Secure Target (Elite Operators) (18 page)

Thando sighed, and for the first time he showed a hint of real exasperation. “Fine. Go get some rest. Sergeant Mason, I’ll see you this afternoon.”

Bronnik frowned at his departing partner’s figure before seeming to shake himself out of his thoughts. “This way,” he instructed. “I’m parked in the long-stay lot.”

Lacey trailed him obediently, craning her neck as she took in all the different languages chirping around her and the range of people dressed in everything from shorts and flip-flops to colorful African prints.

They stepped into the cool quiet of the parking garage, and he led her down one of the aisles. She peered at the row of cars ahead, trying to guess which was his. The sporty red convertible? The slick black SUV? Surely not the dark blue minivan—

“That’s us, there.” He gestured toward the end of the row. She followed the direction of his arm and couldn’t smother the laughter that bubbled up as soon as she realized where he was pointing.

Bronnik was leading her toward a rugged, boxy white Land Rover with a spare tire hung on the back. An extra row of headlamps was mounted above the windshield, mud splatters crept up the chassis, and a South African flag sticker had been slapped above the rear bumper.

“Of course,” she murmured.

“What?” Bronnik asked, hauling open the back door and shoving their luggage inside.

She shook her head fondly as she made her way to the passenger-side door. “I should’ve guessed this is what you drive.”

“The Defender is a highly practical, all-terrain vehicle.” He patted the hood. “Although I didn’t realize you were planning to drive.”

She frowned. “I wasn’t, why?”

He smiled. “We drive on the left in this country, Miss Cross.”

“Oh, right.” She scurried around to the other side and climbed up into the cab beside him. The interior was clean and bare, the seats were leather, and as she buckled her seat belt he put his badge on the dashboard and shoved the Beretta into the empty cup holder.

He put the key in the ignition, and when he started the car the CD player came to noisy life, filling the car with a loud, pumping beat.

“Sorry, sorry,” Bronnik called over the music, punching a button to switch it off. He grinned cheekily, throwing the Land Rover into gear and backing out of the space.

“Okay, let’s head home.”

The airport was situated fairly centrally, and once they were on the highway Bronnik told her it wouldn’t be more than a half-hour drive. The sky above was a deep, clear blue, and Table Mountain loomed ever closer.

He cranked down his window and inhaled. “Smell that?”

“Diesel fumes? Burnt rubber? Air?”

“Africa,” he corrected, his smile sublime.

The highway cut through sprawling acres of shantytowns on the outskirts of the city, which Bronnik explained were called townships, before descending into the lively, built-up central district. Lacey stared out the window, fixated by the newness of everything she saw. Tall office buildings, storybook houses, very expensive cars fighting for lanes right alongside very dilapidated ones.

She suddenly remembered something she’d read on the Internet about crime in South African cities. “Is it okay to have the windows open? What if someone tries to carjack us?”

He snorted. “They’re welcome to try. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

She glanced at the Beretta tucked casually beside her thigh. In that moment she felt every one of the thousands of miles between her and everything she knew.

They rounded Table Mountain on their left, and he shifted gears as they began to climb a hill out of the crush of the city center. The houses were small but picturesque and brightly colored, and the way they were stacked up on the hill made Lacey think of photos she’d seen of San Francisco.

“This is Tamboerskloof, my neighborhood,” he explained. “And this is my street.” He took a right down a quiet, residential road. After a few minutes he pulled into the short driveway of a compact white house. Parking the Land Rover outside the closed door of the garage, he retrieved their luggage from the back while she slid down from the cab. She followed him as he unlocked a metal gate at the foot of the stone steps leading to the front door. That door also had a gate of white-painted bars over it, which he swung open to unlock the wooden door to the house.

“After you.” He motioned her inside.

She moved forward tentatively, taking in her surroundings. The front door opened on to the main living space, which had wood floors and sparse but decidedly masculine furnishings. A comfortable-looking leather sofa slouched in front of a TV, and one wall was lined with shelves packed with DVDs, CDs and more books than Lacey had expected. She walked over and ran her hands along the bindings, pulling out a mystery novel she’d recently finished herself.

“So you’re a reader?”

Bronnik cleared his throat uncomfortably and gave the arrangement of their suitcases an unnecessary amount of attention.

“Let me give you the tour,” he said, straightening. “Not that there’s much to see. Policeman’s salary.”

She followed him into an immaculate galley kitchen. “I don’t get too involved in anything in here.” He waved his hand dismissively and then led her through a set of French doors to a small stone patio on a grassy hill with a stunning view of the mountains that cut through the city.

“This is amazing,” she breathed, staring across at the rugged green mountain looming over the urban patchwork.

“I’m glad you like it,” he said quietly, almost shyly. “Anyway, the guest bedroom is through here.” He ushered her back inside.

The small room protruded slightly adjacent to the kitchen, and also sported French doors to the patio. It was bare except for a small dresser and a bed made up in plain, navy-blue sheets.

“Okay?” he asked, and she nodded uncertainly, unsure whether he wanted to know if she was done looking or if it would be sufficient for her needs. She hoped it was the former.

“It’s not really a proper second floor,” he explained as he guided her back through the kitchen to a narrow spiral staircase at its end. “Just the master bedroom.”

The stairs concluded at a door, which he pushed open and gestured for her to precede him.

“Wow,” was all she could manage at first. The room had a vaulted, wood-beamed ceiling that housed high, tall windows. The same view from the patio was visible here, and the sun streamed through the panes, warming the hardwood floor. A large bed with a summery wicker frame stood at one end, the sky-blue linens pulled up but not fully made. It was flanked by two bedside tables, one of which held a reading lamp and a thick paperback.

The other end of the room was dominated by a built-in closet and a freestanding dresser, the top of which was cluttered with framed photographs. Following the direction of her gaze, Bronnik moved to the dresser with a slightly embarrassed speed.

“These are just family pictures,” he said hastily. “These are my parents, this is Clara’s wedding, this is Heloise and her kids, this is me and Clara’s kids, and that’s Heloise at her wedding.” He ran through them quickly, like he was reciting an inventory, and she barely caught a glimpse of the people in the photos before he was directing her attention elsewhere. “Anyway, bathroom’s through here.” He indicated a slightly ajar door to the right of the dresser. “I thought you might like to stay in here, because it’s got its own bathroom, and I’ll take the room downstairs.”

Ouch.
She winced.

She didn’t understand when or why this stilted awkwardness had crept between them. Maybe she should’ve taken Thando up on his suggestion of a hotel. Maybe being in Bronnik’s space was too much for him, too quickly.

Not that he’d minded invading hers.

He was frowning. “Is that all right? I know it’s not a massive house, but you’ll have plenty of privacy up here.”

“It’s not that,” she began, then stopped. What she really wanted was to ask why he’d suggested she stay in his house at all if he wasn’t planning on continuing whatever it was they’d started back in Topeka. There had been no ambiguity that night in her bed, and she was sure that this was a case of his signals making an about-face, not that she had misinterpreted them.

Emboldened, she arched a challenging brow. “I guess I assumed we’d be sharing a room.”

Bronnik sighed, rubbing his hand over his eyes. Her heart stilled—it wasn’t the reaction she’d hoped for, and momentarily she worried that she’d misplayed her hand.

His tone was weary when he spoke. “I can’t stress enough how dangerous the situation has become. Hardy’s on the loose, and he’s not happy. He’s already made an attempt on your life, and I have no doubt he’ll make another and another until we catch him or he kills you. This isn’t a vacation, do you understand that? You’re in South Africa because it’s the best way for me to keep you safe, not because—”

“Not because you want to be with me,” she supplied in a voice barely above a whisper. Her throat constricted painfully. She’d been wrong all along, then—she was chasing a one-sided fantasy built on a few moments of lust. All of a sudden her knees felt weak, and she put a hand on the dresser to steady herself.

“Dammit, Lacey, don’t put words in my mouth.” His voice held such sudden harshness and volume, she took an involuntary step back. He closed his eyes for a minute, taking a steadying breath, and then he moved toward her and put his hands on her upper arms. When he spoke again his tone was low and uncompromising.

“I do want to be with you,” he told her flatly. “I want to be with you so badly I can barely think about anything else, including my job. And if I can’t focus, I can’t be sure I can protect you.”

She stepped into his embrace and flattened her palms against his chest. “Then don’t fight it. The more we deny what’s going on between us, the more we’ll both be thinking about it, and then neither of us will be fully on guard.” She brought her hand up to his cheek, and ran her fingertips over the wheat-colored stubble that gave evidence of the long journey they’d just endured. “You told me instinct was essential in your job. So follow your own.”

His hands tightened on her arms, and then his mouth was on hers with a strangled, primal moan.

The next hour passed for Lacey in a bleary, jet-lagged fog of sensation. There was the press of Bronnik’s tongue against hers, the sweep of his thumb over her nipple, the clunk of his belt buckle as it hit the floor. They were in his bed, and as his hands kneaded down her bare back she pressed her face in the pillow and drew a lungful of the cool, ginger-sharp, deeply male scent she found there. He was inside her, filling her, inflaming her, first from behind as she propped herself up on the wicker bedstead, then on her side as he drew her ankle up over his shoulder, and when she thought she couldn’t possibly find release again, thought the muscles in her inner thighs would never stop trembling, he hoisted her on top of him. She straddled his hips and drove herself farther and farther down onto his hot, penetrating arousal. Sunshine poured over her bare breasts, and beyond the window the mountains stood their ground, ancient and powerful and unrelenting.

Bronnik reached up to brush his fingers across the underside of her breast. His face was full of tenderness and wonder, and the surge of emotion that flowed through her was so intense that suddenly she was on the brink of tears.

She felt him throb within her, and as his eyes squeezed shut she thrust herself farther down, pushing him deeper into her center. His grip tightened on her waist, and in the split second before her pleasure reached its apex hand in hand with his, Lacey knew she would never be the same again. She knew this man had changed her, at a fundamental level, irrevocably.

Chapter Thirteen

Bronnik pulled the Land Rover into the parking lot behind the high-rise concrete tower that housed the Special Task Force headquarters, and shut off the engine. He’d left Lacey sleeping as he showered and slipped out the door, and the memory of her gently slumbering form draped over his chest threatened to undo all of the mental clarity the drive over had provided.

The familiarity of the building’s cool interior was like a soothing balm on his frazzled, disoriented mind. With what felt like endless hours spent on a series of flights, the worrying ambiguity around Hardy’s movements, and of course the transcendent sex he’d just had with the woman secured in his house, he felt like he was losing track of all the main markers in his life that dictated who he was. A week earlier he would’ve confidently said he was a happily single elite operator who loved his job and was damn good at it. Today that was all in question, and the knot between his personal affections and his professional obligations was snarled and confusing.

He trudged up the stairs to the third floor, his feet slow and heavy. Lacey was right—he needed to face up to the attraction between them, be open to it and accept it as a fact to guide the rest of his thinking rather than to keep fighting it, trying to convince himself it wasn’t so.

But that was much easier said than done.

Part of the problem, he acknowledged to himself, was simply coming to grips with the seriousness of his feelings for this woman. He would’ve struggled with that anyway, even if she had no relevance to his job. Sex, for him, had always been peripheral. It was something he indulged in occasionally, for fun, and the partners he chose had the same approach. He thought he was reasonably good at it—he’d certainly never had any complaints—and his encounters always ended amiably, with no expectation of anything further.