Dangerous Ground 3: Blood Heat (9 page)

“Hedonist.” Will tickled his balls, which began to tighten. Taylor sucked in a breath as Will"s fingers grazed the crevice beneath his cheeks.

Will squirted more lotion into his palm. He traced up and down the moist curve of Taylor"s buttocks. Taylor groaned, gazing dizzily up into Will"s gravely smiling face. “Oh God. Yes. Do it to me, Will.”

Will slipped his fingers inside, making Taylor cry out sharply and toss his head against the flat pillows.

“Shhh.” Will threw a guilty look at the door dividing their room from their prisoner"s.

Taylor acknowledged the warning, but the feel of Will"s fingers moving inside him was exquisite. He stretched and pushed down, aiding Will in that quest to find the spongy nub of his prostate.

“Good?” Will watched his face.

Taylor swallowed. Nodded. Hard to find words in the face of pleasure that intense. He closed his eyes and simply
felt
. The scent of musk and flowery lotion, the prickle of hair and fingernails…

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63

As always there was the little regret when Will"s fingers gently withdrew. But the next moment, Will"s thick cock was pressing into him, pushing, piercing him slowly, deeply.

“
Tay
,” Will breathed.

There was a brief pang of resistance, the alarming, stretching pull of skin and muscle, the almost unbearable pressure, and then the instant overwhelming pleasure.

Taylor wrapped his legs around Will"s lean waist. His hands rested on Will"s broad shoulders, smoothing, absently urging him on. Will began to move into a more powerful rhythm, and Taylor pushed back into it, the blood-hot clutch of flesh on flesh. Fevered, damp, restless…he rode the tiger, absorbed the pounding flash fire inside himself, both their bodies slick and shining with sweat, incalescent…

The pleasure of his coming was almost painful, so ferocious it racked him. The sun seemed to fill the room with light, brighter and brighter, burning him up—and then pinched out.

* * *

With the Mad Russian. I could have got us all killed.”

Taylor turned his head on the pancake pillow. There were lines in Will"s face he only remembered seeing once before. That had been the afternoon he"d thought he was dying. The afternoon they"d both believed he was dying.

“Sometimes it does get in the way. My feelings for you. I can"t…”

“I can"t either,” Taylor said. “But we agreed that it was better to take our chances together than apart. We knew it would be hard sometimes.”

Will"s jaw worked. Taylor brushed his knuckles against the tight, smooth skin.

“That why you feel you need five thousand miles between us?”

Will shook his head. “That"s not fair. You know why I want this job.”

Taylor turned his face away. Stared at the dark, scarred paneling. “I know.”

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Josh Lanyon

“I"m not running from
us
. I"m not running
from
anything. You said yourself it"s a huge opportunity for me. It"s the chance of a lifetime. I can"t turn it down. It would be stupid to turn it down.”

Taylor closed his eyes against Will"s pain—and his own. “I know. Sorry. I"m being a jerk.”

“Taylor, you
know
I love you.”

Taylor opened his eyes, turned his head, and Will"s face was for once unguarded, all his feelings there to be read. His own throat closed. He nodded.

“I know you don"t believe it, but it"s just the same for me. It"s
exactly
the same for me. The thought of these two years is killing me. But if I don"t take the posting, I"m afraid of what it will do to us. I"m afraid I"ll resent that decision later on.”

Taylor nodded. “I know. I"m afraid of that too. You need to go.”

But two years?
Two
? He missed Will when they were working apart just for a couple of days.

It would be a mistake to cry, not least because he"d never get over the humiliation, but he was about as close to tears as he"d ever been in his life. It was a real struggle, and he wasn"t totally sure he wouldn"t drown in all that backwash of dammed-up emotion. He kept his eyes screwed tight, but for expediency"s sake, he had to open his mouth and drag in a soggy breath.

Will groaned. “Don"t. God. Don"t.” He gathered Taylor tight, burying his face in Taylor"s shoulder. He could feel Will shaking with the same effort at control.

Paris seemed a long way away.

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65

Chapter Seven

The heat shimmered off the cracked asphalt and seemed to settle on the drooping leaves of the pecan trees along the wide street as they went into the coffee shop next to the Mountain Inn motor court.

“I don"t understand why we"re flying out of Ruidoso,” Hedwig said once they had been seated. “There"s an airport here.”

“Because if anyone is following us, they"ll expect us to fly out of the airport here,” Will told her. “Besides, if we"d waited for a flight out of here, we wouldn"t have been able to get a connecting flight to Los Angeles from Albuquerque this evening.”

She gave him a long unreadable look from behind her glasses and picked up her menu.

Will shook his head inwardly. Through the coffee shop"s plate-glass windows, he spotted Taylor, wearing a new pair of aviator sunglasses, walking from the parking lot.

A moment later, the glass door pushed open. Will"s heart skipped in that funny way it had a habit of doing these days at the sight of Taylor"s lean, rangy figure.

He raised his hand, and Taylor crossed over to them and sat down in the crescent- shaped booth across from Will. “We"re all checked out at the motel, and the rental car is in the parking lot behind this place.”

“Good.”

Taylor"s face was unreadable behind the shades, but Will had the sense that Taylor wanted to tell him something.

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Josh Lanyon

He raised his brows. Taylor gave a slight shake of his head.

Will asked, “Do we have time for lunch?”

Hedwig looked up in surprise.

“Why not?” Taylor picked up a menu.

The waitress arrived, and Hedwig, presumably eating for two, ordered a Monte Cristo sandwich, a strawberry milkshake, onion rings, and fried shrimp. Even Taylor, who most often had an appetite like a young wolf, seemed in awe over the fried shrimp. He opted for the Santa Fe salad with chicken, black beans, and tortilla chips. Will ordered a burger and fries.

The business of ordering taken care of, Hedwig folded her arms on the table and scrutinized Taylor and then Will. “Do you two live together?”

“Not your business, is it?” Taylor said, checking e-mail messages on his BlackBerry.

That was the correct answer, so Will was startled to hear his own voice simultaneously answer, “Yes.”

“
Yes
?” Taylor questioned, looking up as though someone else had answered.

“Half my stuff is at your place. My dog is at your place.”

“That"s not the same as living together.”

“According to Riley it is.” Will was trying to joke, but Taylor was unsmiling.

“You have to hide your relationship,” Hedwig deduced.

“Not anymore,” said Taylor.

Apparently the truce Will thought they"d reached earlier that day was already at an end. “Wait a minute.”

Taylor"s gaze was cool. “Our relationship won"t be a problem once we"re not partnered.”

That was true. Will hadn"t thought about it before. He said staunchly, against the sinking sensation in his belly, “That"s one of the positives then.”

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67

“Yeah.” Taylor returned to studying his e-mail. “I know I"m thrilled.”

Will folded his lips against all the things he wanted to say. He needed to be sensitive to Taylor or this long-distance thing was going to rip them apart, and he had no intention—regardless of what Taylor believed—of letting that happen. So he would bite his tongue and keep biting his tongue, and eventually Taylor would get over his insecurity and they"d be okay again.

“How"d you get involved with Bashnakov?” He thought Hedwig looked mildly disappointed at his change of subject.

“I met him when I was an exchange student in Moscow. I was friends with his son Alexi. Mikhail and I…there was an instant…connection. The age difference meant nothing.”

“How long ago was that?”

“I was in high school. When I came home, I wrote him. He wrote back.” She shrugged. “One thing led to another.”

“Those must have been some postcards.”

“Then, when I was at Barnard, Mikhail bought an estate in New York—”

“You went to Barnard?” Taylor interrupted.

“Yes. Why not?
Oh
. Because I don"t fit your preconceived notion of what a Seven Sisters graduate is like?”

“You don"t fit my preconceived notion of what a junior college graduate is like.

Or a normal high school graduate.”

“Okay,” Will said. “Don"t make me separate you two.”

Hedwig gave Taylor her bared-teeth expression. Fortunately, their lunches arrived, ending further civilities. Hedwig tore into her plate of shrimp with the savage satisfaction of a great white.

When the meal was over, Will went to pay the bill. He was replacing his credit card into his wallet when he spotted a familiar figure heading in to the Mountain Inn next door.

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Josh Lanyon

Of course it was possible there was a dog show in town, but somehow Will suspected Reuben Ramirez might have another reason to be wandering around Carrizozo. He returned to the dining room.

As he reached the table, Taylor, apparently reading his expression, hooked a hand around Hedwig"s arm and drew her to her feet.

“I have to use the ladies" room.”

“You"re going to have to hold it,” Will told her.

“I can"t hold it!”

“Make it snappy.”

She yanked her arm away from Taylor and sailed off to the restrooms.

“We should have left her handcuffed,” Taylor said.

“The idea was to avoid attracting attention. That might be academic now. I just saw Reuben Ramirez go in to the Mountain Inn lobby.”

“That"s quite a coincidence. Here"s another one. There"s an automotive repair shop next to the car rental place. Guess who I spotted getting a tire replaced on his SUV?”

“Our friend with the Mohawk?”

“
Da
.”

“Great. The sooner we get out of town, the better. Hopefully Ramirez and Nemov will stake out the airport. Or each other.”

“I"ll go watch the rear in case Mother Russia decides to climb out the bathroom window.”

Will nodded. Taylor disappeared through the crowded tables of diners and exited through the glass door.

A few minutes later, Hedwig pushed out through the bathroom door.

Will hustled her to the parking lot. Taylor joined them, and they piled into the rental SUV.

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69

Nobody appeared to be following them as they left Carrizozo in the red dust and started the drive to Sierra Blanca. Nor did anyone have much to say. To fill the silence, Will turned on the radio, and they listened to weather and traffic reports.

There was an update on the flash flood cleanup efforts. It seemed that their rescuer in the Hummer had been correct. No lives had been lost, though property damage had been considerable. That section of the national forest was currently closed to visitors.

“Have you ever been with a woman?” Hedwig asked suddenly from the backseat.

Pop goes the weasel
. She had to be doing it on purpose, Will decided. Either because she liked mixing things up or because she believed she could gain some advantage by keeping them distracted and on edge.

“What is it with you?” Taylor asked, possibly reaching the same conclusion.

“I"m curious. In the
Mafiya
, it"s one of the four unforgivable transgressions. It carries a death penalty.”

Taylor made a sound of amused disgust.

“Anyway, how do you know you wouldn"t like sex with a woman if you"ve never tried?”

Will said, “I have tried.”

The words just…popped out. Seeing Taylor"s astonishment, Will wished he"d kept his mouth shut.

“You have?” Taylor was frowning. “When?”

“Back in high school.”

“High school? You never mentioned it before.”

Will shrugged. That was one thing that had always surprised him about Taylor. For all Taylor"s sexual adventures, one thing he"d never tried was intercourse with a woman.

Hedwig asked, “You didn"t like it?”

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Josh Lanyon

“I liked it fine.” Will was a little irritated at the way Taylor was staring at him—as though Will had confessed to having an extramarital affair. It was kind of ironic coming from a guy who"d had intimate acquaintance with such items as butterfly boards and piercing needles.

“Did you only try once?”

“Mind your own business,” Taylor told Hedwig. To Will he said, “How many times?”

Will sincerely wished he"d kept his mouth shut. “I don"t know. A few. I had a girlfriend.”

“A girlfriend? A steady girlfriend?”

Will nodded. Why the hell was this a big deal? For the life of him, he couldn"t imagine, but he could feel Taylor"s shock like an electromagnetic field.

“Why"ve you never mentioned this?”

“I have.” Will knew he hadn"t, actually, but not because it was some deep, dark secret. It was just a long time ago and…well, a little painful.

“No you haven"t. I"d have remembered.”

Will glanced in his rearview mirror. Hedwig was staring out the window as they wound higher up into the trees and hills. Apparently she"d lost interest in the conversation. Nice. Had her only purpose been to wind Taylor up? If so, she"d succeeded.