Live Wire

chapter 17




Back in the car, the weapon stored safely in the trunk, Jordan watched out the window impassively as Noah pulled from the exit of the storage warehouse and reentered the heavy D.C. traffic surging through the streets.

“We need to find someplace to lay low while we’re considering our options,” Noah proposed. “There’s a hotel with suites just outside of town. We can get you checked in under an anonymous name.…”

“We’re going to the senator’s estate,” Jordan broke in firmly. “Kell’s throwing another party tomorrow night and I want to be in a position to protect Tehya.”

“The team will be there, Jordan,” Noah argued. “We can keep Ascarti at bay without you. If this jeopardizes her life, then you’ll never forgive yourself.”

But there was no staying away from her. Even now, every cell in his body ached to hold her close, to assure himself she was indeed safe and unharmed.

“The team will be there, and so will I.” Jordan kept his tone smooth, and his decision firm.

In the rearview mirror, Jordan caught a glimpse his nephew’s expression, the concern as well as the disapproval in his gaze.

“This isn’t a good idea,” Noah continued to argue, though his tone remained cool and unheated. “You could be seen by staff or anyone watching Stanton’s estate after her arrival. It could endanger the plan to make it appear you’ve been killed.”

Jordan’s gaze met Noah’s in the mirror for a second before his nephew turned his eyes back to the road.

The thought of not going to Tehya had his guts clenching in refusal. He’d be damned if he would let her sit there alone, allow her to sleep alone after experiencing the heat and pleasure of having her against him throughout the night.

“I didn’t ask if you thought it was a good idea. I said do it.” His gaze met Noah’s again for a brief second, their wills clashing as Jordan set the tone of command at its firmest strength.

Noah grimaced and his gaze jerked back to the road, the muscles at the side of his jaw flexing angrily.

“She’s getting to you, isn’t she, Jordan?” Noah finally asked as he made the turn onto a bypass and entered the heavy late afternoon traffic as his tone sharpened with a flare of anger. “Are you giving in to the illusion?” he mocked.

“Like you and Sabella, Noah, the illusion is real for Tehya. Just because I don’t believe in it doesn’t mean she doesn’t believe she feels it.”

Or was there more to it? Jordan fought the denial raging inside him at the thought that love didn’t exist. He had always believed it was an illusion. Since he was a teenager, since that first flush of love and the resulting betrayal, he’d refused to let himself believe.

And now he was beginning to wonder if perhaps he had been wrong. Tehya gave every part of herself to him when they came together, and he’d learned that each time he touched her, thought about her, ached for her, that the need became stronger, deeper, more intense.

“Doesn’t mean you can’t reap the benefits of it either, huh?” The disappointment in Noah’s voice wasn’t hard to miss, and it struck at one of the few vulnerable areas Jordan possessed. His affection for family, his need for that family’s affection.

Jordan raked his fingers through his hair impatiently as he met his nephew’s mockingly angry gaze. “Just because I believe it’s an illusion doesn’t mean I can’t claim the results of it,” Jordan amended, his voice darker as a part of him cringed, or seemed to, at the illogical feeling of having betrayed Tehya somehow with that statement.

Noah didn’t say anything further. His lips thinned, his expression became set in lines of disapproval, but he kept his argument to himself.

If only the others were so kind.

“Hey, Noah, did you notice he said just because he believed it was an illusion rather than just because it is an illusion?” Nik piped up from beside Noah, his voice heavy with amusement. “Maybe he’s relenting just a little bit.”

Neither Jordan nor Noah responded. Jordan could feel the heavy threat of condemnation rising from each of his men as they rode toward the senator’s estate.

Noah had to fight to rein in the impatient anger brewing inside him.

Hell, he’d been around Tehya and his uncle enough to know that Jordan was determined to fight whatever he was feeling for Tehya. He’d been feeling it for six damned years now or more, and still, Jordan didn’t dare mention the L word. If he acknowledged it, then he might have to admit it actually existed.

But if any man had ever been born to love a woman, then Jordan had been born for Tehya, just as Noah knew he had been born for Sabella.

It was the Malone curse, his grandfather had always said. Malone men were warned to love wisely, because once they loved, they loved forever, they loved deep, and they loved with a blazing heat that burned clear to the soul.

Jordan just didn’t want to admit he was in love with Tehya. If he admitted it, then he had to face the fact that he couldn’t exist without her.

And it wasn’t a bad thing, Noah acknowledged to himself. He’d made mistakes with Sabella. He’d left her when he should have had her brought to him. He’d turned his back on his marriage, his life, his identity because of his own stupid pride and fear. But as Noah Blake rather than Nathan Malone, he’d returned, claimed everything that had ever belonged to him, and at the same time, Sabella managed to mark his soul a second time with a lash of delicate, feminine claws, female stubbornness, and raging hunger.

Hell, if he could knock some sense into his uncle, then that was exactly what he would do. Unfortunately, the more a man, or a woman, pushed at Jordan Malone, the more stubborn he could get.

Maybe, hopefully, this time Jordan would realize the gift Tehya had been holding for him all these years. The other men swore they’d seen it, eight years before. That first night they had come face-to-face in Aruba during the operation to identify and neutralize Sorrel, Tehya’s father.

Noah prayed, for his uncle’s sake, that he realized what he saw as an illusion was the only emotion that would ever ease that core of agonizing loneliness Noah glimpsed in Jordan’s eyes. If Jordan let her go this time, if he walked away, then Noah feared there would be no going back.

Glancing in the rearview mirror once again, he glimpsed that dark, dangerous set of Jordan’s face once again. He’d seen it too often, watched it growing over the years until Noah was beginning to fear that one day, it would become a permanent set to his face.

Until Jordan had come after Tehya. Only with her did he lose that look. Only when Tehya was around, did Jordan soften. She was Jordan’s last hope, and Noah prayed, he prayed often, that this time she would break through shield around his uncle’s soul and dissolve that core of dangerous darkness overtaking him.

If she didn’t, then Noah feared Jordan would only return to the Ops, and if he did that, then it wouldn’t be as a base commander. Jordan would take field command, and one day, he just wouldn’t return.

As Jordan’s gaze slid to the mirror, meeting Noah’s as he glanced back again, Noah realized his uncle was riding a much finer line than he’d imagined. If the look in his eyes was any indication, if Tehya couldn’t settle that darkness, then Noah feared he’d lose the uncle who had risked his career as well as his life, to save him.

* * *

Lightning flared across the sky, sharp brilliant fingers of electricity shedding its brilliant glow over the Stanton estate as it pierced the night. Thunder rattled and rolled and sheets of rain blew through the night, saturating the ground and lending a heavy sensual excitement to the air outside.

The storm vibrated with primal fury, pounding through the night as well as the senses as Tehya sat in the large, well-padded chair that faced the window and stared into the heart of the storm.

She felt isolated, alone. Fear and worry crowded her mind, turning her senses bleak and reminding her of the danger there seemed to be no escape from.

She was thirty years old. For twenty-five years she had been on the run in one way or the other, fighting to survive, clawing for freedom. And God, she was so tired. She was so tired of hiding, of watching over her shoulder, of knowing whomever she loved, whoever tried to protect her, would only lose their life for their effort.

Tonight, as she had so many nights before, she was dressed in borrowed clothes, a nightgown in this case, and sleeping in a borrowed bed. She was watching the night, knowing the monsters that existed there, knowing that any moment they could be watching her, coming for her. Just as they had so many nights before.

Or Jordan could be coming.

Tucking her feet beneath her, Tehya laid her cheek against her knees and stared into the night, feeling the storm raging inside her as well.

She wanted to run.

Oh God, she should have run the minute she suspected she was being watched again. Why had she become so stubborn when Jordan had arrived? What in God’s name made her believe a house, a business, or friends was worth the risk Jordan and his men were facing?

Baby girl, all you had to do was come home. She would have lived.… Sorrel had laid the blame at her feet. But a part of Tehya had known better. He had wanted both of them. He had needed both of them.

You and your mother were the key to my future, to Kenneth’s future, he had sighed months before she had gone to Aruba. Come home, baby girl. Let Daddy take care of you. I promise you, the embrace of your brother will be far better than what awaits you otherwise.…

Running, hiding, losing friends, never knowing what true freedom was because she could never stop long enough to experience it.

It was still far better than the embrace of her brother.

She shuddered at the thought. When she had been younger, she had idolized Kenneth. When he would come to her and her mother’s rooms, unlock the door and take her out into the gardens to play. When he would laugh with her, tease her, and tell her stories of what the world was like. The parties she would one day attend if she were a very good girl. The life she could have if she obeyed the rules.

If she would tell him or her father if her mother ever tried to escape. All she had to do was be a very good girl.

Her chest tightened as her stomach rolled sickeningly. She had never told on her mother, but her mother hadn’t truly trusted her either. Tehya had been convinced the reason her mother had left her with Sister Mary was to test Tehya. And while running, Francine had learned exactly the danger she and her daughter faced.

A danger Tehya couldn’t escape, even with Sorrel’s and Kenneth’s deaths.

She rocked against herself, her arms tightening around her legs as a knot of agony burned in her chest, the need to release it like a knife twisting inside her soul.

Thunder rocked outside, and lightning blazed with a power and brilliance that lit the world with nature’s display of strength.

And how weak she was in comparison, not just to the storm, but to the danger surrounding her. The danger she had drawn Jordan and his men into.

The click of the bedroom door behind her drew her attention. Shadowed and dark, the tall, black-clad figure that stepped inside had her heart suddenly racing in much more than fear. Excitement and lust, emotions she had given up on fighting years ago, and a need for touch that threatened to leave her shaking.

The black mask covering his face didn’t hide his eyes. The brilliant blue looked brighter, more sapphire, almost neon as he closed the door, locking it behind him before prowling across the room, dangerous intent marking every line of his body.

“The curtains should be closed,” he informed her as he stepped around the chair, his back to her now as he reached up and jerked the heavy material across the floor-to-ceiling windows. “Anyone could have a bead on you, Tey.”

Turning to her, he pulled the mask from his face slowly, dropping it to the floor as he stared down at her. His expression was tight, savage, and radiated pure hungry lust as he gripped the bottom of the snug black shirt and pulled it off as well.

Sensation punched through her womb, clenching it tight as she felt her juices ease along the bare lips of her p-ssy. The electricity of the storm seemed to sizzle over her flesh, tightening her nipples, her *, and racing across her body with a sudden, exciting surge of sensuality.

Dominance radiated in his face, his gaze.

“Are you wearing panties?” Guttural, fierce, his voice echoed with the hunger reflected in his eyes.

The surge of electric sensation that pulsed through her p-ssy was so strong, so deep, it was almost an orgasm. Her heart picked up further in speed, racing, pounding with pure excitement as his hands went to the black nylon belt, moving slowly, with predatory intent, and released the catch.

Tehya swallowed tightly. “No.”

Weakening sensuality swept through her at the smile that edged his lips. At the same time, he flipped the catch of his black pants loose, the edges spreading slowly apart as his cock sprang free.

Thick and long, the engorged crest had flushed a dark purple, moisture gleaming at the tip and over the tiny slit at the blunt point.

Heavily veined, wickedly erotic and explicit, the sensual demand apparent in the heavy stalk of flesh sent Tehya’s senses reeling.

Slowly, she unfolded her legs, leaned forward, her gaze lifting to meet his as her lips parted, her tongue peeking out for a taste of the silk-covered steel throbbing demandingly before her gaze.

Male heat exploded against her taste buds. A hint of salt, a hint of spice. Addictive, intoxicating, the taste of him was a hunger suddenly exploding inside her.

Reaching for him, the fingers of one hand curled at the base of his cock, unable to surround it with her fingers, but her lips parted, taking the thick head between them, stretching around it to suck him inside.

The complete eroticism of the act was almost too much to bear. Her eyes closed, a moan trapped in her throat, vibrating there as she felt the hard throb of response against her tongue.

His fingers speared into her hair and clenched in the strands, tugging in sensual demand as she drew on the heated cock head, feeling his hands guiding her head, holding her in place as his hips began to move.

“F*ck, Tehya, I dream of this,” he growled. “Watching my dick f*ck your mouth again. Seeing your pretty lips stretched around it, sucking me deep.”

She could feel her juices easing along the folds of her p-ssy, moistening her, preparing her for him.

She wanted him, with a desperation that clawed at her senses. His fingers flexed around the strands of hair he held, tugging at her scalp and sending an erotic fire radiating through it.

Pulsating need traveled through her senses. Flames of exquisite sensation raced over her flesh until she found her hands tugging at her gown, pulling it to her thighs as her fingers found the desperately aching bud of her *. An agony of need filled her cunt, raging through it like a wildfire out of control.

A smothered cry escaped her as painful pleasure exploded through her. It wasn’t as good as his touch; sometimes he seemed to know her body better than she did, her pleasure better than she ever could. But with his dick in her mouth, her fingers stroking her *, she could still sense the impending explosion and the rapture that would surround her.

Inside, she heated and clenched as her juices began to saturate her fingers.

“F*ck. Tehya.” The growl had her jerking in response as a shudder raced through her.

“Let me see, baby.” He tried to move back, to pull free of the grip her mouth had on him. She couldn’t allow it. She couldn’t release him just yet, not as long as this pleasure was tearing through her.

His grip tightened, male determination apparent as his cock pulled from her lips and her eyes flared open in rejection.

“No. Not yet.” She pulled her fingers from between her thighs, both hands reaching for him now.

“Let me watch.” The order in his tone throbbed beneath the lust as he gripped her wrist and pushed her hand back to her thighs. “Let me watch you play with your pretty p-ssy, baby. I want to see it. Every stroke, every soft caress of your fingers.”

Let him watch? Let him see the agonizing need tearing through her as her fingers played against her *?

He went to his knees, and she admitted in that moment that she would do whatever he needed her to do. Whatever he wanted her to do.

One powerful hand gripped her knee, lifting it and guiding it over the arm of the chair as he continued pressing her fingers against her p-ssy until they moved.

She found her * again, her head digging into the back of the chair as she felt herself rapidly flying into the center of the sensual, sexual vortex he was building inside her.

His gaze became darker, yet more brilliant, his expression more savage as a reddish flush stained his sun-darkened face and his lips appeared more sensual, with a hungry curve.

“Oh yeah,” he breathed out roughly, his eyes centered on her fingers as she circled her * slowly. “Show me how you make your pretty * swell, baby.”

The hard bud pulsed and tightened further as Tehya felt her breathing escalate. The room suddenly became hotter, steamier with lust as his fingers slid up her thighs and parted the swollen folds of her p-ssy.

Sensation electrified her. It whipped through the sensitive bundle of nerves and left her gasping for breath as excitement tightened through her.

As his head lowered, his lashes lifting to stare back at her, she watched, entranced, as he licked through the saturated flesh, a low hum of enjoyment vibrating against her flesh.

Tehya jolted, a fractured cry parting her lips and she swore she lost her breath for precious seconds. Her hips arched forward, driving his tongue closer to the aching entrance to her cunt.

“I need you,” she whispered, desperate for him, needing him now in ways she hadn’t before.

Each time the pleasure seemed to be higher, hotter. It whipped around her with such incredible intensity that she wondered if she could possibly live without him or his touch now.

“Don’t stop.” His hand caught her wrist as her strokes eased, pressing them back to her flesh. “Let me watch you come, Tey. I want to see it.”

The silky slide of her juices was caught by his fingers before he stroked the clenched opening, then with two fingers, began to penetrate the tender tissue. He parted her flesh, working inside her as her fingers began to move more quickly, more firmly against the sensitive bud now burning with the need for release.

“God, yes, Tey,” he groaned as his fingers stretched her slowly, thrusting inside her with slow, deliberate movements. “Come for me baby. Let me see you.…”

“Jordan,” she cried out his name, jerking as her body tensed, tightened, and began to shudder with the orgasm suddenly tearing through her.

She was only dimly aware of his fingers sliding completely from her. She wasn’t given a chance to miss them. In the next second he was stretching her further, the intimate flesh of her cunt burning with the sudden intrusion of his cock impaling her with strong, heavy thrusts.

Her lashes lifted as her hands moved with drugged weakness, her fingers gripping the strength of his biceps as his hips surged between her thighs.

The feel of his cock rasping over ultrasensitive tissue, stretching, creating a friction and pressure that sent electric surges of pure sensation tearing through her senses was almost too much to bear. Rapture exploded through her. Tender nerve endings flared with each pulse of her release as her p-ssy clamped down on his cock as though fighting to hold him inside.

Until he thrust in deep, his body arching, and the feel of his release suddenly spurting inside her intensified those last surging sensations rocketing through her womb.

His head fell to her shoulder, his mouth pressing to it for a second before they parted, allowing his lips to grip her flesh as a harsh male groan tore from his chest.

His pleasure combined with hers, whipping through her senses until she swore she could feel him moving through her soul, possessing her, owning her as nothing or no one else ever could have.

For Jordan, it was like suddenly waking. A part of him that he had never known existed flared to life. With his eyes closed, his teeth gripping her flesh, the taste of her, the scent of her overriding his senses, he knew some integral part of him had changed forever.

And it had happened the moment he saw her sitting before the window as though daring her enemies to strike.

The last ecstatic pulses of his release left him weak, pressed against her, fighting to catch his breath. It left him wondering at the sudden aura of contentment, of satisfaction that raced through his mind.

This was a part of pleasure he had never known before. It was an intimacy he couldn’t have imagined existed.

The last surge of release shuddered through him as reality began to slip past the overwhelming sensations that had surrounded him.

Tehya rested against him, her arms draped over his shoulders, her breathing just as hard, just as rough as his own. Sprawled against the back of the chair, she held him to her, bonds of silk and feminine warmth locking him in place more tightly than chains ever could.

Moving wasn’t something he wanted to do, it was something he made himself do. That inner voice of warning was screaming at him, alarms clashing inside his head at the realization that this one woman was beginning to mean more than any other in the past.

“Don’t leave me yet,” she whispered, the desperate plea in the words tearing through him.

“I’m not going anywhere without you, baby.” As his flesh pulled free of hers and he rose to his feet, it was only to bend to her and lift her in his arms.

Cradling her against his chest, Jordan moved to the carefully turned-down bed and laid her in the center of the soft mattress before removing the rest of his clothing, her gown, and climbing in beside her.

There was no hesitation as she moved into his arms, her head lying against his chest as masses of red-gold curls spilled over his arm and stomach. The warmth of it was like silken chains wrapping around him, holding him in place.

God, what would he do without her?

For the barest second, his breathing paused at the thought. There had never been anyone in his life that he didn’t think he could survive without, until now. And that was terrifying.

“Did you follow them?” Her soft voice pierced him with the underlying fear he sensed in it.

“We followed them,” he answered as he smoothed his hand down her hair, finally allowing his fingers to tangle into the curls that lay over his stomach.

He didn’t want to talk about this. He knew the past was coming back to haunt her, that Gregor Ascarti had been one of the demons who had chased her since she was a child. One that refused to die.

“What aren’t you wanting to tell me, Jordan?” The fear was gone. There was an edge of steel in her voice now, a determination he didn’t particularly want to hear.

“Just lie here with me for a while, Tey,” he sighed. “Let me just hold you for a minute.”

He didn’t want to do this to her. Telling her Ascarti was still alive would be nearly as bad as telling her Sorrel himself had risen from the grave.

“Senator Stanton has been on the phone with Elite Ops Command,” she said, her voice quiet as she spoke of the shadowed group that governed the private multinational group they had been a part of. “He’s trying to get a team out here to back you.”

Jordan shook his head. “We have the backup team, Tehya. I don’t need, nor do I want an Elite Ops team on this.”

Hell, this was just what he needed, having his plans hijacked by a team that would do nothing more than clutter up the protection he’d placed around Tehya.

“Perhaps you should talk to him then,” she suggested, the noncommittal tone of her voice causing him to wince.

That was the tone she adopted when she knew he wasn’t telling her everything. When she knew he had one of his backup plans in progress and hadn’t told her or the team.

“Perhaps,” he answered as he frowned up at the ceiling. “The thing about the senator is that if I tell him to pull back, then, like you, he’s going to know there’s more going on than he’s aware of. And the senator being the senator, he is going to apprise the committee. Then they’re going to get their heads together and attempt to lay insurance that their ass is covered, forgetting in the process that I’m rather good at covering all our asses.”

She was silent for long moments before he felt her breath whisper over his chest.

“Tell me who you saw, Jordan.”

Keeping it from her wasn’t fair. She deserved to know, but hell if he wanted to see the shadows in her eyes after he told her.

“Jordan?” Tension filled the room, as did the memory of the girl he had met eight years before.

Eyes too big for her pale face. Hair that had been darkened from its natural color. And in those eyes, he had seen the fear, the courage, and the hopelessness she had begun feeling.

“It was Ascarti, Tehya. It was Gregor Ascarti.”