Page 65 of Sublime Target
All this time…? she mouthed.
Jerik shrugged. Mavrel wasn’t a supreme fighter, but he was exceptionally talented at inventing, and he had a few tricks up his sleeve.
He would be fine. Jerik had no doubt Mavrel could handle a room of low-tier human mercs. The tech had dealt with much worse in the past.
Cooper Garner looked at Jerik. Then his gaze swiveled toward Clarissa… and back to Jerik again.
“Very well,” he said at last, attempting to sound in control of the situation. “But you will leave off this land business. That land is mine.”
“Agreed,” Jerik said lightly. “But should you change your mind and decide to sell it to us, we will be open to a deal.”
Clarissa shook her head and folded her arms, a tiny sigh escaping her perfect lips. She was infinitesimally gorgeous, and Jerik wanted to devour her.
He prayed to the Goddess she would come to him willingly.
Surely, she would.
He’d been very, very good, after all.
TWENTY-THREE
When Clarissa finally managed to get away from Garner and the sullen mercenaries and the chaos of upstairs—escaping the incessant roar of her former boss’s flyer hovering outside—she went straight to the private lounge on the twenty-first floor, the only place she could think of that would give her the peace and quiet she so desperately needed.
And Jerik followed, filled with simmering tension, a stalking, hulking bodyguard who wouldn’t let anyone or anything get near her.
For once, she didn’t fight it.
On one hand, she was utterly daunted by his actions.
He’d reduced one of the most powerful men in the world to a terrified mess in the span of a few minutes.
And it had been so easy for him.
On the other hand, she liked his indomitable presence.
With Jerik standing behind her as she’d given Garner her verbal resignation, she’d felt unstoppable.
But now, as she stood in the middle of the lounge, she was shaking.
The place was deserted. She wouldn’t be surprised if most of the senior staff members had conveniently taken the afternoon off.
She would have done so, too, if she’d heard there was some sort of hostage situation unfolding in the tower.
Especially one involving Kordolians.
Well, it was too late for that now. She’d come closer to a real-live Kordolian than she’d ever thought possible.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Jerik stood before her, carefully apart yet overwhelmingly close. Unable to meet his eyes for a moment, she stared at the broad plane of his chest. Her eyes wandered, tracing the outline of his shoulders, the powerful, corded column of his neck, all the way up to his taut jawline.
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple rising to prominence.
She was still shaking. Whether from overwhelm or fear or just the sheer magnitude of the adrenaline dump after the guns and the hostages and telling Garner to stick it and him…
She didn’t know.
But she knew for certain that right now, it was his presence that was responsible for her wildly beating heart.
“I had no idea that all of this was unnecessary.” She folded her arms, trying her best to summon a glare. “You didn’t have to comply with the mercs’ demands, did you? You actually weren’t afraid for your man at all. So why go to all that trouble?”