Compromised (18 page)

She fell face-first on the ground in her haste to get to him. She took one of his hands in her good hand, stretching across the quay to reach him.

He hauled himself up, moving as if he was as damaged as she was. He flung one leg out and levered himself onto dry land, groaning as he did. He lay next to her, holding her hand.

When they eventually stopped panting with exertion, he said, “That was stupid.”

“What? Coming back for you?”

“Leaving without telling me you love me. Okay,
and
coming back for me,” he said, obviously in pain.

“I promise. It won't happen again,” she groaned, and then, not able to hold her shoulder off the ground anymore, she flopped it down. The jagged pain sent waves of nausea through her and blackness into her eyes. She closed them to try to bat back her roiling stomach, and they stayed closed.

S
adie lay on Simon's sofa in his North Carolina home breathing deeply. She'd given up pacing and checking to see if she'd missed a call or a text. She was trying a Zen approach.

Her arm was still in a sling, but she had to go a full two weeks without pain medication to get back on active-duty status, which was back to Athens, back to Devries Construction, and back to Director Lassiter, who had been eventually found with his mistress. No wonder he was unreachable at the golf resorts they'd tried. He'd been brought back to Langley for some “remedial counseling” and was due to retake his position as station chief in Athens two weeks after she returned.

The British guy, whom she now knew as Malone Garrett, had found them and made sure it was the embassy ambulance that came to get them. That way they could hide that they'd even been there. Malone had then disappeared into the ether, after racking up an obscene room service bill. Simon had just laughed.

They still didn't know what the Russians were trying to distract everyone from, but they had a whole new cadre of operatives working their contacts. The Russian finance minister was recalled to Russia and had disappeared. Had he failed in his mission? No one knew that or even what his mission to distract was all about. Nevertheless, all US agencies were on high alert.

Simon had sustained internal bruising in the blast. The dolly hadn't moved fast enough for him to jump off before it hit the water, so he had to stay on, only jumping clear when it was actually over the bulkhead. He'd just been pulling himself out when the charges blew, slamming him against the harbor wall. It was a miracle he'd survived. A real, God's honest miracle. No doctor could believe he virtually walked away from the underwater shock wave.

It was a miracle that they'd decided they weren't going to waste.

She looked up at the sound of a car squealing to a halt outside the house and hauled herself up, trying not to rumple her white silk dress and silk sling.

He burst through the door in a suit, carrying a bouquet of flowers. When he saw her, he stopped and placed a hand on his heart. Then he held up his finger, dragged out his phone, and took a photo. “I just want to always remember you like this. Beautiful, rolling your eyes, and suffering from a battle injury. You're perfect.”

Her heart filled up. He'd been so much freer with her this time, been so much more open, more lighthearted. She didn't know why—maybe because they now understood what they each did at work. Maybe they trusted each other more. Maybe they were just in love. Horribly, cringeworthily in love.

“Come over here and say that, mister,” she said.

Clearly he didn't need to be asked twice. He ditched the flowers on the sofa and swung her up in his arms.

She laughed as he carefully deposited her on their bed, being sure not to move her arm too much.

He stood and frowned. “We need to get that dress off you.”

With her sling and shoulder injury, she knew it would take too long. “You know, maybe it needs some rumples in it. After all, it won't do to look too fancy now, will it?” Their elopement was planned carefully to be the antithesis of their original wedding plans.

Simon didn't need persuading. He shucked off all his clothes so fast she laughed again, only stopping when his mouth descended, with purpose, on hers.

She'd never get tired of this. Even when she hated him and had thought he'd played her, she still could never resist his kisses. Or his touch. He pulled her gently on top of him and slid his hands up her stockings to her bare thighs.

Her dress pooled around him as his hand slipped under her panties to find her heat. She raised herself slightly to allow him better access. He found her clitoris and circled it until she was desperate for more. As he slid a finger inside her, his phone started ringing and vibrating.

She started and went still. Of all the days…

He grabbed the phone with one hand, and her heart dropped. But he didn't take the call, just placed the edge of the phone against her clit, letting it vibrate against her. She arched as he pulled her panties to one side and slid his dick inside her, his phone still vibrating. “Oh my God,” she gasped as he filled her.

The phone stilled and Simon took a fast look at the screen. He grinned and showed her. “Barnum,” he said. Her eyes half closed with pleasure. Barnum wouldn't just call once and leave a message; he'd call until it was picked up.

It started vibrating again and he held the whole phone against her as he thrust into her. Need for release rushed through her like a wave. Simon's eyes were on her face.

“You've never looked more beautiful. Wedding dress, me inside you…”

“Barnum making me come…?” she moaned.

“Me making you come,” he said, throwing the phone across the room. He withdrew from her and raised her up onto her knees, sliding down so his mouth was level with her panties. He reached for the switchblade he kept in his bedside drawer and cut the satin of the material, exposing her to him. He didn't hesitate. He reached for her and pulled her onto him. His tongue broad-stroked from her ass to her clitoris, making her buck against his mouth.

She braced herself with one arm against the headboard as his assault continued. Then the very tip of his tongue swept across her clit over and over, until she felt like she was bursting inside. As she came, he slid his fingers inside her, prolonging the crest of the wave.

Sadie needed to feel him. Needed to feel his release. She slid down his naked body, grinding for a second on his dick before taking him in hand and sliding him inside her. He held her hips in place as he thrust inside of her over and over. She leaned back and raised her dress. Since Athens, she'd realized that nothing got him off like watching his dick disappear into her.

His thrusts got more urgent. “Sadie,” he whispered, as if in awe. Before she could reply, he came in strong spasms.

As they caught their breath, she looked at the scene of the phone crime. “You killed your phone,” she said.

“Past time, don't you think?” he said, stroking her thighs. “I'm not going to leave you if you need me, ever again. I realized I'd missed so much of what makes you you. I don't want to do that anymore.”

They'd had this conversation before, but it didn't hurt to hear his promise again, mere minutes before their wedding. “Um,” she said, looking at her watch and disengaging from him.

“Tell me you're going to marry me with no panties on,” he asked, grabbing his clothes and heading for the bathroom.

“I'm going to marry you with no panties,” she repeated. She got off the bed, smiling to herself. Brushing down her dress, nicely rumpled now, she looked at herself in the mirror. Not exactly how she'd envisioned getting married, with a sling, a creased dress, and nothing underneath, but it also couldn't have been more perfect.

“Come on. The county lockup awaits our presence.” He emerged from the bathroom and held his arm out to her. She tucked her hand in his elbow.

“My mother is going to have a conniption when she finds out we were married at the county jail.” She couldn't help but giggle—the county's registrar worked from the jailhouse.

“Isn't that half the fun?” he whispered in her ear.

“Maybe a quarter of the fun,” she replied, stopping at the front door.

“What are the other three quarters?” he asked, gazing into her eyes, making her knees wobbly.

“A quarter is that you've taken a sabbatical to stay in Athens for six whole months with me, a quarter is that I'm
finally
marrying you, and a quarter is that I get to milk my injury enough that I get to be on top our
whole
honeymoon.”

The truth was that Simon had spoken at length to Barnum and had decided to run one of Delta Force's satellite offices in Europe. Not, unfortunately, in Athens, but close enough that they could easily travel to each other. Less fieldwork for him—the move made him more of a station chief than an operative—which made Sadie a lot happier.

For her part, she'd been promoted—on probation—to Sebastian's desk. She was going back to the office to open all his files and find out what he'd been working on. It was a whole new adventure for her.

“You'll get no complaints from me.” He raised an eyebrow pseudosexily.

She poked her tongue out, which he claimed in one swoop.

He took her breath away. All over again.

Emmy Curtis
is an editor and a romance writer. An expat Brit, she quells her homesickness with Cadbury Flakes and Fray Bentos pies. She's lived in London, Paris, and New York and has settled for the time being in North Carolina. When not writing, Emmy loves to travel with her military husband and take long walks with their Lab. All things considered, her life is chock-full of hoot and just a little bit of nanny. And if you get that reference…well, she already considers you kin.

Learn more at:

EmmyCurtis.com

Facebook.com/EmmyCurtisAuthor

Twitter: @EmmyCurtis19

He hit enter, and then had a pang of…something. He'd sworn to himself that he wouldn't make fun of his boss's concern about his daughter, but fifteen reports later and it was frankly too hard to keep a lid on his frustration. The sooner his boss realized that she was safe, the sooner Mal could go on to his next job—which would hopefully be more interesting than following the most bloody boring woman in the world around the most bloody boring town in Ukraine.

Abby Baston was one of life's do-gooders. She'd dropped out of college in her first semester to join Aide International and was currently working at a Ukrainian orphanage. She'd been there about six months, and her father was getting increasingly concerned for her safety, after the recent saber-rattling of the Russians.

Mal's instructions were to get her out if the Russians did anything aggressive, like storm the Ukrainian border. Of course the silly woman had chosen an orphanage less than five klicks from the Russian border.

And of course, Mal was spinning his wheels, following her sorry arse around: apartment, run, apartment, orphanage, and apartment again. He wanted to scream at her to get a fucking life. Go somewhere interesting, do something dubious—anything to make this job less boring. She barely smiled or broke stride to even look in a shop window.

And it was fucking hard work, sitting there doing nothing. Under normal circumstances, he'd just engineer a meeting, seduce her, and pretend to be her boyfriend until the job was over. It was a method he'd perfected over time, and by far the easiest way to keep an unsuspecting principal close and safe.

Not to mention the most fun. But she wasn't even interesting enough to warrant even entertaining that idea.

Besides, he valued his job. Baston was one of the few people who didn't bat an eye at Mal's heavily redacted employment record. So this was a job worth keeping, and seducing the boss's daughter was out of the question. Which meant that he actually had to do his job and follow her everywhere she went. And now his life was effectively as boring as hers.

He checked that the sitrep had been received, checked his watch and yawned, leaned back in his plastic lawn chair and propped his feet up on the windowsill of his apartment. A camera was set up on a tripod, for all the good it did. The girl closed the curtains when she came home from the orphanage at night. He sighed and closed his eyes. He'd never been as tired on a job as he was here.

There was just nothing to keep his brain occupied. In the two weeks he'd been in the flat, he'd tried crosswords, Sudoku, and mah-jongg. He hadn't actually tried Candy Crush. He was saving that as a last resort. Even his damn PC was complaining at the shit he was making it do. A quiet buzzer went off beside him and he reluctantly took his feet off the sill and leaned forward, his hand on the remote for the camera.

He'd put the alarm under the carpet in her doorway so that he'd be alerted to anyone entering her flat. Even if it was just her. He checked his watch again. Yup. She was bang on time.

His boss was a wizened old dog who had any number of awful and awesome stories to tell after a drink and a cigar. What the hell had happened to his offspring? His son was some kind of corporate lawyer and his daughter was—well, an aid worker. Where was this generation's love of danger, excitement, and risk?

Okay, it wasn't exactly a different generation; she was only six years younger than him. But still. He leaned back in his rickety chair and contemplated the women he'd had who'd been about six years younger. And then he wondered what Danielle was up to now—she'd been every bit of six years older than him…and those six years were all she'd admitted to. But she'd been a classy—and very dirty—lady. He grinned at the memory. They'd been in the Sinai, he'd been collecting intel, and she did work for the embassy. She'd opened doors to him in the Egyptian society that would have remained closed to someone like him. She was…

What the—

He got up so fast that the lawn chair snapped closed and fell to the floor. Abby was opening the window, despite the chilly evening air. She was jumping up and down. What the—?

The floor-to-ceiling windows showed virtually her whole apartment except the bedroom, which he'd already looked at the first time he'd broken in. He grinned as she waved her hands around. She'd burned something. Ouch, it looked like it had spilled on her. For a second something panged in him, seeing her with something red all down the front of her shirt. A wafer-thin sliver of his brain thought she might've been shot, but the rest of his brain's experience said gunshot victims rarely flapped around like that.

For a second something else flickered across his mind. That tiny sliver of his brain hadn't been surprised at the prospect of her being shot. Mal's eyes flickered to the right for a second as he tried to solidify that thought. There was something about her. Was anyone really that dull in real life? Especially a relative of his boss? Was she hiding something?

He'd survived years of combat and enemy activity just listening to his gut. And his gut was now singing a song that had been alien to him before Abby had spilled something tomato down her front. Accepting that maybe she wasn't exactly as she seemed relaxed him. It was as if his instinct had been waiting for his brain to catch up. He was going to have to meet her.

Somehow.

Eyes on Abby, he opened a bag of strangely flavored Ukrainian crisps…no chance of burning anything in here. He hadn't even touched the kitchen—such as it was—since he'd arrived. He watched the windows of her apartment, newly alert to any possibility.

She disappeared for a few minutes, and he picked up his binoculars.

He looked back up as a movement caught his eye. She'd taken her shirt off and was waving it around her head, trying to get the smoke out of the apartment. In her underwear. He fumbled the binoculars and they fell on his foot. He winced and picked them up, carefully stretching his foot to make sure there was no lasting damage.

Looking across the road, he could still see her waving the smoke away. His fingers twitched toward the binoculars again. Every cell in his body wanted to see her in her underwear, but he knew he shouldn't.

Except…he had a hook in his brain now. Something wasn't right. He just couldn't figure out what.

He peered through the window. Yes he could have gone all zoom lens on her, but knowing she was in her underwear kind of made him feel sketchy about looking. All he needed to do was make sure she was okay, and try to figure out what was starting to bother him about her.

She was laughing at herself. Waving her arms around the room like a crazy person. He smiled. He'd seen her smile only a couple of times, and once had been in an ID photo that was in her file.

Bloody hell!

She started dancing like a crazy person, still wafting smoke out of the window. She wriggled out of her skirt and was also wafting that around her head, making her look from a distance that she was twirling duo lassos. It was like watching a totally different person. In virtually no clothes. He looked away again, but his eyes were inevitably drawn back to the tableau.

She coughed, covering her mouth with her skirt, and he tensed. Was there gas? Was the smoke too much for her? But she just turned back to the kitchen. Then she popped open a few other windows and continued waving her arms to get rid of the residual burning smell probably, laughing and singing, seemingly at the top of her voice. This was totally not the Abby he'd been following for weeks. Not even close. She looked fun.

Determined not to invade her privacy any more, he grabbed his phone and paged through the news. A flash from Abby's window caught his eye, and he looked up again. She was closing the windows and swishing the curtains shut. All but one that didn't go all the way. He watched for a second and then went back to the news—such as it was. Celebrities, politics, and wars. He sighed and clicked through to a story about the G20 meetings that were being held in Athens. He knew a few operatives working there, so he scanned the article for anything familiar.

He took one more cursory look at Abby's apartment.

Oh my God, what is she doing now?
This was obviously a part of her evening
routine that he hadn't seen before.

Abby stretched like a cat, yawned, and held some kind of yoga pose. He only saw half her body between the curtains that hadn't completely shut, but still, he couldn't help but notice her breasts move together as she did.

He swallowed.
Look away, look away.

He looked back.

She turned around and touched her toes. Jesus fucking Christ. Impossibly small panties covered barely anything. His eyes flicked to the binoculars.
No way, Garrett.
He wasn't going to start being a Peeping Tom at his advanced age. God, he wanted to see her though. What did that make him?

And did he really care?

It was like seeing her with a whole new perspective. Okay, she was almost naked, but still—he had to find out more about her, if only to quell his gut. He started to second-guess himself. Was he reaching for an excuse to actually meet her? Was he fooling himself into believing he had a gut feeling that something wasn't as it seemed?

He looked again, resolutely leaving the binoculars on the floor.

He was a fucking saint.

Her dark, wavy hair was pinned up in some kind of bun, and the reading glasses she wore seriously made Mal think he was watching
True Confessions of a Librarian Behind Closed Doors
. There must be a reality show like that somewhere in the world.

Between the swaying curtains that half-hid her, she slid gently and slowly into the splits. She bent and touched her arms to her left foot, and then to her right, and then to her left again.

She brought her legs together in front of her, and then stood. She turned so her back was toward the window, and swung her arms around, holding each shoulder with her other hand, as if they were sore. Rolling her neck from side to side, she took out the…whatever was holding her hair up, and let the curls fall down her back.

His mouth went dry. She was beautiful. Not her hair, or face, or body, although now he was getting a good look, he couldn't deny their allure, but it was her grace that really took hold of him. It was as if there were two Abbys. The one who never cracked a smile, who followed a precise routine and never seemed as if she was capable of fun. The other could laugh at herself, even when the kitchen was on fire. She danced and sang and laughed. And then the way she held her arms, the legs that were obviously as strong as they were long. How her back looked when she stretched, long muscles moving under her skin.

He wondered what her skin felt like.

And wondered why he'd briefly thought it normal that she might have been shot.

She turned back to the window and reached behind her back as if she was about to take off her bra. He stood, stock still, almost holding his breath. But her head jerked to the side, and she stopped what she was doing and walked over to a side table. She picked up the phone.

Damn that caller to hell. Damn him.

He took a breath, realizing he was as hard as he'd ever been, not actually physically touching someone.

He wanted to meet her. To explore his gut feeling about her.

Sure. That was why.

Abby closed the curtains all the way, suddenly realizing that if anyone in the opposite building was home—which, judging by the lack of lights, didn't seem likely—they'd be able to see straight into her apartment, and probably judge her for her lack of cooking skills. To be honest, it could only loosely be called “cooking.”

How do you burn tomato soup? Then, how would it be possible to try to move it so fast from the stove that it slopped over on to your only white blouse? She had no idea what was up with her today, but cooking was not on the cards. The smoke had already blackened the ceiling over the stove, and she wondered for a second what would happen if the CIA couldn't get their deposit back. She snorted softly to herself. Drone strike? A visit from “the guys”?

The smoke had left the apartment, leaving a sweet, charred smell that she hoped would also leave soon. Good thing she wasn't field-stripping guns, or having to pass aptitude tests. She'd been so clumsy recently. She was out of practice. With everything.

She'd had this insane idea that someone was watching her, but she'd never seen anyone, and no one had intercepted her when she'd left to dead-drop information under the guise of going for a run. She'd looked for a good week before deciding that she was imagining it. The problem with being a covert officer—a solitary profession at the best of times—is that it made you slightly paranoid. Sometimes correctly, but most often not.

She stretched again and grinned to herself. She never imagined she'd be given a job so dull that an imaginary tail would be a welcome distraction. But regardless, the border—and whoever crossed it—was her only focus.