Chapter 7
SHAWN
I decided to let Kara be for a while. I moved to the desk and spent the next ninety minutes working until Victoria had breakfast prepared and Kara had to stop pretending to be asleep. Her icy blue eyes trapped mine as I returned to sit beside her so we could eat together.
“I don’t want to seem ungrateful,” her voice was restrained and polite, “but when we land in Maastricht, I’d prefer it if you didn’t get off your plane.”
“I believe I mentioned I wanted to see you home, to make sure you get there safely.” I tried not to put too much emphasis on it.
Her gaze narrowed. “That’s not necessary.”
The annoyance at my brother and sister-in-law grew. Kara had a right to know she was potentially in danger. “Jason asked me to do this. Perhaps he’s paranoid, but I didn’t have a problem agreeing to it, and I’m going to follow through.”
I witnessed my annoyance mirrored in her eyes. “Scott Rhodes is in police custody in New York. I think I’m safe with the ocean between us.” She returned to her cantaloupe, cutting off a hunk with aggression.
“It’s not Rhodes that Jason’s worried about,” I said. “It’s Juric.”
She froze mid-bite.
Did her mind go blank the way mine did whenever she heard that name?
I’d known him as Frey, but he’d begun using the name Ryan Juric once he’d become obsessed with Laurel. The psychotic assassin had abducted her and held her captive for four terrifying weeks.
“What’s happened?” Anxiety made Kara go pale. “Jason said the CIA had him. He said they were safe.”
An unfamiliar need gripped me. Not a sexual one, but a desire to protect. I took her hand to offer comfort and found it cool to the touch. “The man Jason believes is CIA reached out. There was a fire where Juric was being held,” I hesitated, “and the bodies haven’t been identified yet.”
Her hand tightened instinctively on mine. “Juric’s escaped?”
“Ethan said it’s unclear. He could be one of the bodies. Apparently, the fire was very bad.”
She made a face of confusion, and I understood.
“The agent who helped Jason and L,” I continued. “He said his name is Ethan.”
She visibly struggled to process the information. “Jason and Laurel—”
“He took her to a safe house he owns outside of Munich.”
That was technically a lie because I owned the house. My brother was stubborn and proud, usually refusing any financial help I offered, but not if it benefited his wife. He let me pay for L’s around-the-clock security detail, which I was happy to do.
I’d do anything for family, and I liked my sister-in-law very much.
“When was the fire?”
I took a breath. “Two weeks ago.”
Now she understood why the workplace incident had put all of us on high alert.
“Two weeks?” Her face hardened. “They should have told me.”
“I agree. That’s why I’m telling you now.” I hadn’t gotten authorization on that, but my younger brother would need to get over it. Jason had made it clear what he wanted. I was supposed to keep my hands to myself during this trip.
My gaze dropped to her blanketed lap, where her hand was encased in mine.
“They didn’t want you to worry,” I said. “Hopefully, all this caution is for nothing.” Then I made the mistake of brushing my thumb over the back of her hand, alerting her to my presence.
She drew away, forcing me to do the same, and concern filled her elegant features.
“I’m sure you’re safe,” I added. Even in the scary event that Juric was loose, the likelihood of him coming after her was next to nothing. His obsession was the younger of the Hayward sisters.
“I’m not worried about me,” she said, frowning. “I’m worried for them.”
“Of course, but I’ll escort you home and wait with you until your security team arrives.”
She tensed. “What security team?”
“The one I’ll put in place until we know Juric’s dead or in custody.”
Her anxiety ticked up another notch. “No, no. I can’t accept that.”
“Because of the cost?” I waved a hand because this wasn’t a big deal. “Please, don’t worry about it. I just want to keep you safe.”
“No, Shawn. I can’t accept this because it’s another thing for you to hold over me. You say you want to keep me safe, but I think what you really want is to keep tabs.”
“No, of course not.” I frowned. “Like I have some sinister plan for you?”
“Don’t you?”
There was a challenge in her eyes, and I couldn’t help myself. I found it undeniably sexy. “Yes, I have plans for you, but ‘sinister’ is not the word I’d use to describe them.” I lowered my voice so it was barely audible over the engines. “I promise, you’ll enjoy my plans very much.”
The atmosphere between us thickened, and I watched her throat bob with a hard swallow.
But then she lifted her chin and pretended my words had no effect. “I highly doubt it.”
A wicked smile tugged at my lips, and I leaned in, dipped a hand beneath the blanket, and placed it suggestively on her thigh. The muscle in her leg tensed, but I kept going, wanting to prove my point, and slid my hand between her legs.
Her eyes went enormously wide and the fork in her hand clattered to the tray table so she could grip my wrist.
“What are you doing?” she hissed.
This wasn’t a big deal. Victoria was in the attendant station behind the partition. Plus, my hand was beneath the blanket and the fold-out tray table. Even I couldn’t see what I was doing to her.
“Showing you,” I said simply.
This action was intended to be a bluff, but it became real when Kara shuddered. Not in fear, but with pleasure.
My heart beat faster, excited. I pressed the pads of my fingers to the center seam of her jeans, rubbing back and forth.
Her eyes warmed with unexpected desire, and she barely breathed the word. “Shawn.”
I fucking loved it when she said my name. She made no effort to stop me. In fact, my name on her lips rang out as a plea for more. The rise and fall of her chest was almost as rapid as her gaze that darted around, checking to make sure Victoria wasn’t watching.
But we were alone.
“Don’t,” she whispered, but in direct conflict, she shifted beneath the blanket, parting her knees and making it easier for me to continue. “Stop.”
“Don’t . . . stop?” I repeated, confused.
Her only answer was to sink her teeth into her bottom lip and whimper with pleasure.
“You and your mixed signals,” I groaned in German, knowing she didn’t understand. “Tell me,” I said in English, “that I can come home with you.”
“I don’t,” she struggled to catch her breath, “want that.”
Oh, she didn’t? I ground my fingers faster between her legs and grinned as her eyes hazed. “Liar.”
She sat back in her seat, one hand on my wrist and the other gripping the edge of the tray table, as if she needed to hold on while enduring the pleasurable sensations I created.
Her lips were parted so she could gulp down air as I continued to touch her, and she stared at me with an expression that was a perfect mix of shock and lust.
“You’re so fucking sexy,” I told her in German.
I kissed her roughly then, silencing her impending demand that I repeat whatever I’d said in a language she could understand.
Wasn’t that unnecessary? My dominating kiss should make my meaning crystal clear.
Through the blanket, her fingernails dug painlessly into my wrist, but not to stop me.
Only to strengthen her hold as I touched and stroked and caressed.
Her mouth was resistant to my kiss for a moment.
Perhaps she worried she was surrendering too easily, but then her lips softened beneath mine.
The tiniest sliver of a moan came from her, but it rumbled as loud as thunder in my ears and struck me much harder than it should have.
I had to break the kiss, to get hold of myself and push my raging desire to the back of my mind.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she whispered. Her eyes pleaded with me to stop yet begged for me to keep going.
“Tell me I can come home with you,” I said it before I could consider if it were wise, “and I’ll stop.”
A war waged inside her. Kara wanted to stand her ground and not give up any control. But if she let me continue, it would give me a different kind of power.
Her expression hardened, and it looked like the modest side of her won the battle. Her tone was begrudging. “Fine.”
Guilt flickered through me, and I stopped moving but left my hand where it was, nestled between her thighs. For insurance, I told myself. Not because I couldn’t pull it away.
“Only to see that I get in safe,” she added, her hurried breathing slowing. “And nothing else.”
“All right.” I was fine with letting her believe that for now.
But this thing between us was going to come to a boiling point. Of that, I was damn sure.