Caitlyn sucked in a sharp breath through parted lips that ached from the splits in them. She wished she hadn’t said that—it had come out in the worst possible way and there was no way to reverse it. Her eyes squeezed shut, the swollen one shooting a lancing pain into her head. Pressing against Duke’s chest, she would have pulled away, but his arms tightened around her, refusing her escape. He shook his head. “No. Stay right where you are. I’ve spent three years watching you from a distance. In love with a woman that I wasn’t supposed to have. I’m tired of the space between us,” he told her in a harsh whisper, an edge to his voice that sent a shiver racing over her. “Whatever this is, Caitlyn. Whatever you’ve done, you need to tell me. That’s all I ask. And you need to know, whatever it is, there’s no way in hell I’m letting you go.” “Duke, I—.” He silenced her protest with a kiss, tender against her abused lips despite the severity of his words. There was no
Duke tucked his mouth up close at her ear. “If you’re guilty, Caitlyn, then so am I.” Her pulse quickened and her toes curled, a zinging tingle sweeping over her flesh as his breath stirred her hair, tickled across the whorl of her ear. “I don’t care about the right or wrong of it, darlin’. I can’t see beyond this minute. Or next week. All I can see is you. And you’re too good, Caitlyn. Too pure of heart and intention to ever maliciously hurt someone else.” “But Duke—,” she tried urgently, but he continued, his words spilling over his lips, across her trembling flesh. She turned her head into his shoulder, breathed in the clean, warm, distinctly male scent of him. “I don’t care what you do. I don’t care what you’ve done.” His mouth closed, warm and insistent, over the tip of one breast and she shuddered, her fingers diving into his hair. “But I’m afraid to lose you,” he assured her, moving to the taut tip of the opposite breast to pay its due. “I’m afraid to lose the love of my life
Standing before the window in her darkened room, Rachel crossed her arms over her chest and peered into the nighttime murk beyond it. It all seemed still, quiet, exactly like any other remote forest ought to be. Except that every once in a while, she’d catch the brief flash of a tiny lamp—sometimes green, sometimes blue, most often red—and detect movement, and she knew that there were men out there patrolling. She heaved a deep sigh. Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed to come here. Reaching out, she fisted the heavy drapes at the sides of the tall, narrow window and jerked them sharply, pulling them closed. She pivoted in the dark, using the dim light through the remaining windows to guide her to the bedside. There, she turned and let herself fall backwards onto the mattress. Then again, the accommodations are a vast improvement over the cramped little hotel room. She stared up at the Murano glass chandelier in the center of the ceiling, glinting with multi-colore
Dex perched over the arm of a sofa so he could see down the long hallway that led to the bedrooms. He’d been appalled to watch Jay Ellis invite himself into Rachel’s bedroom, but was even more appalled when the man reemerged five minutes later, and after shutting the door behind him quietly, headed for the bar in the corner of the living area. “Goddamn, that woman is spicy,” Jay muttered appreciatively as he adjusted himself in his expensive slacks, a feral grin plastered over his face. Gritting his teeth, Dex suppressed his envy and watched as the other man poured himself a generous Scotch and tossed it back without so much as a flinch. Rachel was spicy—on that much they agreed—and it annoyed the hell out of him to think that this was the kind of man she’d settle for. “You want something, pretty boy?” At the bar, the other man refilled his drink. Dex arched a brow as his head swiveled towards Jay. The suit the man wore was Armani, and if he was any guess, probably as expensive as
Duke’s brow furrowed at the question, one he doubted she’d like the answer for. “For the moment, I’d like you to rest and heal.” Beneath him, Caitlyn froze. “You said we were going home. What aren’t you telling me?” she asked in a dangerously soft voice. His long exhale of frustration tickled across her flesh, raising the delicate hairs along her neck and arms in alarm. “There’s nothing to tell, darlin’. We don’t yet know what we’re up against.” Caitlyn processed his statement in a soporific haze. She hurt. And her body was so tired that her exhaustion felt like a drug, her limbs heavy and unresponsive. From the little that she’d gleaned, both from her kidnappers and from Duke and her rescuers after, his statement made no sense. They’d taken out the rogue agents. They’d incapacitated the terrorist agents and turned them over to Interpol. “I thought—.” Her voice trailed off as an irrational panic fueled by fatigue washed over her. If this was l
As soon as Caitlyn woke, immediately she reached behind her, seeking Duke’s reassuring presence and warmth. Instead, her fingertips found only empty space, and she frowned, rolling to her back to look at his side of the bed. Her fingertips hadn’t lied. He was gone, and by the cool feel of the sheets, he had been for some time. She squeezed her eyes shut against the brightness of the sun against the curtained windows, then gave a soft grunt as acknowledgment of her body’s lingering pain. She continued to lay as she was, contemplating all that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. All that she’d learned from Richards and Jantzi. All that she’d learned from Duke and his remarkably resourceful and strangely unnerving friend, Jay Ellis and his sister. Her thoughts strayed to what Duke had said about envying Alex. The vulnerability she’d heard in his voice when he’d admitted it made her tense and agitated, and left her feeling guilty and defenseless in an unhappy marriage of roiling
When he opened the bedroom door, Caitlyn was seated on the foot of the bed. Her hands rested, relaxed, in her lap, and her eyes fixed without seeing on a random spot on the floor. She’d showered, and looked the better for it without the smudges of wiped off blood from the day before, but she was still dressed in her filthy clothes. Now that she was clean, every mark and bruise on her body conveyed the full impact of what she’d been through in aching detail. The fine hairs on the back of Duke’s neck lifted and stood on end suddenly and he cursed himself in his head. She was waiting. Something was very wrong. “Darlin’?” Her eyes lifted and focused as he drew her replacement luggage into the room, then shut the door behind him. When she eyed the new suitcase, he explained. “It’s—they destroyed yours. Had Allie pick you up a replacement that she thought you might like. Your clothes are still here.” “Something from her bag of tricks?” she said softly, but t
Duke lay along Caitlyn’s side, his bicep pillowing her neck. It had taken a boring wander through the villa’s library, then a long walk through the guarded forest around them, and finally a sedative before she’d relaxed enough to drowse. His fingers twisted into her hair and he pressed a kiss against her unbruised temple, solely so he could inhale the scent off her. His entire life, he’d lived essentially without fear, trained to protect, prepared to die. Which suited him just as well. Fear pissed him off. The paralyzing characteristics of it pissed him off, and he had no use for that kind of emotion. Not in his line of work. But now, he knew what it meant, how it felt to be vulnerable. He’d become all too familiar with being afraid in a way he didn’t like. He slid his hand across her flat belly, gripping her hip gently to pull her closer against him, feeding his warmth into her. Under the effect of the sedative, she never stirred. What the hell am I going to do? He’d wracked his br