Chapter 27
When Charlie wokeup the next time, Nick was stretched out on the bed next to her, watching her with a tender smile.
“Nick,” she murmured. She felt so much better. Freer. Lighter. No more burning in her thigh.
She tilted her face toward him, and he kissed her.
She sank into that kiss as if she might never get another chance at those sexy lips of his. All pain and worry fled from her mind as the kiss grew deeper and deeper, until nothing existed except that magical realm of Nick-and-Charlie.
“How are you feeling?” he murmured when they eventually withdrew from the kiss, so slowly, so reluctantly.
“How about you go lock that door for me?” she whispered in answer.
His eyes flared with heat, then he got to his feet and did as she asked. The click of the lock made excitement swirl through her belly. “Guess what Ani had in her medical bag?”
“Please say condoms.” He advanced toward her, prowling like a panther. “Because I didn’t have a chance to grab any.”
She reached onto the nightstand where she’d set the foil packet, and knocked the little baggie onto the floor.
He picked it up and turned it over to look at it. “What is this?”
“I’ll explain later. Come here. You can take some clothes off if you want.”
He stripped down to his underwear while she watched hungrily, feasting her eyes on the powerful lines of his body. There was definitely a lot to be said about a guy who made you feel safe. That was something new for her.
“How about some more of that kissing,” she murmured when he was mostly naked.
“You read my mind.”
It quickly turned into more than kissing. In a few moments, his hand was up her shirt and they were both breathing fast. She arched toward him so her breast slid into his palm. The touch of his fingers against her nipple made her sigh with desire, then gasp as he pinched it. Hot sensation rippled through her body. He tugged at the ribbed baby-T she was wearing.
“I’m taking this off,” he warned her, though she was already helping him do exactly that. She wore no bra underneath.
“Fuck, you’re beautiful.” She felt her nipples harden under his thirsty gaze. “Do you know I thought about this moment all the way back in Barlow, Indiana?”
“Really? So that whole flirting thing wasn’t just an act to get close to me?”
“Nah. Normally I don’t even talk to my targets. I surveil from afar. You’re the one who came up to me, and after that I just had to roll with it.”
“Are you serious?” She sat up on one elbow. “So helping Hector, that wasn’t a ploy to get my attention?”
“Of course not. I told you I have a soft spot for injured creatures, the human kind, too.”
After that, he devoted himself to licking her nipples for such a long time, and with so much eager expertise, that she started to wonder if she’d died from that arrow wound and this was Heaven. When he went between her legs with that forceful tongue, she was almost sure of it.
Somewhere in the midst of her arousal, she found time to get his underwear off, and the rest of her own clothes. Being naked together in the daylight like this felt very…raw. Very vulnerable. And yet somehow perfect for two people who were so used to hiding their true selves.
Were she and Nick perfect for each other? What a shocking thought.
It disappeared in the mist of arousal and the flurry of caresses, until she blinked back to awareness to find her hand on his erection and her breasts flattened against his chest, her heart racing and her blood pumping.
“I’ve been thinking about the best way to do this,” Nick told her, his voice thick with lust. “I came up with a few options.”
“Really? You’ve been researching ways to have sex with someone with an arrow wound?”
“A back-of-the-thigh wound,” he corrected. “Here, let me run you through the options.” With firm, capable, gentle hands, he brought her onto her hands and knees. “How does this feel? I could kind of, lie under you. Or this might work.” He settled himself behind her, but that made her wince when his thigh brushed hers. “I saw that. Scratch that. Come here.”
He drew her up onto her knees so they were face to face. No contact with her thigh. Lots of skin touching skin, hot hard flesh against her mound…oh yes. This would work. “I like this,” she murmured against his lips.
“Get ready to love it,” he growled back at her.
And boy, did she ever. Once he slipped that condom on, there was nothing stopping them from doing what she now realized they’d been heading toward since that first moment in the park. His muscles tensed and flexed under her hands, the sweat rose on his bare back, and when he touched her deep within, she let out a whimper of need. They rocked together like that, his hands on her ass, moving her against him, careful to keep from straying down to her bandage.
Always so thoughtful, even when he was coming close to his peak. She felt him surge within her, finding a spot that made stars spangle across her vision. She flexed her hips, meeting his movements with equal force. The climax was close, so close, they were climbing that peak, rising higher and higher, reaching for the stars, the flames, the brilliance. The fiery peak.
When she came, so hard she bonked her head against his chin, something flashed through her mind. An idea. An inkling. A moment later, it was gone in the fountains of sparks still exploding through her system.
Trembling from that soul-searing release, she sagged against his body. He slid his arms up her back to support her. They panted into each other’s necks, sweat gluing their bodies together.
Now she was grateful for the breeze from the open window—even if an arrow came through. Maybe one had, in fact, straight from Cupid’s bow.
She snorted at that ridiculous thought. She wasn’t the Cupid’s arrow type. Robin Hood, maybe. Cupid, no. Nick pulled away to meet her gaze. His dark eyes were still heavy with lust, his hair gone wavy from their shared heat. He looked adorable. “What did that sound mean?”
“Nothing. Just a random thought. You know how sometimes weird thoughts float through your mind during sex? Or after it?”
He cocked his head. “Not really. I just focus on the woman.”
A surprising spike of jealousy hit her. Who were these women he liked to focus on? Don’t be silly. He’s a grown man. He even has a child.
“That works,” she said lightly. She extracted herself from their entangled position, which was starting to make the front of her thighs ache. Glancing out the window, she saw the ruddy glint of sun striking one of the rock faces on the upper slopes of Fire Peak. Such interesting colors there. Was it the vegetation? Or the rock itself?
“I just want you to know, this isn’t my normal MO with a client,” Nick said gruffly.
She startled, all her worries about her father flooding back. The job they wanted her to do. The twenty-four hours.
“Did you talk to your contact at Hobbs?”
“I did. They’re going to drop it.”
She sat bolt upright, blanket held to her chest. Solved, just like that? “What did they want?”
“They wanted you to steal some proprietary data from a competitor. Completely illegal, as we feared. We worked it out, and they promised to stay away from your father and leave you alone and find someone else to do their dirty work.”
None of this made sense. After tracking her down, chasing her to Alaska, scaring her father, now they were just going to drop it? “Why? How? What did you do?”
“I can’t talk about it. But it’s real. I swear on my life.”
She stared at him, his strong body, his dark eyes, his full lips. His body was stretched long under the covers, his hands were interlaced behind his head, and his expression gave away nothing.
“I want to know. I’m the client. Don’t I have the right to know?”
“You said you trusted me to take care of it. I took care of it. One of the conditions was that I not share any details. I’m sorry, I know that’s probably going to drive you crazy. But can you find a way to let it go? Accept the good news and move on?”
She should feel grateful. And she did, in a distant kind of way. But there was something else, too. A kind of…shame? She always took care of her own messes. Letting other people in felt wildly uncomfortable. Nick knew everything about her now, even more than her best friends.
She rolled to the other side of the bed and pushed herself off. Her thigh really did feel better. But her mood was worse. She didn’t like being in the dark. She didn’t like Nick knowing more about her life than she did.
“I suppose you didn’t want to fuck a criminal,” she said bluntly.
He scrambled into a sitting position. His hair was a wild mess, a sheen of sweat on his chest. “That’s not fair.”
“Then why were you so worried about me doing a job for Hobbs?”
“I didn’t want you to be coerced into anything.”
“You mean, into doing the kind of thing I’ve already been doing?” She wrapped a robe around herself and went to close the window. Now that the sun was dipping behind the ridge, the air was much colder. “I am what I am, Nick. That’s not going to change.”
“People change all the time. I changed when I became a father out of the blue.”
“You’re saying you want me to change? You want me to become a good little girl who follows the rules?”
“I don’t want you going to prison,” he blurted. “I’m not sure I could handle that.”
She sucked in a breath, because she knew damn well what it was like to see someone you cared about in prison. She wouldn’t wish that on anyone. In Nick’s dark eyes, in the tense set of his jaw, she saw how serious he was. It was romantic, in a way. I care about you and I don’t want you behind bars.
Her antagonism melted away. This man was something special, and she’d be a fool to push him away.
“I can understand that.”
“So we’re okay?”
Can you find a way to let it go? Accept the good news and move on?
“We’re okay,” she said finally. Her father was safe. That was what mattered.
“Phew.” He fell back onto the pillows in an exaggerated collapse of relief. “Can we talk about that little baggie now?”
“Yes, and all the other clues I’ve been gathering.” Jumping at the change in subject, she sat cross-legged on the bed and filled him in on everything—the Chechens, what they’d said on the recording, the mysterious Vasily, everything that April had told her, what she’d seen on the video from the helicopter.
“You’ve been a bad girl,” he scolded her. “You’re supposed to be healing, not investigating. Great job.”
“It’s a good distraction.” She grinned, amazed at how much better she was feeling already. She was getting better, and her father was safe. She was ready to spring into action on whatever their next step would be.
“I got something too.”
“What’s that?”
“A solid stranger-with-a-Russian-accent spotting.”
“Oooh, let’s go!”
He laughed and pulled her close to him, toppling her onto his chest. “Sweetheart, it’s one in the morning.”
“It is?” Shocked, she checked her phone, then the pearly light outside the window. “Midsummer in Alaska. There’s nothing like it.”