Deadly Sins (37 page)

His control had always been in question when it came to Jaid.

His palms moved to cup her butt, encased in the same sheer fabric her breasts had been, while her hands wedged between them to unbutton his shirt. And it helped calm his raging pulse, just a bit, to notice the tremble in them as they worked.

It was torturous to feel the warm skin separated from him by only a filmy layer of fabric. He increased the torment by tracing the thin elastic beneath her cheeks, to where it disappeared between her legs. The first touch of her fingers against his bare chest had him jerking against her. The next had a dash of cold water rushing through his veins.

His hand came up to catch hers. To halt it. And the look they shared in the semidarkness was full of unspoken understanding.

“Adam.” It was the softness in her voice that undid him. Coupled by a lack of the pity that would have wounded far worse than LeCroix’s sharpest blade. He tugged off the shirt, let it fall. Steeled himself for her reaction. But she only swayed forward, pressing against him. Close. Curves flattened against angles. And the sheer pleasure of that first contact had his senses howling.

Her palms raced over him, trailing heat in their wake. He reached to sweep the panties over her hips, down her thighs and returned to stroke the flesh he’d bared. Deliberately, he traced the seam of her legs, the softness of her folds, and felt the slight sting of her nails against his biceps as she jerked helplessly against him.

And the dark magic they always created enveloped them. Cocooned them from the world. From a reality that could too often be cruel.

He found the taut bundle of nerves between her legs and brushed it rhythmically with his thumb as he kissed her deeply. When she jerked against him, he used her reaction to bring her closer. And let himself drown in the sensations she summoned.

Her fingers were at his zipper, and he hauled in a deep, shuddering breath. Too much. Too soon. And his muchvaunted restraint had never been further out of reach. He stepped out of his trousers when they hit the floor. But when she reached out to trace his hardness through the boxer briefs, his vision abruptly grayed at the edges. Catching her hand to still those questing fingers, he drew in a breath. Then another. It took a moment before he was able to move them, with less grace than he would have liked, to the bed.

He dropped down beside her, rolled to cover her. Razor-edged lust was clawing through him, a relentless drive for release. He looked at her, willed the fog of passion to lift. But what he saw in her expression nearly sent him over the edge.

Her eyes were heavy with desire. But her touch was sure, knowing, as she rid him of the last barrier between them. When she took him in her hands to stroke and tease, every clever clutch and slide of her fingers seemed destined to shatter his resolve.

He withstood it as long as he could. Until the need for completion was a primitive urge surging through his system. He could focus on nothing but her. Nothing but the primitive desire to mate with her once more. And to make it be enough this time.

Levering himself away, he reached for the bedside table, his fingers going in a blind search for a condom. Was almost undone when she took it and spent an inordinate amount of time sheathing him. When she’d finished, every muscle in his body was clenching and quivering in a futile clutch for restraint.

Surely, the years apart had been a waste. Her hold on him was as certain as it had ever been. And the dark and desperate longing for her was still a fever in his blood, a hammering in his chest. If it had been only physical, she wouldn’t have represented such a threat. But she’d been more. She was still more.

She straddled his hips, and he watched her, his eye slitted. Her long dark hair teased her bare shoulders, moving with every motion. Her face was filled with emotion, a sight that once would have concerned him. But it was part of her response, and he was suddenly greedy. He wanted it all. Everything she had to give. Even if once it had been more than he’d dared accept.

Demand pounded through him, fueled by a desperation that was new. She seemed to feel it. Reciprocate it. Because she lifted herself then and guided him inside her.

And with a sense of homecoming, he surged up into her, the force of his thrust stealing his breath; the sensation of being steeped in her, surrounded by her, fired through his system. His hunger leapt and raged like a beast unleashed. His hands went to her hips. Her fingers clutched at his shoulders. The pace quickened. Became harder. Faster. His urgency was fed by a brutal need that he was helpless to control. And when he heard her crest, felt her orgasm, he followed her over the edge, his mind wiped clean of everything but her.

They’d collapsed in a spent sweaty heap, and he’d yet to let go of her. He’d held plenty of women before Jaid. More after her. But none gave him this sense of peace he found just by having her close.

That alone made her dangerous. The realization had tempered his response at one time. Resulted in decisions that he couldn’t undo.

“Seeing you with Royce, it reminds me of my mother.” He felt her still at his words. Knew the reason. He’d rarely offered the least bit of personal information. Not, as she might believe, to keep her at a distance. But because his past held no appeal for him. There was only the present. The future.

But he found himself offering her a slice of his past now. Because it was the only way she would understand. “You wouldn’t care for the comparison. Glenna was a simple woman. Uneducated. And prone to bad decisions. But she did her best by me. It was little enough, but I knew what she did, she did out of love. That matters. Even now that matters.”

He felt her fingers tracing the shallow indentations around his heart. A legacy from the three bullets he’d taken last May. He’d been fortunate then. But knew that most people wouldn’t share his view of luck. “What’d she do?”

His hand swept down her back, then up again to trace each individual vertebra there. Such a delicate spine to be capable of such inner strength. “She cleaned houses. Apartments. That paid the rent but little else. So sometimes on the weekends she would, ah, supplement her income. She’d take me to a church first. It was her way of keeping me safe, not exposing me to whatever, whomever, she brought home. We weren’t Catholic, but churches were always unlocked back then. And where safer to leave a young boy? I proved adept at finding spots to hide myself away. Sleeping or playing with whatever toys she’d packed in my bag. And on Sundays after the noon mass, she was always there. Always came to take me home again.”

“How long did this go on?”

“A couple years.” He continued because there was nothing in her voice but interest. No judgment for the woman who had done her best for the child she was ill-equipped to care for. He’d come across far worse parents in his career. Enough to make him remember Glenna with fondness. To recognize her best quality in spite of her flaws.

Jaid lifted her head a little to look at him in the darkness. “That’s how you met Jerry.”

“It is, yes.” The memory had a smile curling his lips. “I imagine he knew I was there long before he tried to coax me out. In the end it was the comic books that got me. He’d leave them at the end of a pew. Farther into the church each time. Until finally, if I wanted to get my hands on the newest adventures of the Green Hornet, I had to take it directly from him.”

“He had to earn your trust.”

“Much like one would coax a wild animal, I expect. At any rate he kept my secret. Never told anyone that I know of. But after a while I’d find a pillow and a blanket in the choir loft. Knew they were mine for the weekend.”

He felt her smile against his chest. “He’s a good man.”

“The best. He helped when the inevitable happened. Because one Sunday Glenna didn’t come back. The next day I finally gave him my address. And when he came back from checking things out, I didn’t want to believe what he told me.” He halted then. No, he’d had to see it for himself. Had to return home only to see the rickety apartment door covered with police tape. And when he’d let himself inside, he’d known what the chalk outline and the bloodstains on the floor meant.

“Did you live with him then?”

“That wouldn’t have been allowed. There were foster homes.” The passing of time had helped frame them for what they’d been. None better or worse than necessary. “But he made time for me every week. He’s my family, as much as I have one. I realized later that my mother tried to prepare me for the worst. She had to have known the risks of the lifestyle she was dabbling in. Every Friday when she dropped me off, she’d tell me, ‘If anything happens to me, it’s going to seem really bad. But know that it will be the worst thing that can ever happen to you. And nothing in your life can ever get that bad again.’ For a long time I believed that.” Hell, he’d lived his life according to that mantra. “But turned out she was wrong. LeCroix was bad. So was losing you.”

Something clutched in his chest when he felt the dampness there. Her tears were all the more gut-wrenching for being silent. But her voice when it came was steady. “You didn’t lose me, Adam. You pushed me away. There’s a difference between the tragedies that befall us and the ones we bring on ourselves.”

As usual she didn’t give an inch. He settled his head more comfortably on the pillow. Brushed his fingers over the curve of her shoulder. That quality of hers had been appealing when they were together. She’d been a rookie, yes, but she’d gone toe-to-toe with him to argue a point when she disagreed.

And she’d disagreed, vehemently, when he’d ended things between them.

All the reasons he’d given her then were still valid. He stared blindly at the ceiling. And it was hard to convince himself that a willingness to ignore them now was any more than selfishness on his part.

And maybe ego. His fingers stilled. Because despite the fact that she was in his arms, in his bed, he had no reason to believe that Jaid was open to renewing their relationship. Eight years was a long time. Emotions faded. Circumstances changed. She had a son to consider now.

He frowned. One that Bolton was somehow threatening in Adam’s name.

That news had been worse, far worse, than the unfamiliar pang he’d experienced when he’d recognized the number on the phone’s screen. Since he wasn’t a man to feel jealousy, it had to have stemmed from something else.

He rolled to face her. “I think we need to make a plan about what to do about the reporter. He can’t be allowed to . . .” Adam broke off when a tiny noise sounded. Not without regret, he disengaged himself from Jaid and sat up, levering himself to the edge of the bed.

“Is that your phone?”

He used the bedside table to push himself to his feet. Grabbed his trousers and pulled them on quickly. “No. It’s an e-mail.”

By the time she’d dressed and joined him at the computer in the room, he was at the bottom of the message documenting Macy’s thorough, well-researched findings. Stunned, he didn’t object when Jaid pushed his fingers aside and scrolled back to the top. Read it for herself.

He waited for her reaction. It wasn’t long coming.

Halfway down the page she stopped. “Oh my God.” Her voice was threaded with excitement. “It’s not a match. Lambert’s statement and the message the cyber agents found embedded on his computer are by different authors. He was telling the truth about being threatened by someone.”

“Probably.”

His terse response seemed to warn her. She sent him a sidelong glance before scanning the rest of the message. “Ninety percent accuracy, it says. That’s pretty good odds. I’d be interested in knowing how she does . . .” Her words tapered off abruptly.

“She is good.” His voice was bleak as he looked at the screen and read the results of the second test again. “So I’m going to have to accept the fact once and for all that the man who hired Lambert—ostensibly the one behind the homicides of Patterson, Reinbeck, and Cote—is the same man who hired Mose Ferrell to kill me.”