Chapter 12
CHAPTER TWELVE
The sky opened up as Griffin walked along the gravel trail leading to the front of the house, but he slowed his pace at the sight of Savanna in one of the two rocking chairs beneath the porch overhang.
He stopped walking altogether and closed his eyes as memories from his teenage years gathered to mind. His mom used to sit in that chair while waiting for his father to return from hunting. She could sit there all day too. A book in one hand, coffee or wine in the other.
Saying his mother loved books was an understatement. And Griffin got the impression that Savanna was much the same.
“Everything okay?”
The gentle timbre of Savanna’s voice had him opening his eyes and blinking away the raindrops clinging to his lashes. She was standing at the top of the stairs now, waiting for him.
“While you were on the phone with Rory, one of the sensors was tripped.”
“Sensors? What kind of sensor?” She leaned into one of the large columns at her side with folded arms.
“It’s basically like a landmine, but instead of exploding when a person or an animal steps on it, it triggers a silent alarm on the security app on my phone,” he explained, still standing in the rain for some reason.
It’d only been an hour since he’d shattered her hopes about Nick Vasquez, but he refused to believe there’d be any redemption for that man just because he was her husband’s brother.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” She pushed away from the column, allowing her arms to fall to her sides.
“Because I checked the cameras on the app, and it was only a deer. I reset the sensor when I made the rounds,” he casually said. “That’s why I didn’t put you in the safe room.”
“You mean the panic room?”
“Do I look like someone who panics?” He flashed her a quick smile as he moved to the bottom of the steps. “The room is to keep you safe, it’s not for panicking.”
“Mm-hm, sure.” She closed one eye as if she disagreed on the semantics. “How long are you going to stand there getting wet?”
“Guess I’m getting in my third shower of the day,” he tossed out, resisting a playful wink. She didn’t need to know why he’d taken that second shower or the fact he’d heard her moan his name.
He worked his fingers down the placket of his soggy shirt, freeing the buttons one by one as he slowly ascended the steps. Once beneath the overhang, he peeled off the shirt and proceeded to wring out the water onto the porch floor.
“Don’t forget to do that with your jeans too.” There was humor in her tone mingled with . . .
Mingled with? What in the hell, Griff? This woman had him living inside the pages of one of her novels. Damn, what is she doing to me?
“I think I’ll keep those on,” he replied, smiling even though his father’s voice had just invaded his head and scolded him to not get his mother’s floors dirty.
But they weren’t her floors anymore, were they?
He draped the shirt over his shoulder before crouching to unlace his muddy boots and hoped like hell Gray or Carter would call soon and tell them they needed to leave. He wouldn’t survive another twenty-four hours with this sweet, sexy dynamo. The sexual tension between them was too strong. It’d been strong from the moment she’d set her hand on his chest in Jesse’s kitchen, and it’d only increased since then. He couldn’t explain why, but he was drawn to her like no woman he’d ever met.
And that fucking terrified him. Griffin wasn’t afraid of much, but this five-foot-six Southern belle with one dimple that popped on her right cheek when she smiled had him on the verge of crossing his self-imposed line.
Married women were off-limits, and Marcus didn’t have to be alive for that to hold true. Griffin felt the man’s presence as if Savanna shared a heartbeat with him.
Griffin stood and kicked off his boots, noticing Savanna’s attention directed skyward as she watched the storm.
“I’d rather you be inside the house. You’re at a safe distance from any snipers, but this makes me uneasy.” Everything about you makes me uneasy. He tossed his shirt on the rocking chair before opening the door for her.
“Okay,” she whispered and faced him. “Did Carter or Gray call your other phone while I was talking to Rory?”
“Not yet,” he answered once they were inside, and he was grateful his jeans weren’t as soaked as his shirt had been so he wouldn’t drip water all over the pine floors. The place was renovated about a decade ago, but the property had been a gift to his dad nearly thirty years back.
He closed and locked the door, and when he turned, he found Savanna drumming her fingers at the sides of her jeaned thighs. Her bottom lip planted between her teeth and eyes aimed at the floor.
“What’s got you so nervous?” It seemed a bit out of character considering she’d shown the courage and tenacity of a mama bear thus far, so he couldn’t help but ask.
“I just want to clear the air.”
Crossing his arms over his chest, Griffin watched with amusement as her focus lingered on his damp jeans for a moment, then slid up and stalled on his six-pack. And there was that adorable dimple. He’d bet she was completely unaware of the grin on her face. “What’s that, Sugar?”
When her beautiful hazel eyes met his, she softly said, “I wanted to apologize for what I said earlier. It was inappropriate and completely unlike me. I don’t know what came over me.”
His lips twitched as he resisted a smile. He shouldn’t play dumb or prod her to repeat the impetuous invitation she’d offered earlier. He remembered it all too clearly. And it’d be a long damn time, if ever, before he forgot the sound of her crying out his name while she fingered herself to orgasm.
“Can we still be friends? I mean, I know we just met, but I’d like to be friends. You seem nice. And we both have that sprinkle of Irish, so we have that in common. Although based on your name, I’m betting your dad is a bit more than a sprinkle and?—”
“Savanna,” he cut off her nervous ramble because, for one, it was too cute for him to handle, but more importantly, he needed to crush this friendship idea ASAP.
She swallowed as he relaxed his arms at his sides and took a few steps back.
“I can’t be friends with you. I’m sorry.”
She frowned, and then her eyes narrowed as if remembering their conversation in the van yesterday. “Because you don’t think men and women can be friends without wanting . . .”
“Because one day you’ll remarry,” he slowly admitted, his pulse picking up. His heart pounding a bit too furiously in his chest like he was betraying the organ that gave him life by turning her down. “And I can’t be single and friends with a married woman.”
“I’m not going to remarry,” she was quick to say before adding, “And do you not trust yourself?”
What could he say to that? “I’d never . . . not with a married woman,” was all he managed to work loose from his lips.
“So then, what’s the problem?” Her hands landed on her hips, and she stared at him in a way only a Southern woman seemed to know how to do.
He cocked his head and leaned in closer to her, which was most likely a mistake. “Because that wouldn’t stop me from wanting to.” He needed to add that space back between them before he screwed up.
“Need I remind you, I have male friends, and nothing has happened with them?” She held up her hand and started counting on her fingers. “Jesse. Beckett. A.J.’s other brother, Caleb. Then there’s?—”
“Shep,” Griffin finished for her.
He’d stunned her to silence. Her mouth rounded in surprise, then slammed shut before guilt washed over her face.
He was right. She’d slept with Shep, and why’d that fact infuriate him? An unfamiliar feeling bloomed in his chest. Jealousy?
“Well, I’d like for us to be friends, but I won’t push you.” Her shoulders fell and she turned.
“Savanna, we just met. You don’t know me,” Griffin reminded her. “And I don’t know you.”
“And yet, there’s something there. Something I can’t put my finger on.” She turned only enough to offer her profile. “Maybe it’s all in my head. I read too many romance novels.” The sadness in her tone was going to gut him.
Because he felt it too. And he was just as clueless as Savanna as to what it was. But it would do neither of them any good if he admitted that.
“I’m confusing my situation with the plot of some romantic suspense novel. You know, where the guy rescues her, and they . . .”
Fall in love? Fuck? He couldn’t take this.
“End up having sex,” she said. “You know, the one-bed trope. Or the fake couple sharing a hotel room. Or stranded-in-a-romantic-cabin-in-the-woods sort of situation.”
“Cabin, huh?” he found himself saying under his breath.
“I’m sorry. I’ve been living inside the pages of books for a long time.” She fully faced him, and the sadness in her voice was now also reflected in her eyes. “I mean, there’s nothing wrong with books. They’re my escape. Sometimes they’re the only things that help me get through the hard days when the real world feels impossibly difficult.”
He tipped his head slightly to the side as he observed her and fought the urge to wrap his arms around her, to be the one to help her escape her pain.
“What would happen in the cabin? In the book, I mean. What would happen once they were alone together?” He’d officially lost his damn mind, but he couldn’t prevent the questions from tumbling from his mouth.
Savanna looked into his eyes, her brows drawn together, fists clenched at her sides as if she were channeling restraint the same as him. “Um. They’d argue a few times to heighten the tension. Have some back-and-forth sexually charged banter.” A hard swallow followed, and she wet her lips. “Then he’d lose his control. He’d pin her to”—she glanced off to her left to the wall by the door—“that wall, and he’d touch her. Run his hand beneath her shirt and palm her breast. Take her lip into his mouth and gently bite.” She was getting breathless as she spoke, and he remained frozen in place and riveted to her every word. “He’d kiss her. Maybe pin her hands over her head. Link her wrists together with one hand as he touched her pu . . .”
She stopped talking as if her throat had become parched, and she’d lost her ability to finish.
“Savanna?” he said quietly.
“Yeah?” she mouthed, her tits lifting and falling with a deep breath.
“Are you wet?” His voice came out in a rasp.
Her eyes widened a little, then she pressed her lips together in a tight line and nodded.
“Good.” Griffin erased the space between them and backed her against that exact wall she’d peered at, then captured both her wrists in one swift movement, just as she’d described, and brought them over her head. “But I need proof,” he said while holding her steady, his eyes fixed on hers. Intense desire burned heavily between them, and nothing, either in this world or the next, could stop him from doing what he mapped out in his head.
He leaned in, captured her lip, and sucked it as his free hand traveled beneath her tee, tugging down the cup of her bra and palming her perfect breast. She whimpered as he pinched her nipple before he released her lip to slant his mouth over hers.
He was the one groaning now as their breaths mingled and his tongue met hers. He lost hold of her wrists, finding himself coming undone. From just a kiss.
God, I am so fucked.
The feel of her fingernails biting into his back as she gripped him tighter drew out a groan from deep within his chest. Did she have any idea what she was doing to him? Melting at his touch and grinding her needy little pussy against his rock-hard cock? He released her tit, needing to see just how wet she was for him.
He quickly undid the button of her jeans and yanked down the zipper, sliding his hand against the plain cotton panties he’d picked out the night before and gripping her hip in a possessive hold.
“Why’d you choose boring underwear?” she asked between kisses.
“I think you know.”
“Even last night, you knew you wanted me?”
He pulled his face back to find her eyes for a moment, breaking their mouths in the process. “Even last night,” he admitted before seeking her tongue again. He’d never craved someone so much in his life.
“Touch me,” she begged. “Please.”
And that was all he needed to hear to comply with the order. He dipped his hand beneath the last layer of fabric and over the smooth V between her thighs, and . . . “You’re so wet,” he said against her mouth, his cock growing painfully hard at how slick his two fingers were from touching her.
“Griffin,” she cried out, and hearing his name was all the ammunition he needed to keep going, to get her off and watch her fall to pieces in his arms as she held on to him like a lifeline.
She rocked herself against his palm, willing him to give her the pleasure she so desperately craved. Only when her gasps and moans turned into whimpers of frustration did he sink two fingers deep inside her, working them in tandem with the pad of his thumb on her clit.
“Don’t stop,” she hissed before cupping the nape of his neck and sinking her teeth into his lip as she came for him. And damn, did this woman come, squeezing his fingers like a fucking vise. She released his lip and tipped her head back against the wall as her breathy, freeing moan danced across his skin. “Oh my God,” she said when her body relaxed. And then he felt her hand slide down his overly heated skin to the fly of his jeans, and now it was him biting back a moan as she brought her lips to his ear and said, “I?—”
But before she could finish her thought, a flash of lightning followed by the crack of thunder made her flinch and let go of her words.
A message from God? Griffin frowned. From Marcus?
Probably both because of how bad I just messed up.
The disposable phone in his pocket began vibrating, causing her to jump yet again.
“They’re calling.” His voice came out gruff and angry. Angry with himself, not Savanna, and yet he still couldn’t take his eyes off her swollen lips. God, he wanted to part them with his tongue and taste her again. Shit.
“Maybe they know something.” Savanna’s words roused him from the daze he’d fallen into. He was on a job. And she was the job, wasn’t she?
He stepped back and retrieved his phone, mentally chastising himself yet again as he focused a little too hard on her exposed flesh as she straightened her clothes.
“Yeah?” he said after placing Gray on speakerphone.
“The men refuse to give up the name of their boss, but they confirmed Nick worked on their team before he betrayed them. And they’re after something Nick has that he was supposed to turn over. But without crossing the line and torturing them, I don’t think we can get them to say more,” Gray shared. “Still working on their real identities, but I’m assuming they’re also Greek.”
And for some reason, Savanna, with her big heart, looked like she’d eaten something sour and winced. She was still having a hard time believing a criminal would associate with . . . well, criminals.
“They did say they believe Savanna is the way to get to Nick,” Gray added.
“So, they weren’t in her house to see if Nick hid that ‘something’ there?” Griffin asked.
“They didn’t say, but it’s doubtful, or they’d have sent more men back to her townhouse to tear the place up, and they came for her at Jesse’s instead. But . . .”
Damn, Griffin hated that word. It rarely led to anything good.
“They said they’re not the only ones after Nick, which means more people will come for Savanna,” Gray finished.
More people after this woman?
Savanna’s hand covered her mouth as her chest lifted and fell with nervous breaths. How had they gone from an orgasm just minutes ago to this?
“I’m sure Nick came to my house for a reason, and I’m also sure it wasn’t to paint a target on my head.”
“And yet, your neighbor’s Ring cam clocked him going in the front door,” Gray stated as though maybe Nick had purposefully involved Savanna.
“You still haven’t found him on any local CCTV footage, right? It’s possible he didn’t anticipate the camera across the street, nor would he have factored in something as random as the accident that happened at that moment,” Griffin suggested. “He may not know he was identified, which means Savanna is right, and he risked a hell of a lot to show up.”
Savanna peered at him and mouthed a thank-you as if he were defending Nick, but hell no. He was just stating the facts. Regardless of Nick’s motives, he did put Savanna in danger. There was a target on her head because of him.
“Okay, I’ll bite,” Gray began. “If Nick used your place to hide something, where might he?—”
“The Mustang,” Savanna cut him off, shaking her head as if upset that the thought hadn’t hit her before. “The one time Nick showed up at our place, he wanted to buy the Mustang from Marcus. It’d been a gift to the both of them as teenagers, but Marcus took it over when Nick went to prison. I overheard Nick saying he wanted a piece of the past back, that he thought maybe somehow the car would help him get back on the right road in life.” She squeezed her eyes closed as if reliving the painful memory. “Marcus said a car wouldn’t change him and then kicked him out. I never saw Nick again after that.” She slowly opened her eyes. “Check the car. It’s the only place I can think of where he’d hide anything. Well, if he did hide something.”
“Will do,” Gray responded and issued an order to someone in the room to head to Savanna’s place.
“We need to get her out of Alabama,” Griffin declared vehemently, just as the lights flickered overhead.
“The storm?” Savanna asked, her eyes wide.
Griffin held up a hand for her to remain silent as he lifted his chin and closed his eyes, listening closely and hoping his mind was only playing tricks on him. That the sound he was hearing was thunder and not what he feared.
“We’ve got company,” he said to both her and Gray when he confirmed the blades of a helo chopping the air over his house.
“I don’t understand. I thought this place was secure,” she rushed out.
“From the ground, yes. I wasn’t expecting anyone to fast-rope onto the property.” He grabbed her arm and pointed to the hall leading to the master bedroom. “Move,” he instructed.
“I don’t know how they found you,” Gray said. “But?—”
“I won’t let anything happen to her. Be in touch.” Griffin tucked his phone away and hurried her into the master, then shifted the tall dresser to the side, punched in the code, and the door immediately opened inward to reveal the hidden room.
“Wait, what? I’m hiding in here? Oh my God. You have to stay here with me. You can’t go out there.” Savanna tugged at his arm.
“I have to handle this. You don’t leave this room unless I say so. You understand?” He turned to the wall of weapons behind him in the six-by-six room and grabbed a rifle, a 9mm, then strapped on a plated vest and packed it with mags.
“We don’t know how many of them are coming. Please, don’t go.” Savanna was pleading now.
“I have to.” He sidestepped her to access the security cameras and turned on the screens. A moment later, he heard glass shatter and caught sight of at least three armed tangos infiltrating the living room. Faces hidden. Armed to the teeth. And he had to assume more would be coming from the back.
With a calmness he was far from feeling at the moment, Griffin gently gripped her upper arms and looked into her eyes. He wanted to kiss her so damn badly, but she wasn’t his to kiss goodbye. So, failing wasn’t an option. Failing meant they’d get her.
“I’ll let you know when you can come out. If I can’t handle this, there’s a panic button to call the police. No one will be able to get in here. You’ll be safe.”
“Then stay with me. We’ll call the police and wait for them to show up. Please,” she begged. “We can call them now. Why wait?”
“I need answers. I need to find out what in the hell is going on. I’m sorry.” He stared into her terrified eyes for one last moment before shutting the door and cutting off her protests.
He shifted the dresser in its place, then set his back to the closed bedroom door, listening to the sound of boots crunching over broken glass in the living room.
If you’re really here, man , he silently implored Marcus while lifting his eyes to the ceiling, preparing himself to go out into battle, keep your wife safe while I’m out there.