2

“I-I’m sorry.” I shake my head. “I can’t do this.”

He frowns. “Huh?”

“This,” I mumble, the alcohol blurring through me. “I don’t want to do this.”

His frown turns into a scowl, which almost looks comical with his boyish features and his stupid little strip of facial hair.

“Oh, so just leading me on for a free drink, huh, bitch?”

“No, that’s not it—”

“Let’s go.”

He starts to drag me down the dark hallway, away from the thumping music and blue lights toward what must be the men’s room. Panic lances through me, and I try to yank my hand back from his grip.

“I’m serious, okay? Look, I’ll pay you back for the stupid drink, just—”

“Oh, you better believe you will.”

I gasp as he whirls us, pushing me against the wall. His hand grabs my bare thigh, and I recoil.

“Yeah, you like that, don’t you, baby? You like it when Mikey puts his hands on you, huh?”

“Get—”

I don’t even finish the sentence before Mikey suddenly goes flying away from me, like magic. I blink, trying to make sense of how exactly he’s just managed to skip backwards and crash into the wall opposite me so fast, when suddenly, I turn and I see him.

Him.

My heart stops for a second, and a heat I’ve never felt before blooms across my skin. He towers over me, his huge shoulders heaving and the dark scowl on his face deepening as he takes a step toward Mikey. There’s a dark shadow of a scruff on his perfect, chiseled jaw, clenched tight. He runs a hand through his dark hair, and my eyes follow the way his thick arm muscles ripple, the tattoos covering his skin dancing in the low light.

He’s much older than me, and while there’s this air of scariness and danger to him, he’s also totally gorgeous.

“She asked you nicely.”

His deep, dark voice resonates right through me, even if he’s talking to Mikey. It tingles through my body, vibrating through every part of me and making me gasp quietly.

“Look, man, who—”

The man growls, like an animal, and when he takes a step toward Mikey, the creepy college boy whimpers and recoils across the floor.

“Smart. Now you fuckin’ stay there and count to one hundred before you get up.”

And slowly, he turns, and his eyes lock right on me. I gasp, swallowing as those piercing ice-blue eyes cut right into me, burning something fierce and hot right through me, like his eyes are nailing me to the wall at my back.

“You,” he growls, softly this time.

“Me?” I squeak.

“You’re coming with me. Now.”

I shiver, his words melting through me before I suddenly blink. Wait, what?

“Wait, excuse me?”

“We don’t have time for the banter, princess,” he grumbles, glancing over his shoulder back toward the bar before turning back to me. “Let’s go, now.”

“Uh, no? I’m here with my frien—”

“I’m counting to three,” says the big, gorgeous, dangerous-looking man.

“And what happens at three?” I croak out.

“I throw you over my shoulder and carry you out of here.”

“You wouldn’t da—”

“One.”

I blink, my eyes darting to the creep on the floor before glancing back at the big man.

“Hang on—”

“Two.”

“Who are you?”

“Cormac,” he mutters quietly. He glances over his shoulder one more time, and I watch his jaw tighten as his eyes dart back to lance into mine all over again.

“My name is Cormac, and you just ran out of chances.”

I start to open my mouth, when he beats me to it.

“Three.”

He’s on me before I can even process it. His strong, powerful hands grab me, and I shriek as he suddenly lifts me up, tosses me easily across his hard, muscled shoulder, and storms down the dark hallway.

“Let go of me! Let me—!”

The door at the end of the hallway slams open when he plants his booted foot against it. The chilly night air hits me, teasing up over my bare skin and up under my tiny skirt. The man—Cormac—storms toward a black Escalade parked out back of the club.

“Wait, please—”

Panic grips me as he yanks the door open and effortlessly tosses me into the passenger seat. I scream, twisting and lashing out with a heel. He grunts as I catch him in the thigh before his powerful hands grab my foot and shove it back into the car. I lash out with my nails this time, but he growls as he catches my hand before I can reach his face.

“Listen, princess!” he roars, instantly shutting me up. “We both know what you saw the other night.”

The blood drains from my face, and a cold chill suddenly slices through me. And instantly, I know what this is. He must work for the men I saw. And now, he’s here to silence the one witness to what happened in that alley.

“Please, you don’t have—please don’t kill me!”

A tear starts to roll down my cheek, when Cormac frowns.

“I’m not here to kill you, princess,” he growls quietly, his piercing blue eyes burning into mine as he hovers over me, holding me down in the car seat. “I’m here to protect you.”

His jaw tightens, and for whatever crazy reason, believe him.

“Now let’s go.”

He slams my door shut, and I watch, my pulse pounding as he marches around to the driver’s side and gets in next to me. The Escalade rumbles to life.

“Go where?” I say quietly.

“There’s a cabin, on a lake. By a place called Blackthorn Mountain.” He turns, his eyes flashing as they pierce into mine. “It’s somewhere safe. A place where no one is going to find you.”

I’m still trying to decide if that sounds hot as sin or absolutely terrifying coming from him as he roars the SUV to life and peels out into the night.

Chapter Two

Cormac

They say I’m the best there is at what it is I do. Some people think it’s because I’m married to the job, so to speak. That I know no other life than the rule of the gun and primal urge to hunt and to bring down. Others think it’s my military background, that the Marines hammered rigorous discipline into me like a machine.

But really, it’s just one thing. It’s that I’m merciless.

I’ve held a man in chains in a fucking storage facility for weeks once, because that’s what was necessary for the job. I’ve stepped in front of bullets, crashed cars through walls, watched men I’d call brother fall, all in the name of duty. My mission, whatever it is, takes priority over every other facet of my life. The mission owns me, and I own it until its completion.

First, there was the Marines. Then came the blue shield of a cop’s beat. I worked the roughest neighborhoods in Detroit when I came back, fighting against gangs almost worse than the damn Taliban.

But now? Now I’m something different entirely. At forty now, I’m a contractor for the FBI, with my unique skills being used the way they should be. Unhindered by rules. Not weighed down with a badge. My job is to hunt now—to seek, to capture, and to secure. I hunt down the odd wanted man, but primarily, my job is to get ‘at risk’ witnesses into protective custody, and to get them there alive.

And that’s what brings me to this shitty college club tonight. Her. Because she’s in more danger than she could ever possibly imagine. Because it’s not just me hunting her, it’s pieces of shit that would hurt her. Badly. Kill her too. But that’s not going to happen, not on my watch.

Hell, I’m in danger too. And not just when it comes to the assholes trying to hurt her that might come after me if I intervene. No, it’s bigger than that. It’s more explosive than that. Explosive like the kind of news that makes headlines. Headlines like ‘FBI collusion with criminals.’ And here I am caught in the middle of it, with this particular job being the crux of the whole thing. I could always walk away, and just leave the whole mess behind me, but that is not gonna fucking happen. Not with her involved. Not when walking away could get her killed. Not a fucking chance.

I stop, my jaw clenching tight like steel as I melt into the shadows by the edges of the dance floor. My eyes scan the room, instinct working like an oiled machine to drown out the background sounds and distractions until finally, my gaze finds her.

And I growl.

I’m like a wolf who’s caught scent of his prey. A wild animal just waiting for the chains to come off so that he can pounce. Because this ain’t no regular job, and she sure as shit ain’t no regular mark.

Everything is different with Nina.

It’s more than just ‘protect the witness’ with her. It’s more than just doing my job. With her, it feels like I’m protecting a piece of myself. With her, the idea of failing doesn’t just piss me off, it gets me furious. The idea of those pieces of shit getting their hands on her, or hurting her, or even touching her has my blood boiling like lava in my veins, my fury barely contained as my muscles clench and my rage builds, standing there in the shadows.

I’ve been watching her for days now, ever since the bureau got wind that Sylvan and his men were after her. Surveillance footage placed her in the alley near the hit Sylvan and his men pulled on the rival arms dealer, and it was pretty easy to put two and two together and figure out what that jackal wanted with her.

He wants to tie up loose ends. Plug the leaks.

That’s not going to happen.

Yeah, I’ve been watching her alright. Watching, agonizing, and obsessing over her. And my obsession has only grown with each passing day, until it’s consuming every single part of me. I’ve watched the way she turns those college boys’ heads without even knowing it—heads I want to snap off at the neck for having the audacity to try to catch a glimpse of her. I’ve watched her slowly give in to the pressures of her shitty, terrible influence of a roommate. The sexier clothes. The staying out later. Going to parties, flirting with boys.

My blood boils again at the fucking thought of it. And when I watch the fucking punk with the stupid ass pencil-line excuse for a beard put his hands on her, I almost roar. I almost charge through the crowd like a bull set free to pound him into the ground for touching what’s mine.

Oh, and she is mine. Or, she will be. Duty? The job? The mission? Oh, I’ll be fulfilling all of those. I will make sure she’s safe from Sylvan Bucks and his crew. I’ll make sure she’s safe from the whole damn world. But after that? No, after that, she’ll be mine and mine alone. There’s that innocence to her that sets a fire inside of me. There’s that way she walks and the way she moves that tells my trained eye that she’s never been touched—not like that.

She walks like a girl who’s never had a man’s cock slide between her legs and plunge deep in her sweet, honeyed little cunt until she’s filled to the brim. She’d never been claimed, or ridden hard. She’s never had a man bend her over across the hood of a car, or gotten her on her hands and knees on a bed made for a queen as he’s given her every inch.

Oh, but she will. I’ll be the man to show her those things. I’ll be the man to take that sweet innocence for himself. I’ll pluck that rose. I’ll spread those pretty thighs and ease my thick cock deep inside her candy sweet pussy until I empty every single sticky drop of cum from my swollen balls against her womb.

I watch as the punk takes her hand, my teeth flashing and a red mist clouding my eyes. I watch her nod, and the rage only grows. He starts to pull her away, toward the back of the club away from her roommate, off to that dark hallway that leads to the men’s room. My pulse roars inside, and the sound tumbles from my mouth like a wild beast about to kill. It startles two sweet little things and some punk in tight jeans and a designer t-shirt standing near me. The three of them stare at my huge form with terror in their eyes, like they haven’t noticed me standing there in the darkness until the sound.

They move away quickly. I turn back toward Nina, but when I realize she’s out of sight, my rage explodes out of me. I snarl, shoving through the crowd, knocking these college boys and their stupid dates for the night aside. I plunge right through the middle of the dance floor, which starts to part for me, like I’m a force of nature about to destroy.

And I am.

I come around the corner to see her struggling, trying to pull her arm free of the punk who’s got her pressed against the wall. He laughs, and when his hand touches her thigh under that slutty short hemline of her skirt, something inside of me snaps. I roar as I thunder toward them, ripping him away and slamming him into the opposite wall. The piece of shit crumples.

“She asked you nicely.”

He starts to open his mouth, but when I snarl and move toward him, he recoils like the little predatory pussy he is. And I know he’s not getting up then. I turn, and suddenly, my eyes fall on her.

Fuck.

I’ve never been this close to her. I’ve never been close enough to smell the scent of her, or feel the heat of her skin. Close enough to reach out and pull her against me. Close enough to crush my lips to hers like I’m never going to stop kissing her.

But there’s danger close by, and I know it’s a matter of time, and not much of it, before it hits us. I spotted Sylvan’s guys outside the club when I came here, and I know he must be on the way. And when they spot her here, the shit’s going to hit the fan. We have to move, now.