The Whole Truth (The Supercharged Files Book 1) (24 page)

I tugged his hair. When he
vacated my nipples, a draft from the ceiling fan tightened them like pebbles.
“Wait, wait. Why are you doing this?”

“Cleo, I thought you knew.”

“Knew what, about you being a
spy?” I held my breath. I wanted him to say he wasn’t the mole, say it to my
face. It would mean I’d have to confront Yuri, but please please please don’t
let the man I wanted to sleep with be the bad guy!

“I thought you knew how much I
wanted you. I tried to hide it from you, but how could you not have seen it?”
He didn’t avoid my gaze or duck his head. He was telling the truth, but he
wasn’t answering me. “I hate the thought of you and Walker together.”

Jealousy was motivating for some
people. Horniness and lust were motivating for me, but there you go. “That’s
why you jumped me? You’re pissed at Walker?”

He licked the corner of his
mouth, his lips ruddy from the kissing and suckling. “I want you, Cleo. If you
don’t feel the same way I do...”

“Oh, I do.” My body would
spontaneously combust if we didn’t follow through.

“I thought so.” Framing my face
with his hands, he kissed me gently. I leaned into him, our lips clinging.

“The first moment I saw you,” he
whispered, sending shivers to the ends of my hair, “I wanted to do this.” He
rose with me in his arms. Impressed despite myself, I clung to his shoulders
and bent my head away from the door jamb when he carried me into the bedroom.
It was like the rest of his house—clean on the outside, but through the crack
of his closet door, I glimpsed lunacy.

The cabinet, the closet—the man?

He tossed me on the bed and
shoved his pants down. Toed off his shoes, shook out of the slacks. Boxers.
White. He flipped the elastic with his thumbs and stared at my breasts, which
were not at their best with me flat on my back. I propped myself on my elbows
and...

No, no, no. I would not be
seduced out of doing my job.

“Look at me,” I demanded.

“I am.” He crawled up the bed,
hovering over my hips. His gaze focused on the button of my shorts.

“Up here. At my face.”

He lowered himself, biceps
bulging, until his breath splashed across my stomach. I sucked my gut in and he
nipped the top of my zipper.

“You smell luscious.” His tongue
flickered out to trace my navel. “Your skin has so many flavors.” Somehow he
unbuttoned my shorts with his mouth and caught the zipper tab between his
teeth. After he lowered it, he said, “I can’t wait to taste the rest of you.”

“Oh dear.” He licked and sucked,
inching closer to a destination I knew I wouldn’t be able to resist once he
arrived. As hot as I found his cataloguing of my DNA, I couldn’t let the taste
test continue until he passed
my
test. I grabbed two handfuls of his
hair and yanked.

I cleared my tight throat. “That
is not my face.”

“Ow, Cleo!” He shot to the top of
the bed until we were eye to eye. Chest to chest. Hip to hip. His boxers, my
shorts halfway down—he wasn’t faking his interest in the proceedings.

“You have to tell me whether or
not you’re the mole, John. I asked everyone but you and Yuri. Am I supposed to
believe it’s Yuri? According to Al, there might be more than one leak. Maybe
you and Yuri are in cahoots.”

He chose his words with care; I
could tell because it took him so long to say them. “Nothing would make me
happier than YuriCorp’s financial health and my continued employment there. I
want only the best for YuriCorp.”

He was telling the truth. But it
wasn’t a straight answer. “Are you leaking information to somebody that’s
causing all these people to get burned out?”

“I don’t know anything about the
supras who’ve been attacked. I don’t know why and I don’t know how and I’d go
to great lengths to put a stop to it.” He gave me a tight smile. “I won’t ask
how you can think that of me. It’s your job. It’s what Yuri, what we all, want
you to do. We want you to make a miracle happen because we’ve tried and
failed.”

“I’m not a miracle worker.” I
wriggled, adjusting our lower halves so his body fit more comfortably between
my legs. “It’s especially hard when I don’t have all the facts.”

He kissed beside my mouth,
slowly, murmuring against my skin. “I know I haven’t been open with you, Cleo.”

I nodded, afraid to speak.

“I don’t like to get involved
with coworkers. My job is my life. It’s what I am, what I’ve always been. I’ve
avoided you because you make me want to break my own rules.”

“I do?”

What, I couldn’t believe the
truth when it was staring me in the face, without a mask?

“You know it’s true.” He placed
his lips against mine, his hand between my legs, and I didn’t ask him any
questions for some time thereafter, except, “Jesus Christ, can you do that
again?”

Chapter 18

Easy Peasy

John pulled me into the crook of
his arm until my head rested on his shoulder. The sheet covered us, and my body
ached with the pleasant afterglow of vigorous sex. He stroked my arm. “Was it—”

“Do not ask if it was good for
me,” I warned. The man had been like a machine in bed. My body felt as drained
as a farm pond in August.

In fact, I’d go so far as to say
he’d been like a machine with an endless supply of batteries. Not that he
hadn’t enjoyed himself at the end, but his determination to give me several O’s
had been exhausting.

I tilted my head until I could
see his profile. “I think you’ve done that before.”

“Me? Never.” He closed his eyes
and smiled, a shadow coating his face, but since he was teasing, it was to be
expected. “I feel so relaxed after sex. It’s the only time I can really
unwind.”

I placed my palm on his chest.
His steady heartbeat tickled my fingers. “Is that your way of telling me you’re
about to fall asleep?” I wouldn’t argue if he was. I was tuckered.

“No.” He rolled us over, and for
a minute I was afraid he was about to go for it again. There were only so many
times I could orgasm before I got sick to my stomach. “I want to talk to you
when there’s nothing between us.”

As we were both naked and
slightly sticky, the “nothing between us” part was a given. “Was there
something in particular you wished to discuss?”

 “We need to finish our
conversation from earlier.”

“We do?” I’d been satisfied his
loyalty was to YuriCorp. He liked his job and wanted our company to do well. A
mole would support some other company—or person, or agency, or secret initiative—hence
the leaking of vital information.

“I don’t want any doubts left in
your mind.” He kissed my nose. “No more secrets, no more worrying who’s telling
the truth and who’s not.”

A thin shadow coated his
features. After sex—after successful sex—my ability had a tendency to wane. It
was similar to extreme physical exhaustion, but all I had to do was orgasm, not
climb thirty flights of stairs in Chicago in the summer because the damn
elevator was broken.

Alas, it never waned enough for
me to believe it when a guy said I was the best he’d ever had and that he’d
call. Why was John lying about being open with me?

“Honesty is crucial,” I agreed.

“Especially with you.” His gaze
cut to the side for a moment. “It’s been hard to stay away from you, but we had
our jobs to do. A relationship would complicate matters.”

Was he about to dump me? In bed?
With his naked body squishing mine?

 “We still have those jobs. That
hasn’t changed.” I rushed to cover how hurt my feelings would be if he didn’t
intend for us to start dating. “If this is just sex, I guess that’s cool, I
know a lot of people sleep around at YuriCorp...hell, everywhere...I said I was
hard up, and—”

He was already shaking his head,
smiling a little. “No. It’s not just sex.” His gaze canted to the side again before
returning, the pupils dilated in his bourbon colored irises. This close I could
see flecks of hazel in the brown. “Do you trust me?”

“Suuuure,” I drawled. “But I have
to warn you. When a guy asks that in bed, it usually precedes a vulgar
proposal, and I’m tapped out.”

He didn’t frown. He really was
relaxed after sex. “Do you suspect me?” he asked. “Do you think I have anything
to do with the problems at YuriCorp?”

He’d never struck me as insecure,
but I didn’t mind offering reassurance. “John, I saw your face. There was no
mask when you said you didn’t know anything about the burnouts. Unless your
hidden skill is to futz up my hidden skill, I’m a believer.”

“That’s wonderful,” he said
earnestly. “I’d never willingly hurt anyone at YuriCorp, not even Walker.”

“I guess you believe me now, too.
About Beau.”

He bent down until his forehead
touched mine. “If you were involved with him, you’re not anymore. You’re with
me now.”

“I’m definitely with you,” I
agreed.

He hadn’t said he believed me, he
just believed he’d converted me. He almost behaved like bedding me meant he’d
one-upped Beau, but if he’d been attracted to me all this time, jealousy was
normal. His competitive reaction was also normal.

Normal—no worries. No barriers
between us. “You’re not angry I thought you were the mole?”

“No,” he lied. “Not angry.”

“Come on, John.” Lying to my face
during a discussion about honesty. How rude! “You were a little angry.”

For a moment he frowned—the first
frown I’d seen on his face in some time. Then he laughed.

“You’re good. All the years of
honing your suprasense have given you sharp instincts about deception. Even
after sex, you can tell, can’t you? Maybe it’s a woman thing.”

“Um, yeah, I can tell,” I agreed,
because it was true, although I’d been using my suprasense to call him on his
fib. “Don’t try that again, mister.”

“I was angry at the situation,
not you.”

That was true.

“You had an assignment, and you
performed to the best of your abilities. Whenever we spent time together, it
could have interfered, but now that you trust me, we can move past it.” A grin
curled into one side of his mouth, awakening a single dimple. “We can be
together. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“Are you asking me out?” I
teased. We’d come this far. No turning back now.

“Yes.” He kissed me, but it
didn’t ripen into anything momentous. Then he rolled off me, our skin pulling
apart like Velcro.

“Yeow!”

He laughed. “I don’t know about
you, but after sex I want spicy food. Hot food. Food that’s bad for me.” He
stood, rubbed his chest, and held out his hand. “All the food I can’t eat when
my senses are working. You want to go to Merlin’s and get chili?”

“I’m a little peckish.” What did
he mean, he wanted the food he couldn’t eat when his senses were working? It
would take more than afterglow to bolster him through the evil beans. “Are you
sure about the chili? You and Sam warned me away from it.”

Obviously I’d tried it as soon as
I was at Merlin’s alone, and it had been so spicy I’d gotten blisters in my soul.

“Supras with a taste sensitivity
crave it when we’re burned out. Chili, hot mustard, wasabi—we want it all. The
chef makes it just for us. I figure we’ve got an hour or two of post-coital
before I flicker back. Merlin’s is only twenty minutes away.”

“What? What? What?” Me, the
broken record, skipping on a word like a twitch. I squirmed into a sitting
position and yanked the sheet to my chin. “You’re burned out?”

He glanced over his shoulder and
shot me a superior grin. “Not as burned out as you are. I only came once. But
don’t worry—I didn’t pull that stunt where I pretend to climax so I can take
advantage. It’s too difficult for a man to fake it.”

A half-lie shuttered his face. If
I hadn’t been thoroughly sexed, it might have been a whole lie, but the mask
was dim. Either way, knowing something he’d said was untrue did me no good when
every word coming out of his mouth was crazy-talk. He thought I was burned out
because I’d orgasmed? That was demented.

“I can fake an orgasm.” And anyone
could fake being burned out. “How is that taking advantage? It would mean I
didn’t get to come.”

He froze in the act of stepping
into his pants, and his eyes narrowed. “I can tell when a woman climaxes. I can
taste it, Cleo.”

“Can you tell when a woman is
burned out?”

He finished pulling on his
trousers, his back to me. Muscles worked beneath his smooth skin. “Don’t be a
jerk. I know you came. Three times. You’re toast for hours. Don’t you enjoy the
break from the lies? You’re always saying how much you wish you could turn it
off, and now you have me for that.”

I opened my mouth to correct him,
and my brain stopped me. It whirled so furiously I wouldn’t have been surprised
to hear the gerbils complaining about the whip.

I could fake an orgasm, but I
wouldn’t. I could also fake being burned out, if I thought someone needed to
believe I was burned out.

“You got me.” I heaved a big
sigh. “I am so happy to get a break from my ability.”

The rodents in my head squeaked
and snapped, protesting the pace. John thought sex burned a supra out. He
treated this wacked-out notion like it was common knowledge.

Orgasms. Burnouts. This was that
time all supras experienced. The burnout that had embarrassed John to discuss back
when I’d hired on. The burnout Lou and Ursula and Samantha had referenced at
Merlin’s.

The burnout I myself was not
experiencing and had never experienced.

I inched my legs off the bed,
still wrapped in the sheet. My heart raced almost as much as it had when we’d
been having sex. What should I say? Should I confess? Should I...

Take advantage of the situation?

I shouldn’t. It wouldn’t be
right. Nevertheless, a horrible compulsion possessed me, and I said, “Are you
glad to get a break from my abilities?”

He turned back to me, his dress
shirt in his hand. “It doesn’t matter to me,” he lied.

I rubbed my eyes and focused on
the lips of his mask as he shrugged into his shirt. Now that I understood supra
orgasms, it made sense that the masks dimmed when I climaxed. But I couldn’t
make out the words.

What would John lie about? “Now
would be a good time for you to tell me I don’t need to lose weight.”

“You don’t need to lose weight,”
he parroted. Since it was true, I smiled.

“That’s so nice of you.”

We both laughed. If I were
careful, this didn’t have to be a hindrance to our relationship. It wasn’t as
if I hadn’t dealt with it before. No need to confess how I wasn’t like other
supras. He’d feel obliged to tell Yuri, and Yuri might tell Beau, and I did
not
want to be on the receiving end of those lab tests.

Well, maybe I did, if it was for
the sake of science.

No! I didn’t. I was with John
now.

“It is a relief, you know. Being
able to trust you.” I held out my hand, and he took it, smiling at me. He
raised it to his lips and brushed a kiss across the knuckles. “I dreaded asking
you, John. I didn’t think it could be you. The problem is this only leaves one person.
I don’t know how I can bring myself to ask Yuri whether or not he’s the leak.”

“You have our full support.
You’ve got to find out if it’s him,” he said, and his mask darkened so much I
could practically hear it when it finished the sentence for him.

But I know it’s not—because
it’s me.

~ * ~

I did not pass go, I did not
collect two hundred dollars, because I’m not a hooker, and I did not go to
Merlin’s for chili. I pleaded exhaustion and escaped from the lying sex
machine’s apartment without letting on I’d seen the truth. I sped home, where I
dove into my bed with a box of tissues and a giant bottle of water. When I was
this upset, I needed liquids to force myself out of bed to pee. Otherwise I had
a tendency to hide under the comforter and, well, lose jobs and such.

When you could see lies, it was
inevitable someone sucker punched you with a big fat one every now and then.
The only glimmer of hope was that John didn’t know about the burnouts. I’d seen
that and still believed it. But he was a traitor. A spy. The damned corporate
mole who’d been slipping confidential information about YuriCorp to...well, I
wasn’t sure because I’d ditched him so fast. He wasn’t handing it straight to
the saboteur, as far as he knew.

Was this some cosmic punishment
because I’d slept with him? In my current state of betrayal and shame, huddled
in the wrinkled mess of my new bed, I had to confront the fact that my libido
had driven me to make the mistake of the century. The man who’d avoided me for
months had jumped me like a horny teenager after I’d brushed up against his
secret, and I’d fallen for it, right onto my back.

He was a pro. I was an amateur.
While it was my job to unveil him, it was his job to hide from me. He was better
at his job. If I hadn’t slept with him, would I ever have figured it out? What
made me even angrier was the fact he was probably the leak Yuri and Al knew
about.

This was the name they’d kept
from me, hoping I’d provide a fresh perspective with my so-called open mind. If
they’d trusted me, if I’d really been part of their precious inner circle, I’d
never have done such a tragically stupid, horrible, humiliating, idiotic thing.

Far be it from me to have made
any progress in the search to uncover the traitor, even as Mata Hari. Not that
I was going to tell anyone about that quirk of my DNA. Yuri would rent me out
as an exclusive and call himself business savvy instead of a pimp.

Again, I was no hooker. And I was
frustrated enough by the whole situation that I did something drastic the next
day. I mean, besides wear yoga pants and a T-shirt to work. A girl can’t be
expected to dress for success when she’s failed so miserably.

~ * ~

“I’m serious, I quit,” I repeated
to Yuri. He, Al and I were sequestered in Yuri’s office, blanket on and tempers
flaring. All right, my temper flaring. Al and Yuri seemed as cool as cucumbers.
As cool as spies.

Al crossed his arms and leaned
against the wall next to the door. “I hear Psytech is hiring.”

Well, that hadn’t worked. I’d
almost meant it, too. What I really meant and said next was, “I feel betrayed.
You should have told me not to trust John Arlin.”

“There are many ways in which
John is trustworthy,” Yuri, behind his desk, said beyond the shadow of a doubt.
“Aside from this little issue, he’s a model employee.”

“Little issue?” I yelled. Al
winced. “This is not a little issue. Neither is me quitting. I could snap my
fingers and go work for another consulting firm or a detective agency or even a
counseling outfit. Hell, I don’t even have to get a supra job.” That would mean
a vast reduction in pay, but I’d survived on normal wages before.