Mine To Hold (12 page)

She wore a dark robe. Her hands lifted.
Unbelted that robe. It fell at her feet.

Claire took his hand. She led him back to the
bedroom. The woman had no idea just how close to pouncing on her he
truly was.

He should be careful with her. After their
last time together, she was probably sore.

“I want you.” Her voice was pure sin, like a
stroke right over his aroused cock.

His control was shredding. Every second with
her ripped it a bit more.

“I want to give you pleasure,” Claire told
him as she stared up into his eyes. “Teach me how?”

Right then, he couldn’t. He could only push
her back onto the bed. Part her thighs. See the perfect pink flesh
that waited. “This gives me pleasure.” He put his mouth on her and
feasted.

She bucked beneath him. Arched. Her taste
drove him insane.

Get her ready. Take her.

When her nails raked down his back, Noah
rose. He positioned his cock right at the entrance to her body.
He’d put on a condom, pausing just those few seconds—
one day
I’ll have all of her—
and he drove deep into her.

Only then,
only then,
the frantic
tension left his body. The fear. The fury. The lethal combination
that seeing Ethan Harrison had roused within him.

Claire will tease and she will flirt, but she
won’t sleep with you…She can’t. Claire knows she belongs to me.

Ethan was so wrong.

Noah thrust harder into Claire. She whispered
his name. Her sex squeezed around him. So hot and tight and wet.
Perfect for him.

She climaxed, crying out and her sex clenched
him even tighter.

Noah’s thrusts became faster then. Deeper.
The bed shook beneath them. The headboard thudded into the wall. He
didn’t care.

Nothing could have stopped him at that
moment.

He plunged into her. Lost sight of everything
but Claire.

And when he came, he roared her name.

Mine. Always.

Noah would do anything necessary in order to
protect what was his.

***

They’d taken Claire away.

Ethan Harrison paced the length of his cell,
rage pouring through his veins. All of his pictures were gone. The
pictures that let him see Claire. That let him feel her.

Those pictures were important.

He needed them.

I need Claire.

That bastard Noah York didn’t scare him.
After what he’d survived in prison, nothing scared him.

His father had thought that he kept Ethan
safe from the other inmates. But when the lights went out, when the
guards turned their backs…you had to protect yourself. He’d gotten
very good at protecting himself.

And now…his father was dead.

The funeral would be in a few days. That gave
him so little time.

It was a good thing he’d been plotting his
escape for nine years. All of the plans were already in place.
Soon…very soon…

I’ll see you again, Claire.

And it wouldn’t just be a thin photograph
that he touched. He’d have the real deal in his arms once
again.

No one will take you from me.

Chapter Six

“They’re burying the senator today.”

When Noah made that announcement, Claire’s
fingers stilled over the computer keyboard. She’d been staying with
him at York Towers for the last few days. Sleeping in his bed at
night, working by his side during the day.

Drake had vanished.

The reporters had stayed close.

But not as close as Noah.

Noah cleared his throat and said, “And
they’re letting Ethan go to the funeral.”

She looked up. They weren’t in the suite now.
Instead, they were working in one of the offices downstairs. They’d
spent the morning going over blueprints for the Washington
restaurant addition. Talking marketing. PR. Noah wanted to open the
roof-top restaurant with a bang on New Year’s Eve. Throw a huge
party and—

“
Claire.
”

She swallowed and focused on him. She’d
already known that Ethan was being allowed to attend the
funeral.

“You’re wearing a mask, Claire.
Talk
to me.” He caught her hands. Pulled Claire to her feet.

“What do you want me to say?” There wasn’t
anything
to say. She wasn’t going to pretend some sort of
grief for the senator’s death. It was wrong, but she felt relief
now that he was being buried.

He can’t hurt me anymore.

“I want you to talk to me.” The words were
hard, but his hands were light on her. “Claire, it’s me. I won’t
judge anything you say. Just…
talk to me.
”

“I’m scared.” There. She’d said it.

His hold tightened on her.

“I saw on the news that the Alabama governor
was granting some sort of special release for Ethan.” A temporary
hardship release or some other kind of bull. “I don’t like knowing
that he’s out there, free, not even for a second.” She wanted him
locked away behind as many bars as possible.

“He won’t touch you.”

His gruff words sounded like a vow, but Noah
didn’t understand. “That’s what my parents told me, too.” She
pulled away from him. Headed to the nearby window. Stared out at
the city. “They told me I’d be safe. That Ethan wouldn’t hurt me
again. That I could just walk away from him.”

Behind her, Noah swore.

“I wasn’t safe. Even with a restraining order
on him, he came after me. He killed them, and he found me.”

He’d told her that when he first found her on
the dock. Been so proud.

“He watched me in that courtroom. Watched me
like he owned me.” She’d been sixteen. So terrified. “And when I
left the courthouse each day, there’d be people outside, yelling at
me. Calling me so many names. There’d be spray paint on my house.
People were believing his story. I thought…” This was the part that
twisted her insides, but saying it out loud…
I have to do it.
“
I thought Ethan was going to get away with what he’d
done.”

Noah’s hands wrapped around her shoulders. He
turned her around and forced Claire to face him. “He didn’t.”

“I thought he was, though, and I knew if he
got free, he’d come after me.” She looked down at her wrists.
Covered by her long sleeves. Always covered so carefully. “So I
took the razor.” A hard smile lifted her lips. “I made sure I cut
myself just the right way, and I waited to die in the same house
that my parents had died in.”

His hold on her was bruising.

“I know it was weak,” she said, voice husky,
“but I was sixteen, and so scared, and death was better than having
to see him again.”

He yanked her against his chest. She could
feel the mad drumming of his heart.

His scent wrapped around her. His arms held
her close. She felt safe there, in his embrace. Once, she’d thought
that she’d never be safe.

“You won’t see him again,” Noah promised her.
“He’s going back to jail.”

But one day, Ethan would get out, for good.
In five years, eight months, and seven days. Yes, she knew exactly
how much time he had left to serve.

“Sara found you, didn’t she?” Noah asked
her.

Claire pulled away from him, just a little
bit. “She came home early.” Her big sister. Older by four years.
“She saved me. She got there in time.” Her lips trembled as she
thought of Sara’s recent death…and how she’d just been minutes too
late to save the one person in this world that she loved. “I
couldn’t do the same for her.”

Claire had lost everyone that she loved.

So much pain. Sometimes, she felt as if it
were choking her.

His lips brushed against her forehead. “We’re
getting the fuck out of here,” he said.

Claire blinked. “What?”

“I’ve got a place in the Hamptons. We’re
going to the beach. You’re going to drink wine with me, and you’re
going to relax on that beach—even if it is getting a bit cold
now—and you’re not going to think about death, Senator Harrison, or
that asshole Ethan.” He tipped up her chin. “You’re only going to
think about me. Got it? Me…and you…and the way we can make each
other feel.”

“But…the Washington hotel, the
restaurant—”

“Will still be there when we come back. We’re
leaving, Claire. Because you’re alive, I’m alive, and the rest of
the world can just screw off.”

***

He hated funerals. Particularly this
funeral.

The overdone mourning. All the fake tears.
The talk about the “good” man that had been taken too soon.

Such bullshit.

Drake Archer shifted beneath the hanging
branches of the old oak tree. Spanish moss clung to the sprawling
branches, and the moss blew lightly in the faint breeze.

It was a packed funeral, but Drake had
expected nothing less. Old senators, law enforcement personnel,
reporters…and, of course, just the curious had turned out for this
event.

It’s like a freaking circus show.

Noah hadn’t asked Drake to attend the
funeral. After he’d left New York, Drake had actually planned to
just head back to Biloxi, but the funeral in Fairview had been too
close for him to pass up. Maybe he was just curious, too.

Or maybe I’m a suspicious bastard, and I
wanted to see Ethan Harrison with my own eyes.

Because the guy was there. Not wearing prison
orange, but instead dressed in a black suit. Drake sure never
would’ve guessed that man had spent the last nine years in a
cell.

It turned out there were actually two
Harrison boys. Ethan Harrison, and his older brother, Austin. Ethan
was the black sheep, but the brother who currently sat beside him
on the front row, right next to the casket, well, it seemed Austin
Harrison was supposed to be the savior of the family.

He was an attorney, some big corporate deal.
Drake had done a little digging, and he’d discovered that Austin
was the one who’d kept the family afloat for so many years. After
the senator had crashed and burned, it had been Austin who made
sure the family never lost their position in Alabama society.

They’d kept their mansion. Kept their
power.

Drake shifted again, moving to get a better
view of the brothers. His eyes narrowed. Ethan was staring at the
grave. He was…smiling?

“Are you a friend of Senator Harrison’s?” A
soft voice asked him. “Or are you family?”

He turned his head and saw a petite beauty
with light brown skin standing close by. “I’m neither,” he told
her.

She tilted her head. The woman’s shoulders
were straight. Her hair fell just to her chin. She was dressed
simply but stylishly in black pants and a matching blouse. Her gaze
held his, then slid to the mourners, as if assessing them.

His instincts kicked into gear. The way she
was watching the crowd…

Cop. Or a private investigator.
He
could usually spot them easily.

Even when said cop came in the form of such a
pretty package.

“Don’t bother,” she said, not glancing back
at him. “I’m taken.”

Drake felt a grin curl his lips. “I was just
admiring.”

“Um.” Her gaze was on Ethan Harrison. “Well,
Mr. Neither, if you aren’t a friend or family member, then want to
tell me why you’re at the funeral?”

“I was just passing through. It’s not every
day that a senator gets buried.” He kept his eyes on her. “And
what’s a cop with a northern accent doing down here in
Alabama?”

“I’m the cop who found the senator’s body in
D.C.”

“So why aren’t you
in
D.C. right
now?”

Her gaze came back to his. “Because I’m
trying to find a killer, Mr. Archer.”

Ah, he wasn’t Mr. Neither any longer. The
lady had known exactly who he was all along. Interesting. “It would
seem then you’re a pretty good cop.”

“You’re a friend of Noah York’s,” she said.
Once more, her gaze turned to sweep the crowd. “Did he send you
down here to watch the funeral…or to watch Ethan Harrison?”

“Neither.”

He thought her lips curled a bit at that
answer. “Like I said, I’m just passing through,” Drake told
her.

This time, she turned to face him. “Your
friend could be a killer.”

There was no
could be
about it.

“You wouldn’t protect a killer, would
you?”

I’d protect Noah York any day.
“Once
upon a time,” he said as he remembered days better left in the
past, “Noah pulled me out of hell. A man doesn’t forget things like
that.”

Because he could’ve died in a frigid prison,
if Trace and Noah hadn’t fought so hard for him. They’d been
willing to die in order to save him. No, he’d never forget what
they’d done.

His gaze slid back to the funeral.

Drake knew that, if he had to,
he’d
kill in order to protect Noah. Because he would not just stand back
and watch his friend crash and burn.

***

The funeral was over.

Ethan Harrison tried not to smile as he
stared at the grave. His father was gone.

Good fucking riddance.

The mourners kept looking at him. They were
driving him insane. There were so many whispers and curious stares.
He hunched his shoulders. Looked at the ground. And tried to act
like this wasn’t one of the best moments of his life.

I’ll be getting away soon.

His brother tried to brush by him. Ethan
grabbed Austin’s shoulder. “We need to talk.” He steered his
brother to the relative privacy of a nearby mausoleum. The guards
stayed close, about ten feet away, so Ethan dropped his voice when
he said, “You haven’t come to see me,
brother.
”

He and Austin had the same eyes. Same green
color. Same shape. And right then, Austin’s eyes were bright with
fury. “Why the hell would I come and see you?”

“Because we’re family!” That should be plenty
of reason. “You don’t lock family away and forget about them.”

“You do if the family is anything like you.”
Austin glared at him, the disgust plain to see on his face. That
was Austin all right. Always looking down his nose at him. Always
acting like he was so much better than Ethan.