Night Shield (14 page)

She held out a hand, turned it over to expose the scar on the inside of her left wrist. “Only got to the one, and didn’t do such a hot job on it.”

“What stopped you?”

“First? The blood. Really put me off the idea,” she said with a surprisingly cheerful laugh. “Anyway, I’m standing there in this filthy bathroom, stoned, bleeding, and I got scared. Really scared. I called Jonah. I don’t know what would’ve happened if I hadn’t reached him, if he hadn’t come. He got me to the hospital, then he got me into detox.”

She sat back, tracing a finger over the scar as if it brought the memory back with more clarity. “Then he asked me something he’d asked me a hundred times before. He asked me if I wanted a life. This time I said yes. Then he helped me make one.

“Along the way, I thought I should pay him back, and I offered what I was used to offering men. It was the only time he ever really got pissed off.” She smiled a little. “He thought more of me than I did of myself. Nobody else ever had. If I knew anything about Jan, or this business, I’d tell you. Because he’d want me to, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him.”

“From where I’m standing, you both got a good deal.”

“I’ve never once had a man look at me the way I’ve seen him look at you.”

“Then you’ve got your eyes shut.” It was Ally’s turn to smile. “Keep them open tonight when Will asks for his after-closing brandy.”

“Will? Come on.”

“Keep your eyes open,” Ally said again. “Are we square here?”

“Yeah, sure. I guess.” Confused, Frannie got to her feet again.

“Ask Beth to come up. Just give me five minutes to find my brass knuckles.”

With a half laugh, Frannie went to the elevator. After pushing the button, she glanced back. “Will knows what I was.”

“I guess he knows what you are, too.”

*  *  *

She wrapped up the last interview by seven, circled her shoulders and wondered if there was a possibility of food anytime in her near future.

The clock told her she was officially off duty, and since she had nothing to add to the current status of the case, her reports and follow-ups could wait till morning.

Still, she helped herself to the use of Jonah’s phone, checking in, giving updates. She was sitting quietly at his desk when he came in.

“Dietz. The cop who was shot last night. They’ve upgraded his condition from critical to serious.” Closing her eyes, she pressed her fingers against them. “It looks like he’s going to make it.”

“I’m glad to hear it.”

“Yeah.” She pulled the clip out of her hair, ran her fingers through it. “It sure fills this big hole in my gut. I appreciate the use of your office. I can tell you that the rest of your people aren’t suspects, at this time.”

“At this time.”

“I can’t give you more than that, Blackhawk. All evidence points to the fact that Jan and Jan alone worked the inside. It’s the best I can do.”

She tossed the clip on his desk. “Now, I’ve got something else to say.”

“Which is?”

“I’m off duty. Can I have a drink?”

“I happen to have a club just downstairs.”

“I was thinking of a private drink. From your private bar.” She gestured toward the panel. “If you could spare a glass of wine. I noticed a nice sauvignon blanc in there.”

He turned toward the panel, opened it, selected the bottle.

“Why don’t you join me?”

“I’m still on duty. I don’t drink during working hours.”

“I noticed that. Don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t hit on the customers. During working hours,” she added.

He turned back, the glass of pale gold wine in his hand. And watched her take off her jacket.

“I hope you don’t mind,” she said, then shrugged out of her holster. “I find it awkward to seduce men when I’m wearing my weapon.”

She laid it on his desk, then walked toward him.

She might have taken off her gun, Jonah thought, but she wasn’t unarmed. A woman with eyes as potent as whiskey and a voice like smoke would never be without a weapon.

Worse, she knew it. That longbow mouth was curved up, just a little, like a cat’s when the canary cage was open. He didn’t much care for his role as target.

“Your wine.” He held out the glass, a deliberate move to keep an arm-span of distance between them. “And though I appreciate the thought, I don’t have time for a seduction at the moment.”

“Oh, it shouldn’t take very long.”

She imagined he’d devastated countless women with that careless, almost-absent dismissal. For her, it was only a challenge she had every confidence of meeting.

She took the wine and moved right in, grabbing a fistful of his shirt to hold him in place. “I really like the look of you, Blackhawk. Hot mouth, cool eyes.” She took a sip of wine, watching him over the rim. “I want to see more.”

His senses went blade sharp. The muscles of his belly tied themselves into a dozen hard and tangled knots. “You get right to it, don’t you?”

“You said you were in a hurry.” She rose on her toes to nip her teeth into his bottom lip, and sliced a jagged line of need straight through him. “So I’m picking up the pace.”

“I don’t like sexually aggressive women.”

Her laugh was low, mocking. “You don’t like cops, either.”

“That’s exactly right.”

“Then this is going to be very unpleasant for you. That’s a shame.” She leaned in, skimmed her tongue up the side of his neck. “I want you to touch me. I want you to put your hands on me.”

He kept them at his sides, but in his mind they were already ripping at her shirt, already taking. “Like I said, it’s a nice offer, but—”

“I can feel your heart pounding.” She shook her hair back, and the scent of it slithered into his system. “I can feel the way you want me, the same way I want you.”

“Some of us learn to shelve certain wants.”

She saw the change in his eyes, the faintest deepening of green. Dead giveaway, she thought. “And some of us don’t.” She took another sip of wine, then moved forward, walking him backward. “I guess I’m going to have to get rough.”

Mortified she’d put him in retreat, he stopped short, nearly groaning when her body bumped his. “You’re going to embarrass yourself. Drink your wine, Detective Fletcher, and go home.”

She imagined he thought his voice was clipped, dismissive. But it was thick and strained. And his heart was a fury under her fist.

“What is that answer you’re always giving me? No. Yes, that’s it.” She drained her glass so the wine pumped in with the reckless power surging through her. “No,” she said again and, tossing the glass aside, hooked a hand in the waistband of his trousers.

Aroused and furious, he retreated again. “Cut it out.”

“Make me.” She threw her head back, then leaped, arms wrapping around his neck, legs vised around his waist. “Come on and make me. You’ve got plenty of moves.”

Her mouth swooped down to tease his, and she tasted a wild, wonderful mix of desire and temper. “Take me down,” she whispered, raking her hands through his hair. “Finish it. Finish me.”

His blood was raging. The taste of her, hot and female with the faint zip of wine, was on his tongue. “You’re asking for trouble.”

“So …” She rubbed her lips over his, as if imprinting her flavor on him. “Give it to me.”

Control snapped. He could hear it echo in his head like the violent crack of hammer against stone. He gripped her hair, wrapping it around his hand, yanking it back so that she let out a little gasp as her head flew back.

“The line’s crossed.” His eyes weren’t cool now. They simmered, as if a bolt of lightning had struck a pool. “You’ll give me everything I want. What you don’t give, I’ll take. That’s the deal.”

Her breath was already quickened. “Done.”

His gaze lowered to the long, vulnerable curve of her throat. Then he set his teeth on her.

Her body jerked against his as the shock of that threat of pain, that lance of pleasure, stabbed into her. Then she was falling, clinging to him as she tumbled into the shadows, into the dark.

She lost her breath when she hit the bed, lost her grip when his body covered hers. Then, for a moment, when he tore her shirt open, she lost her mind.

Floundering for balance, she threw an arm up. Her knuckles thudded against the bedspread, then her fingers dug in. “Wait.”

“No.”

His mouth was on her breast, ravaging tender flesh with lips and teeth and tongue. She fought for air, fought to find the power that had been hers just moments before. Instead she found herself spinning past control, past reason.

His hands were on her, as she had demanded. And they were hard and fast, ruthlessly exploiting weakness, secrets she hadn’t known she’d possessed.

Then his mouth came back to hers, hot and greedy. The low sound in her throat was equal parts terror and triumph. Leaping recklessly toward the heat, she met demand with demand.

She went wild beneath him. Writhing, bucking, reaching. He’d wanted nothing less. If he was to sin, he would sin fully, and reap all the pleasure before the punishment.

Her skin seemed to burn under his hands, his mouth. He craved. The long, clean lines of her. The taut and ready strength. The delicate give of curves.

He rolled with her over the wide pool of the bed, taking what and how he wanted.

She tugged at his shirt, sending buttons flying, then letting out a sound of feral delight when flesh met flesh. When he dragged her to her knees, she trembled. But there was nothing of fear left in her.

She could see his eyes, the predatory gleam of them, from the backwash of light from the office. She let out a ragged breath as she ran her hands up his chest, into his hair.

“More,” she told him, and crushed her mouth to his.

And there was more.

Lightning-quick flashes of unbearable ecstasy. Gusts of shuddering desperation. And a flood of needs that swamped them both.

He tugged the slacks down her hips, following the path of exposed flesh with his mouth until she was shuddering and mindlessly murmuring his name in that hoarse, erotic voice he couldn’t get out of his head.

His teeth scraped her inner thigh, sent the strong muscles quivering. When she arched, opened, he
feasted on her.

She cried out as the orgasm ripped through her, fisted her hands in the bedclothes and let each glorious aftershock batter her until her system wept with the pleasure of it. Heat swarmed up her body, through her, and she embraced it, reveled in the breathless power of what they made together.

“Now. Jonah.”

“No.”

He couldn’t get enough of her. Each time he thought desperation would overpower him, he found something new to tantalize him. The subtle flare of her hips, the narrow dip of her waist. He wanted to feel the bite of her nails on him again, hear that choked cry of release when he dragged her over the next edge.

Her breath was sobbing, his own so clogged in his lungs he thought they would burst from it. He moved up her again while her hands raced over him and her body bucked.

He could see her eyes, and nothing else. Just the dark glint of them, watching him as he rose over her. He held back for one quivering instant, then plunged.

Here was everything. The thought stabbed through him, then shattered in his brain as she closed hot and tight around him.

She rose to him, fell with him, the slick slide of bodies mating. Sighed with him as pleasure shimmered. Her heart thundered against his, beat for beat. Their breath mixed, drawing him deeper so that his mouth was on hers, another link, as they moved together.

The tempo quickened so that the slide became a slap, and sighs broke into gasps and moans. Her hips pistoned as he pounded into her. As sensations staggered her, she raked her nails down his back, dug them into his hips. Urging him on even as she was swamped by the next crest.

He felt himself slip—a glorious feeling of surrender—and with his face buried in the tumbled mass of her hair, he fell.

*  *  *

It was over for him. He knew it the minute his system leveled and his mind began to work again. He’d never get over her. Never get past her. With one sweep, she’d destroyed a lifetime of careful avoidance.

Now he was stupidly, helplessly, irretrievably in love with her.

Nothing could be more impossible or more dangerous.

She could slice him to pieces. No one had ever been allowed to have that kind of control or power over him. He didn’t mean to let that change now.

He needed some sort of defense, and determined to start building it, he rolled away from her.

She simply rolled with him, stretched that long, limber body of hers over his and said, “Mmmmm.”

Another time he might have laughed, or at least felt that knee jerk of pure male satisfaction. Instead he felt a light trip of panic.

“Well, you got what you wanted, Fletcher.”

Instead of being insulted, which would have given him a little room to regroup, she just nuzzled his neck. “Damn right.”

To please herself she hooked a leg around him, then shifted to straddle him and slick back her hair. “I like your body, Blackhawk. All tough and rangy and taut.” She trailed a finger over his chest, admiring the contrast of her skin against his. “You’ve got some Native American blood, right?”

“Apache. Very diluted.”

“It looks good on you.”

He twirled a lock of her hair around his finger. “White bread,” he said dryly. “But it looks good on you.”

She leaned down until they were nose to nose. “Now that we’re all cozy and complimentary, how about doing me a favor?”

“And that would be?”

“Food. I’m starving.”

“Want a menu?”

“No. Umm.” She tilted her head, teased his mouth with hers. “Just something that’s on it. Maybe you could send down for something.” She trailed her lips down to his jaw, back up to his mouth. “And we could, you know, fuel up. Mind if I grab a shower?”

“No.” He rolled her onto her back. “But you’ll have to wait until I’m done with you.”

“Oh?” She smiled. “Well, a deal’s a deal.”

*  *  *

And when he was done with her, she staggered more than walked into the bathroom. She closed the door, leaned back against it and let out a long puff of breath.