5
“When you look at me like that, I’m not sure whether I should kill you, shag you, or marry you.” She breathed deep.
“Why don’t you just kiss me,” he growled.
She wanted to kiss him.
That thought shocked through her whole system. She hadn’t actually staged this night’s scenario to seduce him, but she wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Distracting him into putty to be molded and strung along like his cousin Hank had been at the back of her mind.
She bit her lip and gazed at his mouth. Damn, unlike his cousin Hank, she wanted Scarecrow in all his perfect glory. She’d been thinking about him almost non-stop since she’d met him at the airport and as a result felt the need for some physical and alcohol stimulation.
How the hell could he see right through her? She was the top of the elites in MI-6, and she never let her guard down. What was it about him that cut right to the heart of everything? And why was it that he made her feel so reckless, vulnerable, and needy?
She hated him for that.
His restraint grated on her, and in hindsight it hadn’t been the best idea to drink this much. For some reason she’d been thinking about her family, an indulgence she rarely allowed herself. She wasn’t going to be a chump and give in to emotion. Only there were times when she couldn’t seem to help it.
But she was here to track down the bastard who had killed her family, she was going to end him, and she would get her family possessions back, no matter the cost. Then maybe, just maybe, she could sleep at night.
There was something about Scarecrow that cut down to the core of her. His presence discombobulated her, and in the spy biz that wasn’t good. This might be her personal mission, but she was every bit as dedicated to it as she’d been to anything MI-6 had asked of her. She had given in to her baser instincts in her lone wolf job and enjoyed the sex that came with the job she had to do. She wanted her feelings and her emotions uninvolved with Arlo “Scarecrow” Porter.
She wasn’t used to being so naked, not with herself and not with anyone in her life. Pretty soon she’d have no place to hide from him or herself. And if anything in this world frightened her, that was it.
He wouldn’t let her go, and his question hung in the air between them.
I want to know what the hell you’re doing here. The real reason.
She couldn’t tell him that information. Her trust didn’t extend as far as her desire.
She blinked, then blinked again and hardened her resolve against the unwelcome wave of emotion welling up inside her. Damn the alcohol. She rarely cried, that show of weakness not allowed except in her repertoire of spy tricks when she needed to cry to reel someone in. Then she could on cue.
He smelled so good, she ached with it. He was a hard guy, cold-hearted, cool-headed, and so appealingly primal—the strong angle of his jaw, the defined lines of his face, the bad-boy, bad-ass look of him. It flat-out stole her breath and had from the moment she’d laid eyes on him at the airport.
She wanted to have him, now, to get him out of her system and move on with her investigation and assassination. She was enjoying being this close to him, too much and she wanted the taste of him in her mouth.
She let out a soft, weary breath full of all her pent-up longing.
He made a hard sound in his throat and his grip loosened a tad.
“I’m here for a change, to plant and become one with the earth. You should try it.”
Apparently, his charm only lasted until he got serious about what he wanted. Her flippant tone made his eyes narrow, and it only thrilled her all the more to have him be so threatening to her as he tried to suss out why she was here. The battle between them was something she’d never anticipated. Men were her playthings, that’s how it worked. She didn’t allow herself to get bogged down with caring or emotion.
But damn it all to brilliant hell, Arlo was different. Which made him even more dangerous.
And made her adrenaline kick in. She was ready for a fight with this man. It would be so damned delicious.
If he won, she would be doomed.
“Scarlett.” He spoke her name softly, like that could possibly save them from themselves. It wasn’t lost on her that he wanted her, too. She closed her eyes, feeling woozy from all this testosterone overload and the hurricane she’d downed before he’d gotten there. His hand cupped her cheek. “Hey, are you okay?”
Oh, damn, this whole situation was going downhill. He actually sounded like he cared.
She opened her eyes, and he was so drop-dead gorgeous, she ached to fill her hands with the contours of him again, with the weight of his sex.
Get on him, get all over him.
Her breasts were jammed against his chest, and she could feel the hardness of him at the apex of her thighs. The alcohol and him were fogging up her brain, removing her much-needed control, her only anchor him—those green eyes thick with lush lashes, smudged with shadows of sleepless nights, that sexy stubble effectively drawing her eyes to his firm, enticing mouth tempting her closer.
She was usually much stronger than this.
But not today. Not when she was walking the razor’s edge between common sense and all-out, consuming need.
Would kissing him be so wrong?
In this state of mind? A resounding yes.
His eyes changed, softened, and there was the hero, the man who saved many, who risked his life so others could dance and drink in ponds in their back yards without a care in the world. Not her, she thought hazily. She had only one hard care left in her. She couldn’t afford to let this man, this SEAL, get to her…or his old, lovely mum.
He relaxed his whole body from bad-ass to aw-shucks. Her head was spinning now, and that was the sign she was three sheets to the wind. She went a little boneless, and his arms came around her, bolstering her up.
“Scarlett, if you’re doing this so you won’t have to talk to me,” he growled, a thread of insistence woven into the hoarse, smoky texture of his voice.
“I just need a minute,” she said, then found herself shifting even lower as he caught her hard against him.
How long was a minute? she thought as she tried to find her feet. In the meantime, she lay against all that muscle and heat, her face pressed into the middle of his chest, her breath getting his shirt wet.
She tried to shift herself. She really did, but she must have put way too much rum in the hurricanes. Forget juice is what she called it. Happy juice worked, too.
“Scarlett?”
“I’m almost there,” she whispered as she put her hands on him, suddenly realizing that she’d been hanging in his arms like a rag doll. She had backbone, she had gumption as they’d say here in the South. She was freaking brilliant at walking, and you should see her run. She was really good at that.
She closed her eyes, and between one breath and another, Scarecrow came up with his own solution. Her world shifted as he dipped down, captured her underneath her noodling legs, and lifted her up with such power and ease, she had to catch her breath.
She found she had to do that a lot around this man.
“Show-off,” she mumbled under her breath as he splashed out of the pond and started across the lawn. There had been a time when she’d been carried by a muscular man, her memory rushing and the present dimming. He was dead now. Just like the others. It’s the game she chose to play.
She instinctively squeezed her right hand tight, fisting it in his shirt, feeling all five fingers converge, the backs brushing hot, smooth, damp skin. The scars on her right shoulder were another matter. There was no getting away from them, no fixing them. They were a brand, the price she’d been made to pay for being too young to understand.
“Everything will be okay,” he murmured, his voice deep and easy.
Right. She’d heard that before. She worked in an environment where certainty was for suckers, security for the naïve. She was neither. But that was Arlo Porter, cool, calm, collected, and she bet he was the best damn SEAL on his team. Even with a half-naked woman in his arms, it was business as usual. Or was it? She could feel his heart pounding beneath all that hard-packed muscle. His feet made no sound as he climbed the porch steps, his breathing barely changing.
Why did he have to be so impressive?
She didn’t want to be impressed. She didn’t want to feel anything, not for him or for his sweet mum whom Scarlett already realized was failing. It only took a moment to be in her presence to understand age was catching up to her. She thought suddenly, she’d never had the opportunity to see her mum in old age. That would have been the proper order of things.
He managed the door as if there wasn’t one there, breezing through with her tucked safely against him.
Once inside, he asked, “Where is your room?” The air conditioning was suddenly cool against her damp skin, chilling her.
“Upstairs, left, then first door on the right,” she said looking up into his handsome face, but he was already focused on the mission to get her to her room and settled. He climbed the hand-carved staircase onto the second floor, then went left.
He used her body to push open the two wooden doors, gaining entrance into her room. The room was a study in plantation elegance with delicate wallpaper on the wall, the heavy four-poster bed with its sensuous drape of white netting, a dressing table and beveled mirror. He crossed to the edge of the bed. He stopped there and released her legs, and she swung against him, her arms still clasped around his neck.
She couldn’t let go. He seemed solid and powerful as if he could keep the crow demons from pecking at her. She wasn’t a wilting blossom like the beautiful, elegant room suggested, but here with him, she felt…safe.
God, she swallowed hard. She’d been looking for that place. One safe spot so she could stop protecting herself so rigidly.
They stood there, touching everywhere. She’d expected him to kiss her outside in the lovely pond with them damp and throbbing, but here in her room, everything changed. The intimacy of it seeped into her. She wanted him to kiss her here where there was no ambush, no coercion, nothing but his desire to kiss her.
She raised her head, wanting more from him, and she wondered again if the heat and the humidity of this place was driving her slowly mad.
“Can you manage?” His voice was a hoarse rasp as if he was also fighting a formidable foe. Himself?
“I can.” Her voice was barely a whisper, her words a little muddled and filled with bravado. This is what the American military would describe as a royal clusterfuck. She’d tried to say the words firmly, but her legs just wouldn’t cooperate.
He guided her down to the bed and glanced at the nightgown thrown across the coverlet. It was a blush color, and the garment looked vintage, like something to be found in the 1940’s bedroom of a starlet, with its pretty, demure bodice, the material draping in the back, leaving the skin bare. It was rich and decadent. Just like her indulgence. She should never have imbibed so much.
He stood there, his head bowed, the moon’s glow flowing over him as if it couldn’t help itself, liming his muscles in shadow and light. Her mouth went dry as she slowly, leisurely dragged her gaze back up the length of his gorgeous, well-built body, until she finally reached his face.
Lust, strong and undeniable, licked through her like a river of flame. Seduction was her tool, but he’d turned the tables on her by being so strong and so…vulnerable at the same time. How he did it she wasn’t sure, but she knew in her ruined heart that it was genuine.
She could hate him for that alone.
But she wanted to touch him, run her hands all over him from his close-cropped golden-brown hair to his well-formed toes. He did things to her that no man had ever been able to do. She closed her eyes, trying to grab a hold of the cold bitch she needed to carry out MI-6 missions.
But when she’d shed her identity and become Scarlett, it was as if she’d gone back to that small frightened child who had wandered a battlefield looking for some shred of comfort and security. Her past haunted her from the moment she woke to the moment she closed her eyes, but during her adulthood, she’d compartmentalized it. Here in Bellise, here is where she would find her answers, and that would mean everything to her. Revenge was a dish best served cold. Yet, this place was so hot… Scarecrow was so hot.
She could barely breathe. He reached down and picked up the satin and caressed it as if he’d never felt anything so soft. He set it down, and without asking her permission, he crouched down and started to undo the buttons on her gauzy shirt; the warmth of his hands as they brushed her skin made her ache.
He pushed the fabric off her straining breasts, baring her to his eyes, her skin white and delicate in the moonlight. He stared at her for only a moment, his hot gaze full of tension. Then he grabbed the satin almost violently, manhandling her off the bed. She cried out softly as the cool feel of the material slithered over her taut nipples and sensitized skin.
“Fuck me,” he whispered softly, reaching for the bed to pull the coverlet down.
“Yes,” she whispered in the shadowed room and he stiffened.
“Scarlett—”
She silenced his oncoming protest with her fingers against his mouth. His lips were so warm and pliant and tempting, all she could think about was tasting him and making that precious control of his shatter. Feeling the barely leashed aggression beneath his reserve, along with the solid length of his erection pressing against her hip, she knew she was close to doing just that.
Her greatest wish was to be ravished by this man, except his discipline was greater than her own. She was supposed to be in control here. That’s the way it always had to be. But she wanted this. She wanted Scarecrow to break.
Maybe she could get her control back if he would just lose his.
He was a few inches taller than her as she faced him, her mouth right at the hollow of his throat. Sinking her fingers into the soft, richly textured hair at the nape of his neck, she lowered her mouth to steal from him, but right before her lips made contact with his skin of his neck, he jerked his head back.
She sighed. His reaction was disappointing, but Scarlett wasn’t surprised. He was a SEAL, and he aimed to prove she couldn’t wrap him around her little pinky.
She wasn’t deterred, and she didn’t take his rejection personally, not when he was staring at her with eyes that were dark and tormented with wanting, and the struggle within him was nearly palpable.
She tipped her head to the side and asked, “Don’t you find me attractive, Arlo?”
The sound of his name made his eyes flash. “Jesus—” He exhaled a long, harsh breath and curled his hand into a tight fist on the bedsheets as if he was working at trying not to touch her. “I’ve got a goddamn raging hard-on here, lady.”
“No, I barely fucking know you. This isn’t a good idea—for either of us.”
She blinked, then blinked again. “Oh, damn. You’re being chivalrous,” she said, shock almost knocking her sober. He was trying not to take advantage of her. It made everything even worse and made her want him more, even as she fought it.
“Dammit. You have an ulterior motive for being here and are not being honest with me. I don’t sleep with the enemy.”
“But you want to, and who knows? Maybe I’ll slip into pillow talk.”
Pale moonlight washed across his gorgeous features and gleamed off his hair, making him appear every inch the dangerous gunslinger he was. But it was the candid, caring look in his eyes that captured her attention the most and made her realize how serious this moment was to him.
“I can’t stop at one kiss, darlin’. We both know it. You’re drunk. If I interrogate you, it won’t be in bed.”
His words were so real and honest, they made her heart skip a beat to think he found her that irresistible. She always had to wonder if it was her or her adeptness at seduction that turned the tables.
She went boneless, and he couldn’t keep his hold on the coverlet and her, too. He backed up, and she grabbed his shoulders and moved her body so he was now the one backed up to the mattress. Smiling, she leaned toward him and nipped gently at his bottom lip, teasing him with her tongue, promising something hotter, deeper, sweeter. “Kiss me, Arlo,” she breathed against the corner of his mouth while she boldly tugged his shirt out of the waistband of his shorts, so she could slip her hands beneath the warm, soft cotton.
He wavered, and she pushed him back onto the bed and straddled him. Pressing her core to his hard, thick erection, the feel of him drove her wild. Where she had hoped for control, she was as lost as he was.
“Touch me,” she urged as she splayed her palms on his rock-hard stomach and glided them upward, aching to feel his hands on her, too. “Take me, please.”
A low, untamed growl ripped from his chest, and that stubborn, unyielding control of his finally, finally gave way to all the pent-up desire and hunger he’d been struggling against since they’d met. His hands, which had been careful came up and tangled in her hair, and the next moment, he’d rolled her underneath him and crushed his mouth to hers. Her lips parted on a gasp of surprise, and he took advantage and slid his tongue inside, reckless and demanding, sweeping every one of her senses into overload.
His response was so royally grand.
She’d released his lust, and now all that alpha male aggression was spilling over into the hottest, most erotic kiss she’d ever experienced. Returning his kiss with the same fervor, she wrapped her arms around his waist beneath his shirt, trying to get as close to him as she could.
Judging by the restless shift of his body against hers, he was still fighting himself. Impatient, she wrapped her legs around his waist and was rewarded when he buried his face against her throat, nuzzling his hot, damp lips and skin against her.
An involuntary sound escaped her, a soft cry of need that any man would understand. One of his hands skimmed down her and covered one of her breasts, pinching her nipple through the satin, gentle at first, then harder, firmer, creating a firestorm of sensation that spiraled straight down to her core.
He captured her mouth, his velvet tongue swirling, telling her how exquisite it would feel to have him do that to her aching nipple. Soft, heated strokes that made her tremble and moan. The gentle scrape of his teeth against her bottom lip was both sweet and exquisite pain. When he finally sucked her tongue deep into his mouth, the pleasure was so intense, her entire body shuddered, and she cried out.
Her honest response tore a groan out of him, too, and his mouth turned desperate and needy, her mind spinning from the onslaught. It was easy to flip him onto his back. He circled his strong arms around her and pulled her close, but when that didn’t seem like enough for either of them, he skimmed his flattened palms all the way down her back to her hips. She was still straddling his thighs, but that didn’t stop him from tucking his hands beneath her bottom and flipping her onto her back again. The moonlight caught the deep blush in the gown, painting it with an opulent hue. She’d never felt more beautiful, or more desirable, than she did at that moment with Scarecrow staring down at her, worshiping her with his reverent gaze. Soon, though, what she had come here to do washed over her, causing her to shiver. This man needed to be distracted.
Scarecrow bent over her, pressing his muscled body intimately, insistently into hers with his thick erection fitting naturally in the crux of her thighs. Running her palms over his hair, she welcomed another deep, drugging kiss, and sighed against his lips as his hands caressed her breasts and warmed them in his palms. His mouth eventually followed, trailing a searing path from her neck to her tight, puckered nipples. With the wet heat of his tongue, he lavished each with attention before kissing and nuzzling his way down to her soft belly where, instead of raising her gown, he laid his head on her stomach.
She was panting, and he was breathing just as hard. Hot, damp puffs of air caressed her belly through the satin, and the stubble of his jaw caught in the material.
She already knew what was going to happen.
“We have to stop.” His voice was rough and strained, and it was enough to tell Scarlett that it was taking Scarecrow tremendous effort to bring things to a halt.
Aroused beyond belief, she squeezed her eyes closed, trying to ignore the way her body was clamoring for release—with him.
“Arlo,” she said, “you are a formidable man.”
He lifted his head, raising a dark brow. “That sounds almost like a compliment.”
“You can take it any way you like,” she said as he got off her. Before she suspected what he was going to do, he had her up in his arms, then under the sheet before she could say Bob’s your uncle.
He loomed over her, his male aggression banked but not snuffed.
Oh, God what had she done? What had she revealed? Too much? She raised her chin. “I’m not afraid of you. I’m not afraid of anything.”
“Aw, darlin’,” he said, leaning down and grabbing her rebel chin, the gorgeous tone reverberating through her as he exhaled. “Everyone is afraid of something.”
She closed her eyes and floated. She had no idea how much time passed.
His voice was faint, indistinct. “Maybe if you’re honest with me, we can stop playing this damn game. I don’t care how complicated this gets. I still want you.”
She immediately missed the feel of his hot skin against hers. “Maybe I like our games. Maybe I don’t want you to know the real me.” She breathed softly, her voice hardening. “I’m here for…retribution.”
Her eyes drifted open, but Scarecrow was gone. She had no idea if he’d heard what she’d said.