Loving Lies (7 page)

And he was coming back, for dessert. Heat raced through her body, singed every nerve ending and had the blood pulsing fast and hot through her veins as she rushed for the shower. He was coming back and she intended to be ready for him.

Chapter Six

 

Amy was waiting for him when he pulled into the driveway of his home, and she wasn't alone. Sitting on the porch with her was Don Farrell, his handler at the Office of Homeland Security. Slade could feel his stomach sink as he walked slowly up to the porch, the keys to the front door in hand, some internal sense warning him that his life was about to go to hell.

“I heard you were cutting up a fuss at the campsite,” he told Amy as he stepped onto the porch.

Amy wasn't really the “cutting up a fuss” sort, and as he stared at her he knew whatever reason she had made such a public showing to collect him, it had nothing to do with hurting Jess, and everything to do with destroying his life.

“She had to follow the relationship the two of you set up last year, Slade,” Don explained as Slade opened the front door then stood aside so they could enter.

“That's over,” he informed both of them. “So why try to continue playing the game?”

The interior of the house was cool, dim, the peace it had once held shattered as Amy and Don entered and the door closed behind them.

“Wrong. Kingston and Baines tracked us back here, Slade. The operation is back on. They made contact the other day and they're interested in the deal we were setting up for the arms. We're back on, lover.” She laughed at him, as Slade felt something wither inside his chest.

Kingston and Baines were as elusive as shadows. The arms dealers were supplying weapons and ammunition to the Middle East, and the C.I.A. as well as Homeland Security were desperate to stop them. If they didn't stop them, the bloodshed was only going to get worse.

“We have a watcher who drove in last night.” Amy pulled a file from her bag as she moved into the kitchen.

Slade went for the whisky. He didn't bother with a glass, he uncapped the bottle and took a hard, nerve-strengthening swig that nearly stole his breath.

“Are you okay?” Amy asked as he lowered the bottle, fighting for life rather than just breath.

“I'm listening.” And dying inside.

“We had announced the engagement before the operation broke off, and Kingston and Baines are offering to host the wedding.” Her smile was triumphant as she opened the file to a color picture. “This is our watcher, he arrived in town last night, and he was at the party you attended in the clearing. We'll be heading back to Washington in three weeks, compliments of Kingston and Baines, once everything is in place. They'll hold the wedding and we'll be in.”

Kingston and Baines were family men, as odd as that was. Working within the organization had taken over a year, only to have it fall through when the two brothers-in-law had pulled back from their very lucrative side business for some reason.

“Why now?” Just when he thought he had his life on track. When he thought he could finally follow his own dreams.

“Who knows? That's what we need you to find out,” Don stated, his plump face sober and intense. “Find out what they're up to and get the proof on them. Let's do this while we have the chance.”

“Projected length of assignment?” It wouldn't be overnight, that was for damned sure.

“Three years. From experience we know they won't move fast. They're just dipping their feet back into the arms sales right now. Your cover as suppliers will aid us in finding out exactly where those arms are going and who their contacts are. We want to round up the whole network, Slade, not just a few of them.”

Three years.

He stared at Amy. The engagement they had set up before the operation had fallen through had made sense at the time. Now, it was ripping through him with razor-sharp regret.

Jessie. God, what was he going to do about Jessie? He tilted the bottle back, ignoring Amy and Don's confused looks as they watched him. He didn't owe them any fucking explanations, all he owed them was the completion of the contract he had signed. A contract that signed his soul to the Homeland Security office until this operation was finished. A completion that had been a done deal until now.

He nodded shortly. “Give me the details.”

He couldn't not finish it. If Kingston and Baines ever learned he wasn't who and what he pretended to be, a construction company owner with the means and connections to procure the weapons they needed, then they would strike. They would strike first at the people closest to him. At Jessie. Jessie couldn't be hurt. He had to protect her, the only way he knew how.

 

 

 

Summer nights had always been Slade's favorite time. The breeze rushing through his hair was scented with freshly cut grass, burning charcoal and life. Peace had always enveloped him when he rode the bike on nights like this, but tonight, there was no peace.

Regret ripped through his guts with enough force to knot the muscles there, to cause his teeth to clench until they ached from the pressure. The wind whipped through his hair, the familiar scents of the mountains wrapped around him, but all he smelled was Jessie's sweet scent, and a bitter fury that could be aimed at no one but himself.

All he could think about was touching her, feeling the heated warmth of her flesh against him, the fist-tight grip of her pussy milking his cock with destructive results, hurling him into a release he couldn't refuse, no matter how much he wanted it to last. The way her eyes stared up at him, no matter what he did to her, or encouraged her to do to him, she watched him with heat and hunger.

God, what a fool he had been. Wrapping himself around her, letting that something he couldn't name fill him, only to have it ripped from him with a force that still left him gasping, fighting to breathe past the denials racing through his head. He should have just stayed home. It was senseless to do this, but he couldn't seem to let it go. He had to see her, one last time, convince himself more than her that the past weekend had been a mistake they were both going to have to put behind them.

He owed her that much. He couldn't leave her hoping, wondering. If he did, he would never be able to protect her in the only way he knew how. And he had to protect Jessie. Above all things, even before his own comfort, his own agonizing regret, he had to protect her.

And it was destroying him to make this ride, to follow through with what he knew he had to do. As he drove through the night, images of the weekend played before his mind. Jessie on her knees, her lips wrapped around his cock as he taught her how to pleasure him. On her back, her thighs spread, her screams filling his mind as he pushed his tongue slow and easy inside her climaxing pussy, feeling the waves of release on the fingers he had buried in her ass.

Jessie swimming naked in the water, wrapped in moonlight, daring him to join her. Or sitting against his chest as the dawn rose over the mountains, his arms wrapped around her as the fog enclosed them.

It had been a dream. A fantasy come to life, and now it was over. It was just over.

He turned the motorcycle into the small apartment complex she lived in. The neat little rows of buildings with their cheerful flowers growing along the stoops and fresh cut grass, cut into his chest. He didn't want to see cheerful when the regret was nearly eating him alive. It was just regret. It wasn't truly grief. His soul wasn't being ripped in two. He hadn't loved her, he assured himself. He cared for her. He didn't want to hurt her—hell, he had spent years protecting her until she was old enough for him. She was a beautiful woman. A sexy, hungry little kitten and he was a possessive man. That was all it had been. He didn't love her.

He parked in front of her apartment, breathing in roughly as he forced himself to move. He made his fingers uncurl, one by one, from the handgrips, before swinging from the seat. He felt like an old man, every bone and muscle protesting the journey he was about to make.

He walked up the cement walk, staring straight ahead. He had never shirked his responsibilities in his life and he wasn't going to start now. His knuckles landed heavy on the door as he felt the muscle in his cheek jumping violently in response to her call to enter.

Her voice was like honey, hot and sweet, making his dick jerk and throb with a hunger he knew had no choice but to go unquenched.

He opened the door, stepping in slowly, his gaze instantly finding her by the small dining-room table, a halo of candlelight surrounding her from the tapers she had set in the center of it.

He stopped, ensnared by her, entranced by the vision standing before him. Slender feet were encased in black heels that lifted and arched her graceful feet so erotically he almost howled in pain. A short, clinging black dress covered her breasts, cupping them, shaping the sweet mounds before sliding down her body like a fall of night.

She was so fucking beautiful that for one moment, for one blinding, weakening second he nearly took what his cock was screaming was his before doing what he knew he had to do.

Protect Jessie. The impulse was so ingrained, so profound, even the ravening hunger building inside him couldn't overrule it.

“Slade?” She tilted her head, her hair falling over her shoulder like a silken shadow as she stared back at him. “Are you okay?”

Okay? God no, he wasn't okay. He was dying inside. He stood staring at a vision any man would kill to have and he was going to turn his back on her, rip her tender heart out of her chest and walk away. He was just going to walk away, and die a thousand deaths when he did so.

He reached to his side and flipped on the overhead light, watching her blink at the sudden brightness as a glimmer of foreboding filled her gaze. The smile that had curved her lips eased away and within seconds her expression was somber.

He cleared his throat, glancing away from her, fighting for the strength, the self-control to do what he knew he was there for.

Her lips tightened, pursing as they trembled lightly, before she stilled them, her breathing beginning to accelerate. He could see the slowly dawning awareness in her eyes, the flash of horror, of denial, the pain that for a moment twisted her features and left her swaying before she gripped the back of the chair, holding tight, and facing him anyway.

God, she was so young, so beautiful, and so fucking strong that in that moment, he knew exactly what he was walking away from, and what he was headed toward. And it was going to be hell. And he had brought it all on himself.

“Just say it.” He watched her steel herself. Saw the tightening of her shoulders, the knowledge that filled her eyes. Her voice was low, lacking the bitter anger he had expected, the tears he had been certain she would shed. The thought of those tears terrified him. How was he supposed to fight her tears?

“Do I have to?” he asked, not certain if he could say the words, thanking God with every thought that she knew what he had come here for, that he wouldn't have to say the words, wouldn't have to let her see it was killing him to do this.

“Oh, I've heard about that part of your relationships as well.” Her voice was bleak, her words echoing with a pain she couldn't hide. “I guess I was foolish enough to think it would last longer than a weekend. I have to say, at least I broke a record. Your shortest relationship. Lucky me.”

She was breaking him. She was breaking his will, ripping something inside him that he didn't know existed, with her pain-laden voice and her dark, agonized gaze.

He wanted to comfort her. Everything inside him was screaming at him to go to her, to hold her, to tell her, to explain everything. She would understand. God help him, if he had ever believed anyone had loved him in his life, he knew Jessie did and he was a goddamned fool to walk away. But he knew there was no other choice. The best gift he could give her was the lack of hope. To be a bastard in the purest sense and allow her to get on with finding someone…

He couldn't finish the thought. Sons of bitches, he would kill the prick brave enough to lay the first finger on her where he could see it. He wouldn't be able to survive if he saw another man touching her.

“I'll leave then.” He had to force the words past his throat. “You were good, Jessie. Damned good. But you were right, not mature enough…” The words stuck in his throat as he watched her flinch. As though someone had laid a lash to her soul, she jerked so hard he felt the pain himself.

“I understand.” She turned away from him, a shudder racing up her back as she bared the delicate naked flesh that ran to her hips. There was no back to the dress, just slender straps holding it in place.

His hands fisted. He couldn't touch her. He wouldn't touch her. But son of a bitch if it didn't hurt to breathe, to drag each lungful of air into his chest, to survive without touching her. How the hell had he let this happen? How could one person have so much power to hurt another?

And he didn't love her. It became a mantra within his mind as he watched her. But she believed she loved him, how much worse was it for her? The ragged wound digging into his very spirit became deeper at the thought.

The candles extinguished but she didn't turn around.

“Leave. Now.” Her voice was low, nearly incoherent as her shoulders shuddered. “Just leave, Slade.”

He pressed his lips tightly together, stilling the violence inside him, the need so overwhelming it locked in his soul and screamed out in bitterness to tell her the truth. He breathed out wearily instead, turned and did as she asked.

He left.

 

As the door closed behind him, Jessie felt herself collapsing, felt her breathing falter as the pain erupted in her chest. She didn't bother to find the chair or to stop the slow slide to the floor. She was only thankful the leg of the table was there to brace her back, to hold her upright as she stared before her, dazed, disbelieving.