Page 48 of I Dream of Danger (Ghost Ops #2)

He could understand her worry. They would risk their lives for strangers.

If the three of them got caught, they’d be executed.

They were all real clear on that. But more important than that, if they got caught or if they died, Haven would die, and not well.

The small community they’d gathered round them was precious to him and to all of them, and they were moving toward complete self-sufficiency, but it was still dependent on what Ghost Ops could steal or liberate from the outside world.

It was dependent on Ghost Ops for protection and direction.

If the three of them were gone, Haven would slowly die.

And his child would grow up fatherless.

Mac squelched that thought immediately. Catherine was way too perceptive for him to allow something like that in his head.

“I know we need to rescue them,” Catherine said quietly. “No question. And not just for Nick, for us.” She searched his face. “We need to do this. I feel it very strongly.”

Man, when Catherine felt something strongly, it was as true as true could be. But what she felt wasn’t making her happy. The lines between her brows were back and her mouth was turned down.

Well, Mac had a cure for that. “You feel it strongly, huh?”

His tone must have tipped her off because her head tilted and eyes narrowed as she studied him. “Mac,” she said.

He waggled his eyebrows. “I feel something strongly, too.” He grabbed her hand and placed it right over his dick, and ah, man. It happened again. He’d been semi-hard, and at her touch, at that massive warmth he always felt when she touched him, he just turned hard as steel. “You can feel it.”

Her hand cupped him. “It’s quite a…sensation,” she murmured.

Mac thrust himself further into her hand. “Yeah. I have a strong feeling you should be doing something about this. Forget about those other guys. Rescue me .”

Catherine laughed and pulled him down for a kiss. She looked excited and happy, just what he wanted.

Mission accomplished.

“We’ll get her back,” Nick said quietly, and Elle looked up in surprise. Knowing how protective he was, she imagined he’d tried to distract her, with sex probably, because she was apparently easily distractible that way. With him, at least. But Nick went right to the heart of what she felt.

“God, I hope so.” She twined her hands and pulled them apart, an old trick. “I can’t bear the thought of her in their hands. Sophie’s nice. Good and gentle, you know?” She looked up at him.

His face was tender. “I know. Like you, like Catherine. Would it help you to know that Jon and Mac and I haven’t failed a mission yet? Except for the one where we were betrayed.”

Elle smiled. “Actually, it does help.” And it did. If anyone in the world could rescue her colleagues and her best friend, it was Nick, with the help of his friends. Lines of friendship becoming lines of salvation.

They were sitting up in bed, Elle leaning against Nick’s strong shoulder. Finding comfort from just the physical contact. He placed his hand over hers, lacing his fingers through hers.

“Let me show you something,” he said quietly in her ear.

“To distract me?”

“Yeah, that too. But also because it’s beautiful and we should take time to notice beautiful things.”

Elle twisted her head around to look into his face, eyes wide. Nick, a philosopher?

His mouth quirked. “You don’t have to look at me like that. I’m not an animal.”

She cupped his face with her free hand. “No, you’re not.

” As a matter of fact, he had being a full human being down pat.

It was a new way of looking at him, and it hit her heart with the force of a blow.

He looked tired, new lines in his face. He and Mac and Jon were hunted men, and yet instead of thinking of keeping themselves safe, they protected an entire community.

He had taken her problems entirely upon his shoulders, so naturally that it was only now that she realized he’d done so.

She’d been almost blinded by her sexual attraction to him and the very strong emotions he evoked in her.

She’d seen him as almost superhuman, something more than a man.

And he was, but he was also a man. Who presumably felt tired and despondent, who might be sad that his life as a soldier had been trashed, who felt the weight of responsibility for the many souls in Haven who depended on him and his teammates.

But he never let that show.

She saw the full man now. With all his many strengths and very few weaknesses. She was one of his weaknesses.

“Show me,” she whispered. If there was something beautiful he wanted her to see, she wanted to see it.

“Okay. Brace yourself.”

She blinked in surprise.

Nick reached for something, pressed something, and Elle’s breath caught in her lungs.

The walls of the room had simply…disappeared.

It was as if the bed had been magically transported into the forest by a benevolent wizard.

All around them was deep snow in the moonlight, a bright moon barely visible among the clouds.

It had snowed earlier and the forecast was for more snow, but for now, the scene was calm, gentle.

Picture postcard perfect in an imperfect world.

“Like it?” Nick’s deep voice was right against her ear and she shivered.

Everything felt so…magnified. The beauty of the scene—their bed magically transported to an enchanted forest—the love she felt for the man beside her.

The intense affection she was starting to nurture for the outlaw community she’d joined.

“I love it. How did you—” Her voice caught because he was kissing the oh-so-sensitive skin behind her ear and because his hand was smoothing up her thigh, taking her nightgown with it.

“Hmm?” he purred. She felt the vibration of his naked chest against her back. Nick slept naked, which she thought was a bit of overkill. He was a temptation dressed. Naked he was simply irresistible.

“How did you manage to make the walls disappear?” Because that was a bit much, even for Nick. Even for Haven.

“They didn’t disappear. They turned into monitors.

What you’re seeing comes from remote cameras we have ringing Haven.

It’s one specific spot, one of my favorites.

But later we’ll program it to other spots you might like.

This scene is real time, but we could show a recording.

Sunrise or sunset.” His hand found her core, one rough finger circling her opening.

Her head fell back against his shoulder. “Anything you want, honey.”

“Oh God, Nick.”

“Yeah? Is this what you want?” One big finger slid inside her and she shuddered.

Ten minutes ago, if anyone had asked her, she’d have said she wasn’t up for sex.

Too tired, too tense, too scared. But that was then and this was now.

All her troubles and worries coalesced somewhere outside her.

Maybe swirling in that glorious landscape outside.

They were still there, but far away. They’d come back of course, but for now, she was concentrated on her body.

On the feel of a naked Nick against her back, his finger stroking heat inside her.

He bit her. Lightly. Not enough to hurt but certainly enough to galvanize her, like a jolt of electricity. She broke out in goosebumps and could feel her sex become wet, more open to him.

“That’s right honey,” he murmured directly in her ear and she shivered. “Think about this. Think about me doing this to you.” The finger slid in deeper, slid out, slid even further in. “Don’t think of anything but this.”

“Speaking of thinking…”

She jumped when his thumb circled her clitoris and his hold on her tightened.

She could feel his erect penis against her back, but he made no move to enter her.

Just held her and touched her and bit her and licked her, all the while his finger moving in her now-slick folds with a light sucking sound, and everything she was, all her senses swirled inward in an ever-tightening circle until with one last stroke of his thumb she fell over the edge, tightening around him endlessly as her climax took over.

“Oh,” she sighed.

“Thinking what?” That deep voice in her ear. She shivered.

“What?”

“Thinking. You said speaking of thinking…”

Mmm. Thinking. Now that was a pointless activity right now, when every cell in her body felt replete and swollen. She sighed again.

Nick nudged her shoulder with his. “You were going to say something.”

“I was. I got distracted.”

“Focus.”

Focus. Easier said than done while he was cupping her breast. But the thought had been important…“Oh.”

“Yeah?”

She turned to face him, placing a hand against his cheek. The slight bristle of stubble tickled her hand. “I should shave.”

“Yes, you should, but that’s not what I wanted to say. Catherine told me that she suspected that sex, really really good sex, which I gathered is the kind she and Mac have, increases her power. That she thinks sex made her slightly telepathic, more so with Mac.”

The smile broadened. “Sex, huh?”

“Really, really good sex,” she said primly.

“We’ll see about that.” Nick slid out from behind her, turned her over.

He kissed her, endlessly, one hand cupping her head, the other stroking her sex.

She was very wet, almost embarrassingly so.

He circled her with his finger, dipped into her.

She was almost hyper-aroused from the climax.

The feel of his rough finger against her sensitive tissues was almost electric in its intensity.

He took his hand away, but before she could object, he curled her hand around his erection.

Oh God. It felt so good . Hard and hot, yet the skin was almost velvety.

She pumped her hand up and down, feeling the effect on him.

His breathing speeded up, his mouth bit at hers, the hard muscles of his back became even harder.

“Put me in you,” he whispered in her mouth.