No, he understood far too much, was way too perceptive for her to lie right now. “I can’t—I can’t talk about it,” she said finally, after a long silence.
He drummed his fingers once more, thinking about it. If there was one thing a former Navy SEAL, former FBI HRT guy understood, it would be what he’d call “opsec”. Operational security. What she knew and what she suspected hadn’t been classified as secret because it didn’t officially exist, was pure supposition, but it was a bombshell nonetheless. And certainly not something she could share now.
“Okay.” Nick continued watching her, face expressionless. “I can’t argue with that. So, you won’t tell me—”
“Can’t,” she interrupted. “Can’t tell you.”
“All right.” He bowed his head in acknowledgement. “Can’t tell me. I respect that. God knows I’ve got enough stuff of my own I can’t talk about.”
I bet, Kay thought. Just about every mission of his as a SEAL would remain classified until the sun went nova.
“Just tell me this. Give me this much.” His jaw muscles hardened, the skin over his temples hollowed. “Someone bothering you? Harassing you?”
She might be driven into lifelong exile, she might be tossed into the deepest dungeon in the world, she could lose everything she had worked so hard for.
Her head dropped. “Not quite in the way you mean, but…yes.”
Nick was silent.
Surprised, she lifted her head.
He waited another beat. “That stops,” he said. “Right now.”
Actually, it did. Not because of something Nick could do, but because of what she was about to do. She was stepping into danger…but it was almost better than the last few weeks of agonizing heartache as she slowly came to the realization that someone in an institution she worshipped had sold out and had her best friend killed.
Whatever was to come, at least she wasn’t tormented by doubts. Whatever was to come, she was going to face it head-on.
So, yeah. It stopped, right now.
“Thanks.” Kay smiled wryly.
He cocked his head, studying her. “I can’t ask and you can’t tell. That’s about it, right?”
She nodded, throat tight.
Oh God, how she wished she could unburden herself. How she wished she could open up, tell him everything, walk him through how she got here, alone and lost.
Nick was smart and, above all, Nick thought strategically and tactically. Kay was lost in this world. Her world was science, the world of truths. Eternal truths. A world of things that could be proven. Two plus two equals four had been true before humans walked the earth and would be true to the end of time. The beauty of science was its clarity. If scientists didn’t understand the truth, it wasn’t nature’s fault, it was theirs. The universe was clear and straightforward, even down to quantum physics. It was people who were opaque and contradictory and often made no sense at all.
“Something I have to deal with myself,” she said. “You can’t help me.” Actually, no one could help her.
“I can’t help you with the science thing,” Nick admitted. “But I can beat someone up for you. Easy. I’d enjoy it, too.”
A laugh burst out of her, a little intense bubble of emotion that brought tears to her eyes. Whoa. She coughed and looked away, blinking furiously. If only it were so easy.
For a second Kay was so tempted to lay all her problems before him, put everything in his very large and very capable scarred hands. Nick would know what to do. And now that he was out of the FBI, his career couldn’t be ruined.
But that would be so unfair. Kay had a heavy burden to bear, and it was hers alone. Nick was a good guy, but he’d already helped her out so much. He’d helped save her grandfather, her only family.
Nick was interested in her—he’d shown that. He’d made it clear he’d like an affair. But sex didn’t mean he wanted to take all her baggage on board. It would be like lifting a thousand-ton anvil, all for a quick lay.
Though with Nick, maybe it wouldn’t be so quick…
Heat blossomed through her again, a blast of it so strong it was like a hand at her back, pushing her forward.
Sex with Nick.
So.
There it was, out in the open. In the back of her mind, she’d been thinking of sex with Nick for a while now. It was, possibly, the reason she’d agreed to dinner tonight. Kay wasn’t used to her subconscious tripping her up, but there it was. Her glands leading her around instead of her head.
Well, why not?
Who would it hurt? Her, actually, because it could only be a one-night stand, and Kay didn’t do those. She’d never had an affair that was only sex. A night of passion then disappearing forever…ouch.
Plus, she thought Nick might like something more. A two-night stand, maybe, at a minimum. A week-long affair, perhaps. Nick wasn’t known for his long-term relationships, but he wasn’t a player, either. He’d want something more than slam-bam thank you, sir, which was basically all she could offer.
But one night…oh man. Payback for all the long, lonely nights wrestling with this huge, writhing thing at the center of her life. Nights spent staring at the ceiling, slowly coming to terms with the fact that someone in an institution she admired was fundamentally evil, way beyond anything she could ever imagine.
Nick knew about that kind of evil. Grandfather Al knew, too. They knew what humans were capable of. Their enemies were the scumbags of the earth. Terrorists, rapists, murderers, abusers, the corrupt. Men whose coin was pain and fear.
Kay’s enemy her entire life had been completely different. Her enemy was nature itself. She was going to be a brick in the wall that cut mankind off from its worst enemies—cancer, heart disease, muscular dystrophy. All the illnesses the flesh was heir to.
Disease, illness, plagues—they’d always been so horrible, killing millions and millions of people throughout history. Smallpox alone was one of the most terrifying things on earth. And yet…it never failed to astonish her that people could be more dangerous than disease. More murderous, capable of much greater damage.
But Nick had known that for a long time.
She’d always thought of herself as brave. She worked in a bio-safety level 4 lab encased in body protection as strong as a space suit, but one tiny tear, one leak and she would die a horrible death. That was bravery.
Nick was braver.
She’d been so afraid these past weeks. Her heart constantly thrummed a drumbeat of terror. She’d end her day exhausted, sticky with the sweat of anxiety. Which was exactly how she woke up in the morning, too. Heartsick and terrified.
Nick wasn’t afraid of anything. She knew that about him. He’d done astoundingly heroic things. She didn’t know this from him. He never talked about it, ever. She knew it from her grandfather and from stories her friend Felicity passed on from her lover, Metal, and his guys. The guys in Nick’s new company, who’d been his teammates in the SEALs. The consensus was that Nick was a really good guy, one of the rare ones. Hard-headed, yes, stubborn as they come, but brave as a lion.
Nick the Lionheart! a teammate had yelled when Nick had run across an open field of fire with a wounded soldier in a fireman’s carry, bullets pounding the sand at his feet. Nick had thrown the wounded teammate over the threshold of the sandbag bunker and then tumbled over head first, bullets following him. Nick stood immediately, took up a station at a break in the wall of bags and started calmly picking off enemy targets, totally unmindful of the fact that a bullet had passed through the meaty part of his thigh.
Nothing ever rattled Nick.
What would it feel like to be like that? To be so fearless? To feel up to any possible physical challenge? She’d never know. But…maybe she could get close enough to him to borrow some of his courage. Touch that strong, tough body all over, feel him inside her…
Another bloom of fiery heat.
His eyebrows drew together in a V shape. She’d turned beet red again. He must be wondering whether she suffered fr
om some kind of mental or hormonal disorder.
Maybe she was. Nick Lust Disorder.
“So,” he said casually, leaning back. “Is that a yes? Want me to beat someone up? Whack someone for you?” His tone was light but his face was deadpan. Tough and utterly inscrutable.
She sighed. “I wish.” If only this was the kind of problem you could shoot your way out of. Pity bullets couldn’t kill viruses.
They’d eaten their way through dinner, though she’d left most of hers on her plate. His had disappeared and she’d yet to take a bite of hers. He took her spoon out of her hand, dipped it into the creamy panna cotta and held it in front of her lips. When she opened her mouth, he slipped the spoon inside and she nearly fainted from the sugar rush.
“Again,” he insisted, heaped spoon at her lips. He watched as the spoon entered her mouth, pulling it out slowly, empty. His face was dark and hard. “Jesus.” He looked like he was in pain.
It nearly made her smile. “It’s just dessert, Nick.”
He wasn’t smiling at all. “Not the way you’re eating it, sweetheart. You’re making this pure sex.”
Kay blew out a breath. This was so unfair. She wasn’t trying to be sexy, though…well, with Nick Mancino across the table from her, staring at her with dark, narrowed eyes, it was hard to think of anything but sex.
“Sex,” she whispered without even realizing it. The word was in her head, in the cloud of pheromones swirling around her, even in the panna cotta. It was in the molecules of the air.
Nick wasn’t a fidgety man, but he froze into immobility. “What did you say?”
What? What was he talking about?
His face was a mask of tension. “What did you say?” he repeated.
What had she said? Kay ran the tape in her head back a minute and there it was. What she’d said.
Sex.
What was she thinking of?
“Sex,” Nick said. His dark eyes glittered. “You said sex. I heard that. Distinctly.”
Kay swallowed and nodded.
“So…” He scooted his chair closer. “Does that mean that sex is on your mind? The idea rolling around your head as a possibility? Say, in a completely theoretical and abstract way?”
“Not theoretical,” she whispered through a scratchy throat. “Not abstract.”
Nick’s face tightened and he looked at her intensely, like looking through a screen door at something from a long distance away, uncertain of what he was seeing.
“Not theoretical,” he repeated. He took the large, snowy-white linen napkin off his lap and threw it on the table. “That means practical. You’re thinking sex in a totally non-abstract and non-theoretical way. With me.”
She nodded.
His eyes were like lasers piercing into hers. The cords in his neck stood out, his jaw clenched.
This was crazy. She was sending out huge signals—like flares on a dark night—without thinking about the consequences. Careful, steady Kay, who always thought before she spoke, was now opening her mouth and wondering what would come out next.
Totally out of her control, as if her mouth was separate from her, run by someone else.
“Yes,” she whispered.
Yes!
Finally.
God, he’d waited long enough for Dr. Kay Hudson. Years, it felt. Like fucking forever.
He stood up so suddenly his chair would have fallen if he hadn’t caught it. A real feat, when you considered he was having a slight out-of-body experience, as if his head was in another room while all the blood in his body rushed to his dick.
He drew in a deep breath and he felt twelve feet tall. Twelve feet tall, strong as the lion of his nickname, about to bag the biggest prey of all.
Kay.
The instant he’d seen her for the first time, back in DC, a beautiful woman worried sick about her grandfather, he’d been blown away. He’d been doing his duty by this woman, a friend of friends, not to mention that her missing grandfather was an FBI legend and he himself had recently transitioned to the Hostage Rescue Team. He’d have put everything on the line for her anyway.
But goddamn, when he met her coming off the plane from New York, worried and anxious and so fucking beautiful he couldn’t take his eyes off her, duty and loyalty to an FBI teammate faded and he knew he’d do absolutely anything to help this woman, no matter what.
And then it turned out she was not only gorgeous, but smart—smarter than him, for sure—and loyal and kind.
Her grandfather, Al Goodkind, had been kidnapped by FSB fuckers, who had tortured him for info on the whereabouts of Felicity Ward, Goodkind’s protégé. But Goodkind was a tough old coot and didn’t break, and Nick’s guys in ASI found him and saved the day.
And Kay had kissed him.
One hell of a kiss, too. Full-body lip-lock, where their mouths stood in for their sex. Shit, that had been one hot kiss. Nick had been around the block, so one kiss shouldn’t have imprinted itself on his brain and on other parts of his body, but it had.
That one incendiary kiss—then Kay disappeared, and fuck if he could get near her again. God knows he’d tried. Half the guys in ASI were laughing at him as he shot to Portland every time he got word that she was going to be there, that there was the possibility of her being there, that she was thinking of going there. He’d also missed her in DC and in New York.
Then he left the FBI and joined ASI. Not to catch her…well, not only for that. Because he loved the guys and the company. It was better than the FBI, more badass. Better bosses. Much, much better pay.
And with a better chance of pinning Kay down.
Because he still hadn’t had a repeat of that kiss and he wanted one, badly. And the sad truth was he hadn’t even been in the same room as her, much as he’d tried to.
And another sad truth—he hadn’t been to bed with anyone since that kiss. Pathetic, but there it was.
Then, out of the blue, yesterday, she’d called him and said she’d be in Portland for some big scientific congress and did he want to have dinner?
Did he want to have dinner with Dr. Kay Hudson? Smart and beautiful and enticing Kay Hudson?
Fuck yes. He wanted to have dinner, then go back to his house and have sex for a couple of weeks straight.
Realistically though, he’d thought it might take the four days of the conference. Taking her out every night, seeing her at the lunch break, being with her every second he could.
ASI was cool with that. Metal O’Brien, Felicity’s husband as soon as he could convince her to set the date, told him the brass had cleared the decks for him so he could pursue Kay.
There was even a pool on how long it would take, according to Metal.
They were all rooting for him because they all liked Kay.
He liked her too. That was putting it mildly.
Nick felt a massive connection to Kay that went beyond her red-gold hair, ivory skin and intense sky-blue eyes.
He liked the way she loved her grandfather. Nick came from a very large, very close, very loud family, and he understood that kind of love down to his bones.
He liked the way she talked about her work, not that he understood it. She was a virologist and geneticist—the fuck he knew about genes? Except the fact that his were irresistibly drawn to hers.
He liked that she was such a beautiful woman without being coy about it, without acting like one. Before meeting her, he’d just broken off a semi-relationship with a wannabe model who looked perfect but was empty inside, like a plaster-of-paris person. Kay was real and warm and funny and so sexy she turned him inside out without even trying.
He should be mad at her because she’d been avoiding him. But she’d called him and here he was and he wasn’t letting her slip through his fingers again, no sir. No flies on him. He’d put his pride away for a chance to get his hands on all that smooth ivory skin.
Kay came around the table to stand next to him, looking at him as if for instruction. She was super smart, but this apparently baffled her. T
he question of sex came up, she more or less said yes, and then waited, as if uncertain of his reaction.
Well, he knew what to do, if he could only keep his hard-on from crippling him long enough to get to his house or her hotel, whichever was closest.
Kay said something. Her mouth moved and he heard her voice as if coming from a long way away. He shook his head as if he could rattle his brains into reason.
“What?”
She looked a little lost, as if unsure what came next.
Okay, he knew what came next. Though it seemed strange that she was unsure, because Nick was certain his dick was so hard it was sending signals out into space that she could pick up in her fillings.
“Nick,” she said, putting her hand on his arm. “Did you—did we pay?”
“Yeah,” he answered automatically, though a teensy bit of doubt clouded his already clouded mind. But yeah—he’d thrown two Ben Franklins on the table. Enough to cover the bill and leave a really nice tip in case he ever came back, because running out like they were doing was really uncool.
Though necessary.
He took her elbow hard. Not hard enough to hurt but hard enough for her to understand that she was coming with him. Only where? He steered her toward the door, hoping he could make it down to the garage where his car was. The restaurant was attached to a big hotel, which was great for parking.
But just as he reached the elaborate, big glass doors, Kay tugged. “No,” she said.
No? No?
Nick stopped dead in his tracks, staring down at her. She didn’t want this? Oh dear God. Well, he wasn’t proud. He’d just fall to his knees and beg.
But it wasn’t bad news, it was good news.
“I’m staying in the hotel,” Kay said softly—and turned bright red.
Nick’s palms broke out in a sweat. She was staying here? In this hotel? They were basically an elevator ride away from sex?
“Good,” he said, and steered them toward the side door of the restaurant, which led into the hotel via a long slate-tiled corridor. They crossed the coolly elegant lobby that, thank God, was decorated in a spare, ultramodern style. There was absolutely nothing to stop him from walking in a straight line toward the bank of brushed-aluminum elevators, because if he’d had to navigate a series of couches and tables…