For Love or Vengeance (13 page)

Chapter Twenty-three

Miguel looked dead tired by the time he and Helene finished beating the pavement in the theater district, and returned to Federal Plaza.

“I can’t believe your feet haven’t fallen off in those heels,” he muttered, slipping off his shoes.

She chuckled. Her voice mail light was blinking, so she checked her messages.

“It’s from ADIC Hernandez,” she said. “He wants a report ASAP.”

His brows lifted. “This late?”

“Seems so.”

He slid his shoes back on with a curse and a sigh.

“Poor baby,” she cooed, and he made a face at her, but gave her a kiss in the elevator.

The ADIC’s assistant was long gone and as they walked up to his open door, voices floated out from the office—the ADIC’s, and a woman’s. A young voice with the slightest hint of—Miami?

Helene knocked on the doorframe, and ADIC Hernandez rose from his chair and waved them in. “I was hoping you’d get back before Special Agent Reyes left for the night.”

As they entered, a petite woman slowly eased up from a chair and turned to them. Helene put her in her early thirties, though her eyes had a tired, almost haunted look of someone much older. Her face was pale and her body thin. Too thin.

Hernandez introduced them, then said, “This is Special Agent Reyes. You asked for help, so I’m assigning her to help you on the Butcher case.”

Helene eyed her coolly. Reyes eyed her right back.

“Uh-oh,” she heard Miguel whisper under his breath behind her. “Major cat fight brewing.”

Helene barely contained the urge to turn around and show him her claws.

He stepped forward with a covert wink at her, and extended his hand to the other woman. “Special Agent Reyes. I’ve heard a lot of good things about you.”

So had Helene. An excellent agent, but a loose cannon.

“Thank you, Special Agent Sanchez,” Reyes replied with a quick smile and a shake, then returned her attention to Helene. “Not to worry, Special Agent Alexander. I know I’m only doing the grunt work.” She held out her hand.

Tortured energy buffeted Helene the moment she grasped it. Shocked, she met Reyes’s gaze, and realized she’d also felt the exchange.

Impossible
. Only immortals had the kind of power she was feeling. But the push of energy surrounding Reyes was undeniable. What was this woman?

ADIC Hernandez gestured for them to take a seat. She and Reyes took the two chairs in front of his desk, and Miguel stood behind them, his hands resting on the back of her chair.

There was something almost protective about his stance.

She tried not to let that sensation distract her as their ADIC ran down the various tasks that needed to be completed, and what Reyes would be doing to help. Then he asked for their report.

Helene glanced at Miguel first, then said, “We canvassed the whole area today. No sign of any similar casting call flyers, but we did run across someone of possible interest.” She ran down the details. “We plan to ask NYPD to keep an eye on the place.”

Hernandez leaned back in his chair, fingers laced over his midsection. “Do we have probable cause to do more?”

Helene shook her head. “Just a hunch, Sir.”

He pursed his lips. “Maybe Reyes can help with background checks in the morning while you go back and try to get something more concrete than just a hunch.”

“Yes, sir,” she and Miguel replied.

“If that’s all, we should call it a night.” The ADIC rose from his chair.

But as they were heading for the door, he said, “Reyes, I need a word before you go.”

Helene and Miguel left the room, and Reyes closed the door behind them.

“What do you suppose that’s all about?” Miguel said as they walked back to their desks.

Helene thought about the energy flowing from Reyes. Clearly not human. But it may have been left behind by contact with someone else. Like Hernandez’s little Goth friend. Though the intensity of that young woman’s power had not been nearly as strong as the aura around Reyes.

“Helene?” Miguel prodded.

“
Hmm
. I think our ADIC and Reyes have their share of secrets,” she said, and decided to find out just what they were.

“Want to grab a bite?” he asked as they reached their desks.

She picked up a folder and stuffed it into her bag. “I had planned on going over my notes while I grabbed something to eat.”

He snagged a few files from his desk. “Me, too. Maybe we can order in? Go over them together?”

Or climb into bed and make love again. Suddenly she was hungry for more than just dinner. She slanted him a smile. “My place or yours?”

Chapter Twenty-four

When Helene said she was changing before their quick meal of Chinese takeout, Miguel didn’t know what to expect. If Helene was anything, it was unpredictable.

He made himself comfortable at the modern glass and steel table in the dining area off her galley kitchen, stripping off his suit jacket, tie, and holster, and rolling up his sleeves and unbuttoning the top few buttons of his shirt so he could relax.

She emerged from her bedroom just minutes later, her face freshly scrubbed, her hair pulled off her face and secured with a brightly colored scrunchie. She was dressed in a baby blue T-shirt that exposed a small strip of skin above the waist of her fleece capri pants. Her breasts bobbed softly as she moved, hinting that she was braless.

She smiled knowingly when she caught him looking, and he flushed, but she turned her attention to the takeout menu she had snared from a basket sitting on the kitchen pass-through. The basket was filled with many, many menus.

“Eat out much?” he said with a smirk when she handed it to him.

“No time to cook.”

He quickly scanned the menu and said, “Kung pao chicken.”

Her smile broadened sexily. “Like things hot, do you?”

He caught her around the waist and skimmed his hand along the bare skin below her top. “What do you think?”

She playfully walked her fingers up the bare skin exposed by his rolled-up sleeve.

“I think we need to do some work before you can have dessert.”

He thought about the kind of sweets she had in mind, took a breath, and somehow managed to resist laying her out on the table to sample them right now. “Later, then.”

Pivoting on a bare foot, she grabbed her cell phone and placed the order while he spread out some of the papers from the files he’d brought.

Helene sat kitty-corner to him, one foot tucked up on a chair as she perused her notes and occasionally glanced over at what he was working on. He looked over at her from time to time, too.

Finally, he sat back in frustration. “He’s good. He hasn’t left us anything we can follow. No evidence at the crime scenes. No DNA.”

“Only that one doctored flier, and even that was clean. No prints. No DNA,” Helene said, her expression just as frustrated as his.

“What about that shop today, where you got a bad feeling?”

“A feeling won’t get us a warrant, unfortunately,” she muttered.

“And if we tell our tattooed friend we’re really cops, I don’t think he’ll cooperate.”

Helene popped up in her chair. “How about chatty Jeff at the sheet music store? I bet he could give us a name for the freak show, as well as the gossip on Tim Gold.”

A buzz came at her intercom.
At last
. He held up a hand and said, “Let me get it.”

He confirmed that it was the deliveryman and buzzed him in. Moments later, a Chinese teen was at the door, a surprised look on his face as Miguel answered.

The kid looked from the door to the receipt and back to him. “You’re not Helene.”

“I’m a friend,” Miguel said, took the bag of food, and handed him the money.

The kid laughed as he accepted the cash. “That’s a first. I didn’t think Helene did anything but work.”

Miguel gaped after the delivery boy, who was already heading down the stairs. They were on a first-name basis? Jeez. She really must do nothing but work and eat Chinese food.

He turned to see that Helene had set up placemats on the coffee table and opened a bottle of wine.

She held up the bottle. “Would you like some?”

Considering the frustrated knots in his stomach from all the brick walls they were hitting with the case, he could use a little wine to relax. It would also help him properly savor the sweets that would come after the meal.

“I’d love some.”

He sat down on the sofa and unloaded the various containers overflowing with their entrees, rice, and assorted sauces and fortune cookies. It all smelled amazing.

She leaned forward to pour the wine and the loose collar on her T-shirt gaped open, providing him an enticing glimpse of her breasts.

His erection surged to life, and he shifted on the sofa to hide his reaction. He wondered how the hell he was going to make it through dinner.

Helene went around the coffee table and sat beside him, then spooned out portions onto their plates. She handed Miguel his glass of wine and grabbed her own. “Here’s to catching the bastard.”

“Amen.” They clinked, and he took a sip. “
Mmm
. That’s tasty. What kind of wine is this?”

“An old family favorite,” she said. Which was true. But it wasn’t wine he was drinking. It was an elixir that had been handed down to the gods and goddesses from Zeus himself. By drinking the powerful potion, a person’s aura was intensified, exposing their true character to the immortal. In Helene’s many years on Earth she had used the elixir sparingly. She almost felt guilty testing Miguel like this. But when she’d spied the bottle tucked into the back of a kitchen cabinet as she’d fetched their plates, she couldn’t resist using its special powers.

She had to protect herself.

Miguel was becoming too important to her—in ways that threatened her mission, and worse, challenged everything she had always believed about herself.

He took another sip and nodded. “Good choice.”

She hoped so. With his second sip, she felt the change in his energy. By the time he finished the glass, he would have a full glow on, letting her judge whether she had made an awful mistake in allowing him to get this close to her.

He picked up his fork, and out of habit she reached for the TV remote. But he grasped her hand and said, “Let’s talk instead.”

She hesitated. She knew what he expected. He wanted her to tell him more about herself. Because he had shared so much on their canvass today. But that wasn’t going to happen. Not if she could help it.

“You know I don’t like talking about my past.”

He grinned at her words, confusing her, although the beginning shimmer of his elixir-enhanced aura remained a calm blue. “So tell me about your future instead.”

She chuckled. “You’ve clearly spent too much time around lawyers.”

Pointing at her with his chopsticks, he said, “And you’re not going to evade the question this time. Where do you see yourself in five years? Ten years?”

Working on her kung pao chicken, she chewed thoughtfully and considered his question. She swallowed and finally met his gaze. “It would be too soon to be ADIC in five years. So maybe in ten. In the meantime, you and I will close a ton of cases. After successfully solving the Butcher case, of course.”

His aura swelled with a glow. “Good to know you think we’ll be partners for a while.” He took another sip of the elixir, his aura growing steadily, the blue of peace, calm, and truthfulness rippling around him in soft waves like the Caribbean Sea.

With a carefree shrug, she picked up another piece of chicken, and said, “We work well together.”

He set his nearly empty plate on the table and cupped her cheek. “We do more than just work well together.”

His touch sent an electric jolt through her, thanks to the amplified aura swirling around him. It enveloped her, and she felt it all the way to her toes. Desire sizzled through her, thanks to the stronger force created by the elixir. “Yes, we do,” she agreed, her voice growing husky with need.

“It’s just plain crazy to get involved while we’re partners,” he said, though his thumb continued to stroke along the curve of her cheek.

His aura lost none of its brightness and the thrum of its power raced through her. He was being honest with her.
True blue
, she thought, realizing how apt a human adage that was.

She placed her plate on the coffee table, scooted closer to him on the sofa, and brushed her fingers down the side of his neck. She traced the warm, bare skin exposed by his open collar, down past the vee of his unbuttoned shirt.

“I’ve never been crazy before,” she confessed, and felt the vibration of his groan beneath her fingers.

“
Querida
, you must not realize how dangerous a comment that is.” His hand trembled against the side of her face before it drifted downward to her shoulder.

Yes. She realized the danger. She had never become this involved with a human before. Had never done anything that could risk the mission she had vowed to complete.

Until now.

“Love me,” she whispered, wanting him more at that moment than anything she’d ever wanted.

Another groan rumbled through him and he brought his hand down to cradle her breast through the thin cotton of her T-shirt. Gently he circled the tip, tracing around and around, then grasped it between his thumb and forefinger, deepening his caress.

She moaned at the erotic sensation and shifted closer on the sofa, but he surprised her by suddenly grasping her hips and gently urging her to straddle his lap.

She slid onto him and his erection pressed upward against her center through the barrier of her clothes. In a swift move, he tugged off her shirt, exposing her to him.

“This is crazy,” he murmured. Then brought his lips to the pebbled tip of her breast. He suckled and bit the sensitive nipple while he caressed her other breast with his skillful fingers.

She held his head to her, savoring his loving. She urged him on with soft cries and the shift of her hips as his erection jumped and throbbed against her center. Heat and dampness built at the connection as her body prepared for him, yearning for the union of their two bodies.

She slipped her hands beneath his shirt and with a fast tug, ripped open the shirt, sending buttons scattering and pinging against the hardwood floor.

He chuckled against her breast and teased, “All you had to do was ask.”

She laughed and bent her head to meet his mouth in a hungry kiss. They kissed over and over until they were both panting with need and she slipped off his thighs, dancing kisses down to the center of his chest.

“I owe you another shirt,” she said as she tossed aside the ruined one, humming in pleasure at the hard sculpted lines of his chest and abdomen.

She tongued down the center of his torso, leaving a trail of wet kisses until she reached the barrier of his belt buckle.

He was already undoing it as she started on the button and zipper. Together they eased off his pants and briefs, freeing his erection.

She kneeled before him, encircled him with her fingers, and slowly stroked her hand up and down the hard length.

He watched her, his hands curled into fists, as she explored the length of him with one hand and cupped his balls with the other. They tightened with her caress.

“Tell me what you like,” she said, wanting to please him.

“Kiss me. There,” he said hoarsely, his body vibrating with need. His aura danced wildly from his desire, the blue deepening to sapphire.

Honest desire.

True emotion.

Something deep inside her came alive in response, releasing a torrent of need greater than she’d ever experienced before.

“Like this?” She leaned forward and dropped a chaste kiss on the tip of his cock, but then smiled and licked around the head before taking it into her mouth for a deeper kind of kiss.

“Or like that?” she teased when she looked up, sending him a slanted glance as she slowly stroked him.

His eyes were half-lidded and dark with desire. His lips parted slightly and his breaths came short and hard as he fought for control, struggling to restrain the carnal beast she knew was buried deep in him.

She wanted to shatter that control. Show him what really lay beneath the good-guy exterior he always wore.

She leaned in close so her breasts bobbed against his straining length. He gulped as the supple flesh brushed the tip.

She cupped her ample curves and surrounded his hard cock with them, and asked, “Or do you like it like this?”

He surged forward, grasped her shoulders, and pushed her onto her back on the sofa. And then he thrust into her, so forcefully that she cried out from the pleasure–pain of his penetration.

“No. Like this,” he growled as he pulled out and stroked deep into her again, driving her upward on the sofa with the strength of it.

She gasped at his domination, unprepared for the power of it. Not ready for the memories it roused of another taking. One in which she was not so willing. Fear roiled up inside her. She pushed against him with a strangled cry.

Miguel halted abruptly, a frown sweeping over his face. He reached up to cradle her cheek. “God. What was I thinking? I’m sorry. Do you want to stop?”

She wanted to say “No,” but the word was trapped in her throat.

At her hesitation, he withdrew at once. Before she could take a breath, he swept her into his arms and carried her down the hall, peering in rooms until he located her bedroom.

Striding to the bed, he gently laid her down and crawled in beside her. He gathered her close, urging her onto her side to face him.

He ran his hand up and down her arm soothingly, and his voice filled with intensity as he said, “I won’t ever hurt you.”

She knew that. Although he was a man capable of violence when called for, he would never direct it against her, or anyone weaker than he was. Of that she was certain.

“I know,” she said, and placed her hand above his heart. His blue aura was strongest there, glowing a rich cobalt blue. At her touch, their connection sizzled with electricity. She could feel the goodness within him flowing outward, into her, easing past hurts and creating a balance within her that had been lacking for millennia.

“Helene?” he asked uncertainly, glancing down at her hand as if feeling the energy surging between them.

But she couldn’t explain. Couldn’t reveal that she was a goddess who could see beyond his physical form, straight into his soul. A soul filled with incredible life and love. An extraordinary essence, more good and noble than any other she had ever known.

Which reminded her of what he’d once told her.

With a touch of awe, she said, “You’re not just a regular Joe, Miguel. You’re a very special one.”

Miguel inhaled deeply, holding in the emotion her words had awakened. For all her outward strength and hardness, inside she was still that scared little girl, capable of an amazing amount of love, but terrified to trust anyone enough to show it. Because of what had happened to her, her trust shattered by the betrayal of those who should have loved her and kept her safe.