The Departed (4 page)

* * *

THE feel of her mouth against his was a delight he had never expected to feel, one he knew he didn’t deserve…and one he knew he wasn’t strong enough to turn away from.

When she would have pulled away, he reached up, cupped his hand over the back of her head.

He thought she’d pull away.

Was sure of it, even.

She was just trying to assuage his guilt, and it didn’t surprise him. She was cocky, sarcastic, and very often full of attitude, but she had the gentlest, kindest heart…and he didn’t deserve that kindness. She didn’t pull away, though.

And when her mouth opened under his, it wasn’t the sort of soft, pitying kiss he might have expected.

The heat, the hunger in that kiss might have laid him low…if he hadn’t already been so starved for her. If he hadn’t spent so many fucking nights dreaming of her. If he hadn’t been half blind with need and guilt and desperation and too many other emotions he couldn’t even begin to describe.

Slanting his mouth more firmly against hers, Taylor stared at her from under his lashes and was startled to realize she was looking back at him. Swearing, he jerked back and muttered, “Damn it. This is insane.”

One slim, ringless hand came up, toyed with the placket of his shirt. “I always thought it was insane not to do something you really, really want…” Dez’s gaze shifted up to meet his and his body tensed, whip tight, as she murmured, “And I’ve wanted this a very, very long time.”

That elegant, long-fingered hand stroked down the front of his shirt. The smile that curled her lips was so smug, so sexy and female—if he hadn’t already been rock hard and aching…fuck, he could have gone to his knees and begged just then.

And when her fingers closed around him, stroked him through his trousers, he almost did. The smile on her mouth widened. “Taylor, you want me, too. So, tell me…why is this insane?”

There was a reason. No. Not
reason
.
Reasons.
Lots of them. He knew it. But as those fingers stroked up, then down, he couldn’t think of them, not a single one.

Staring into her sloe eyes, he dredged up a couple of those reasons. “You work for me. I’m your boss—this is a bad fucking idea.”

“Then I guess maybe we shouldn’t tell anybody.”

Yes, that’s a good idea…
Shit. This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t.

* * *

DEZ could see the war being waged in his eyes and if she had any sense at all, she’d back off. She already knew she’d have a hard time facing him when she went back to work—hell, five minutes from now when the fog cleared from her brain—but she couldn’t back off. She needed this, needed him. The ache was a constant, pulsing emptiness inside her and it grew worse and worse with every passing second.

Instead of backing away as common sense demanded, she teased the line of his mouth with her tongue and delighted as she felt him tremble against her. The subtle power in that lean body had always amazed her…and she could make him tremble.

It was a drug.

That would explain why her brain suddenly went beyond haywire, why every last nerve ending started to buzz and jitter and vibrate. Fisting her free hand in his shirtfront, she pulled him closer and sank her teeth into his lower lip. “Tell me something, Taylor…you ever turn that brain of yours off?”

He swore.

And she could almost hear it as the threads of his control snapped. His hands grabbed her, hauled her against him. Breathlessly, she laughed against his mouth and whispered, “My bedroom’s down the hall.”

But she didn’t think he even heard her.

Five seconds later, Dez wasn’t even sure
she
remembered where her bedroom was. She went from standing pressed against his body to sitting on the cool marble of the kitchen island, with him standing between her thighs.

Always, always, always Taylor Jones presented a remote, impassive mask to the world, but the man staring down at her now was anything but remote, anything but impassive. His steely blue eyes glittered with hunger, and harsh flags of color stained his high, elegant cheekbones.

As his mouth crushed down on hers, Dez barely had two seconds to think, to realize…all that hunger, it was for
her
.

But for all that burning hunger, his hands were gentle as he stripped away her shirt, infinitely gentle as he peeled it away. “Your skin is so soft, so fragile,” he whispered, dipping his head to press a kiss to her shoulder.

“I’m not the least bit fragile,” she said, her voice husky. She fisted a hand in the silky, short hair at his nape and guided his head to her breasts. “Touch me, Taylor. You have no idea how many times I’ve thought about this.”

He buried his face between her breasts as he reached around and unfastened her bra, drawing it away and dropping it to the floor. When his mouth closed around one swollen nipple, Dez groaned. She started to arch her head back but the tender, healing flesh at her neck protested and she hissed out.

Taylor stiffened, pulling back.

But when he would have pulled away, she fisted a hand in the front of his shirt. “Don’t you dare,” she said. Catching his wrist, she guided his hands back to her, lowering her gaze. “I want to see you touching me.”

His hands, tanned, lean, and elegant, looked so damned nice against her darker skin, she decided.

“You’re not up to this,” Taylor muttered.

But that didn’t keep him from stroking his thumbs around her nipples and when she sneaked a look at him from under her lashes, she saw that he was also staring at the way his hands looked on her flesh.

Arching into his touch, she said softly, “Isn’t that kind of up to me to decide?”

“You’re supposed to take it easy.”

She reached down and undid his belt, slowly released the button on his trousers, lowered the zipper. “Then we’ll just have to drag out the whips and chains next time, huh?”

Slipping her hand inside, she closed her fingers around his cock and stroked. With a groan, he crushed his mouth to hers.

Those wicked, wicked fingers would drive him out of his mind if he wasn’t careful, he realized.

Or maybe they already had, because there was no way in hell he could be sane and still be doing this. If he were sane, he wouldn’t have stripped Dez out of her clothes, wouldn’t be easing her body back so that she lay spread out over the cool white marble of the kitchen island. Her flesh glowed a soft, warm brown, her breasts round and full, her belly softly rounded. Her hips flared out, a sweet, sweet curve that had driven him insane pretty much from the beginning. Her legs, strong and sleek, parted for him as he moved up closer.

Dez stroked a hand down the front of his shirt and said, “You’re still dressed.”

He knew. He needed to do something about that, but first…

Between her thighs, the flesh of her sex was glistening and pink, already wet. Wet…for him. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Reaching down, he cupped her in his hand and as he pushed a finger inside her, he watched her face.

“I don’t have anything with me,” he said, his voice ragged. This had been the last, the absolute last thing he had planned on doing—even though it was the one thing he wanted more than anything else on earth.

He was so unprepared, it was laughable. He had his hand between Desiree Lincoln’s thighs, one finger inside her snug, wet pussy, and his cock ached like a bad tooth and the nearest fucking gas station was fifteen miles away.

Her lashes drooped low over her eyes. “I’m on birth control.” Then she arched her hips against his hand, a shuddering sigh rolling out of her. “And that’s not the only consideration…but I’m clean. Broke up with my last serious boyfriend a few years ago and haven’t been intimate with anybody since him.”

He knew she’d broken up with the guy—he even knew the date. He knew the guy’s name, his address, his job. And he also knew that the last thing he needed to be saying was, “I have a physical yearly and I’m clean.”

“We’re responsible, reasonable adults,” Dez said. She rocked against his hand once more and reached down, closed her fingers around his wrist, held him closer as she started to ride his hand slowly.

His heart slammed against his ribs at the sheer, sweet sensuality of it.

“Yes. And we should both know better.”

Their gazes met. “Fuck it,” she whispered.

He shoved his trousers down and tugged her to the edge of the island, steadied himself. Disentangling his hand, he lifted his fingers to his mouth and muttered, “Later, I’m going to taste you. All of you.” Then he licked them clean before gripping her hips.

He had the pleasure of watching her eyes flutter as he pushed inside…slowly. Feeling that soft flesh yield and stretch around him as he took her. Slick, tight…so wet. Skin to skin. He hadn’t gone skin to skin with a woman…ever. As he buried himself completely inside her, he pressed his brow to hers and stared into her dark, warm eyes, shaken to the very core.

“Dez,” he whispered against her lips.

She brought her legs up, wrapped them around his hips.

“Make love to me, Taylor,” she murmured.

How could he do anything but?

* * *

LATER, he kept his promise.
After
Dez called her friend Julie and told her she’d have somebody with her and would be okay through the night, of course.

And after Taylor did something she didn’t think she’d ever seen him do.

He took the rest of the day off, calling in for personal time.

One very hot shower later, she was sprawled on the bed and he was sprawled between her thighs, her butt in his hands and his mouth against her pussy, his tongue stroking and teasing and making her so damn hot, she didn’t know if her heart could handle it.

He tasted her, he tormented her, he teased her, and when she was sure she’d die if she didn’t come, he rolled onto his back and pulled her on top of him. Sensitive and sore, her body unused to the demands after a few years of celibacy, she bit her lip as she slowly sank down and took him inside.

“I love looking at you,” he whispered, his voice raw, rough. So unlike the cool, collected professional she was used to. The steely blue of his eyes was molten and hot, stroking all over her flesh like liquid, living flame. His hands cupped her breasts, plumping them together, teasing her nipples until each light touch was like an arrow of fire shooting straight down to her crotch.

Dazed, she rested her hands on his chest and rocked against him.

He lifted his head and caught one nipple in his mouth and Dez shuddered, shook, clenched down around him. It made him groan and the vibration of it against her flesh had her shaking all over.

Madness…she’d fallen into madness.

Actually, though, it was more than that.

She was insane and she was in…in something else that she wouldn’t even think about. Not right now. Bending down, she crushed her mouth to his, linked their fingers, and started to pump against him, madly. Desperate. Driving. So full of need, so full of hunger.

She needed him—so much. The ache had lived inside her for so long and she’d ignored it for so long.

The thick ridge of his cock twitched, swelled inside her, and he shifted, adjusting her weight so that when she moved, she was pressing against him just…
there
…

She cried out against his mouth and went shuddering, shaking, and screaming into orgasm.

* * *

ALTHOUGH she wasn’t surprised by the distance between them the next day, it did hurt.

She sat sipping her coffee and watching as he put his armor back on.

That suit, a little wrinkled and worse for the wear, hid a body she’d held pressed against hers through the night and she decided she really did hate those suits. He used them to hide.

And when his phone rang, she watched as he used that to put even more distance between them.

But she wasn’t surprised.

As he finished taking the call, talking in terse sentences, she shored up her defenses. She had feelings for the cold bastard, but she knew a one-night stand with him wasn’t going to change things…not for him. Maybe she’d hoped to get him out of her mind, and only time would tell if it worked.

When he disconnected, she lowered her coffee and glanced up at him. “Missing child?”

“Yes.”

She nodded and asked, “Who do you think you’ll call in?”

He tugged his tie on, tying it in smooth, efficient motions. “It was Taige Br—Morgan that called. She’s already tracking.”

“Taige?” For the past few years, Taige had been mostly incommunicado with the bureau. Ever since that last injury. Although the injury wasn’t to blame. She’d gotten married, had a real life…finally. Dez was happy for her. Taige needed a real life, something outside the misery the other woman had known for most of her life. But if something was pulling at her, Taige wasn’t going to ignore it, she supposed.

“Yes.”

Recognizing the distance, and even more, recognizing the light burning in his eyes, she lifted her cup. “Then you’d better hit the road, boss. If Taige has a live one, it probably won’t take that long for her to track the kid down.”

He came closer and, for a brief second, her heart stopped. But all he did was angle her chin up so he could scrutinize her neck. Jerking her chin out of his grip, she said edgily, “I’m fine. They wanted me to have somebody with me for the day.”

She pushed away from the chair and carried her coffee over to the sink. Suddenly it was turning her stomach. She dumped it down the drain and looked at him over her shoulder. “I had somebody with me all day…and all night. Now, if you don’t mind…I need a shower.”