“Oh, yes. You will,” she said.
It pissed him off that Kate would think he wanted to hurt Chase. “Is that what you think? I’m out to ruin his life? I don’t want to feel this way, damn it. I don’t want to love you a drop more than second cousin status. I don’t want to hurt him, either. Give me some credit.”
Kate shook her head, ignoring him. “He
will
kill you if he finds out. From a mile away.”
“Crowded room, busy street,” Jake whispered. Chase had been a sniper in the military, and it was a standing joke when Chase was pissed at Jake. He’d never worried about it before, until now.
“Yes, and when he’s done with you, he’ll kill me, too. So you need to get out there and find yourself a woman of your own to love.”
“No!”
“Yes. You want to love someone so bad, we’ll find you someone.” Kate thought for a moment. “What about Elaina?”
“I don’t know.” He shifted. Blonde, maybe one of the secretaries? No… “I don’t think about women once I’ve fucked them.”
A flash of black hair, chocolate brown eyes and long, long legs came into his memory.
Tia
. He’d met her last fall, and until he had realized he loved Kate, she had been more than enough woman for him to be exclusive. Jake didn’t do excusive, so that was a first.
“Mouth, Jacob.” Kate glared. “It is going to be almost impossible to find anyone in D.C. you haven’t slept with. That’s the problem with being a man whore.”
She shot him a holier-than-thou look as she adjusted the blankets and folded her hands on her lap. She had every right to look that way. She’d been a virgin for Chase, and Jake was her number two. Always second.
She sniffed. “When was the last time you had a woman, besides sharing me?”
“Last? A month ago. Right before my birthday.”
“And after that?”
“I haven’t slept with anyone since my birthday.”
“My God. That’s almost celibacy for you.” Her eyes were wide, and she shook her head, staring like he was a pariah.
Well, it wasn’t celibacy. He’d been longer. Though maybe that’s why he wanted to slip under the covers with her so badly. But he wanted just to hold her, which was odd. Yeah, he’d fuck her if she’d let him. But he wanted his arms around her more.
“You don’t love me, Anderson.” Kate was so pretty, even when she frowned, which wasn’t often. “What you feel for me isn’t love. It’s love for what Chase and I have. What I give Chase.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
“No. Look, Chase was a basket case workaholic with a control complex before we started in. Now he’s sane, satisfied, and has only minor workaholic tendencies. He’s still got a hell of a control complex, but I’m only human.” She smoothed his jacket with her palm. “What I’m trying to say is that you don’t love me. You love how happy Chase is, and you want that for yourself.”
Could that be true? He didn’t love her? He loved what she gave his buddy? Sounded wrong, but Kate was rarely wrong.
“What if—” Jake didn’t even want to say it. He was an ass for even thinking what if, to wish his best friend out of the picture. He wasn’t sane.
“Don’t go there, Jake. If Chase were to die or not want me any longer, then maybe. Maybe I’d love you, but it wouldn’t be what you’re looking for. And frankly, I like that Chase micromanages every second of my life. Are you going to do that? Because I’m not learning to cook and this room is a pigsty.”
She gestured to the open suit cases, the clothes everywhere, the tray of dirty dishes, the little bottle of booze he’d drunk from the bar stash at dinner and then left on top of the TV. “Chase would have already ordered me room service and would have cleaned up and then would have gone to his courier drop. And I’m not going to tell you what he’d do when he returned, because I don’t want to give you ideas. He’s the boss, he makes the plans, and I love him for that. And you and I have a better chance of dying than he does, so just get over it.”
“Room service.” He groaned and picked up the phone. He dialed out and ordered Kate some toast, ginger ale, and a few other things he thought might settle well. “There.”
Kate rolled her eyes. “Back to our mission to find you someone to love.”
“Fine.” Jake would indulge her. She was sick, after all.
“There isn’t a single woman at home you’ve sought out more than once? Twice? Three times?”
Yes, Tia. But Tia hadn’t made any claims on him at all, so when his birthday came up and Chase offered an evening out, he hadn’t felt guilty. Until after. Which made no sense, because if he loved Kate and only Kate, he wouldn’t feel guilty about sleeping with her…would he? “Yes, there’s one.”
Tia Richards was probably the only woman he knew that could touch Kate’s beauty. She was the exact opposite of Kate—dark hair with loose curls, exotic instead of stunning and wholesome. But Tia was intense, sometimes cold, and hardcore when it came to sex. He loved that she was wild and had no problem pushing his boundaries. She made him hot in a whole different way, a way he’d never felt before. Maybe because even though she had submissive tendencies, she also had an air about her, one that said she was beyond possession, beyond being claimed totally. His inner Dom saw that as a challenge.
Jake glanced at Kate. Maybe the opposite of Kate was exactly what he needed if he couldn’t have the real thing. He nodded, more sure this time. “Definitely one woman I can think of.”
Kate was firm in her resolve. “So when you are finally home, you call her, you say you’ve thought of nothing but her for the last month, but the office has been busy.”
“But I’ve thought of nothing but you.” Which he wasn’t so sure about, now, because he’d thought quite a bit about Tia, too. Jake ran a hand through his hair.
“You are a spy.” Kate smacked him with a pillow. “Lie. Lie through your teeth, Anderson. Because if Chase finds out—and you know it’s only a matter of time before he sees you looking at me like that—he’ll kill you. How bad do you want to die?”
“I don’t want to die, but I don’t think she’ll want to speak to me again. I sort of left her in a hurry last time.”
“Why?”
Jake sighed. That weekend had been such a mess. “Charlotte’s assignment was threatening to implode, and Chase needed me on a plane.”
“So?”
“I sorta left things unfinished.” As in, Tia in restraints, begging for him to make her come as he hastily grabbed his clothes to leave for work. He closed his eyes on the memory. Man, she had been beautiful, bound, and begging. He loved it when she begged like that. He just wished he had time to do more than uncuff her and kiss her a hasty goodbye.
“What do you mean,
unfinished
?”
“We were at the club?” He winced, hoping she’d get the drift without the details.
Her eyes narrowed. “How unfinished? Did
you
finish?”
Jake looked away, embarrassed. He’d had one hell of an orgasm, and he wasn’t necessarily proud of it, not when Tia hadn’t.
Kate sucked in a breath. “And she didn’t? Jesus, Jake. How could you do that to her?”
He shielded himself with his hands as she smacked him again, this time on the shoulder. “Chase wants us to be on the plane in under an hour when he calls. You know where I was, so you do the math. I was a half hour from the apartment in traffic, a half hour from the plane in traffic, and I didn’t have a shred of gear on me. I had to go home, and that’s fifteen right there.”
He spread his arms in front of him, palms up, in a gesture of surrender. “I’m damned good, but I can’t go back in time to make a woman come so I can board a plane on time for your fucking husband when I’m already fifteen minutes late.”
“Oh, Jake.” Kate sighed and grabbed the pillow from his lap and held it to her chest. “I have no idea how to spin that one unless you just say you’re really sorry, you’ve thought nothing of her, and you owe her three orgasms.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“And for goodness sake, do not mention me when you try to seduce her again. There’s nothing worse than a man mentioning the work wife. Don’t mention my name in any way, shape, or form, unless my name is linked with Chase’s, and then use his first. Chase and Kate. Got it?”
Jake held his head. “There are too many rules.”
“If you want to live, then you will do this. If you can’t do it for you, then do it for me.” She shoved him off the bed. “Go forth, make the pickup. When we get home you can find a woman of your own to love.”
****
Tatiana Richards had a problem, and the solution’s name was Jake Anderson. She slid her chair behind a towering potted plant in the Parisian hotel bar, just out of Jake’s view. But she was able to peer between the fronds of the plant, spying on the man she intended to seduce. Damn him, he owed her an orgasm or two, and she would get them, come hell or high water.
Jake called the bartender over, ultra confident, almost smug as he leaned against the polished wood. He ordered something in his perfectly accented French and then perused the room as if he didn’t have a care in the world. He could have been a businessman, a playboy on vacation, but Tia knew him for what he was—a spy and a man whore. And he was good at both.
Jake owned handsome. Broad shouldered, his dark blond hair barely brushing the collar of his dark jacket, the highlighted strands a little longer in the front and tousled, golden from the sun. Underneath the expensive, tailored suit he was deliciously lean and muscular in all the right places. It was oddly erotic to see him dressed, seeing she’d spent more than enough time with him naked in the past few months.
Jake glanced at his watch and then smiled at a hot blonde walking by. He didn’t check out her fine ass in her little black dress though, and Tia frowned. Maybe what she saw earlier was true. Maybe he did love the perfect, wholesome-looking blonde she had seen him with in the hotel lobby. And obviously, Blondie was late.
Tia shifted behind the plant to get a better view of Jake. If he was in love with Blondie, that would prove to be a problem, since she fully intended for him to finish what he started. His leaving her unfulfilled and bound at the club had been humiliating, though she understood the circumstances. Duty had called, and he had too much honor to blow off his responsibility. She got it. She was also a spy, for a more conservative office, though.
But it didn’t damper the confusion at the new sensations, her growing awareness of him. They’d met at the club months ago, and their mutual attraction had led to incredibly hot, erotic play sessions. Usually she didn’t think twice about a man. She didn’t want a commitment. Didn’t deserve one. But memories of Jake sparked new questions. What was he like out of the club? Was he as courteous? A good man? It didn’t matter. But she still wanted to know.
Tia watched Jake finish his drink and order another. Probably whisky and cola, if she knew him well enough. She hadn’t heard from him in a month, but she knew he was busy. His division was swamped, and his boss had actually approached her about crossing over into their office to cover some of the workload.
Tia was definitely interested. Chase’s division was more rogue, able to go deeper, harder, faster after the bad guys. No spy was on the radar, but Chase’s division was able to go where other agents couldn’t, and she wanted to be a part of that. She was just waiting to hear back about when she would start.
So she really wanted to solve her problem, now, before she started work. She didn’t fuck her co-workers. Since she was already doing Jake, she would make a concession this once. She frowned. But there was the problem of Blondie... She refused to be second best, even to get the elusive proper orgasm.
But Blondie was nowhere to be seen, and Jake was looking quite relaxed, like he owned the place and didn’t have a care in the world. A facade for sure, since he didn’t miss a thing. If she jumped him, he’d kill her without batting an eyelash. She loved that in a man.
A woman with long, deep-red hair in a deep blue dress entered the bar. Jake’s eyes lit up as she strolled up to him and whispered in his ear. He laughed, his head back, and then looked into her eyes with that devastating smile of his plastered to his face. Ginger leaned in again, and when the bartender brought Jake another drink, he ordered one for her.
They talked for a while. Ginger leaned in again and this time the length of her body pressed into his. He grinned down at her and kissed her, his lips slow, gentle, the way Tia remembered him kissing her. Damn, could he ever kiss. Those lips of his knew how to coax, tease, and caress.
Jake’s hand slid to Ginger’s ass and squeezed. She shot him a glare and whispered in his ear. Jake laughed and his hand slid back to her waist, tugging her closer.
Ginger slipped her hand into his pants pocket, let it linger, as if she were testing what he had to offer, then she withdrew her hand and placed it on his chest. It was so smooth, if Tia hadn’t known what was happening, she’d have thought Ginger was feeling him up. But Tia knew what was happening from experience. A courier run. Ginger had dropped something into his pocket. That’s all she was to Jake—work.
Tia sighed in relief. Now she just had to solve the mystery of Blondie. Blondie had looked sickly in the lobby, and Jake had been all kinds of concerned, with a look on his face Tia had never seen before. It had to be love. And then Blondie flipped her hand, and Tia had seen a huge engagement ring. One that didn’t just claim but screamed she was taken, along with a very expensive wedding band.
Tia had a hard time believing Jake had settled down in a month, but weirder things had happened. Of course, he could have married her before, and then screwed Tia for fun, on the side. She frowned. Jake didn’t seem the type. Maybe Blondie was another assignment, on the side of a courier run. But Tia doubted it. Jake looked too smitten.
Jake paid the bar tab, kissed Ginger goodbye, and left. Tia followed at a safe distance, taking the second elevator back to his floor. She caught a glimpse of him going into his room. Then a moment later he came back out into the hallway, still looking concerned. She had reserved a room on this floor earlier when she had seen him, hoping to hook up—she didn’t want him in her personal room—and now she faked leaving, jiggling the door handle, and he looked up.