Rumor (A Renegades Novella) (6 page)

She just kissed him back, tasting the hint of whiskey, of mint. The heat, the passion. Letting herself go, letting herself feel his arms around her, soaking in the sounds of pleasure in his throat. She opened her mind to take in every rock of his hips, every squeeze of his hand, every breath lifting his chest, so she could save them in her memory banks for the future.

His mouth slid off hers, kissing a trail across her cheek, resting his forehead against her temple. “God, Grace…”

His hands slid down her sides, curved over her waist, cupped her hips. Grace shivered—a combination of his words, his touch, and the cold. She wanted to tell him how good he felt, how much she wanted him, but feared if she spoke, she’d break this fragile bubble in time. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and scraped her fingers through his wet hair. How many times had she dreamed of doing this? Hundreds? Thousands?

God, he felt good. Big. Strong. Hard. Hot. Wet.

It had been so long since she’d been wanted like this. She pulled on his shoulders and lifted herself up his body, the same way she pulled herself up the stripper pole. He gripped her waist, settling her open thighs around his hips and her ass on the car’s trunk, pressing his rigid cock to her heat with a long groan into her mouth.

She rocked her hips into him, sliding her sex along his length. He broke the kiss on a long “Oh, Gracie…”

She pressed her face to his neck and bit her lip against her need to say his name. Her need to tell him she needed him inside her—right here, right now, in the parking lot, in the rain.

He pressed her against the car and rocked his hips into her, simulating a long, deep thrust. She couldn’t keep the high-pitched cry of pleasure from escaping her throat. Then his hands moved beneath her tee, pushing the wet fabric over her breasts. She hadn’t bothered with a bra, and now he bent his head, watching as he took her gooseflesh-textured breasts into those big, strong, scarred hands and stroked roughly, brushing her nipples with his thumbs.

Sensation flooded her chest and arched her back on a soft “Yes.”

“So fucking beautiful.” His head lowered, and the warmth of his mouth covered one breast.

His name echoed in her head, lay heavy on her tongue, but she held it back, wanting more. Needing more. He sucked her nipple against the roof of his mouth with a growl of lust that vibrated along her skin, and she couldn’t hold back the sound that rolled out of her.

Pleasure washed her body, her mind, her soul. She groaned and arched. Rain tapped her face. Cold and hot spiraled through her body. So alive. So free.

“More,” she moaned, fisting his hair, lifting her hips against his. His mouth released one breast only to move to the other, freeing another bubble of delicious sensation at the center of her body. “Fuck… Josh…”

He paused. Exhaled heavily. Then pulled back, sucking her nipple from his mouth and making her shiver. He dropped his forehead to her chest. His quick breaths bathed her skin with heat. Her body ached and throbbed. She needed more. Needed
him
.

“Come home with me,” she whispered, combing her hands through his hair. “My place is close.”

He rocked his head side to side, then tapped his forehead against her shoulder as if banging it against a wall, his hands fisted in the back of her shirt. “Fuck, fuck,
fuck
.”

His body had gone rigid, his muscles coiled, and an uneasy energy buzzed around him. A flash of panic burned a hole through her chest. This was a huge,
huge
step they should have taken a year ago. She wasn’t just going to let him run again.

She used his shoulders to drag herself upright and pressed her mouth to his neck. The hands in her shirt slid down her skin as he pulled the drenched fabric back into place. Even though her instincts told her to keep her barriers up, her heart opened. Hope swelled through her chest, but experience pushed tears to her eyes.

“Look,” she said, working for a teasing lightness. “We’re still alive. No lightning strike.”

His hands rested at her hips, his head on her shoulder, as if he were as much frozen in fear of moving forward as Grace was of him pulling away.

She eased kisses toward his ear, then along his jaw as she slid her hands down his chest, his abdomen, then lower, stroking his erection. His hips rocked into her touch and he groaned. With her free hand, she cupped his jaw and pulled his mouth to hers. She kissed him, licked into his mouth, then whispered, “Come home with me.”

With another groan, he pulled from the kiss with a shake of his head. “Can’t.” He pressed a hand to his face, rubbed his eyes. “Can’t, can’t, can’t.”

She wasn’t sure if he was talking to her or trying to convince himself, but he was definitely pulling away.

Hurt flared, drawing anger. She stomped it down, drew on patience, and tried to drag his face up to meet her eyes. But when he lifted his head, his eyes were squeezed shut, as if he couldn’t bear to look at her.

“Josh—”

“No,” he murmured. Then his eyes opened, and the look there told Grace she’d already lost him. He was miles away. “No, Grace… God… I shouldn’t have…”

“We’re good together,” she insisted, her
patience thinning. “We want each other. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

He stepped back, easing his wet body away from hers with a sucking sound.

“Goddammit.” She gripped his forearms and dug her fingers in. “I haven’t been Isaac’s wife for
three years
. You haven’t been his teammate for
a year and a half
. How much time has to pass before it’s okay?”

“I…don’t know.” His expression had gone flat and resolute. “I…just… I don’t know.”

He pushed away, leaned down, and picked up his soaked blazer from the ground. Grace hadn’t even remembered it falling. She wiggled off the fender and gripped his arm. Hurt and anger battled in her chest. “Josh—”

“I know you don’t understand.” His gaze drifted down her body, and the pain in his eyes stabbed her heart. He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

He turned toward the club, pulling his phone from his pocket.

She fisted her hands. “Don’t walk away from me again, Josh.”

He paused, hand on the door, head hanging.

Please turn around.

Please.

But he pulled the door open and disappeared inside.

Josh balanced his cell between his sore shoulder and his ear and jotted down Carolyn Ashby’s address. “Twenty-eighth Street? Isn’t that on the east side of Balboa Park?”

“You got it.” Pete was an information broker of sorts. Josh used him for background checks on employees involved in any consulting job. “And I must say, a much nicer neighborhood than where her daughter resides.”

“Yes,” Josh muttered. “Yes, it is.” And he was damn well getting to the bottom of this. Grace didn’t have to like it.

Josh glanced down the street from Grace’s apartment building, where he’d been waiting for almost an hour. He hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said the neighborhood was ghetto. Every building needed work, junk cluttered yards, landscaping nonexistent or overgrown. Not one house was decorated for Christmas, and only a few apartment windows had been lined with lights.

At the corner, not a quarter mile from Grace’s car, three young men loitered. Josh was damn sure he’d seen half a dozen drug deals go down in the short time he’d been watching.

“How long has her mom been there?” He’d gone to the home where Carolyn had lived just last year, but, like her daughter, Carolyn had moved on. This time, the current residents didn’t have information on a forwarding address.

“Looks like…” Computer keys tapped in the background. “About nine months.”

The same amount of time Grace had worked at the club.

“Thanks, man. Talk later.”

He disconnected, dropped his head back against the seat as his stomach made another hard roll. He felt like a steaming pile of shit. And not just from the wicked hangover throbbing behind his eyes either. Or the way the rancid 7-Eleven coffee stewed in his gut like acid. No, it was his stupid-ass, bone-deep loyalty that was seriously fucking with him again.

He popped two more Advil, grimacing as he swallowed it down with the brown muck in his coffee cup. Checking the dash clock, he picked up his phone and called his mother.

“Ready to talk about it?” she answered.

“Good morning to you too.”

“So, why’d you miss your flight?”

He winced, wishing he could flop into the backseat, curl up,…and die. “Doing a favor for a buddy.”

“Mmmm?” she coaxed, her way of telling him she expected more information than that.

“Do you remember my teammate Isaac Beck?”

“Of course. I still send packages to your whole motley crew.”

Of course she did. Just like Carolyn Ashby did. Just like Grace used to—before the divorce.

God, even two cups of this mud couldn’t wipe her taste from his mouth. The sultry, lust-filled flavor of her tongue still haunted him.

“Well, he needed a favor. And it’s taking longer than I expected. I’m not sure what day I’ll come in, but don’t worry about it. I’ll catch a cab home.”

She snorted a laugh. “Your father won’t have that, and you know it. What’s wrong, son? What’s this favor Isaac needs?”

He winced. She always knew, dammit. “Nothing big. I’m just helping Grace out. It won’t take long.”

“Are they back together?” she asked. “I thought they got divorced.”

“They did get divorced. It’s complicated.” So fucking complicated it made him want to smash his head against a wall.

“Hmm.” Another one of her all-knowing hums. “Well, just so you know, Grace is always welcome here for Christmas. Carolyn too. Your father has more frequent-flier miles than we’ll ever use.”

The innuendo in her voice only turned the knife in his chest. His mother had been nudging Josh toward Grace since they’d met at one of the team’s first homecomings, when his parents had flown out to the west coast to visit. That had ended, of course, once Beck and Grace were married, but started up again when they’d come to see him in the hospital and found Grace asleep in the chair beside his bed. “Jesus, Mom, don’t start.”

“I’m starting nothing,” she said in her crisp, matter-of-fact tone. “There was something between you two years ago. You always did make things more complicated than they had to be.” A quick sigh transitioned into “I’ve got to go. Your favorite peach pies are cooking, and I don’t want to hear you bitch about burnt crust. Love you, son.”

A reluctant smile turned his mouth. “Love you too.”

Josh disconnected, and the second he looked back up toward Grace’s apartment, she came down the stairs. She was dressed in shin-length workout pants and a sporty tank top, her long hair wound into a messy knot on the back of her head. And, shit, that outfit framed every luscious curve and toned muscle in her tight little body.

In flip-flops again despite the cold, rainy December day, she jumped a puddle with angelic grace and half jogged, half skipped to her car. His heart lifted, squeezed, and ached, all at the same time. She was the most adorable little thing on the face of the fucking planet. So much stronger, smarter, and more savvy than he’d given her credit for. And way sexier.
Way
.

He could have had her last night. Had that strong, slim body wound up in his. Could have felt every part of her. Touched and tasted his fill. Driven deep inside her. Been surrounded by her. Could have heard her whisper, moan, scream his name.
His
name.

She could have been his. Even if just for the night. Hell, just for the moment.

After feeling her in his arms, experiencing the passion she kept bottled up, he knew making love to her would blow his fucking mind. He craved the luxury of giving himself over to the desire, a desire that would turn into an all-consuming passion if he really let himself go.

The only thing he’d ever wanted as much as he wanted Grace now, was to become a SEAL.

And at the moment, he had neither.

Grace slipped into her piece-of-shit ’90s-something Honda and cranked the engine three times before it started.

He swore under his breath. She shouldn’t even be living in this neighborhood, let alone driving a car that could break down on her. She pulled away from the curb, and Josh let her get two blocks ahead before he followed.

His cell rang with a blocked number, and he answered through his car’s automated system. “Marx.”

“Did you find her?” Beck asked over a crackling connection.

Josh’s mind flashed with the memory of pushing her wet shirt up, skimming his hands up her tight, warm belly, taking her plump, soft breasts in his hands, and covering one rosy-tipped mound with his mouth. His eyes closed on an involuntary moan, and he cleared his throat to cover. His desire turned him inside out with lust…and clenched his stomach with guilt.

“Yes, I found her,” he said. “And she’s fine.”

“What’s going on with her? Why isn’t she calling me back?”

She’d never given him an answer about that. “She’s working,” he ad-libbed. “It’s Christmas. She’s just busy, dude. We didn’t get much time to talk. But you don’t have to worry about her. I’m checking everything out, making sure she’s square.”“Oh, great,” Beck exhaled in relief. “I know you haven’t had much time. It’s just that we’re headed out again, and I don’t know when I’ll be able to call. The targets weren’t where they were supposed to be. Lousy fucking CIA intelligence.”