“Oh, I think you’d surprise yourself.”
She didn’t get to say more because his mouth claimed hers in a much hotter, more adventurous kiss. He rolled with her on the wide cushion of the chaise so that she was beneath him, open and receptive to his kiss, his heat, his body.
One hand claimed her waist and the other rose to gently cup her breast, shaping her softness through the thin layers of cloth that separated them. She moaned and pushed upward, into his touch, telling him without words of her desire.
They were both fully clothed, like teenagers exploring the forbidden. But the heat they generated was hotter than anything Sam had ever felt. He’d never experienced a woman more made for him than this one. And he feared he never would again.
That stray thought jolted him out of the drugged reverie of her kiss. He drew away, staring down at her. A woman who quite possibly could be his downfall. Suddenly, he didn’t care. If being with her, tasting her, taking her would bring later doom, he would live for today.
He swooped downward to retake her lips but one slim hand rose to press lightly against his chest. The slight pressure of her hand stopped him.
“What is it?” His voice coaxed, his gaze zeroed in on her swollen lips, wanting badly what she kept just out of reach.
“Are you sure about this?” The doubt in her voice made him meet her gaze.
“You’re not?” he countered.
“Technically, I’m your boss. I shouldn’t have let this happen.”
He grinned. “Don’t worry. I won’t sue for sexual harassment.”
She laughed at that and the mood turned intimate once more. “Okay. But will you respect me in the cockpit?”
“Oh, Em. I’ll respect you no matter where we are.” He moved off of her, wanting this to be clear between them before taking their relationship any further. It was important to him and he sensed it was equally—if not more—important to her as well.
Sam moved back into his original position, sitting at her side on the wide chaise, his arm around her shoulders. She didn’t object.
“You’re the boss, Em. In the air. In the cockpit. Even here. If you say no, I stop. But if you say yes . . .” He turned to face her, daring her with his smile to follow where their passion for each other led.
“If I say yes . . .” She placed her hand over his heart, stopping him once more. “It won’t be tonight. I’m not easy.”
Sam laughed outright, his tense muscles easing. He understood where she was coming from. No woman wanted to be thought of as cheap.
“I never thought you were, Emily. In fact, I believe you’re worth waiting for, no matter how long you make us wait.” He kissed her forehead and settled comfortably back against the cushions of the chaise, his arm still around her, keeping her close.
She sighed heavily but remained next to him. In time, the tension in her shoulders eased.
“This is nice,” he commented. “Watching the stars with you could become a habit.”
“They’re clearer at forty thousand feet.” Her mumbled comment made him laugh.
“That they are. But I can’t hold you like this in the cockpit.” He kept his voice low and as seductive as possible. He wanted to keep her in this pliable mood for as long as she’d let him keep her there.
“Yeah, the FAA might object.”
“Or the passengers. I wonder what they’d think if someone saw us canoodling in the cockpit?”
“Canoodling?” She turned her head to look up at him, the sparkle of laughter in her pretty eyes. “What kind of word is that?”
“Sue me for being old fashioned.” He shrugged, enjoying her teasing. “You bring out the long buried gentleman in me, Emily.”
She sat back, snuggling into his half embrace. “I’m glad.”
Chapter Six
T
hey watched the stars roll by for about an hour before Emily finally stretched and stood up. She had enjoyed her time with Sam tonight. It had been altogether unexpected and completely captivating. She had to be careful, lest she fall completely under his spell.
That meant she had better leave before she forgot all her sensibilities and jumped the man. No, that would never do. Not if she wanted him to respect her in the morning. No, she had to leave. Now.
The first part was getting her legs to cooperate. Finally, after a few minutes of sternly lecturing herself, she had managed to rise from the comfortable chaise. Now came the hard part—actually leaving.
“I really should be going.” Darnit. Even to her own ears, she sounded reluctant to leave.
Sam stood up and she realized how tall he was all over again. The man was a giant compared to her more petite stature. She should be used to it, having been towered over by her brothers all her life, but Sam was imposing in a new, very male, very sexy way. She liked the feeling of it, even as it scared her a little. He was raw power. A caged tiger that could come out to bite her at any time. Dangerous yet alluring.
And there went her temperature, skyrocketing toward the stars. She had all too vivid an imagination around Sam Archer. Pilot or not, she was about to break all her rules when it came to getting involved and she didn’t care a bit. Sam was worth the risk. She had a feeling being with him might very well ruin her for any other man but the little daredevil voice inside her was cheering her on, saying
ruin away
!
“I understand.”
Wait. What did he understand? For a minute there, confusion reigned. Had she somehow said something out loud?
He began escorting her toward the patio door, back inside the house. When he didn’t touch her or head toward the nearest bedroom, she began to relax. She hadn’t given herself away. Not yet, at least. She’d better make good her getaway before she succumbed to temptation.
“Thanks for dinner and the stargazing,” she said as they neared the door. She’d picked up her purse from the couch and tucked the strap over her arm. “I really enjoyed meeting your friend.”
A frown marred his brow. “Forget him.” He took her by the hand and drew her closer, his head dipping so that his lips were a breath away from hers.
His kiss this time was designed to imprint him on her senses. At least, that’s what it accomplished and the possessive way his arms came around her made her feel claimed in a very basic way. Protected too, come to think of it. Sam had a way of making her feel safe. It wasn’t something she’d thought out. It was intuitive.
His big hands roamed over her back and down to cup her rear, drawing her into his hard body. Yeah, that felt really good. Dangerous, but really good. She wanted to stay like this, pressed against his hardness, yet she craved more. And feared it.
That thought was the only thing that gave her strength to pull away.
Sam let her go by slow degrees, releasing her lips last of all. Then his hands dropped away from her body and they stood facing each other for a timeless moment, both breathing hard. “What were we talking about again?” she only half joked. Sam gave her the grin that she was coming to recognize as the one that made her stomach flip. One of his hands squeezed her hip as if in approval.
“That’s my girl.”
“We’re flying to Omaha and back tomorrow,” she reminded him for lack of anything more coherent to say.
“I remember.” He released her but didn’t step out of her personal space. He simply leaned against the doorjamb and looked at her. That look spoke volumes and invited her to throw away common sense and jump his bones.
But that would never do.
“Can you be at the hangar a little early?” she asked, clearing her throat and trying to hold on to her sanity. The man was too handsome for his own good—or hers.
“Sure. Why?”
“I’d like to go over the schedule and give you some charts to study.”
“Sounds good.”
“Yeah, it does.” Man, that sounded inane. She had to get out of there before she managed to embarrass herself even more. “So I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Count on it.”
Emily’s request allowed Sam the perfect excuse—and the perfect time—to do a little sneak and peek around the Praxis Air hangar and office. If asked, he could truthfully say she’d asked him to come in early and his curiosity could be passed off as boredom, as long as he didn’t get caught doing anything too suspicious.
He had to take the risk, though. His mission, and his nature, demanded action. He’d spent a lot of time cooling his jets so far and not enough time working on the issue of killer zombies and the fact that this airline could be unknowingly—or worse yet, with full knowledge—transporting the deadly technology. Either way, if it was passing through Praxis Air, Sam had to find out, and soon. It had been too long between outbreaks. The situation was ripe for another and Sam didn’t want to be caught short with nothing to show for his efforts if, and when, the shit hit the fan again and the creatures started killing people.
Sam started his recon in the office, paging through cargo manifests and flight plans. He began to see a pattern and headed out into the hangar to see if he could confirm his suspicions by taking a look at some of the cargo that was stored for flights later that day. Of course, the moment he opened one of the heavy duty packing cases tagged to be shipped to a small airport on the Oregon-Idaho border, Emily caught him.
“Um . . . what are you doing, Sam?”
Caught red handed Sam couldn’t do anything other than cop to being caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He held up his hands and turned around to face her. She’d snuck up behind him without even trying, her rubber soled shoes making little sound on the concrete floor. He decided to try to brazen it out.
“I’m sorry. I got here a little earlier than I expected and got bored so I thought I’d take a look around.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Taking a look around includes opening up cargo crates?”
“I was always too curious for my own good.” He gave her a smile and a sheepish shrug. He wasn’t sure if she was buying it.
“Look, Sam. Curiosity isn’t a good thing to have around here lately. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep your nose out of the cargo boxes and not ask too many questions.”
Oh, he didn’t like the sound of that. Was she warning him off? Was she involved in the illegal activity? Covering for someone else? Part of the conspiracy? He hoped to hell she wasn’t. It would destroy him to have to kill her.
“Why? Is it against the rules?” He did his best to keep his tone light.
She folded her arms over her chest. She’d probably meant it as an aggressive pose, but it looked more protective to him. Not much to go on, but it gave him hope that she wasn’t as deep in this as he feared.
“Let’s just say that asking too many questions could get you fired. Or worse.” Those last two words were mumbled almost under her breath, but Sam heard them. He was paying close attention to every move she made, every word she spoke. This was too important to let anything go unobserved.
“Consider me warned then.” He deliberately brightened his smile and tried to be as charming as possible. “I’ll do my best not to let curiosity get the best of me again. Of course, once I have the commute time figured out so that I can get here with more accuracy, I probably won’t have time to spin my wheels waiting. Idle hands always got the better of me, even when I was a kid.”
She tilted her head as if still unsure how to take his words and incriminating actions. He’d messed up. Whatever trust they’d been building was in doubt now. He’d just set himself back a bit both personally and with his investigation. He’d have to figure a way to get them back to where they were as quickly as possible. This mission—and this woman—were too important.
And that thought stopped him dead in his tracks. When had Emily begun to rank right up there in his priorities with his mission? Saving the world from the zombie contagion
had
to come first. Nothing was more important than that.
Then there was Emily, who suddenly had become just as important to him. If not more so. And he wasn’t sure that she was on the right side yet.
Man, he was so screwed.
“Let’s go to the office. There’s some paperwork we need to finish before we can get going.”
Her expression said she was reserving judgment about his presence here and his lame excuse for snooping around. That would have to do for now. It would take time and some maneuvering to repair the damage he’d just inflicted to his own cause.
Sam followed her into the office and did as she requested. He’d done his homework in here already and his pocket held a tiny digital camera with which he’d photographed the flight plans and manifests he’d found questionable. He’d upload them to the team later, when he was back at his condo, or sooner if he could find a secure connection and a couple of moments free from observation.
He’d noticed what he thought was a pattern in the flights to the Pacific Northwest. He’d ask the team to confirm his initial suspicions with further research, but he had a hunch that’s where the rogue scientists were holed up—or perhaps that’s where they planned to be in the near future. Someone who went to pains to remain anonymous had certainly had a lot of boxes of mysterious equipment delivered to that area in the past few weeks.
Only a small portion of the contents were listed on the cargo manifests. That raised questions in his mind. The airline hadn’t transported that much scientific equipment in the past. At least not to such remote locations and for such mysterious clients. Every other cargo list from prior years that contained anything remotely scientific was usually destined for a reasonably big city airport being shipped either to or from a legitimate scientific business, laboratory, or hospital.
The more recent manifests that had caught his eye had obscure senders and receivers in backwater locations. One or two like that could be put up to random coincidence, but the quantity he’d been able to locate in a quick, covert search made him think there was a fire somewhere beneath all that proverbial smoke. Something was up in the Pacific Northwest.
They used different airports, but all the questionable invoices went to that region. He hoped the team could help him discern a pattern in the shipments that might help narrow down the target area a little more. That region was vast and sparsely populated except for a few big cities here and there. The rest of the area was mountainous and held many ranches and farms as well as miles and miles of forest. It was a good place to hide.
Also a good place to carry on with highly dangerous research. In fact, it was a near perfect hiding place. No wonder the team had lost track of their quarry.
Not for long, if Sam had anything to say about it. This was the information Sam had been sent to find and the reason they’d needed someone on the inside to begin with. He’d gathered enough to start the more analytical-minded folks back at base on the hunt. All in all, it had been a good morning.
Sam still had a full day of work ahead, during which he could further his relationship with Emily. While not strictly an essential part of the mission, getting in Emily’s good graces could be quite useful to the successful completion of his goal. It was also something he wanted on a personal level. He wanted to get to know her. He wanted to be able to vindicate her if she wasn’t involved. And he wanted to be near enough to be able to protect her in case the shit hit the fan and she was in the line of fire.
Emily wasn’t immune to the zombie contagion. Hell, she probably didn’t even know such horrors existed. Sam hoped like he’d never hoped before that she had no idea what dark things existed out there in the night.
If it turned out that she knew and was helping spread the research by transporting it around the country, he’d have to take her down. The thought turned his expression grim. He knew his duty and would perform it to the best of his ability, but he wouldn’t enjoy it. In fact, he began to wonder if he would ever recover from such an eventuality where Emily was concerned.
But he’d cross that bridge when they got to it—if they got to it. Today was for flying and getting to know her better. It was a good day.
There was an uneasiness between them at first as they headed toward Omaha. They went through the various checklists quietly and efficiently. Finally Sam had had enough.
“Bad weather ahead. We’re on IFR into Omaha,” she stated almost mechanically, not looking at him.
“Sure thing, boss. I Follow River.”
There. That got a rise out of her. Emily looked up from her clipboard and shot him a suspicious look.
“You do know what IFR means, right Sam?”
“What? We’re back to testing again? I thought I’d already proven to you that I am fully qualified to fly this jet.” The clipped tone in his voice couldn’t be helped. He was disappointed both in himself for getting caught snooping and in her for being so suspicious of him all the time. “Give me a little credit there, captain.”