CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Max cut an imposing figure as he waited for them at the entrance of the garage. He stood ramrod straight, his arms crossed and his face a stone mask. The glacial blue of his eyes made it feel as if the temperature of the chilly afternoon dropped another ten degrees.
Crystal drew in a steadying breath and took her sweet time turning off the truck and gathering her bag before opening the door.
Of course, his laser-beam glare zeroed right in on the marks on her skin. In response to the anger in his gaze, the hickeys began to ache and her skin grew tight and grungy. When he raised an eyebrow and his lips quirked as if to suggest she had enjoyed herself while she had been undercover, any shame she had felt at her actions gave way and she turned into a pissed-off operative.
What was she supposed to have done? Her talent was touch, and that was what she used. That was the reason why she had been the one to go. She went in, got the information, and got out safely. All of her objectives had been met, and as an added bonus, she had found a way into Madden’s mansion. No one could have done the job better. So was she going to let one look from Max diminish what she accomplished?
Hell no.
Lifting her chin, she met his gaze. “Let’s get the flash drive to Addison, then we need to make a plan for tonight.”
He grabbed her arm as she brushed past him. “You’re not going.”
“Why not?”
“Because I said so.”
She flicked a glance at Ripley, who just stood there scratching his bare chest. His brow crinkled in confusion before he caught on to her pointed glare. “Ah, yeah, look, boss, we’ve been brainstorming and we have a few ideas.”
“You are not going,” Max interrupted, not even sparing a glance toward Ripley. “You are not getting within a hundred yards of Dittmar or Madden. Period.”
She jerked her arm away. “I have a job to do.” Spinning on her heel, she left Ripley to deal with him.
How dare he! How dare he treat her like a child, like a disappointment. Yes, she expected him to go all alpha-asshole, but part of her had held out hope that he respected her as a teammate and would treat her as such.
As she crossed the threshold to her room, she reached behind her and shoved the door hard, needing to hear that satisfying slam. When it didn’t come, she turned to see Max standing in the way.
“We need to talk.” He closed the door with much more self-control than she had a moment before. The bastard.
“No, you want to talk at me, and that’s not going to get us anywhere.” She kicked out and settled for the smack of her shoe hitting the wall to express her displeasure.
“There is no way I am letting you walk into that viper’s nest alone.”
“I won’t be alone. Ripley will be with me. And it doesn’t matter what you think. We needed a way in, and now we have one.”
He loomed over her. “At what cost? If you are found out, they will kill you, or worse.”
“I know,” she shouted. Did he honestly think that she hadn’t gone over the risk a billion times on the ride home? “But you said it yesterday. This is what we are here for, what we’ve been working toward. I have a shot, and I’m going to take it.”
He drove his hands into his hair and pulled at the ends. “Are you insane? Dittmar wants you. How far are you willing to take the deception? Will you let him fuck you?”
Her denial caught in her throat. She wanted to say no. Everything inside her rebelled at the thought. God, she hoped it didn’t come to that. But if it meant success or their lives, she knew she’d do whatever was necessary.
When she didn’t reply right away, his eyes widened and he emitted a strangled groan. He caught her under the arms and lifted her so they were eye to eye. “No. You—I—Do you know what it did to me, to listen to him touch you? Kiss you? I can’t let you do that.”
“And I don’t want it to come to that. But if it leads to information that will bring down Madden, I might have to.”
He shook her as if she were a ragdoll. “That doesn’t matter.”
“Don’t say that.” She broke free of his hold and stood on her own feet again. “You know how important this is. It’s not just you and me involved.”
“What if it was me, Crystal? What if you had to listen to me seduce another woman? Listen to her moan with my hands on her, my tongue in her mouth?”
Her heart fell into her stomach as the tears sprang in her eyes. It would kill her. She would rage and shout out against the unfairness of it all.
And that was the point Max was missing now. She didn’t blame him for how he felt. She wasn’t telling him he was wrong. Her argument was about his utter refusal to send her in to finish the job. If the roles were reversed, she’d feel exactly as he did now.
Exhaustion swept over her, curling her shoulders down under the weight. “I’m sorry, all right? I didn’t mean for it to go so far. It was horrible, and every second I died inside, but there’s nothing I can do about it now.”
“You will not go.” He punctuated his decree with a finger pointing to the ground with each syllable as his nostrils flared. “We’ll come up with something else. Send someone else in, like Doc.”
“Like that’s going to work. And why should she take the risk and not me?”
“Because I don’t love her like I do you!” Max shouted, his eyes wet. “I love you and I—” He slid his fingers into her hair to hold her still for his desperate kiss.
Salty, bitter tears burned the back of her throat. He loved her. He really loved her.
Or did he, whispered that little voice of uncertainty buried in her mind.
For months she had watched Max struggle to keep them all at a distance. But there was no hiding the pleasure in his eyes and in his smile about being part of the group. But love? Allowing another into the inner sanctum of his heart? Making himself vulnerable to another, to her, was a dream she wished for what had seemed like forever.
And this was the way he chose to tell her? In anger and frustration? No, no, no.
The flutter in her heart at his words died. Did she believe he cared for her? Yes. Love her? Possibly. But even so, the situation they were now in hadn’t changed. And if he was using his love to manipulate her, he was a right cold bastard.
Hurt and anger flavored his kiss with a spicy bitterness, while his fear radiated in the tension of his touch.
And then she saw it. A flash of memories slammed into her with the speed and intensity of a hurricane.
The dark-haired woman she recognized. Max’s mother. Image after image flittered as if they were pages in a flipbook, showing over time the slow decay of Daria Madden’s self-worth as her husband engaged in affair after affair. Max’s scream as he tried to stop his mother’s suicide echoed in Crystal’s mind like an ear-piercing whistle on a train.
Was that what was pushing Max to this frenzy? Did he worry she was going to wither away if she had to engage his father?
Or did he see himself in his mother? Desperate for his father’s attention but constantly losing to Madden’s thirst for power and control.
The complicated dynamics of the Madden clan were no secret to her, but did she have the power to save Max from the shackles of his past?
“Please, Max. We have no choice,” she pleaded against his lips. “The mission is bigger than the two of us.”
In response, he picked her up and tossed her onto the bed. His body covered hers before she had a chance to catch her breath. With rough fingers, he yanked at the bodice of her dress, exposing her breasts while an invisible force pulled her arms above her head and pinned them in place. No matter how hard she struggled, she was held tight.
“Max. Let me go.”
“Never.” His hot breath washed over her nipple. “I’ll never let you go.”
The calm, in-control man she knew was gone and in his place was a frantic, needy soul. He stroked and kissed, bit and nibbled her skin as if to consume her whole.
Her heart broke under the onslaught of his anxiety. If he would just let her hands free, she could hold him tight. Comfort him, assure him of her love and understanding.
But she doubted that would be enough. Deep inside she sensed he needed this, needed this control over her, over her pleasure, to secure his place in her world.
Max hiked her skirt above her hips with hands harsh with frustration, then slipped her panties down her legs. He spread her thighs wide open to his hungry, feverish gaze. His thumbs parted her swollen, wet flesh as anticipatory chills raced up her torso. A groan broke past his lips as he dipped his head to taste her, his tongue swirling, lapping up her cream.
Her hips jerked, the pleasure too much to take as she writhed in his hold. “Max, please,” she begged. For what exactly, she didn’t know.
“I am trying to please you.” He thrust two fingers deep into her channel as he sucked her clit into his mouth and lashed it with his tongue. “Scream for me, sweetheart. Scream for me.”
Her abdomen cramped. It was so good, it was painful. She gave herself over to his keeping and allowed the intense rush to sweep her away. Every nerve ending exploded and burned as she screamed his name over and over. The invisible bonds held her down as the strong contractions fought to lift her off the bed. That wicked mouth of his never let her rest as he dragged her along the course he dictated, working her fevered flesh until she came again, loud and hard.
Max pulled back, his fingers continuing to keep her on edge as he tugged at his zipper until his cock sprang free. Hard and red, it pulsed with the anger that still flashed in his eyes. He stroked his shaft with the wetness from her orgasm and mixed it with the bead of cum dripping from the tip.
“No man makes you as wet as me.”
Dittmar’s words punched her in the chest. Tears she no longer had the power to hold back fell down her cheeks. “No one but you, Max. Only you.”
He worked the blunt head up and down her slit before wedging into her entrance. “Never let you go,” he whispered, then plunged all the way into the hilt.
His heat scorched her, his length stole her breath. Bare. He had taken her bare. The importance of the act was not lost on her. This was the last intimacy they could give to another person, and not for a second did she think to argue or try to stop him. She was his. The possessiveness in his gaze and the deep thrust of his hips marked her forever.
“I love you,” she panted. “I love you, Max.”
At her words, his teeth clenched and his pace quickened.
Ah, if only her hands were free. She needed to touch him, ease him, show him how much she loved him. She wrapped her legs tight around his waist, trying to deepen the connection. Everything she was belonged to him. Didn’t he know that by now?
The tension around her wrists fell away as his back bowed and his cock drove deep, pushing her over the edge.
The sensation of his cock spilling inside her sent a shock wave through her body. Her vision dimmed as she felt her spirit float away. Only her fingernails digging into his shoulders tethered her to the earth.
“Crystal.” His voice broke. His arms collapsed, crushing her under his weight.
Against her breast, his heart beat in a frantic rhythm that matched hers. She brushed his bangs off his damp forehead and hugged him tighter. For long minutes they stayed locked in each other’s embrace, only the sound of their ragged breathing breaking the silence.
“Don’t go,” he said in a voice so low, she almost didn’t hear it. “Please, don’t go.”
Everything around her stilled as she lay terrified over how to respond. He might as well have snuffed out all life on earth with his forlorn request for the darkness that instantly plagued her.
The last thing she wanted to do was leave this bed, especially knowing what was most likely to come in a few short hours, but there was more at stake than their love for each other.
When she didn’t answer, he propped himself up on one arm and looked down at her. “Crystal?”
She laid her palm along his cheek and prepared for his disappointment. “I have to.”
“No.” He scrambled off the bed, his glare filled with shards of ice as he straightened his clothing.
“You can’t be mad at me about this.” She too rose to her feet and smoothed her skirt down her thighs. “I love you, Max. So much so that it feels like my heart will explode. If there was another way, I’d take it, but we both know there isn’t. And if Madden gets away because we didn’t take this chance, you would never forgive yourself. Or me.”
As she spoke, he shook his head harder and harder in denial, but she saw it in the tightening of his lips: he knew she was right.
“Please, Max. I need your support.”
The cold mask fell into place as he shook his head one last time, then stalked out of the room.
Damn, damn, damn. She pounded her fist on the dresser, refusing to chase after him.
Okay, he was angry. Understandable. Never mind that she was the one taking all the risk, and she was the one facing the possibility of whoring herself out to save the world. Which, by the way, was only the slightest, slimmest, teensiest possibility because she was going to do everything in her power to keep her clothes on and men off. But no, apparently the only opinion that mattered was Max’s, who believed all she was capable of was using her body to complete the mission.
Sons a bitches. Bumpasses.
Ah! She doubled over, falling against the dresser as lightning struck her brain and a profusion of images assaulted her mind.
A starry night sky blazed overhead. Water bubbled from a fountain. A gunshot. Cold concrete bit into her skin as she lay on her back. Max kneeling by her side. He was crying. He never cried. Blood streaked his cheek. The words pouring from his lips were unintelligible, but he was begging, pleading with her. The images blurred in and out until…
Oh, God no.
Crystal sank to her knees. Agony ripped her chest in two as fear coursed through her veins. Deep, wrenching sobs shook her entire body as her tears soaked the top of her dress.
“No, no, no,” she wept, even as she tried to not fall into despair. If she gave in to the terror of the moment, she wouldn’t have the strength to stand.
It was only a vision. The future could still be changed. Free will. She still had free will on her side.
If only her heart believed the weak pep talk.
After all, it wasn’t every day she envisioned her own death.