to have dreamed about being with her, to finally have her near him, only to have her constantly trying to distance herself.

But in contrast to her anger, he took great pains to move slowly, to close the door behind him with a quiet click and face her with a slight smile on his face. “Clients are a pain in the ass, huh?”

“Yes, they are.”

“And yet without them, you wouldn’t have a business.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I have agreeable clients. Ones who listen to me, ones who don’t question—”

“Ones who are too damn scared to do anything else.”

She said nothing for several long moments. “I don’t like you very much.”

“What a shame. I like you very much.” Before she could add another terse comment that might send his temper careening over the edge she’d already jumped off, he walked toward her, stopping when he was just inches away. “I’m not scared, Jade. At least not of getting shot again. I’m troubled by the need you rouse in me. I wonder if I’ll forget what I’m here to do.”

Instead of touching her, he should be finding a way to separate his fascination with her from his need for her investigative skills. There had been times he’d tossed aside professional ethics, but never for sex.

Ahem.

Okay, so there was that case in Boston years ago when he probably should have resisted the charms of that lovely blond secretary who worked for the drug cartel….

But that was just fun and games. This thing with Jade felt too intense to be a game. Fun…well, maybe…if a man had the right touch.

Thankfully—or not, depending on which parts of him he asked—she didn’t seem to give a damn about his confession of attraction. “We need to get the people on your suspect list under surveillance, and you’re laying low for a couple of days while I gather resources and information.”

“I can’t do that.”

“And I can’t fight blind.”

He had issues with being trapped—which was how he viewed holing up in a hotel room, luxurious or not. He knew this stemmed from his childhood days at the orphanage. While the nuns had been caring and gentle, his movements had been restricted to the convent; his choices had been limited. Had his foray into rebellion and eventual thievery been genetic or circumstantial? He’d likely never know for certain.

“I have to do something,” he said.

“I’ll put you to work.”

“I work better in the field. You must realize I can get in and out of here without anyone knowing.”

Her eyes flashed. “Not without me knowing.”

“Jade, Jade…” He cupped her elbows. “I’m trying here. I’m really trying to work with you. But you can’t put me in a box. You can’t honestly expect I’d agree to that.”

She pulled away, then paced in a circle before facing him again. “I’m asking you to stay put. Just a day or two. I need time to check with my network of contacts about your suspects. Two of them are all the way across the country in San Francisco and one is in south Florida.”

He could help by giving her more information. But he’d promised himself to let her roll with this case her way. After all these years, if he’d made a mistake or jumped to the wrong conclusions, he might never have the answers he sought. “Do you ever stop pushing?”

“No.”

He’d expected nothing less. Wasn’t that why he’d hired her in the first place? “You’re asking a lot.”

“I’m doing what’s necessary. You know I am.”

He knew.

“Do you really intend to tell me everything about your past?” she asked. “The parts that aren’t in your file?”

“Do you really intend to continue to deny our chemistry?”

She sighed and stepped back. “We’re not getting anywhere.”

They certainly weren’t. But as much as he needed her to do her job, to make sure his own investigation had indeed led him in the right direction, he needed her touch, her kiss, her sighs of pleasure even more.

His muscles twitched with the effort of holding back. He clenched his fists at his sides and fought to control his breathing.

“There are parts of my life that aren’t pretty,” he said finally.

“I’m not denying our chemistry,” she said at the same time.

She extended her hands. “You first.”

“Ladies first. Besides, mine will take longer to tell.”

She huffed out a breath. “Okay, look. We’ve got a personal issue with each other. I’m not completely immune, and obviously you’re not.”

Was that a compliment? He didn’t think so.

“It’s just something we’re going to have to work around,” she continued. “It’s a chemical thing that pops up from time to time when men and women work together. Close quarters, tense moments, etcetera.”

He loved her short, businesslike tone. He’d known her three hours, and yet he already realized it was so her. “Really? When was the last time it cropped up for you?”

“I don’t think we need to go into specifics.”

“Sure we do.”

She sighed. “Okay, so maybe one time I let myself get too close to a target. The results weren’t pretty, so you’d better—”

“He got killed?”

“Well, no, but—”

“He was injured?”

“Well, yes, but not because of anything I—”

“He just betrayed you by sneaking off with a terrorist—the one from whom he’d been accepting bribes for more than a year. Then he got shot, got scared and turned over evidence to your superior, who cut him a no-jail-time deal with the government.”

She went still, her eyes frosting over. “Somebody’s been doing some digging.”

“Naturally.” He reached out, trailing his finger along her cheek. “In fact, I know a great deal more about you than I imagine you’re comfortable with.”

“And yet you won’t grant me the same courtesy.”

“I’m getting around to it. I would just rather talk about the personal issue between us.” His tone deepened as desire rolled through his stomach. “Exploring chemistry can be a healthy release.”

“It can also be an unnecessary distraction.”

“We’ll set guidelines.”

“I won’t—”

“Consider it.”

She licked her lips, drawing his gaze and forcing him to suppress a moan. “Okay.”

He smiled, sliding his thumb across her bottom lip. “It’s a start.”