Playing For Keeps (Montana Men) (25 page)

His mouth settled firmer against hers and she thought
she’d die. Their tongues tangled for a moment, then he sought the tiny,
powerful places within. Lord, first one minute she was freezing, next, her body
felt as warm and pliable as soft wax. Had a woman ever been so thoroughly
kissed before?

Flayme wanted desperately to escape him. Worse, the
urgency building inside her made her want to crawl inside his skin, to let him
have his way, to guide his fingers inside her skirt, to aid him in his quest
toward her hit her with the force of a wild mustang—

“Uhh,” she moaned.
“Ooh
—
”
Oh, God, what am I
 
doing?

Clearly, she wanted to succumb to the ravaging of her
mouth. Her body was more than willing.

But Flayme wanted her freedom more.

Stealthily, she edged her hand to the classic-style desk
phone at her fingertips. Before she gave herself time to reconsider, to, yeah,
enjoy the tiny licks he trailed past her navel and the fleeting dip of his
fingers past the waistband of her skirt, she slammed the hard plastic across
his temple.

The air
whooshed
out of his body in a short, single groan. His mouth slackened against her
belly. All sparks of fire died from his heated touches. Flayme thought she’d
cry at that cruelty. She sobbed softly over the sweet loss. Then she gasped.
“Crap.” His entire body had sagged on top of hers. “Please, God, this is
getting to be a habit…me injuring this man. Please don’t let me have killed
him.”

He moaned. Flayme dropped the phone, pushed him off her,
and instantly dug in his jean’s pocket and fished out the key. In less than a
heartbeat, her wrists were free of the steel bracelets.

She scooped up his car keys, took a second to strip out of
her suit, yank on jeans, a sweater, socks and the pair of sturdy shoes he’d
filched from her closet. “One more thing,” she muttered, and snapped the cuffs
around his wrists. “There, they aren’t so bad once you get used to them. Get a
taste of how they feel.” And why was she talking to an unconscious man?
Idiot!

She hesitated for a moment, eyeing the big lump rising on
his forehead and the tiny gash the phone had made. Blood trickled toward his
chin. “Shit.” She hadn’t meant to do that kind of damage. Well, in for a penny
and all that—Flayme whirled and rushed out the door.
Free!

She was free. So why did she suddenly feel so damn
disheartened?

Chapter Nineteen

I love her and that’s the beginning of
everything.

~F. Scott Fitzgerald

Castle Rock, Colorado

February 17, Tuesday

Eight hours and ten minutes after the
assassination…

Rafe
slid his powerful hands beneath Lacey’s hips and lifted her to meet his
penetrating thrusts. Her soft moans of pleasure soared through his soul, and
like every time he loved her, he came undone in her arms.

He
thought he’d die a slow death as she clenched her inner muscles and milked him
of his seed. His heart pounded. His lungs burned and felt as if they were going
to burst. “Lacey, sweetheart.” Rafe cupped the sides of her face and nibbled at
her mouth. “God, don’t stop doing that. You feel so good. You always take my
breath away.” Gently, he brushed a kiss across her eyelids, the sweet tip of
her nose and finally settled on the swollen flesh of her plump lips.

With
the reluctance he couldn’t stop feeling whenever he left her body, Rafe slowly
pulled out of her and rolled onto his back. Curling his arms around her waist,
he took her with him. She settled her head on his shoulder and sighed. “You
have a way of making me feel humble,” she said, twining her fingers through his
chest hair, “as if I’m the last woman on earth.”

“For
me, you are.” His heart hammered with enough force he thought it might explode.
“Lady, you are one dangerous female.”

Lacey
crawled on top of him. “How dangerous?”

“Very
dangerous. I’m not sure my cock will ever go soft again.”

“If it does, I think I know how to revive it.” She grinned
and gently cupped his sac. “That is, if you want me to revive it?” Lacey lifted
a brow, grinning, because his dick was already responding to her light strokes.
Her body quivered in anticipation. “Rafe, do you think we might have made a
baby?”

“You
asked me that last time.” He picked up his watch off the nightstand and eyed
it. “Exactly one hour ago.” He put the watch down and smiled to take the sting
out of his words. The desperation she felt for another child showed on her
face, in the way her lips pinched, and her eyes filled with hope. She troubled
him. Her despair made him apprehensive, as if her conceiving was the only thing
that might make her whole again.

God, let her
get pregnant.
If that’s what
it takes to heal her soul, please let her conceive.

“My
answer’s still the same, Lace,” he said gently, brushing her hair back from her
face. “The more we work on it, the more apt it is to happen.” He grinned. “God
knows I love working on it.”

“I
just don’t want you to feel that the only reason I want you is because
—
”

Rafe
searched her face. He saw the same sorrow there, the same emptiness he’d seen
in her face since she lost their baby and Joseph. Lacey needed another child,
and she needed it as soon as possible.
Please,
God, let it happen. Not for my sake, but for hers.
“I never thought that,
sweetheart. God, you’re so beautiful.” His hand shook as he brushed a damp curl
that clung to her cheek behind her ear. “After this last time, just before I
came, I lifted your hips, tilted them to take me deep. Sometimes that helps a
woman conceive. Yeah, there’s a good chance we just made a baby. Remember, it
didn’t take but one night last time.”

Tears
flooded her eyes. “That was different.
I
was different. I was whole then.”

“Lace,”
he said on a choked note. “Sweetheart, you’re still whole. You just need time
for your body to heal. I want a baby with you, too, but there’s no hurry.”

“Yes,
there is.”

“Why?”

“I can’t explain it, Rafe. I just know we need to create a
baby as soon as possible. I need that with you, to give us roots and
stability.”

“Roots
and stability? I love you, Lacey. If you love me, then we have our roots and
stability.”

“I do love you, but a baby, a
child
, will strengthen our bond. I feel like I’m running out of
time and that if I don’t conceive now, we might never get another chance to
make a baby.”

Rafe
stared at her. The anxiety in her eyes
was real. He didn’t know what to say to
her, to reassure her. He couldn’t tell her what the doctor had told him
―
that
she might never conceive again. It would crush her, and he couldn’t bear to see
that spark die in her again. “We’ll make a baby, Lace, but
honey, it
might not happen right away. You have to realize that. Your body went through a
lot. It needs time.
You
need time.”

“I
don’t want time,” she cried. “I’m fine. A little sore, but I can do this,
Rafe.”

“Sweetheart,
I want to give you
—
”

The
jarring ring of his cell phone cut off his words. “Damn.”

“Who
the heck could that be at this hour?” Lacey asked.

Rafe
grunted. “No telling.”

Lacey
grabbed the cell off his nightstand and eyed the caller I.D. “Danger.”

“Shit.”
Rafe raked fingers through his
hair. “What the hell does he want? Can’t he leave us alone?”

“Don’t
answer.” She flipped the top and shut it with a snap, killing the ring tone.

“Lacey!
What if it’s important?”

“There’s
nothing he has to say that’s more important than what we’re doing.”

“Lace…”
His voice trailed away when she closed her fingers around his aching cock.

“Again?”
she asked, her eyes teasing, but she was already guiding his hard shaft inside
her.

To
hell with Danger, the man had no business calling them in the first place.
There was nothing left to say between them. “I’m all yours, sweetheart,” he
said huskily. “You know that.”

And
he silenced his ringing phone again by punching the off button.

* * * *

Ohio

Motor Lodge Motel

Eight hours and twenty minutes after the
assassination…

Flayme
missed the tiny slot to the ignition on the first try. Drawing a deep breath,
she clenched the car keys and ordered herself to calm down. This time, she
jabbed the key slowly into the switch and turned it with a patience she was far
from feeling.

Success!
However, she couldn’t quite squash the memory of what she’d done to the already
injured and possibly ill agent. How hard had she hit him with the phone? Too
hard? Well, yeah. His forehead had split like an overripe tomato. Her stomach
churned. Nausea bubbled, hot and greasy in her belly.

So
much blood.

Was
this new wound as bad as the knife wound?

Just
because the wound on his forehead bled so much didn’t mean it was serious. Did
it? Hadn’t she read somewhere that head wounds bleed profusely?

Oh,
God, she didn’t know. Couldn’t remember. She only knew she didn’t want to be
taken into protective custody, a formality that still made her little more than
a prisoner.

She
hadn’t done anything wrong. Well
—
unless
one counted stabbing the agent and cracking his skull. Which she didn’t
—
all’s fair in love and war. Wasn’t that
the old adage? Love? War? It seemed like maybe there was a bit of both going on
between them, at the very least, a strong attraction.

No.
No. That wasn’t right. There was
nothing
between them. She barely knew him. In truth, she didn’t know him at all. The
only good thing she could say about him was he knew how to kiss. Was that
necessarily a compliment? Uh-uh. It meant he was very experienced in seduction.

But to give him his due, he hadn’t really tried to hurt
her anytime. Well, except for the punch to the jaw, but she’d given him plenty
of provocation, and still had. She knew he had principles because he hadn’t
taken advantage of the fact that Sam would have slept with him given the
opportunity. So he didn’t use women for the hell of it.

Flayme
clenched her teeth. She refused to dig around, trying to find good qualities
about him
—
time
to move on and think about something else
—
like
making good her escape.

Working
for Sam had given her an opportunity to keep an eye on what was happening
inside the White House. Not that she had the power to do anything about it,
other than hold a press conference. She’d definitely do it, too, if she felt it
was necessary to warn the country of an impending tragedy, like the president
being in bed with another woman when he should be taking care of business.

The
cover-up going on at the White House irked her to no end. She felt the people
needed to know their leader was a cheat, a womanizer, and a liar. She hadn’t
made any secret of her feelings, which might account for the fact she never
received invitations to White House events.

It also might account for someone taking shots at her. The
president and his wife didn’t much like her, but that was okay, because she
sure as hell didn’t like either one of them. She didn’t put anything past the
nation’s great leader if it meant saving his own ass, but she hadn’t done
anything lately to piss him off.

The
one thing she knew without doubt, if her brother was behind
her
being taken into protective custody, then no way
—
she had less reason to trust him than she did the cowboy.

Flayme
tried to shake off the terror that clenched her heart. Her brother? What a
joke! He wasn’t fit to serve the country. He’d been a lousy brother, an even
lousier senator.

She
swiped the tears from her eyes. The gung-ho cowboy agent? Was he trustworthy?
Was he the good guy? She didn’t know. For sure, she hadn’t wanted to hurt him.
Not to the point she had.

But
damn it, why should she care?

Just
because he was a dynamite kisser, and no doubt possessed one hell of a manly
package, at least according to Samantha, and was one hubba-hubba hunk, didn’t
mean she could trust him with her secrets or allow him to handcuff her and hold
her prisoner.

Flayme
rubbed her eyes. God, what if she’d killed him? Shit! She was back to that
concern. What if she’d blinded him with the blow? He didn’t seem to have much
stamina. How the hell had he become such a top-notch agent when he couldn’t
even handle a little stabbing and a minor blow to the head?

And why the fuck wasn’t his fancy car
starting?

Flayme
banged the steering wheel in frustration. She turned the key again, but there
was only the dull grind of a dead starter. Not a spark of life ignited under
the hood.

For
an intense moment, she sat there debating what to do next. Reluctantly, she
popped the hood. Annoyed, she wondered what the hell she knew about what coiled
under a hood. Shoving open the door, Flayme stepped out of the car. She had to
try. She’d come too far to turn back now.

Maybe
she could fix whatever was wrong.

And
maybe cows could fly over the moon.

She
circled the front and lifted the top. Flayme stared, blinked, then stared some
more. Holy hell! Okay. Yep. Clueless was a terrific word. What the hell was she
looking at?
For?
She puffed a curl
out of her eyes and nibbled on her lower lip. Hmm. Well she knew what spark plug
wires were, and she was dead certain they weren’t supposed to be MIA.

But
who could tell exactly how many were gone with all the hoses and wires twisting
and twining under there? It looked like a big tubular jungle of black hoses,
wires, caps, and other parts she had no name for or any desire to learn what
they were connected to.

With
a spurt of anger, Flayme slammed the hoo
d. “The dirty, rotten sonofa
—
”

How
could he take the wires?

When
had he taken them?

She
tapped a long nail on the hood and narrowed her eyes. He must have done it when
he stepped outside for a few minutes. The beast! Squaring her shoulders, she
made up her mind there was no way she was surrendering. He was not winning this
battle.

Flayme gazed toward the office. Even with dawn making its
gray appearance
—
albeit
with more snow clouds obscuring any attempt made by the sun to rear its lemony
face
—
the
clerk hadn’t bot
hered with the small detail of turning off the vacancy
light. The sign still glowed in hot-pink neon. Not that the motel looked
remotely inviting, even with the flashing welcome.

Her
skin crawled. She was going to kill the cowboy! This was obviously a seedy
motel, one of those little shacky type, out-of-the-way flea bags that required
one to exit and drive another ten miles to locate it, only to discover it was a
rat hole. The kind of place she usually steered clear of no matter how
desperate she was for a room. Okay. With no choice left, the office it was.
She’d call a cab to anywhere and charge it to her Visa.

Flayme stopped in her tracks. Shit!
Her wallet!
Credit cards. Checkbook
—
her lifeline to the outside world, to Neiman’s, Tiffany’s,
and Macy’s, to a nice Holiday Inn, for God’s sake, was in her purse
—
and her purse was back at the office in
D.C.

Rage
spiraled down her spine and settled in her womb. It was the cowboy’s fault. If
he hadn’t knocked her out and whisked her away, she could have told him she
needed her purse before they took off to wherever the hell he was taking her.

He’d
made a thorough mess of her life. Ruined her escape! Her stomach clenched with
sudden need, and she wondered if he was as thorough with
—