Overnight Male (15 page)

J
OEL HAD JUST UNCOVERED
some very interesting information in the data he’d mined out of Hobie Jurgens’s computer when he heard the front door slam shut and Lila’s voice call out, “Joel?”

He noticed right off that she hadn’t used her customary greeting of “Hi, honey, I’m home,” and wasn’t sure he wanted to think about why not. The intimacy of the “Hi, honey” comment had been a joke before, because there was no intimacy in the comment. But now…

Well, since the kiss—and then some—that the two of them had shared last night, the intimacy was all too real. Or might have been. Had he not put the brakes on what could have happened.

“In here,” he called out, nudging the memories of last night out of his brain. He was getting used to having to do that, since memories of the way Lila had felt in his arms had been creeping into his thoughts all day. Good thing he was getting so much practice. He had a feeling he was going to be battling memories of that for the rest of his life.

He tried to focus on the lines of code scrolling across the screen of his laptop, shaking his head at the ingenuity that had gone into the programming. Hobie was a genius, no two ways about it. If the kid hadn’t been working on the wrong side of the law, Joel would have suggested to his superiors that he be recruited by OPUS. It had taken most of the day for Joel to hack his way into Hobie’s files, and boy, what he’d found once he got there. The beginnings of a computer virus unlike anything Joel had ever encountered.

He was convinced now that Hobie was working in conjunction with Sorcerer. Which meant Donny Grawemeyer and Chuck Miller doubtless were, too, because the three of them were virtually inseparable. It was interesting, because Joel would have suspected that Chuck was the dominant member of the group, and maybe he was, as far as personalities went. But after studying the contents of Hobie’s hard drive, it was clear he was the real brain. With a little more tweaking and refining, the virus he was designing could indeed take out half the planet before it was stopped. Probably Hobie was still working on it because half the planet wasn’t enough. If Joel and Lila didn’t find Sorcerer soon, this baby was going to go off in all their faces.

He heard the rustle of her approach beyond his bedroom door and, damning himself for primping even as he did it, ran a hand through his hair to straighten it and checked to make sure his clothes matched and his buttons were properly aligned. Yep, the burgundy oxford shirt and blue jeans were presentable enough for the occasion, which tonight, considering what he’d just discovered, would be brainstorming a new strategy. Looked as if he and Lila would be ordering in for dinner.

Of course, the moment he got a look at her, leaning in his bedroom doorway, he began to think about other things they could do if they stayed home tonight. She looked, as always, sexy as hell. Her black jeans, ripped at one knee, hugged slender thighs, and her black T-shirt revealed a hint of creamy flesh between it and her waistband, along with a scant peek of her breasts above the deeply scooping neck. As he watched, she tugged a rubber band from the ponytail at the back of her head and shook out her hair, the gesture releasing the aroma of freshly ground coffee. Even that was sexy, because it made him crave something lush and exotic and potent, and that was Lila to a T.

But there was something else about her tonight, too, some barely leashed vibe that hadn’t been there when she left this morning. Her face was flushed, as if she’d been exerting herself physically, and a fine sheen of perspiration mottled her forehead. He noticed now that the front of her shirt was damp, too, a faint V of moisture making the fabric of her shirt a shade darker between her breasts.

“You okay?” he asked. “You look like you’ve been running or something.”

“I stopped by the Waverly gym to hit the weight room for a little while.”

The announcement surprised him. It seemed an odd side trip for her to make on the way home. “In your street clothes?” he asked.

“Mmm-hmm,” she replied, the murmur sounding a little strained for some reason.

He narrowed his eyes at her. “Why?”

“Just feeling a little antsy,” she told him. “I had some extra energy I needed to work off.”

She looked as if she hadn’t worked off much of it, he thought. One leg was bent slightly, and that foot was perched on its ball, moving rapidly up and down. She’d linked her hands loosely together over her belly, but her thumbs were hammering against each other as if she couldn’t keep them still. Even her eyes seemed alive, darting from one thing in the bedroom to another…though never quite settling on Joel. Her whole being seemed to be overflowing with…something. Something restless and potent and barely contained.

“Do you feel better now?” he asked, not a little cautiously.

She shook her head, the movement jerky and anxious. “Not really, no. This, ah…this happens to me on the job sometimes,” she told him, her gaze still ricocheting around the room. “I get this overabundance of adrenaline or something. Just have to do whatever I can to burn it off. Sometimes working with weights will do it. Sometimes it takes, um…something else. I’ll be fine. Eventually.”

He sensed it then, as if a huge, invisible wave slammed into him, knocking him down and jerking him out with the undertow. It wasn’t just adrenaline rushing through Lila. It was something much stronger. Something much more primitive. Something much more arousing.

Something much too contagious.

“Wh-what?” he stammered, pushing the thought away. Mostly because it was a thought he couldn’t afford to have right now. Or ever. “What’s the matter?”

She continued to fidget, but her gaze finally connected with his. And stayed there. “There’s only one degree of separation between us and Adrian Padgett,” she told him.

Something hot exploded in Joel’s belly at hearing the announcement. “How do you know? Did you see him?”

She shook her head. “But Iris Daugherty can take us to him. She and I had a nice little chat at work tonight about boys. She seems to have rather a crush on a man who sounds a lot like Adrian.”

“Did she mention him by name?”

“No. He’s going by Nick Darian. But the description fits. And Darian is an anagram for Adrian.” She added with a halfhearted smile, “And my spider sense is tingling.”

With the force of a jackhammer, by the looks of her. Her entire body seemed to vibrate with whatever had her so agitated. And hers wasn’t the only one, he realized. Something in him started tingling, too. And talk about your jackhammers…Only, the sensation steaming through Joel like a locomotive had nothing to do with their proximity to Sorcerer. This was a sensation he recognized too well, even if he hadn’t felt it for years. As turned on as he’d been by Lila last night, it paled compared to what was raging through him now. Last night he’d been able to control his feelings. Barely. He wasn’t sure he’d succeed a second time. Not when he felt like this.

“Where is he?” he asked Lila, trying to stay focused on what should have been important.

“I don’t know,” she said.

She pushed herself away from the door frame and began a slow journey into the room. One step. Two. Three. Four. Then she halted, as if she’d suddenly realized she was moving toward him and had to make herself stop.

“I didn’t get a chance to find out,” she said. “But Iris Daugherty is our link, Joel, I know it. We need to get someone on her right away.”

“I’ll phone home tonight and arrange it,” he said, using the term field agents used for contacting OPUS. Not that it mattered, since he and Lila had fallen completely out of character by now. And he had a feeling they were about to fall even more.

They watched each other in silence for a few long moments, and with each ensuing one, Joel felt the level of awareness ratchet higher. The heat, too, cranked higher. Along with every last one of his senses. He noted every detail on Lila’s body, from the way her flesh was flushed above the neckline of her shirt to how her nipples had pebbled against the fabric. He heard her breathing coming in short, shallow breaths that seemed to mimic his own suddenly ragged respiration. He smelled the trenchant remnants of her workout mingling with the coffee now, an earthy aroma that surrounded him until he could almost taste the salt that must linger on her skin. Even his sense of touch seemed more sensitive, his fingertips growing hot as he skimmed them restlessly over the denim of his jeans. And he couldn’t help wondering if he touched Lila that way, would his hands burst into flame?

Stupid question, he told himself. The way she was looking at him now, his entire body was about to burst into flame.

He inhaled a deep breath and released it slowly, thinking it might slow his rapid heart rate. But it came out thready and unsteady, and only made his pulse race more. “I, ah…I’ve made a, um…a breakthrough at my end, as well,” he finally said.

He turned the laptop so that Lila could see what he’d discovered, telling himself it was
not
because he wanted her to finish her trek across the room to get a better look at it, something that would put her within touching distance. There would be no touching, Joel told himself. None. They had work to do. Lots and lots of work. Important work, too, by God. Really, really important. Whatever this weird current was arcing between them, it was only because they were so close to finally grabbing Sorcerer. It wasn’t because of…anything else.

She completed the handful of steps necessary to put her right beside him, then bent forward a little so that she might see the screen better—or something. The aroma of coffee was stronger now, but not strong enough to mask the scent that was intrinsically—erotically—hers. Joel closed his eyes and swallowed hard. He need only lift his hand a few inches to open it over the small of her back. A few more, and he could tumble her right into his lap. And then he’d get a lot more than his hands involved.

“What is it?” she said as she studied the collection of letters and numbers and symbols on the screen. Her voice was soft, breathless and thick with something he told himself he should just try to ignore. “I don’t get it.”

Which, of course, was the problem, he thought. Neither of them was getting it, which was why he kept noticing things like how the rosy bloom on her flesh had deepened, and how her breathing was growing more frayed, and how her luscious scent was starting to intoxicate him, and how easy it would be to have her in his lap, and then he could fill his hands with her breasts and fill her mouth with his tongue and fill herself with himself.

She glanced away from the screen and stood straight again, then looked down at Joel. And immediately her expression began to change, from mildly curious to thoroughly confused to hopefully uncertain to profoundly aroused.

And then, in a voice that was soft and rough and needy, she said, “Joel?”

He couldn’t have stopped himself from doing what he did next any more than he could have halted a speeding locomotive with one hand. Still sitting, he settled both hands on her hips and tugged her closer, then pressed his open mouth against the bare flesh of her abdomen just above her navel.

She sucked in a breath at the gesture, but immediately dropped her hands to his head, tangling one in his hair and opening the other over his cheek. Then she bent to touch her forehead to the crown of his head and curled her arms around his shoulders. It was all the encouragement Joel needed. More than he needed, really. Just having Lila in the same room with him was enough. Having her in the world was enough. He knew in that moment that no matter what happened in the days ahead, no matter what happened after this assignment was over, no matter where she went or what she did, or where he went or what he did, he would always want Lila Moreau. Because what he felt for her was unlike anything he had felt for a woman before. She was indeed special. And she had indeed become a part of his life. Even if she stayed for only a little while, she would be with him forever.

It didn’t matter how she felt about him, he decided as he nudged her shirt higher and opened his mouth over her bare torso. It only mattered how he felt about her. He wanted her. He needed her. He might very well have fallen in love with her. And there was no reason he shouldn’t—couldn’t—have her.

He pushed her shirt higher still, revealing the taut, elegant musculature beneath a filmy bra the color of good champagne. She wasn’t the silk-and-lace type, but the garment was sexy anyway, sweeping low on her breasts to reveal their upper halves, as smooth and supple as fine silk. She removed her shirt the rest of the way herself, tossing it carelessly aside, then returned her hands to his hair. She pushed the dark tresses back over his scalp as he dragged a long line of openmouthed kisses across her belly, as if she wanted to watch him while he kissed her. He closed his eyes and moved his head lower, rubbing his lips lightly over the band of flesh above her waistband, dipping his tongue into the delectable dent of her navel, loving the soft gasp that escaped her when he did. Then his fingers were working at the button and zipper of her jeans, freeing the former and lowering the latter, until the tiny triangle of her underwear became visible beneath.

She groaned softly, her fingers tightening in his hair. Joel pushed his hands up over her back, marveling at the shallow bumps and swells of muscle he encountered. The recognition of her physical strength aroused him even more, and he skimmed his hands higher, deftly unfastening her brassiere, which tumbled down over her arms. As she shifted to free herself of the garment, he covered her breasts with both hands, squeezing gently, loving the way they fit so perfectly in his palms. She sighed at the contact, as if she realized, too, just how well she and he went together.

She lowered herself into his lap, straddling his thighs, scooting herself forward over the hard ridge of his cock that was by now surging against the heavy denim of his blue jeans. Still cupping one luscious breast in his hand, Joel moved his head forward, opening his mouth wide over the taut nipple and dusky aureole, pulling both deep inside to press his tongue hard against her soft warmth. She gasped again at the quickness of his possession, looping both arms around his neck and burying her fingers in his hair again, as if she wanted to possess him, too.