Page 11 of Master of Secrets
“I hate doing this to you,” I said into her ear. “But if you want to be treated like a human being and not an unbroken horse, then take a deep breath andchill.”
A fresh, racking shudder went through her.
“Listen to me.” I put my lips right against the glowing pink warmth of her ear again. “You saved my life and I’m grateful. I’m in awe of you. I worship at your goddamn shrine. I would never hurt you. Not in a million years. I’m taking you someplace safe. You have nothing to fear from me. I swear to God. Please, Kat.”
Her head turned away, and I realized, alarmed, that the shuddering was tears.
She was crying. I was holding down a traumatized, crying girl.Fuck.
I pulled her closer into the strange, tense embrace, touching my lips to the salty, damp tang of her neck. Velvety soft. I wanted to taste more of it.
“This is why I said no to the coffee,” I told her. “I’m not married or engaged. I just have some bad shit going down in my life right now and it was wrong to get a woman mixed up in it, so I tried to be good. It almost killed me to say no. And then you got mixed up in it anyway. Please don’t cry. I can’t deal with that right now.”
“I’m not crying, you shitty bastard. Let go of me.”
“That’s better,” I said, encouraged. “That’s the spirit.”
“Don’t you dare talk down to me,” she warned. “Arrogant prick.”
I could breathe easier now that she was pissed at me again and not weeping.
In fact, her tension seemed to have eased, ever so slightly. I felt so minutely tuned to her, feeling every move, every breath, every heartbeat.
Her pulse had been frantic and stuttering before, but now it was just steady and quick and strong. She was breathing deeper and slower. Good.
“Please, go out to the helicopter with me,” I said. Not that she had any choice.
She twisted, peeked up from under her lashes. Gestured with her chin for me to lower my ear, so she could speak into it over the huge noise of the helicopter. I did so.
Ouch!Fuck! She had nipped my earlobe, hard enough to make me yell.
Then she stayed still, her teeth laid against my flesh, her breath hot and moist against my ear. Her lips still touching me. Teeth still digging in, just hard enough to show me that she could have taken my earlobe off if she wanted to.
I didn’t dare move, but a surge of hot lust went straight to my cock.
She let go of my earlobe, and murmured into my ear. “First chance I get, Ethan Masters? I am gonna kick your ass so hard.”
Smiling was a kamikaze move, but a stupid grin still hijacked my face as I grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet. My nose was swelling, and my chin was covered with blood and my earlobe stung and throbbed, but damn. I felt almost…high.
“I can hardly wait,” I said.
We sprinted toward the waiting helicopter, holding hands.
CHAPTER6
Kat
Iwas astonished at myself.
I couldn’t believe I’d actually given in to him. Just like that.
I mean, practically speaking, there wasn’t a whole lot else I could have done. He was much stronger than me, and had a whole armored van full of huge, flinty-eyed, combat-clad guys, armed to the teeth. The guy had his own fucking helicopter, after all. So yeah, he’d racked up all the points. He had won. Unarguably, definitively.
The strange thing was me. I had wired myself up to fight to the death, no matter what. Defeat was not an option. In my admittedly screwed-up world view, losing meant I was dead anyway, so fuck defeat. Better to die in battle than…well, no. I didn’t let myself entertain those thoughts. I’d leave it at “fuck defeat,” and go out on a high note.
But I did not feel dead right now. In fact, I had never felt so alive.
Masters was strapping me into the helicopter. As I looked down, I realized my blouse was torn open, which explained all the side-eye and furtive grins. The vehicle would be full of snickering and snorting, if those pricks could be heard over the roar of the rotor blade. I attempted to rebutton it, without luck. It was missing most of the buttons, at this point.