Starke said, “I believe it was last night. He stayed an hour, then left again.”
I studied him, unable to tell whether he was speaking the truth or playing a dangerous game.
Either one was a possibility, given the amusement in his eyes.
“Riley,” Jack said into my ear, his voice fading in and out, as if there were some sort of
interference. “We need you back at the office immediate—”
The rest of his sentence was cut off, but it didn’t matter because I got the gist of it. Relief
slithered through me. Never before had I been so happy about being called back to the
Directorate.
I finished my drink in several unladylike gulps, then grabbed my bag and rose. “I’m afraid I’ve
just been called back to the office, so the rest of my questions will have to wait.”
“What, so no hot date, either?” He pushed gracefully to his feet, moving altogether too close.
“It seems a shame to waste such a hot outfit.”
“I’ve learned to live with disappointment.” I gave him an insolent grin. “You should,
too.”
“Oh, I try not to.” He caught my hand and raised it to his lips, kissing it gently. “And I don’t
believe you should, either.”
And with that, he hit me.
Not physically, not mentally, but with the full force of his aura or mojo or whatever the hell it
was.
My reaction was instinctual. I threw up my own aura, trying to use it as a shield as I had in the
past. But I might as well have been using a tissue to block out the force of a gale.
And that gale was instant, burning
need
.
It was deep and violent and it ached. Literally ached.
He smiled and his grip on my hand tightened, forcing me backward. Not to the chaise longue but to
the desk. I fought it, I really did, but the need was all-encompassing.
My body shook with futile anger and the ever-increasing tide of lust, but at least my
thoughts—while a little scrambled—were my own. I might not be strong enough to fight him—and who
would have thought a werewolf would ever be saying
that?
—but at least
I wasn’t a complete automaton.
Not that
that
made the situation any better.
My butt hit the desk and his grip on my hand forced me to slide up on top of it. His free hand
traced the line of my cheek, his fingers so heated against my skin it felt like a burn.
“So lovely,” he murmured, his gaze following the journey of his fingers. Down my neck, past my
shoulder blade, and onto the soft swell of breast. One fingertip gently grazed a nipple and I
couldn’t fight arching my back—an age-old invitation for more. Part of me might be screaming in
frustration and fury, but that part was a flea fighting against the might of a storm right
now.
He chuckled softly and his touch moved down. The remaining buttons came undone and the shirt was
completely open.
His fingers continued their downward journey and my skin twitched and burned, pleasure and pain
mingling into one. He ran his hands down my thighs, then grabbed the end of the skirt, ripping
upward, so that the split tore all the way to my crotch.
“Much better,” he said, rubbing his thumbs down the inside of my thighs before gently pushing
them apart. God, I was wet, so wet with the need for him that when he stepped in between my legs,
I moaned. And hated the fact that I did.
“I have desired to do this in the flesh,” he murmured, thereby confirming he
had
visited me in my dreams and therefore
was
our
wraith. His fingers slid back up my thighs. “Have long wished to know what it is really like to
be inside you, heated flesh in heated flesh.”
I didn’t say anything. Couldn’t say anything, caught between expectation and ecstasy. His touch
brushed lightly over the lace of my panties, then lifted my butt with one hand and pulled them
down my legs. He tossed them aside then reached up and did the same to the shirt, so that I was
all but naked.
Then his caress thrust deep inside of me, making me shiver and moan.
“So wet,” he said, almost in awe. “I ache with anticipation.”
He wasn’t the only one. The brain might not want this, but the body was a slave to his mental
juju and there was nothing I could do to stop it.
He stepped back and began to strip. His body was as glorious as I’d imagined, all sculpted golden
flesh topped by a thick, engorged cock that seemed to grow even larger before my eyes.
And I both ached for and was repelled by it. Or maybe I was just repelled by the sheer fact that
this was all being forced on me.
Then he stepped back between my legs, his hands grabbing my butt and holding me steady as that
gloriously engorged piece of flesh slid deep inside of me.
A deep sound of pleasure rumbled from his throat, then he began to move, slowly at first but
gradually getting faster, harder, until our coupling was a wild mesh of fury, lust, and unbridled
pleasure. Heated flesh slapped against heated flesh, bringing me to fulfillment, again and again,
even though he himself never reached that peak.
The more it went on and on, the more I was being drained.
I had no doubt he’d suck me dry so completely he’d kill me if I didn’t find a way to stop him.
Because even if he didn’t think we suspected
him
, he knew we were
close to one of his identities, thanks to my line of questioning earlier.
Then I remembered the knife at my back.
It was still there, still pressing into my spine. Either Starke had forgotten about it, or he
didn’t believe it was a real threat.
Bad mistake.
But his aura was still surrounding me and I wasn’t entirely sure I could summon the strength to
fight it long enough even to move my hand …
Then, like sunshine breaking through a storm, the strength was there. It wasn’t mine, but I
grabbed it nonetheless, thrusting a hand backward, wrapping my fingers around the hilt, drawing
it free.
Starke didn’t notice the movement. He was too busy sucking me dry.
I shifted slightly. Then, as the realization that I was no longer under the influence of his aura
hit him, I plunged the knife into his back.
Blue fire exploded from the blade and spread out like little bolts of lightning across his skin.
Starke screamed and arched backward, his skin bubbling and boiling and shifting—becoming
something less golden and a whole lot less real.
Then the office door crashed back on its hinges and Kye stood there, a wild mix of lust and anger
in his eyes, and a large silver gun in his hands.
He fired before I could move, and Starke’s head exploded into a rain of flesh and bone and God
knows what else.
As Starke’s body fell to the floor, Kye’s gaze met mine. His breathing was harsh—as harsh as mine
still was—and he smelled of sex and lust and hunger.
He’d been the source of that rush of strength, I realized. The link between us had grown strong
enough that I’d been able to call on his reserves to bolster my own.
It had also been strong enough that he’d known exactly what was being done to me, and who was
doing it.
Strong enough for him to feel every sensation and desire right along with me.
“Kye, now is not—” I said.
“There is no better time,” he cut in ruthlessly. “No one takes what is mine.
No one.”
I’ll never be yours
, I wanted to say, but the words died in my throat
as the force of his need hit.
That need was as much about control as it was desire.
He kicked the door shut and strode over to me. Then his fingers were tangling themselves in my
hair and his lips crushed mine, kissing me savagely as my hands found their way to the waist of
his jeans, undoing the button and zipper before thrusting them down his hips.
Then he was in me, claiming me, and it felt glorious. Because this was
real
and solid, a meeting of flesh
and
soul—even if
the man now claiming me was as unwanted as Starke had been.
He fucked me more fully and more savagely than Starke had, and it felt so damn right tears stung
my eyes. I came seconds before him, my body shuddering and twisting as his body spasmed and the
hot flush of his seed flooded into me.
Then there was nothing but utter exhaustion.
He rested his forehead against mine, his fingers still locked in my hair and his harsh breathing
searing my lips. Slowly, surely, my breath and my thoughts steadied, and I found the strength to
ask, “Why aren’t Starke’s men battering down the door after that gunshot?”
He finally released his grip on my hair, sliding his hands down to my hips instead, holding me
firmly against him. The wolf wasn’t finished with me yet, apparently. But then, I’d learned last
night he had an amazing recovery rate and a
huge
sexual appetite. And
while I might not want him in my life, he was still my soul mate, and I couldn’t deny just how
good it felt to be locked against him like this.
“Because I told them the Directorate was on the way, and if they valued their lives, they’d get
the hell out of here.”
I raised an eyebrow. “And they believed you?”
“Why wouldn’t they?” He began to rock gently, his body continuing to harden inside of mine. Part
of me wanted to slap him away, and part of me wanted to use every inch of him to erase every
second of my time with Starke. “You were already here and, for all they knew, it could have been
the first part of a plan.”
It made sense, and yet …
I didn’t know what it was, but something niggled. Intuition didn’t believe him, and I couldn’t
ignore it.
“But that makes no sense.” I paused, my breath catching in my throat, as his cock—once again
hard—slid so very deep inside, sending a wave of pleasure rolling across my body. I licked my
lips and somehow said, “As far as they’re concerned, you could be just another crackpot trying to
cause mischief.”
“They thought I was an angry husband.” His words were distracted. “How do you think I initially
got upstairs to place my bugs?”
And if he’d left those bugs in place, it would have made our job a whole lot easier. “Why would
Starke let you up there and yet meet me downstairs?”
“He didn’t. I bribed the barman and several security guards to give me five minutes.”
My mind was having a hard time concentrating against the delicious assault on my body. And yet I
couldn’t quite let the questions go. That would be giving in totally to the needs of my body, and
I’d done enough of that for one day.
“You shouldn’t have killed Starke. We needed to question him about his partner—”
The words died as his lips crushed mine, ending all attempts on my part to continue the
conversation.
I conceded defeat and closed my eyes, enjoying his caresses and kisses, until the slow burn of
desire exploded and we came once again.
He kissed me a final time, soft and lingering, then said, “He needed to die for what he was
doing.”
“Kye, he was only fucking me. In the larger scheme of things, that really didn’t
matter.”
Anger spurted, spinning around me, a firestorm that would not be tamed. “He wasn’t just fucking
you,” he said, his golden eyes flashing. “He was taking what was mine, and he was
draining
you.”
“I was dealing with it—”
“Yeah,” he exploded. “I felt how you were dealing with it. Believe me, I
wasn’t
impressed.”
“He didn’t end up with a knife in his back through magic,” I retorted, and thrust a hand against
his chest, trying to push him away from me.
He tightened his grip on my thighs and didn’t budge. “I warned him,” he growled. “I told him not
to—”
He stopped.
Oh my God
, I thought.
I had been soundly fucked not only by one murdering son of a bitch today, but two.
“Come alone,” he said, and before the meaning of his words had even really registered, his fist
smashed into my jaw.
I was unconscious before my head hit the desk.
I
was awoken by the sensation of ice pressing against my
jaw. It wasn’t helping the ache in my face much, but at least it meant there was someone present
who cared enough to try.
The sunshiny scent that teased my nostrils told me it was Kade, but the musky scents that were
entwined within his also said that he wasn’t alone. As did the murmur of conversation.
Kye wasn’t here. His scent still was, but the heated, tingly awareness that always hit when he
was close was absent.
He’d obviously run.
Part of me hoped he ran far and fast, because then I wouldn’t have to deal with him.
But the other part—the part so angry about being so completely fooled
and
used—wanted the chance to confront him.
To get her own back.
To ask
why
.
The surface under my hips was soft, not the hard wood of the desk, and the slide of material
against my skin told me I was no longer almost naked.
I opened my eyes. Kade was kneeling down in front of me, holding the ice pack to my decidedly
tender jaw. Behind him, Cole and Dusty were examining Starke’s remains.
“The cavalry arrives,” I commented, wincing as the mere act of speaking had pain flickering along
my jaw. Not that it would actually
stop
me. I flicked my tongue
across the left side—one loose tooth and several others feeling as bruised as my jaw. “But it
arrives too late, as usual.”
“Well, you will get yourself into situations where the cavalry has no option but to arrive late,”
Cole commented. “Next time, give us a little warning and we’ll be on time.”
“I’ll try and remember that,” I said wryly, and pushed upright. Aside from the sore jaw, I was
actually feeling pretty good. But then, good sex and multiple orgasms tended to do that to you.
“How did you know that I needed help?”
It wasn’t as if I’d actually
called
for it.
“We didn’t.” Kade removed the ice pack and sat back on his heels. “When the com-link went dead
again—this time midsentence—Jack feared the worst and sent us scurrying.”
Meaning Kye had not only been wearing a deadener similar to what he’d placed on me, but that it
had a fairly decent range. The com-link connection had been severed long before he’d kicked his
way into the room.
And
that
was a scary thought, because it had huge ramifications for
the Directorate. It could become deadly when it came to on-street personnel. “Who hit you?” Kade
added.
“Kye.” I hesitated, a mix of anger and hurt and confusion rolling through me. Part of me—the wolf
part, no doubt—still couldn’t accept the fact that my soul mate was one of our killers. Where the
hell did that leave me? What options did I have? If he didn’t have a kill order on him already,
he soon would. Because I couldn’t—and wouldn’t—conceal the truth. And yet if they killed him,
they’d very likely kill me. “He wasn’t here when you arrived?”
“No.” He eyed me closely, his expression concerned. As an empath, he’d be feeling every bit of
the twisted, tortured emotions currently running riot through me. “Why would he be
here?”
“Because he’s one-half of our beheading team, and he came here to warn his client that the
Directorate knew several of his identities.” Of course, Kye himself had given us one of those
identities, and I had to wonder why.
“Oh, fuck,” Cole said. Obviously, Kade had been sharing the news about just who my soul mate was.
“What the hell are you going to do?”
I glanced over Kade’s broad shoulders at him. His expression was one of horror. He might not be a
were-wolf, but he was familiar with the werewolf culture and understood exactly what it meant. “I
don’t know.”
Kade’s expression was decidedly confused. “Why is this a bad thing? He’s a cold-blooded
killer—you’ve said that yourself multiple times. So we take him out and he’s gone from your life
forever. Which is what you wanted, isn’t it?”
“He’s her
soul
mate, Kade,” Cole said, as if that explained it all.
And it did—for those in the know.
But Kade obviously didn’t understand the full impact of the bond. “The soul mate bond is
unbreakable,” I explained. “If one-half dies, the other generally follows.”
His frown deepened. “Ben didn’t.”
Ben was a big, black wolf I’d met while investigating a case a few months ago. We’d become firm
friends since then, and though he’d made continuous efforts to seduce me, it could never have
amounted to anything more than sexual gratification. Ben’s soul mate had died long before I’d met
him, and he, in his own words, existed. Nothing more, nothing less.
“That’s rare. I don’t want to take the chance.” Not given the way fate liked playing her games
with my life.
“So,” Kade said. “We can’t kill him. What about just capturing the bastard, beating him up, then
throwing him in a nice dark cell somewhere to rot?”
“I don’t know if Jack will go for that.” Or rather, I wasn’t sure that the council—higher
or
lower—would let him go for that option. “But it’s certainly a
solution that appeals to the animal side of
me
.”
Kade raised an eyebrow. “Animal? Or betrayed lover?”
“They’re one and the same,” I muttered. “And before we can talk about beating him up and tossing
away the key, we need to find him.”
“The signal from the tracker is erratic. Given the bug placed on you, we suspect he’s got others
in his possession and that they’re interfering with the signal,” Jack said into my ear. “But
we’re in the process of trying to boost it. I’ve ordered a lockdown on all the airports, so he
won’t get out that way.”
“There are plenty of private airfields, and he has the money to use them.”
“Private planes still have to register their flight details, or they’re forced down. And once the
problems with the tracker have been sorted out, it won’t matter.”
I didn’t think it would matter anyway, because Kye wouldn’t do the obvious. His mind just didn’t
work that way.
“Do you want us to come back to the office or wait here?”
“Not here,” Cole muttered, voice disparaging but amusement evident in his brief glance. “We do
not need the crime scene disturbed any more than necessary.”
“Come back,” Jack agreed. “If we get a location in the meantime, we’ll let you both
know.”
“Okay.” I pushed to my feet. Kade rose with me, his fingers under my elbow. Not really supporting
but ready to steady me if I actually needed it. “Looks like you got your wish, Cole.”
“Sometimes fate does take pity on me,” he murmured.
I couldn’t help wishing that fate would take pity on me occasionally. “Hey, I want my silver
knife back when you finish with it, too.”
Cole raised an eyebrow. “What silver knife?”
“The one I left sticking in Starke’s back when I stabbed him.”
“There was no such knife when we arrived.”
“Then the bastard’s taken it.”
“I gather we’re talking about Kye?” Kade said.
I nodded. “It was a gift from Quinn, and had some unusual properties. I don’t want to lose
it.”
“Then we’ll retrieve it before we pummel the shit out of him,” Kade said cheerfully. “Don’t you
wish all problems were that easily fixed?”
I certainly did. I hooked my arm through his and let him escort me outside. I didn’t feel like
driving, so I climbed into the passenger seat of Kade’s car.
“Thanks for dressing me,” I said, once we were on the road.
He gave me an odd sort of look. “I didn’t. You were fully dressed when we arrived.”
I closed my eyes.
Kye
had been the one who’d cleaned me up and
covered my nakedness. And somehow, that just made the whole situation even worse.
Damn it,
why
did he have to do this? Why did he have to take this job
and risk losing both our lives?
But I knew the answer even as I asked the question.
It was all about control. Controlling me, and controlling the situation.
Yet I very much suspected it was also about the risk. The high of knowing that everything was at
stake and that one wrong move could end everything.
Literally.
I knew that high, but I wasn’t addicted to it. Kye, I suspected, was.
What a fucking mess this was all turning out to be. And I bet fate was having a jolly old time
watching all her plans unfold.
We didn’t make it into the Directorate. Jack called on my phone when we were still ten minutes
away. I hit the button and put it on speaker.
“You got a location?”
“We do. His signal is coming from an old biscuit factory out near Broadmeadows. Benson’s sending
the address through to Kade’s onboard now.”
The computer beeped as he said it. I hit the switch and shifted the address over to the nav-com.
Kade glanced down then nodded, doing a fast U-turn and hitting the gas.
“We’re on our way. Can you get hold of a floor plan of the place?”
“We’re searching now. And I’ve called Iktar back from his vacation, but he’s not going to get
there before three-thirty.”
I glanced at my watch. That was nearly an hour away, meaning Iktar was at the spirit lizard’s
reservation up in the mountains near Taradale.
One way or another, the action would probably be over by then. Which left Kade and me alone
against a professional hit man.
The odds should have been in our favor. We were as well trained—or
better
trained—than he. And yet uncertainty gnawed at me.
Or maybe it was just the memory of his last words.
Come
alone
.
He had to know that I wasn’t that stupid. The link between us had grown a lot stronger over the
past few days, and I wasn’t about to trust my ability to bring him to justice.
“And Rhoan?” I asked Jack. Part of me wanted my brother there, and yet it was also a risk I
didn’t want to take. Kye knew that stopping Rhoan would stop me, and if it meant the difference
between him escaping or not, then he’d shoot to kill and to hell with the consequences.
“Rhoan’s apparently in the process of escorting Liander out of town. He’ll get back here as soon
as he can.” Jack paused. “Be careful going in, you two.”
“We always are,” Kade murmured, amusement twisting his lips.
Jack made a disparaging sound. “You might be, but your partner has a definite tendency toward
carelessness.”
“I resent that,” I said mildly, then frowned and added, “Boss, if Kye still has those deadeners
on him, you may lose contact with one or both of us when we get within range.”
“We know. I’ve ordered our cleanup teams to be on standby, and they’ll be ready to go if we lose
contact for more than five minutes.”
“Teams? It’s not going to be
that
big a mess.”
“Maybe not, but the teams are trained to defend themselves and can legally render armed help if
the situation calls for it.”
Which meant he was sending us help the only way he legally could, but he was also giving us the
chance to do our jobs first while trying to avoid endangering the lives of men and women who
weren’t trained killers. “Oh. Thanks.”
“Just be careful,” he said, and hung up. I rubbed a hand across my eyes and wondered if I was
ever going to wake up from this nightmare.
A killer was on the loose and the lives of non-guardian personnel were being put on the line
because of me.
Because I hadn’t been able to really believe that Kye was as cold and as ruthless as he portrayed
himself. Because I’d been unable to see past my own twisted feelings for the man.
“Riley,” Kade said softly, “don’t be too harsh on yourself. None of us seriously suspected that
Kye could be involved. It’s as much our fault as yours that he’s on the loose.”
“But I was with him a lot over the past few days. I
knew
he was
playing some sort of game, but I—”
He placed a hand on my bare knee, squeezing it gently. “Enough. You did what you could. No one
could ask for anything more.”
“Jack could.”
“Jack hasn’t. The only person angry at you is you, and you don’t deserve the beating you’re
giving yourself. Besides, you
did
take out one of our
killers.”
“That was more Kye than me.”
It might have been the truth, but Kye hadn’t really come there to save me. He’d gone there to
preserve the
ideal
of control. He was a man who kept a tight leash on
every little aspect of his life, and he’d needed to prove to me—and to himself—that nothing and
no one could get past him.
That’s why we’d made love. He might have wanted me, but it was also another means of proving that
I
would
comply with his wishes, no matter what the
situation.
Which was probably why he wasn’t running now. That would be messy. Kye didn’t do messy, or leave
unfinished business behind.
It could only mean he planned a more personal ending to this. Maybe that’s why he’d warned me to
come alone. The man who needed to be in command of every little aspect of his life planned to end
all this
his
way.
And his way meant guns and death.
“Riley,” Kade said softly, squeezing my knee again.
“Enough
. I mean
it.”
“You’re such a sweet man, but—”
He snorted softly. “You wouldn’t be thinking that if you knew just how good your skin feels under
my fingers, or what is currently going on in my thoughts.”
I grinned. “Once a stallion, always a stallion.”
“Too true, my dear.” He sighed wistfully and withdrew his hand.
The computer beeped again. I hit another button and a floor plan popped up on the screen. I
studied it for a moment, then said, “It looks like we have two main entrances and a fire exit.
There’re two floor levels and several outbuildings.”
“He’ll be in the main building. There are more options there for running and hiding.”
Neither of which I could really imagine Kye doing. “He’s run there for a reason.”
“Of course he has.” Kade turned off the ring road at Pascoe Vale Road and slowed down for the
lights, checking the traffic to the right before pulling out and slapping his foot on the
accelerator again. “Professionals always have their escape routes planned beforehand, and I’d be
very surprised if Kye didn’t have every expectation of walking away from this.”
And I’d be very surprised if he
did
. Kye was a realist, if nothing
else.
All too soon we were pulling up several buildings away from the one I suspected held Kye. Kade
climbed out and opened the trunk. He had a veritable arsenal inside.
“Good grief,” I said, sweeping my gaze over the rifles, lasers, guns, and stakes stashed in neat
little secured rows. “Does Jack know you’ve raided the weapon store like this?”