Playing For Keeps (Montana Men) (5 page)

Flayme bit her lip in indecision. Maybe she should wake
him so he could move on, but she didn’t have the heart to tell him the building
locked down soon, and the guards wouldn’t tolerate loiterers. Instead, she allowed
her gaze to roam over the parts of him she could see. Forget the face. No way
to make out his features with that big Stetson brim shielding them from
forehead to upper lip, at least, not at the angle where she stood.

Oh, but his legs were a mile long, so he must be tall,
maybe six-three? Yeah, she thought at least that, and his hair, black as
chimney soot with a few unruly curls brushing his ears and nape. Attractive.
She liked a man who possessed a smidgen of untidiness. It hinted at an aura of
danger that appealed to her.

For the second time, but for totally different reasons,
she curled her nails into the palms of her hands. It took all her
self-restraint to keep from reaching for and touching the feathery soft curls
brushing his shirt collar. “Think about something else, girl,
look
at something else. Don’t become
Neil and think you can take what you want, touch what you want.”

Okay. She moved her gaze down to his lean wais
t.
His other arm dangled loosely over the padded chair arm. A thick paper cup
slowly slipped from his limp fingers, headed for disaster. With a slight gasp,
Flayme dashed forward, hunkered down
―
no way could she bend
low enough in six-inch heels and a tight skirt
―
and
rescued the wayward cup before the contents spilled onto the expensive beige
carpet.

Her gaze darted to the man as he made a slight, restless
jerk in his sleep. Deep beneath the brim, she saw his eyelids twitch, then they
flickered open and he pinned her with a hard, direct stare. Mercy.

To say his eyes were the color of emeralds wouldn’t be
anywhere close to an accurate description. They weren’t simply the color of
those precious stones, but rather dark pools of liquid mystery, deep mossy
green with a hint of gold. They reminded her of a merciless predator, a jaguar
maybe, or one of the other dangerous cats that quietly stalked its prey.

Shivers streaked up her spine and tickled the fine hairs
at her nape. Yes, this man was dangerous. Lethal. A walking, talking hunter, as
deadly as any jungle cat making a kill. Broad shouldered, he was striking in a
rugged-as-a-mountain kind of way. She thought if he walked into a crowded room,
whether he was dressed in a tux or as casual as he was now, he’d be the one
male who made all heads turn, a presence to be reckoned with no matter what.

One lean, tanned finger glided down her cheek before
sensuously wrapping a strand of her hair around it. Oh, God. The oddest ache
speared through her body and settled low in her belly. Her chest tightened as
if a knot filled the center and refused to budge.

Flayme wasn’t sure she was even breathing anymore. She now
knew what it felt like to be eye-to-eye with a savage animal. She didn’t move,
couldn’t have moved or escaped the hypnotic fix of his eyes if her life
depended on it.

Then he blinked. His dark-lashed gaze switched from
intense to confused, cloudy with sleep, and something else she couldn’t quite
define. Raw need? Hunger? He stared at her like a man who hadn’t had a decent
meal or good sex in a very long time.

Even as he thumbed his hat back a notch, it took her a
moment to realize he wasn’t fully conscious of his actions. His movements were
slightly out of sync, as if he wasn’t quite aware of his surroundings. A
velvety sigh slipped past his lips. His breath fluttered across her mouth, soft
and warm, and hinted of coffee.

Flayme knew she was in trouble the minute she saw his lips
curve into a tender smile. He murmured something that sounded oddly like
Nicole,
his tone questioning.

Stealing her breath even more, he locked a big hand behind
her nape and tugged her closer. Flayme toppled forward, splashing the warm
coffee on her knees. She splayed her free hand across his wide chest and
marveled at the rock solid muscle beneath the black, western-style shirt he
wore.

“Whau
―
” she began, only to lose her breath on
a little hitch as his mouth descended toward h
ers. Good grief. The man
was going to kiss her! A stranger. A rugged, sexy, dreamboat of a cowboy, one
who wasn’t totally awake, yet had the power to captivate her, was about to lay
one red-hot, lip-smacking kiss on her.

Obviously he had her confused with
someone else, maybe the
woman he really hungered for
—
the
mysterious
Nicole. Her heart picked up its pace. Flayme decided quickly
she didn’t care if he thought she was someone else. She wanted this kiss,
needed it to erase the ugly memory of Neil’s wet lips on hers, to obliterate
the feel of that creep’s tongue crammed inside her mouth.

Flayme couldn’t help but be impressed at the difference in
this man’s rugged sex appeal compared to Neil’s milky non-appeal. Oh! There was
simply no comparison. And what the hell was the cowboy waiting on—a personal
invitation? She waited, waited—breathless. Then amazingly, he rubbed his mouth
against hers, and Flayme went up in flames. She thought her insides might melt
and turn to steaming liquid, that she’d die from the sheer force, the absolute
pleasure and pressure of his warm lips against hers. Now
this
was a kiss.

Tiny explosions fizzed throughout her bloodstream. The
sweep of delicious heat burst into overdrive with the brief nudge of his tongue
against hers. It was a kiss like none other she’d ever shared. Without the
least bit of effort on his part, she sank into the absolute power of his mouth.

The word
intense
popped into her oxygen-starved mind. And passionate. Oh yeah, sex with this man
would definitely be explosive and make a lasting impression. He should be
labeled TNT.

Flayme’s lips parted beneath the firm pressure of his
mouth. Swear to God, it felt as if she’d been licked by a naked wire. Hot.
Alive. Wet, wild, and wonderfully heady. The tingling current plunged through
her body and settled hotly between her thighs. Her entire body buzzed. Her
nerve endings prickled. Hell, the roots of her hair crackled. The liquid fire
erupted through her veins. It settled between her thighs and left an unexpected
inferno there.

Her senses exploded like one of those rock candies that
sizzled on the tongue and stole one’s breath away. A kiss. A simple kiss.
Shared. Brief. So brief. Yet, it was the most carnal thing she’d ever felt, and
it punched a hole in her world.

A fleeting kiss shared with a stranger, two people whose
lives happened to momentarily entwine. But oh, what a kiss it was. It jolted
her clear to her soul and blew off her socks. It sapped her of energy, yet left
her wildly stimulated.

Lucky, Nicole,
whoever she was.

Abruptly, his finger slipped from the curl he held
captive. He sighed, closed his eyes, and shut her out of his sleep-induced
world. Just that quickly, it was over, and he was softly snoring again.

Holy hell! For a moment, Flayme stared at the moist sheen
on his lips, and savored the memory of his sexy mouth molded to hers. Her body
quivered—and
he
slept? She felt like
giving him a swift kick. Obviously, his world hadn’t been rocked like hers had
been.

At last, she swallowed hard and prayed the butterflies
jittering around in her stomach settled into the rare flip-flop. “Oh-my-God,”
she whispered shakily and rose to her feet.

Like a zombie, she turned and ambled down the corridor.
Her legs wobbled, weaker than straw and incapable of holding her up. To keep
from melting on the floor into a useless puddle, she braced a hand along the
wall and continued down the hall.

Flayme closed the door to her office behind her and sagged
against it, panting. “Holy shit!
Who
is he?”

Whoever the crap he was, he packed a wallop, everything
from the fierce penetration of his glittering green eyes to his hot, arousing
mouth. Oh, man, it was all there in one delicious package. God, he’d barely
touched his lips to hers and her thighs had ignited like rocket fuel. She
pressed an
unsteady hand against her heart. Her breasts ached. Her nipples tingled and
felt as tight as
—

Flayme drew a sharp breath. “Get a hold of yourself, girl.
He’s not for you. He belongs to Nicole.” Man, she was beginning to hate that
name. “Forget him! You have enough trouble in your life. You don’t need more
complications.”

She hoped to God she never saw him again, because that
single glimpse into his sultry gaze had derailed her. Never had she felt this
breathless, fascinated, or such a fierce ache for more. She’d never felt this
definite feeling of unease, either. Even asleep, and with his defenses utterly
down, the man packed a lethal punch. It wasn’t in the way he’d kissed her,
although that was dangerous enough. It was the way his muscles had coiled
beneath her fingertips, as if he waited for her to try to escape his touch.

He might have been relaxed and drowsy, but there had been
a certain wary alertness about him. Even after he carefully leashed the power,
she’d felt the danger clear to her bones. Then he’d thrown caution to the wind
or—he hadn’t recognized her as a threat, so he’d decided to let her live.
Thank God!

Flayme couldn’t recall seeing him here before. There was
no way she’d ever forget seeing a rugged cowboy in the CIA building, especially
one who reminded her of a big lazy mountain lion, one that barely held itself
in check. No way. No how.

A woman didn’t miss a man with that much hex or sex
appeal. He was pure Alpha. And though the Alpha male had never appealed to her,
oddly, this one did. Maybe it was because she’d had her fill of milksops like
Neil. She didn’t know. She only knew that for the first time in her life, she’d
met a man who appealed to her baser instincts and he belonged to another woman.
Just her luck!

Sighing, she jerked away from the door as realization hit
her. “Oh, God!” Her heart thumped with a wild, unsettled rhythm. Everything
suddenly fit into place. Shit. Oh, shit. Her body trembled. Why hadn’t she
thought
—
realized? She knew exactly
what
he was. “For heaven’s sake, how
could I be so blind? Oh, no way do I
ever
go near that cowboy again! He’s a flippin’ spook.”

A woman would be an utter fool to tangle with a man like
that. Stupid. Stupid. How could she miss the signs? Now that she thought about
it, it was so obvious. That’s why there’d been the aura of real danger about
him. The wariness beneath the sleep deprived glaze in his eyes, the utter
exhaustion etched on the too handsome face, perfect, except for a small scar
that slashed across his left eyebrow.

A spook
—
a
particular breed of agent who slept with one eye open, a knife tucked away in
his boot, and a finger on the trigger of a weapon. Always.

The man was a deep cover op. He had to be. Those men
who
worked for the agency
—
they
were different from the rest of the male species on the planet. Dark.
Dangerous. Lethal weapons. Lord knew there were plenty of them in supply around
D.C., shadows in the shadowy world of glitz and glamour at the White House
.
Hell, shadows in the world.

They struck, only to vanish like a puff of smoke in the
wind. There and gone, the job done so fast, so unobtrusively, one never saw
them coming or going. Some spooks were more perilous than others. The burnout
rate was extrem
ely high. And sometimes, the agent, whether male or female,
became an unstable monster, one who cracked under the strain
—
one who had to be put down
circumspectly.

It also accounted for the callused ridge along the right
edge of his hand she’d somehow noted in the back of her mind. His hands were
probably registered as lethal weapons. Flayme had a feeling the cowboy topped
the list of the most formidable.

But why?

She frowned trying to ascertain the correct answer, then
realized the solution was simple. Th
e key was what he was
―
hidden
in plain sight. His disguise was no disguise at all
—
western shirt, jeans, boots, Stetson
―
the
earthiness of him, all of it was genuine and appealing, and would always catch
one off-guard.
Don’t judge a book
by its cover,
she thought.

Right. Flayme tossed the cup she’d saved into the trash. No
more rescuing wayward coffee cups. No way. To hell with it
—
let the coffee stain the expensive
carpet next time. She had no intention of ever crossing that man’s trail again
for any reason.
She didn’t think she’d ever go back to the little alcove
on the off chance he just might be there—napping. “Cowboy, my
ass.”

Yeah, he might be the genuine thing, but to what degree
—
agent first, or cowboy first? Her mind
whirled with the questions. She de
cided the cowboy side of him probably
was a cover, of sorts. Not the real thing after all, but a combination of the
two. Yeah, that must be it. He wouldn’t be much of an agent if he couldn’t
carry off a simple masquerade.

What a disappointment.

The last thing she wanted was to be attracted to an agent,
especially an agent who couldn’t make up his mind if he was a cowboy or a spy.
God, working here was causing her imagination to run amok, seeing secret agents
in disguise everywhere.

But hell, her instincts told her if he was a hundred
percent pure cowboy, then she was Annie Oakley. He’d probably just returned
from some sort of covert assignment in West Texas where he’d had to spy on
Tonto, ride the range, break a stallion, or some such thing.