“So contact your partner.” He could see her point about not wanting the guy to worry needlessly and maybe draw a lot of attention to the fact she was gone. “But I wouldn’t use the apartment phone in case they track their incoming calls.”
“I’ve got my cell phone.” She didn’t reach for it, however. She just stared up at him with that endless confidence he’d seen in her before anything else yesterday.
And what did it say about him that the snooty tilt of this woman’s nose turned him on?
“I’m not too keen on this call in the first place, lady, so if you want to dial those numbers anytime soon I suggest you get on it before I wrestle you to the ground and have you every which way I want you.” He ground his teeth to keep himself from touching her, grinding himself into her.
“In your dreams, I’m sure you could.” Smiling her Mona Lisa grin she flipped open her phone and turned her back on him to touch base with her partner.
He placated himself by making plans to tear her clothes off the moment she finished her conversation. Hell, maybe wrestling her to the ground wasn’t such a bad idea.
“Wes? Are you alone?” Vanessa’s soft words for her partner on the other end of the phone yanked him back to the present.
Her body language shifted. Even standing behind her Alec could see a tension hum through her shoulders as she spoke to the guy—some noble cop crusader who was more her type than a wanted man. Alec acknowledged that it made him a caveman to wonder if she slept with this tool of a guy, but he found himself thinking it anyhow.
“I can’t come in today, and I won’t be in for a few days. You think you can let the department know? Tell them I decided to cash in on some personal time at the last minute?” She walked as she talked, putting space between her and Alec, which he damn well didn’t appreciate.
Still, knowing he should give her some privacy to talk didn’t make his feet move away. Instead, he continued to watch her walk and talk, her movements slightly clipped as if she were agitated. Or as if she were lying.
“I don’t want to talk to Russell. It’s sort of complicated and I can’t really get into it now, but I need a favor.” Her tone turned soft again, reminding Alec how easily a woman could wrap a man around her finger. Donata had done it with him, convincing him she needed help as she drew him deeper and deeper into dangerous waters with his uncle.
Vanessa would never be like that though. Would she? She seemed too self-sufficient—too proud—to play those kinds of games.
He flipped through the news stations on TV again, but kept the sound muted as he half watched for updates on the recent string of drug busts and listened to Vanessa’s conversation.
“I need some information on a carjacking last night. A couple of guys in the Bronx rolled a Mercedes sedan and I’d appreciate any news on the whereabouts of this car, but I need to keep it on the low.” She went on to give the license plate over the phone along with the address of the incident, but repeatedly dodged any other details.
After listening to her go back and forth with the partner who was apparently getting annoyed about the whole secrecy thing, Alec watched Vanessa drop down into a chair in the dining room, her movements brittle.
Who the hell did her partner think he was to upset her like that? Alec considered yanking the phone out of her hand to tell the guy where he could step off.
Vanessa nodded at something the guy on the other end was saying. “I appreciate what you’ve been through in the past, but this is totally different. I’m going to level with you about the whole thing as soon as I can but I can’t risk jeopardizing something—” her eyes flitted over to Alec “—or someone.”
Alec jerked his gaze back to the television, pissed off at having been caught eavesdropping. He wasn’t sure which bugged him more—his stupid jealousy she might have slept with her do-gooder cop partner, or this restless unease that flared up at the notion she might care enough about Alec to worry about him.
Stabbing buttons mindlessly on the remote, he told himself that he was just another case to her. She’d put that into perspective for him damn quick this morning. In her eyes, Alec had been relegated to a wanted-man-turned-carjacking-victim she could save. She was the do-gooder type, too, right?
He hadn’t realized she’d sewn up her conversation until she appeared in his line of vision, her sleek curves obscuring an idiotic commercial on TV.
“He won’t cover for me for long.” She folded her arms beneath subtle cleavage he wanted to reacquaint himself with as soon as possible. “I need to get back to work within a couple of days or he’ll start making waves.”
Alec nodded, even though he scarcely heard what she was saying. He might have missed out on the rest of her phone conversation, but he hadn’t forgotten his plans for her as soon as it was done. Besides, she didn’t seem like such a damn do-gooder when she was underneath him, screaming his name while he came inside her.
So what if she thought he needed saving? He needed the taste of her again.
“Are you listening to me?” Frustration laced her words, her fingers squeezing the phone in a death grip. “We don’t have much time to figure out who’s trying to frame you with the embezzlement charges, or if your uncle wants you dead.” She paced in his line of sight, her restless body a hell of a lot more entertaining than anything he might have found via satellite. “Which reminds me of something else I thought of this morning. If your uncle found your hiding place and put those carjackers in our path last night, why wouldn’t he have just had you killed then?”
Damn. She didn’t make it easy to keep his focus on sex. Maybe he just needed to shift
her
focus.
“My uncle doesn’t want me dead yet.” Flipping aside the remote, he rose to his feet, ready to claim what he’d been wanting all morning. “Dead men don’t pay.”
“I thought you said you weren’t giving kickbacks to your uncle?” She stilled, her thoughts way too far off the sexual path for his comfort.
Stalking closer to her, he paused a few inches away, breathing in the morning clean scent of her.
“I’m not.” He eased her phone from her grasp and tossed it on the couch with his remote. “But organized crime makes a profit off of guys they get over a barrel. And Sergio thinks he’s putting me over one with pressure from my partners and pressure from his mistress. He doesn’t understand how determined I am that the bastard will never see one red cent of my money.”
She drew in a sharp breath, possibly because he tugged her closer by the hem of her shirt. His shirt. He watched the rapid pulse of a jumpy little vein at her neck, convinced he could almost see her breath.
In.
Out.
“If you’re trying to convince me you’re moving on the right side of the law, you probably shouldn’t drag me around by the shirttails.” Her breathy voice gripped him by the gonads, making him hot and hard and hungry as hell. “Yeah?” He dug beneath her shirt to palm her bare back, soaking up the feel of cool, smooth skin through his fingertips. “If you’re trying to convince me you’re such a concerned cop, you ought to quit looking at me like you want to get me naked and have me for breakfast.”
“Oh, please.” She rolled her eyes and tried to twist out of his grip, but the leftover tension from her phone conversation eased away as he smoothed his palm up one shoulder blade and down the other. “I wasn’t even glancing in your direction.”
“Are you kidding?” He flicked one bra strap off her shoulder. “You practically incinerated me where I sat. I’m pretty sure the couch is still smoking.”
Apparently she didn’t think much of his delivery because she shoved away from him a little harder this time. Only he held on tighter.
Just out of curiosity’s sake.
“You’re one really messed-up guy, you know that?” She dropped downward suddenly in a boneless heap, a tricky self-defense move that made it tough to hold on to her.
His admiration for her only kicked up a little higher. Damn, but she was a dynamo.
“I never denied it.” He fell on her before she could scramble away, being careful not to put his full weight on her as he pinned her to the floor for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. And he could appreciate that his enjoyment of the position probably did make him a messed-up guy. “But what do you think it says about you that you’re breathing even harder than me right now?”
Her breasts pressed softly against his chest with every sweet inhalation, the friction making blood rush to his groin. Damn well made him dizzy.
“Are you suggesting I need to work on my conditioning?” A slender sable eyebrow arched with the question as she finally grew still.
“Wiseass.” He lowered his lips to hers, unable to wait even five more seconds to have the taste of her on his tongue. He pulled back after just one lick, knowing he wouldn’t be able to speak coherently in another minute. “Your conditioning is oh-so-freaking fine, but I think you need to work on a few other things. I’m going to consider it my sworn duty to make sure you get plenty of practice.”
Correction. She’d dragged men to her bed before in those horrible, dark months after her sister’s accident in an attempt to lose herself. But there’d always been a certain detachment from those encounters that had been more about escaping pain than finding pleasure.
With Alec, the pleasure swelled so high it threatened to wash away everything else around her. And after last night’s brush with mortality in the form of a gun planted to her head, Vanessa welcomed this fiery cleansing, the intense heat that burned away everything inside her but pure sensation.
Even while kissing they grappled for control, Vanessa pushing against his shoulders while he kept up a steady pressure on her legs to keep her still. She’d never played those kinds of games with a man before, her sexual experience frighteningly limited even with the handful of guys she’d coldly roped into one-night stands. She barely remembered those weeks of guilt and recrimination after Gena’s accident anyhow.
Thank God.
“Is this the same vice grip you use on unsuspecting crooks?” Alec muttered the words between kisses, voice just a little strangled.
“Sorry.” Loosening her grip around his chest, she smoothed the rippled muscles up his sides, savoring the tapered lines of a strong upper body down to lean hips. “Actually, I make it a point not to let the criminal element get too close to me if I can help it.”
He arched back from her to meet her eyes. “Yeah? I’m feeling pretty damn flattered then.”
The warm sincerity of those simple words scared her, reminded her she couldn’t afford to get emotionally involved with this man who had already commanded every shred of her sexual attention.
“You’re going to be feeling a whole lot more than that in a minute.” Diverting his attention proved easy and oh so rewarding as she walked her fingers down his hip to the front of his fly.
His eyes closed, head falling down to rest on hers as she skimmed her palm between their bodies to cradle his erection. The showered-clean scent of him matched her own just-bathed fragrance, but he still smelled different. Spicy and musky. Deliciously male.
He tensed with her touch, as if he wouldn’t allow himself simply to enjoy the stroke of her fingers up and down the length of him. His thigh slid in between hers, chasing away her questing palm as he pressed up against the hot center of her sheathed only by her jeans.
Her first inclination was simply to open for him, to ease her legs farther apart to welcome the hard strength of him. But in the hard light of day, sprawled out on this anonymous living room floor with a man she’d known less than a day, that seemed unbelievably intimate. True, she couldn’t deny herself another chance to test the raw sexual firepower of Alec Messina, but she didn’t have to wantonly indulge her every hedonistic whim. Instead, she used that shifting of his thigh on top of her to take advantage of his diverted attention.
Sucking in a breath, she braced her arms against his shoulders and gently shoved, rolling them onto Alec’s back so she could gain the top position.
“Victory.” She whispered her triumph in his ear as she whipped off the tank shirt and tossed it in the general direction of the couch.
“Don’t worry, the view from down here is going a long way toward soothing my ego.” He reached up to tug apart the clasp on the front of her bra, making the two cups fall away.
Leaving her naked to the waist.
A sense of empowerment slid over her, although she wasn’t sure if that was because she straddled a gorgeous man or because she’d effectively wrestled him to his back. Probably a little of both.
She might have savored her victorious position a little longer if Alec hadn’t crunched his abs enough to rise up to a half-sitting position, putting his mouth right at breast level and giving her an eyeful of a ripped six-pack. And then his mouth closed over one taut pink nipple and she couldn’t think anymore. Liquid heat suffused her limbs as he laved her breasts with moist stabs of his tongue.
Her hair swung down past her shoulders, sliding over her breasts to brush against his cheek as he kissed her. Vanessa found her fingers spearing into his hair, too, automatically flexing against his scalp to keep the pleasurable pressure against her cleavage.
She forgot all about her need to be on top, her ever-vigilant inner warrioress gladly taking a step back long enough to enjoy Alec’s clever mouth. Perhaps he sensed her weakening commitment to the upper position because he rolled her back to the floor, his arm covering the abraded skin on her spine from the carpet. The knowledge that he remembered those small hurts and thought to protect them reminded her she needed to pull back, protect
herself
before she started caring about a man with undeniable ties to crime—whether he wanted them or not.
But knowing all of that didn’t stop her wrapping her leg around his, lifting her hips up to his in wanton offering. She needed this joining, this red-hot completion just one more time before she forced herself back on the straight and narrow later. Tomorrow. She’d been too emotionally wasted last night to fully appreciate the nuances of sex with Alec, a mistake she wouldn’t make twice.
Dragging her eyes open she stared up at the mysterious stranger kissing her, sliding off her clothes to bare herself. His coal-dark lashes fanned out on stark cheekbones, his face hewn with harsh lines and framed by silky brown hair cut close to his head.
Perhaps sensing her stare, he opened his eyes to meet her gaze, his whole body humming with the same tension that wound through her. She skimmed her hand over his chest, absorbing the rapid beat of his heart.
“I’ll never be able to get naked if you don’t let go of me,” he finally whispered to her, gently slipping his hand underneath her thigh.
Sure enough, she still had her leg wound around his, pressing him more tightly to her. Damn, she was needy when it came to Alec, her body conspiring against her to keep him right next to her.
“Just trying to get my workout.” Relaxing her calf muscles, she eased off, freeing him.
Praying he wouldn’t go far.
“A workout?” Levering himself up from the floor, Alec stood to shed his pants. Boxers. And she’d thought he looked good in the dark? Lord have mercy. The sculpted strength of him and imposing presence could make the most detached woman swoon. “Be careful what you wish for, lady. You just might get it.”
Before she could contemplate what that might mean, he bent down to pull her to her feet and then half steered, half kissed her backward across the floor. She would have stumbled over her own toes if he hadn’t been there to guide her safely. The kiss, the man, the return of five years’ worth of pent-up emotions combined to knock her on her ass.
No wait, the force of Alec pushing her down to the couch knocked her on her butt. She suspected he had other plans for her, but she couldn’t help but notice her position put her eye level with his cock. And since when did she waste prime opportunities?
She’d never had a chance to develop much of a technique in this arena with all of her doomed sexual experiments. But Alec’s prime male specimen gave her major new inspiration.
Time to lose herself in sex.