Heart of Danger (26 page)

What he felt for her was right there, right under his skin. The heat of sex, the warmth of affection, the iron grip of his desire to protect her, keep her safe.

“But the thing is”—Mac sighed, and slipped in her just a little farther, just enough to open the lips of her sex and make her writhe with desire—“the thing is I keep getting sidetracked, by
this
.”

He slid into her, inch by slow inch, carefully, every muscle tense with effort. He stopped when he was fully inside her, panting a little. His heart had stepped up its rate, as if he were running.

She felt that heartbeat in his penis, pulsing gently inside her.

“Now, Mac,” she groaned, shaking. “I don’t need foreplay.” Every touch of his was foreplay.

It was such overkill, holding that huge body in her arms. So utterly male, so utterly tough, so utterly hers.

Every touch told her he was hers. Every touch, every kiss was for her.

He started moving and it was a luscious dance, skin on skin, beating heart against beating heart. Hard to soft. Meltingly tender this time. Every inch of her was taken up by this man.

Her hands and legs followed that huge bowed back as he thrust in her so carefully, smoothly, movements controlled. It was like being on a sea, waves rocking her, and she lost herself in the rhythm, in the heat. Her senses blanked out, one by one. She closed her eyes and couldn’t see. The beat of her heart and his filled her ears until she heard nothing. She couldn’t feel her limbs anymore, all she felt was the center of her being, filled with him rocking into her, rocking, rocking . . .

She pulled into herself until there was only that small center of white-hot heat, incandescent as the sun, and it went nova.

Mac held himself still inside her as she writhed around him. It felt like that sun was bursting out of her body and she had to let it go in wild pulses of heat and light.

“God,” he muttered as she slowly relaxed. Under him, and against her arms and legs, she felt him explode into action, hips pumping as he moved in and out of her, so fiercely it almost—but not quite—hurt. It would have if this had been any man other than Mac. With anyone else it would have felt like a battering invasion of her body but she was with him every step of the way.

It wasn’t an invasion. His body was trying to get as close to hers as it could. If he could have, he would have crawled inside her, and if she could have, she would have let him.

This was the next best thing, this utter and complete claiming of her, making her completely his.

When he collapsed on her, face planted on the pillow next to hers, she felt as wrung out as he was.

The room was so quiet, the only sounds their heavy breathing. His heart was pounding as if he’d run a hundred miles. She felt it—both their hearts. His thudding in a heavy, rhythmic beat, hers lighter and faster. She lay under him, eyes closed, drinking in this moment of utter closeness and listened as their hearts synchronized, beating together.

Everything about them was coming together. She felt stronger and was aware that his energy was sapped. She was inside his body, feeling the currents of wonder and joy coursing through him. The same currents swirling in her.

Her arms had gone lax in the thousandth orgasm—well, maybe that was an exaggeration but they had been too numerous to count, tripping from one straight into another. Suddenly, her arms and legs tightened around him, wildly, as if she suddenly had to hold him to her, but that was crazy. Mac showed no signs of wanting to get away. If anything, he seemed settled on top of her as if he was never going to move again.

It was just that she wanted to hold on to this. It seemed such a rare, such a unique moment. Something wondrous, magical. By definition fleeting, over almost as soon as it began. This couldn’t last. How could it? What good ever lasted in this world? It was—

Mac lifted his head and gave her a huge grin and she was startled right out of her thoughts. The grin was wide. He was smiling with his entire face and every line in his skin told her it was unusual. The lines in his face naturally went to gravity, to grimness and frowns. This stretched everything out of shape and looked like it actually hurt his scars.

He smiled down at her and she swallowed at what she saw. She saw—so clearly—what he felt for her. Saw how new it was for him. And felt—deep down where there was no possibility of hiding—felt that he would undoubtedly die for her.

Her gift, her curse, told her this, told her that for the first time in her life she was loved. She was loved deeply.

“Wow,” he said. “That was—” He broke off, the smile wiped from his face. He scowled down at her, wiping a tear away from her face with his thumb. “What’s the matter?”

All of a sudden he looked appalled, actually frightened. He lifted up off her, pulled out from her, leaving emptiness and coldness behind. “Did I hurt you?” he demanded. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, I’m fine.” Catherine sniffed, ashamed of herself. She’d suddenly been swamped by her emotions, and his. And she’d scared him. “I’m so sorry. It’s just that—”

Her stomach rumbled, loudly, and she laughed, wiping away another tear with the heel of her hand. Laughing, crying, hungry . . . she was a mess.

Mac was sitting up, a little calmer, eyeing her cautiously. He visibly relaxed when she smiled at him. “If you’re crying because you’re hungry, I have the answer right here.” He nudged the cart with a big bare foot sticking out from under the covers. “It’s all cold but I’ve got a microwave. How does that sound?”

Catherine sat up in bed, grateful for the mundane thought of food. Her stomach rumbled again and she giggled, feeling calmer. “Sounds wonderful. I think I could eat a horse.” A second ago all her emotions had been churning but now she was calmer and, upon consultation with her stomach, starving. “Raw. I hope I won’t have to.”

“No, Stella doesn’t do raw horsemeat.”

“Carpaccio,” Catherine said, smiling. She leaned against the headboard and watched with interest as a naked Mac rose and started ferrying dishes over to a huge microwave against the wall. The back view was astonishing. Wide, thickly muscled shoulders tapering down to a lean waist, hard dimpled buttocks, long, hard thighs, the individual muscles visible.

He threw her a startled glance over his shoulder. “Carpo what?”

Catherine laughed. “Carpaccio. Raw meat or fish, thinly sliced.”

The microwave was the new kind that heated in a second. He was already coming back with the tray full of food, placing it back on the cart.

The front view was as enticing as the back one with the addition of a still semi-erect penis.

“Nothing raw that doesn’t have to be,” he said, pulling out legs from the tray and placing it on her lap. He leaned over and gave her a quick peck on the lips. “Now pay attention here because this is a surprise.”

Catherine sat up straight, wondering what he meant. “There’s hardly anything here that isn’t a surprise.”

“No, this one’s really good. Voilà.” Mac touched something and Catherine gasped.

It was magic.

Three walls, to the right, to the left and straight ahead . . . disappeared. Simply vanished. In their place was an amazing nighttime view of the mountain as if they were on a platform jutting out from the mountainside. Snowy slopes of white firs swooped down to the valley bathed in moonlight. Far far away down the mountainside, almost in the valley below, a few lights twinkled.

Had they been outside all this time and the windows blanked?

It was impossible to tell. Every silvery moonlit detail was sharp and clear.

Mac reached out gently and closed her jaw with a finger and only then did she realize she was staring slack-jawed.

“What—what is this? Are we outside?”

He piled food onto a plate and set it in front of her. “Eat. I think we’ve burned about a billion calories. You’re going to kill me, Catherine.”

“Ha!” She jabbed him in the side and nearly sprained her hand. Rocks were softer than his muscles. “Not likely. So what is this?”

“Holo. We have security cameras ringing the property and Jon set it up so we can project it in our rooms, give us a view. Because it is a view—just not right outside the window.”

“That is really amazing but so’s this. Wait a second.” She held up a hand, closed her eyes, savored the big bite of pumpkin ravioli with chanterelle sauce. Oh God. Heaven. The wild sex, the God’s-eye view that appeared in the blink of an eye, the stunning food. This was sensory overload. “Okay.” Her eyes popped open. “Ready for the view again now.”

She looked around the three walls. A rabbit crossed a small, snowy meadow and stopped, nose wrinkling, sniffing the air. Satisfied, it hopped away. Off . . . screen?

Mac was chomping on a pulled-pork baguette and smiled secretively. “Watch long enough and you’ll see a deer. I saw a coyote the other day. That’s not all we can do, though. Watch.”

He touched something on the bedside table and all of a sudden the room was filled with sunlight, so blinding Catherine had to shield her eyes.

“Oh my God,” she breathed. It was a slightly different view, but the shape of the mountain and the valley below were the same. A blindingly bright sun rose over a hill, making the landscape glow. The sky was the brightest blue in the history of blue skies and there were only small patches of snow on the ground.

“Sunrise, three days ago,” Mac said, and picked up another sandwich.

She watched, amazed, as a hawk flew high in the sky, elegantly gliding on thermals. The sun crossed some invisible barrier and shot light down to the valley in glowing beams coming straight out of Hollywood. Except CGI could never make this stuff up.

“How can you afford all this fancy stuff?” Catherine asked. This was at least several million dollars’ worth of technology, shining into Mac’s bedroom. Then she realized what she said and clapped a hand over her mouth, appalled. “I’m sorry!” she gasped. “So sorry! It’s none of my business and—”

Mac calmly reached over, pulled her hand away from her mouth, kissed her knuckles. “Don’t be sorry about anything, honey, ever. This is your community now, your people. Ask anything you want. And the answer to how we can afford it all?” Those dark eyes gleamed. “We steal it.”

Another bite of that glorious ravioli stopped on the way to her mouth. “You
steal
it?”

He nodded, popped a slider into his mouth. Chewed. Swallowed. “Yeah. Or rather, Jon does. He was on a six-month mission to the Calderón clan in Colombia, undercover as a California dealer. He came away with a lot of intel, enough to hack deep into their systems. When we need something he just creams it off their accounts. Last week, for example, we bought a ton of seeds and fertilizer for Manuel, a new forklift and a crash cart for the infirmary. We’ve got a shopping list a mile long. Jon delicately goes in, takes the money and transfers it to a bank account in San Francisco in the name of a shell company, and we all have black credit cards. So far several Calderón lieutenants have been accused of embezzling from the boss and have been hung out to dry. Literally, with meat hooks. They ran the child prostitution business for the cartel. Couldn’t happen to nicer guys.”

“You’ve got quite a setup here, Mac.”

He stopped smiling, met her eyes. “Yes. We do. We’ve got a lot of people we want to protect. We want to keep this community safe.”

She stopped smiling, too. “And you think trying to rescue Nine will put them at risk. I understand that.”

“There’s no ‘try’ involved,” Mac said. “If we go in, we rescue him. But a lot of things can go wrong and there’s the possibility he’s not there, the possibility that you read him wrong. The possibility it’s a trap.” He took in a deep breath, that broad chest expanding. “No, don’t say it.” He put a finger across her lips. “I know—and Nick and Jon know—you would never deliberately lead us into a trap, but there’s a lot we don’t know about the situation.”

She kissed his finger, pulled his hand down from her mouth and held it. Felt his determination, felt his warring instincts—a desire to rescue a hurt comrade versus a desire to keep his people safe—felt honor and pride and dread. He wouldn’t be her Mac if he didn’t feel all those things.

“Are you guys still planning how to do it?”

“Oh yeah. We’re not rushing into anything without doing a full recon. Jon’s got drones flying overhead and Nick’s analyzing the results. Jon’s checking their computer systems with the codes you gave him. We’ll go down at the new moon and do a thorough check of the terrain, and when our plan is solid, we’ll go.”

She was going with them but it wasn’t the time or the place to say that.

She reached up, kissed the side of that hard mouth. “My money’s on you guys.”

Chapter Thirteen

January 8

Tired and pissed, Mac entered his quarters the next afternoon, hoping but not expecting and ah . . . there she was.

It had been a long, hard, frustrating day. Two drones went belly-up, and since they were urgently needed for the Millon recon, Jon and Nick had slipped over into Nevada to steal two of them from Nellis. They had walked onto the base in full uniform with fake ID, caught the codes for two drones, remotely flew them out, and drove back out of the base, calm as could be.

But it had taken them, door to door, twelve hours.

In the meantime, Mac had been stuck here doing his mayor/king thing, okaying Dane’s request for a hundred miles of micro-steel water pipeline, Pat and Salvatore’s request for a robosurgeon for minor surgery, Manuel’s request for an experimental square-mile hydroponics bed and listening to a two-hour lecture by Stella on How Not to Fuck Up with Catherine.

One goddamned thing after another, when all he wanted was to spend time with Catherine. Possibly fucking her, without fucking it up.

He’d glimpsed sightings of her from afar, like some unicorn. Coming out of the kitchens as he talked with Dane, she was in the infirmary almost all day and had just left when Pat and Salvatore called him in, somehow she was always just out of his reach.

She’d just finished lunch when he finally made it to the communal eating hall and hadn’t had dinner yet. He’d just checked.