She tried to think of happy things, like the fields outside in bright sunlight, the color of the sea, the music that she missed so much. It was making things worse, so she quickly started envisioning depressing things, like Archer and the possible corpse in the basement. It didn’t work. Shoving her fist into her mouth, she tried to stifle it, but it was already too late, Mal had reached out for her and while she tried to bat him away he wasn’t having any of it. He simply tucked her against him, stroking her hair away from her face, his lips against her ear, murmuring soft, comforting things that made no sense.
She wanted to let go completely, to sob in his arms, weep until she was too tired to move, to speak, cry herself out and then sleep for days. But she didn’t, couldn’t, trust him. Somehow she managed to swallow her tears, letting him hold her, comfort her, concentrating on the sensations of his skin, his touch, his smell. And she was the one who fell asleep.
Mal lay still in the shadowed room, holding Sophie. He should slip away, he thought. Use the shower, head downstairs, and catch a few z’s on that quicksand of a couch. The longer he stayed in bed with her the harder it was to leave.
He should never have fucked her again. The other times had been hot, fast, random. This had been something else, something almost otherworldly, and it scared the hell out of him. He couldn’t shake the feeling that this woman, what happened in this bed, was a potential life changer, and he liked his life just fine. He wasn’t going to put himself in anyone’s hands, particularly not a woman who’d betrayed the Committee and had been fool enough to fall in love with a monster like Archer MacDonald.
There were a million excuses. She’d been too young, untrained, Archer was notoriously charming—it should have been little wonder that she’d been compromised.
But she wasn’t ju
st anyone they’d picked up from a temp agency. She’d worked for the State Department, the CIA. She had a formidable intellect and an instinct for the business, plus an innate gift for the physical demands. She’d been sensible and low-key with her emotional involvements—there’d been nothing to hint that she might suddenly lose the brain she’d been given and drink Archer’s Kool-Aid.
He didn’t trust her. Didn’t want to trust her. So why was he lying curled around her, skin to skin? And why did that feel so right?
Feelings weren’t worth pig shit. He was tired; he’d killed a man tonight, which always made him feel . . . off. Sex was the best way to lose that feeling, and sex with Sophie was, for whatever reason, the best sex he could remember having. Not with tricks or acrobatics or tantric positions. There was something between them, something that so far had been impossible to define. Once he figured it out he could let go, but he hadn’t made much progress in that direction.
She smelled like flowers and sex, and he realized with disgust he was hard again. He wasn’t going to do anything about it—she needed her sleep. He needed some too—he had to rest before he could figure out how to deal with the rest of his problem. Chekowsky was out there somewhere, still in possession of the chemical weapon. Archer had found out the man had decamped with all his research records, possibly in search of the highest bidder himself, which left Mal’s job only half finished. He didn’t have time to think about pussy.
But as much as he’d like to define Sophie as simply that, he knew that was much too disingenuous. If she were simply a good fuck he wouldn’t feel so twisted up inside over her. He wasn’t used to fussing over women—he steered clear of the complicated ones.
Get up, you stupid bastard, he told himself, not moving. He heard the change in her breathing, the slight hitch, and he knew he should slide out of the bed. He also knew he wasn’t going anywhere.
She turned in his arms, when he’d expected, half-hoped she’d leap out of the bed. She slid her hands up his chest, putting her arms around his neck. There were the salt tracks of dried tears mixing with the faint freckles on her cheeks, but she looked at him, and smiled. It was small, soft, tentative, and he felt something crack inside him.
He brought his head down and kissed her, slow, nibbling kisses, the seduction she’d complained about before. He did nothing with his hands, simply used his mouth, kissing her eyelids, the sides of her mouth, the freckle-splashed cheekbones, her lips—God, her lips—and she was growing hot, restless beneath him. He kissed the side of her neck, her earlobe, and then he used his teeth on that soft flesh. Her shiver of reaction made him even harder. He was losing his mind, and he couldn’t afford to, not when he had so many things left to do.
He pushed her onto her back, planning to shove inside her, take her quickly and get it over with, but as he moved above her he stopped, looking down into her eyes. And then she said the worst thing she could possibly say.
“I love you.”
He froze.
She looked almost as horrified as he was at her words, and she quickly scrambled to explain. “I mean, I don’t really. Of course not, you’re a cold-blooded bastard. It’s just that I’ve been alone so long, and there’s no denying you’re really, really, really good in bed, and it’s no wonder that I’ve gotten a little confused. As soon as I get out of here and away from you, I’ll come to my senses and you don’t need to worry, but in the meantime”—she was running out of breath—“I love you.”
“Oh, Christ,” he muttered weakly. He didn’t need this. “I’m supposed to take Archer’s place as your lord and protector? Let me tell you one thing, sweetheart. Between him and me there isn’t much difference. I may work for the good guys, he’s one of the bad ones, but we’re both just as cold-blooded and ruthless.”
“I know.”
“So you get off on being treated like shit?” he said, unaccountably disappointed in her. “They should have figured that out before they even brought you into the program.”
“I don’t. Archer was a mistake, made when I was a vulnerable girl.”
“And what am I—the best thing since sliced toast?” he shot back. Why am I still hard? he thought. Those three words were better than saltpeter at deflating a libido, yet he was still going strong. “I’m not better than your husband. Don’t look at me like some starry-eyed twit—I’m a rat bastard.”
The soft smile that curved her mouth drove him crazy with the need to wipe it off her face, kiss it off her face. “I know you are,” she said, agreeing far too readily. “I have lousy taste in men—at least we agree on that one. Don’t worry—I’ll get over it.”
“I’m not going to worry about it,” he said in a rough voice, his insides roiling. “I don’t give a shit.”
He expected her to shrink back, pull away from him, hell, burst into the tears that had startled him a short while ago. She didn’t strike him as the kind of woman who cried, but then, he’d never pegged her as the kind of idiot to fall in love with a man like him. She didn’t even blink at his harsh words.
He started to pull away from her. “I’ve got things to do,” he said.
She slid her hand down his chest, lower, to wrap around his rigid dick, and it took everything he had to still a moan of sheer animal pleasure. “I know,” she said, sliding her hand down with just the perfect pressure.
He felt a slow-burning rage fill him. She’d screwed up everything. She was supposed to be an easy shag, deserving anything he tossed her way, and she was forcing herself into his life, into his thoughts, into his heart . . . Screw that, he didn’t have a heart. Hadn’t since he’d started to work for the Committee.
He reached down, caught her hand, and pulled it away from him, shoving her onto her back. He was going to leave her there, wet and wanting, he was going to turn his back on her and walk away . . .