Chapter Twenty-Seven

I did not just say that, did I? Chance rolled his eyes at the less than romantic come-on he’d shot at Suede, but the woman was obediently peeling her shirt over her head. She couldn’t seem to get out of it fast enough. Reaching behind her back, her bra went next.

He stopped the show with a hiss. He’d seen her naked before, but she’d been beat up and at death’s door. No decent man in his right mind would’ve been turned on then, but now? He was ruined at the gift she eagerly offered. Utterly, desperately ruined to his core.

Aphrodite, take a freakin’ number.

A smug shot of pure masculine joy quirked his lips. If he were a betting man, he’d bet that orgasm was Suede’s first. Humbled to have been the one to give her that experience, Chance bowed his head to inhale the plump breast that fit his greedy hand like a ripe cantaloupe, fresh off the vine and smelling just as sweet. Round and firm with a rock-hard nipple the color of a dark pink sunset, he leaned into the scent of that sweet fruit, so damned hungry for all this woman offered. Her tender flesh hardened at the touch of his callused thumb.

Easing away, his gaze dropped to her flat tummy, wanting her to take this tantalizing strip show as slow as possible even though he wanted her out of those jeans. It had only been a week. He didn’t want their lovemaking to hurt her, but neither could he wait.

Once her pants hit the floor, her panties followed quickly. There was no way to last with this lovely lady laid bare, not as tight as his body ached to enter hers. Past the point of coherent speech, he drew in a deep breath of sugar cookies. That combined with sultry sweet smell of her arousal made self-control impossible. With a growl of anticipation, he wedged his knees between her legs and prepared for lift-off. There was no hesitation on her part, just two pointed feminine heels dug into his ass and a whimpering, moaning female at his fingertips.

Still… He was no pig in rut. Chance bowed his forehead to hers, the need to be seated deep within her body a relentless taskmaster that whipped up his spine like the devil, urging him onward and inward. He held it at bay for one last, breath stealing moment. More than anyone else in his life, she deserved all the respect he could muster.

“I can’t hold back,” he ground out as a drop of sweat fell from his brow to her cheek and landed near the corner of her mouth. Twisting her neck, she caught it with the tip of her tongue, her eyes bright, glittering with the act they were poised to commit with each other. Not to. With. Chance had never wanted anything more than to be with this saucy woman in every imaginable way.

“I don’t want you to hold back. Hurry,” she whined in her adorable petulant way. “I’m on the verge of—”

“Not without me, you’re not.” He met her challenge with a plunge into the hottest, tightest sheath on Earth. This wasn’t sex. This was Heaven.

With a writhing wiggle, Suede climaxed after just a few thrusts. Her breath quickened and a scream whined out of her, “Chance, oh, oh… Chance!”

He found his release while the aftershocks rippling through her feminine muscles tightened. So good. So damned good. After these last excruciating months, Suede was that journey to the stars he hadn’t known waited for him. Better yet, she was—home. His and only his home.

“I’ll never hurt you,” he told her just to be clear, still catching his breath at the pleasure of mating with this woman. Still seated inside her body, as deep as he’d never been before, Chance wanted her to know this was no one-night game of slap and tickle. This was the rest of his life, and she was that life. Yet even as he opened his mouth to utter that binding word, his unbelieving brain told him it was too soon. That modern women just don’t—

“I love you,” she breathed against his neck. Suede rubbed her nose over his chin, purring. “I really, really do, Chance Sinclair. I’ve been dying to tell you for days, but I was afraid. I’m not afraid anymore.”

Right on cue, his phone buzzed from his pants pocket on the floor. “It can wait,” he told her, needing to give her the same dedication she’d just given him.

Suede smoothed her fingers over his face, tracing the ugly scars he’d hid from the rest of the world. There was no recrimination in those tropical blues, just love shining there. Love and a dizzying kind of light. Suede was pure sunshine, and he was head over heels.

“You’re happy,” she told him, like he didn’t know.

“I am,” he admitted, his voice more growl than not.

Then say it!

“We have a lot to talk about, young lady.”

Then start now. You already told her you want to love her. Tell her that you do! Say the words!

Her shoulders scrunched just as his phone reminded Chance he had to end this tender get together to reach for his pants. He stalled. There’d always be black ops, but this precious thing with Suede couldn’t wait. Shouldn’t wait. Lowering his mouth to hers, he pleasured himself one last time with a kiss that tasted like candied apple wine. Desire sparked strong and hard, and once again, he was ready. “I—”

His phone buzzed again. Damn it to hell! “I should get that,” he told her. And toss the damned thing out the window!

Suede grinned and he was drunk on the light in her pretty blue eyes. “Then get it. I’m not going anywhere.”

Easing to his knees, he bowed his head in remorse. He’d done the unforgiveable. He’d run like a coward instead of telling her how he felt, and to make matters worse, he hadn’t used a condom. If the phone hadn’t buzzed again, he’d have that important conversation with Suede right now, but first things first.

Leaning over Suede, he wrangled his phone from his pants pocket. Thumbing accept, he answered the damned call. “Yeah?” he bit out, tired of the intrigue that ruled his life, and for the first time, wanting less of it and more of her. To prove it, he dropped a kiss to the end of her nose.

“Where the hell have you been?” Pagan all but shrieked in his ear. “Where’s your earpiece? You pulled it out, didn’t you? You’re… Shit! You’re in bed with her, aren’t you?”

Damned if that didn’t spoil the mood. Chance rolled his feet to the floor. When the hell had Pagan gotten so perceptive? “The day I answer to you is a long ways off, baby Brother,” Chance growled as he ran a hand over his head. “Why’d you call?” He could’ve sworn he heard high-fives smacking in the background. Was that Kruze there with Pagan? Had they bet on him doing just this? Were they laughing at him? Brothers!

Suede sidled up behind Chance, her sensually pliant body warm and molded against his spine, her fingers smoothing over his bare shoulders and down his biceps. She trailed kisses up the center of his back and between his shoulder blades until he shivered. Through it all, Pagan kept talking. “Kruze and I have a question for you, Romeo. You seen York recently?”

“Why would I? He and his rig should’ve been lifted off my mountain by now.” Chance stiffened. “Wasn’t he?”

“Apparently not. Kruze finally made contact with his buddy, JJ. York was supposed to meet Benito Garcia last week, only York never showed, and get this. He’s not answering his cell. Garcia’s only in town because York and his boss, Wilhelm Gonzales, share some kind of German connection. And you know Miss Vicki? Kruze caught up with her. She’s waiting on York’s ass, too.”

Holy shit. It all made sense now. Benito Garcia was Colombia’s latest wannabe drug lord’s right hand man. His boss and one evil son-of-a-bitch, Wilhelm Gonzales, hailed from the loins of a German Nazi who’d migrated to South America after World War II. He ruled his kingdom with an iron fist that included despicable beheadings after brutal murders, all of which he filmed for posterity’s sake. Were he and York related? Man, the implications.

Suede’s gentle fingers smoothed up Chance’s spine, reminding him that there was beauty in this ugly world.

“You talked with Sullivan yet?” Chance asked.

“That’s your job.”

“This op’s gotten out of hand.”

“You got it. The real question now is who do we off first? Everyone? Or do we sit on our thumbs and wait on York like everyone else?”

“He could be dead by now,” Chance said as he lifted his eyes to the ceiling in the direction of the mountain where he’d last seen York alive. The perfect solution would be if York died of exposure, but Chance doubted Karma would be that accommodating. “I’ve got a mountain to climb,” he told his baby brother.

“Call Sullivan first. Kruze and I can still take out these vaqueros before things get out of hand here in Portland.”

“Copy that,” Chance answered, weary of the job he’d signed onto. He had nothing to lose before, but now he had Suede. He didn’t want her caught up in this. Yet she already was.

“Talk to you soon.” Pagan signed off.

“What’s wrong?” Suede asked, her luscious breasts plump against Chance’s shoulder blades, her nose at the back of his neck, tickling. Warm and soft, so tender that he was certain no man on Earth deserved a woman like her. Certainly not him.

Chance snagged her and rolled her over his hip and onto his lap. “I have to go topside,” he said when she lay flushed and completely naked, yet at ease in his arms. “There’s a strong possibility Yor’s still up there. This has to end.”

Her eyes widened, but the real tell to her fear was the deathly pallor that replaced her sexy blush. “He’s… here?”

“No, he’s up on the mountain, Suede, not down here.” Chance tightened his hold when she moved to sit up. “You’ve got nothing to worry about. Trust me on this. That guy’s not smart enough to know how to stock a rig with food and water, much less how to climb down the south face.” Although he might’ve figured it out by now, what with all the ropes and rigging Chance had fortified his mountain with. No need to tell Suede that. “It’ll be easy. I’ll go take care of business, and I’ll be back by sunset.”

“You said that last time,” she whispered, “but you didn’t come back until your brothers tricked you into returning. What if you get hurt? What if York’s not as stupid as you think he is? What if—”

Dropping his head, Chance sealed her lips with his mouth, needing to end this downward spiral she was caught in. The more he kissed and tasted, the more their tongues tangled, the more he knew. Suede was right. A smart man never underestimated his enemy, not when he had this much to lose.

He didn’t come up for air until he was sure what his next words would be. Setting her upright and back far enough on his thighs to meet her worried eyes, he admitted, “You’re right. York isn’t stupid, but he doesn’t know you’re alive, does he?”

Suede had that dazed, just been kissed light in her dewy blues. She shook her head, her swollen lips wet, and her lovely breasts heaving from anxiety instead of lust for him, damn it. His hands should be full of those pert babies, pinching her nipples, not planning how to end a murderer. They should be lying in each other’s arms in his enormously expensive bathtub by now, the one she didn’t yet know about.

Chance gave her the only answer he had left. “Gear up. I’m going hunting, and you’re coming with me.”