Page 11

She took a quick look at the TV. The hurricane was wrapping tighter, intensifying into a tight knot of monstrous strength.

Its outer bands were lashing the east tip of Cuba, now.

In a few hours, the core of the storm would make landfall.

It was morbidly fascinating to wonder just how bad the damage would turn out to be.

“Hungry?” Alex asked from behind her.

“Starving.”

“Vigorous sex has that effect on me, too,” he commented. “Although, you didn’t work that hard. Next time, you can do the heavy lifting and pleasure me while I sit back and relax.”

She stuck her tongue out at him and he dropped a kiss on the end of her nose. “And she thinks I’m kidding,” he muttered.

“I don’t for a second think you’re kidding. I look forward to having you at my mercy.”

That sent his right eyebrow into an arch and a speculative gleam into his silver eyes. Hah. She dared him to taste his supper, now. Not that she was going taste hers, either.

His hand landed lightly in the small of her back in a protective, possessive way that never failed to turn her on. Oh, so that’s how tonight was going to be, huh?

She leaned into him in the elevator, pressing her breast lightly against his arm as another couple entered the small space. He didn’t glance down at her, but a faint smirk curved his lips.

He asked for a corner table in the darkest part of the hotel’s restaurant.

Pleased to see the long linen tablecloths, she immediately kicked off her shoe and planted her bare foot in his lap.

While she massaged his groin with her toes, he massaged her calf under the table until she was all but groaning in pleasure.

He murmured over their entrées, “So tell me, Katie. What naughty fantasy is rattling around in your head wishing to become real?”

Her steak knife fell to her plate with a clatter as it slipped out of her fingers. Embarrassed, she picked it up and risked a peek at Alex. The smirk was firmly in place, again.

Her gaze narrowed. “I rather like the idea of you on your knees. Maybe even with your hands tied behind your back.”

“And then what?” His eyes glittered like shards of broken mirror.

“I would…present…various of my body parts for you to…”

“Make love to with my mouth?”

“Exactly.”

“And if I do this for you? What will you do for me in return? Sex is, at its core, a trade, after all.”

She leaned back, studying him. “That’s where you and I differ.

For me, sex is a gift. Something I give freely to you.

I don’t necessarily expect anything back in return.

Of course, I get plenty back. But it’s not like I think to myself, “Okay, if I give Alex x amount of pleasure, then he owes me y amount back.”

He asked, amused, “Are you implying I’m a selfish male?”

“I’m just saying your mindset is different than mine. I don’t know if all men treat sex transactionally or not.” She shrugged. “Frankly, you treat everything as a bargain, not just sex.”

“Do I, now?”

Interestingly enough, he didn’t seem offended. Thoughtful, maybe, but not angry. They finished the meal, and Alex ordered chocolate mousse for her without having to ask if what she wanted. The creamy dessert was, bar none, her favorite food on earth.

He let her get well into the mousse before he commented, “Sex has traditionally been a transaction for me. I pay a hooker: she gives me exactly what I want, whether she likes it or not.”

Katie waved her spoon at him. “You don’t want them to like it. You went out of your way to make sure they didn’t enjoy themselves.”

“You’ve been talking to my past escorts, have you?” he asked, sounding amused.

“I don’t need to. I know you.”

“Indeed?” he blurted, sounding surprised.

“You reveal more about yourself than you think you do, Mr. Strong and Silent.”

Alex arched an eyebrow at her in mild warning that she was treading on dangerous ground. But she’d had one glass of wine too many to heed his eyebrow.

She took another spoonful of the sumptuous mousse before declaring, “I think you were taking out your anger over your mother’s abandonment on your hookers.”

Whoops . Predator Alex surged to the fore as he went perfectly still. Alert. Ready to attack. The scale of her mistake finally cut through the wine buzz to register on her.

“Are you finished?” he asked. His voice was cold. Precise. Controlled.

Crap .

“Remind me to stop one glass of wine before I think I need to next time.”

His silence was brittle. Tightly controlled.

You are such an idiot, she chided herself. She kept forgetting what kind of man Alex was. It was easier to pretend he was the kind of man she wanted him to be than constantly walking the tightrope between love and danger with him.

She trailed after him in silence to their room when he didn’t slow down to wait for her. He grabbed a couple mini-bottles of whiskey out of the refrigerator and moved over to the big plate glass window-wall, where he sprawled in an armchair, staring at the ocean and tossing back whiskey.

Was their uneasy truce over, then? She knew how much Alex hated the idea of her going with him on this trip.

But thankfully, he’d been mature and quit fighting with her and André about it when it became clear he was going to lose the argument.

But she by no means thought he’d made peace with the idea.

God knew what else was rattling around in his head and messing with his mind after the past year. She’d read enough spy novels and seen enough spy movies to have an inkling of what he’d been through.

She waited until he’d downed the last whiskey and the tension had left his shoulders somewhat to go stand behind him. “I’m sorry, Alex. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

Nothing .

She might as well not have been in the room with him.

While she could deal with him being mad at her for saying something he didn’t want to hear, she wouldn’t stand for him ignoring her. That was just rude. She marched around in front of his chair, wedging herself between his feet and the cold glass at her back.

“Alex Peters, that is quite enough sulking out of you. It’s not nice to ignore people when they speak to you. So shake out of this snit of yours, right now. Got it?”

His gaze lifted to hers. Had she not already been plastered against the window at her back, she would’ve staggered back a step from the utter emptiness in his eyes.

Where had her Alex gone? This man was…dead.

Remorse and fear roared through her as she fell to her knees in front of him and flung her arms around his neck. She hung on to him as if a tornado was trying to tear them apart.

At first, he didn’t respond at all. But eventually, his arms came around her. He pulled her into his lap. They sat like that for a long time. Long enough for the city to grow quiet below them and the rainy streets to empty of cars.

Without warning, he commenced tearing her clothes off of her.

Some he tore off figuratively. Others that didn’t give way easily enough, he literally tore off.

And when she was naked, he surged to his feet and shoved her face first against the glass.

She heard a zipper rip down, and then he was slamming into her from behind.

No foreplay. No words of endearment. No kisses or caresses. Just his hard, hot body invading hers.

Her breasts mashed against the cold window. Rain struck the glass hard enough for her to feel the tiny impacts. The drops came so close but didn’t touch her. Sort of like her trying to reach Alex’s soul. An invisible but impenetrable barrier blocked her.

If someone happened to look up at this building and zero in on this particular room, they were getting quite a show.

And yet, she couldn’t spare the mental energy to care.

Her attention was entirely focused on the agonized man behind her.

She wasn’t fooled for a second by his angry outburst. This was pain, not punishment.

Anguish, not rage. And if he needed to dump it into her body, she was fine with absorbing it from him.

He was being rough with her, but as always, some part of him held back just enough not to actually hurt her. Relieved that whatever barriers held the beast at bay had worked one more time, she did her best to open her body to him. To convey an unspoken sense of welcome and acceptance.

By arching her back and thrusting back toward him, their bodies fit perfectly. He grasped her hips to pull her back harder, and she groaned her pleasure. He growled under his breath, probably irritated that she was enjoying this. But the harder and deeper he drove, the better it felt.

Finally, as she moaned with too much pleasure to bear, he collapsed against her, panting in her ear, crushing her against the window. His hands came up to cover hers where they pressed into the glass by her head.

“Come to bed,” he murmured. “You’re cold.”

She was frozen with fear for his soul. Did that count as cold? He tucked her under the covers gently enough but then pulled on jeans and a sweater in the dark.

“You’re not coming to bed?” she asked from her cocoon of warmth.

“In a while.”

Translation: I’m going to be up all night, brooding. She sighed, rolled onto her side and drifted to sleep wondering what it would take to get him to shed the darkness in his soul and be happy.