Gino. She’d been with him nearly three months and in that time he’d become her everything. Of course Zhu would try to lull them into a false sense of security. He thought they’d dropped their guard down. She was shocked at how the GhostWalkers worked so fast and so perfectly in sync to eliminate the threat to her. She shouldn’t have been. She had been trained as a soldier, and so had Bellisia. Maybe differently, because mostly, once they were adults, they had worked alone, but when they were younger, they ran missions together.
Bellisia had known exactly what to do. The moment Gino had provided the distraction, she was in the water, exactly where she could have done the most good had they needed it. Cayenne had participated, both women blending in seamlessly with the GhostWalkers. She had stayed on the boat, uncertain what to do. She didn’t want to leave Nonny, nor did she want to mess up whatever plan the GhostWalkers had.
She sighed and lifted the pillow next to her, inhaled Gino’s scent and then switched it with her own. She stared at her pillow a few moments and then punched it hard. The pillow went flying across the room. She wanted to get up and kick it.
“Is that a substitute for me?”
Gino’s soft voice set her heart pounding. She closed her eyes tightly, hoping she wasn’t hallucinating. None of the other men had come back. There was a skeleton crew there and they’d called a friend, Donny, to help watch over the house. Two men she recognized from the compound where she’d been trained were there as well. They’d worked for Whitney and had defected with Bellisia to the GhostWalkers. She was still a little afraid of trusting them.
“Yes.” She whispered her answer, but it wasn’t true. “No.” She looked around the room into the darkest corners. She couldn’t find him, not even when she knew the direction of his voice. “I was afraid for you.”
“Princess, you need to be afraid for the other guy, not for me.”
Her eyes strained to see him, bouncing from one wall to the next, shifting to the floor, trying to cover every square inch of the room. She sat up and turned toward the door. “I don’t care about the other guy, whoever he may be, I care about you. You went into that swamp and you didn’t come out.” There was accusation in her voice.
“I had to tail the remaining merc back to Zhu and his plane so I could put a tracker on it and make the necessary arrangements to follow it. I’ve got a plane standing by and we’re leaving in under an hour.”
“No.” She said it sharply. Asserting herself. “Absolutely not. That’s like following a wounded animal into his own territory. He’ll know if some strange plane enters Shanghai. He’ll know it’s you.”
“I have businesses all over the world, Zara.” His tone was gentle. He emerged out of the shadows, almost right in front of her. “Including China. What’s the point if I can’t commandeer my own airplane? He won’t know it’s my team following him. He’s arrogant, baby. He’s arrogant and thinks he’s above retribution. He believes he owns Shanghai. He’s gotten away with murder too many times and walks around thinking himself invincible. He’s not. Retribution is coming his way.”
He walked toward her, one hand pulling his T-shirt over his head and tossing it into a corner. He wore no shoes and she had no idea how that had happened. She could see them now, his boots, set neatly in a corner close to the shadow he’d just come out of. Both hands dropped to his belt as he got to the side of the bed.
“He’ll know,” she argued. Breathless. All that muscle. He looked invincible himself.
He kicked his trousers away and put one knee on the bed, right between her legs. “No, he won’t.” He took her mouth with exquisite gentleness.
Her heart fluttered and her sex clenched hard. Her arms crept around his neck and she gave herself to him. To that kiss. His mouth was fire. But so much more. Tears burned behind her eyes. The way he touched her was as gentle as his mouth, one arm curling around her back and locking there, sliding her beneath him, so she lay looking up at his beloved face, those eyes that burned over her body and then rested on her mouth.
“Did I remember to tell you that I’m crazy in love with you, woman? I should have told you that before I let you out for your girls’ night out.” He punctuated each word with soft kisses over her eyes and down her face. “Because I am. So in love. I didn’t know it was possible to love this much.”
He wasn’t a man to say such things, and it meant all the more to her that he did. He kissed her again, stealing her breath. He’d taken her heart some time earlier when she wasn’t paying attention. Now he owned her soul. She lifted a palm to his face. Those lines cut deep with desire. With hunger. For her. Those eyes, so dark and compelling, alive with love for her.
“I love you so much, Gino. I don’t care about Zhu. I’d rather live with a few bad moments of worry than to ever have you put yourself in danger.”
He caught her hand and pressed it to his mouth, making her heart skip a beat. He kissed the center of her palm and then nipped at the end of her finger, sucking the sting away. He stroked a caress down her body, his mouth following. Her breath caught in her throat. He could make her come alive with a look, let alone the way he touched her. Everywhere his hands and mouth went, he left flames licking at and over her skin. In her belly. Deep in her core. Between her legs. Everywhere until she couldn’t think, only feel.
Then he was moving in her. His fingers threaded through hers, stretching her arms above her head, eyes staring down into hers, intense, loving, possessive, connecting them on such an intimate level she could barely breathe. He never once looked away from her, his body moving slow, a burn that spread through her, growing hotter and hotter with each stroke.
She slid her foot up his leg to his thigh and then wrapped her leg around him. She did the same with the other foot. Still, he moved with the same slow intensity that was earth-shattering. She couldn’t look away from his gaze. She was mesmerized, caught by him. Held spellbound. Love was overwhelming. She shifted under him, writhing as the need crawled up her spine and heat coiled tighter and tighter in her.
He kept moving at the same pace, and it was beginning to drive her crazy. It was too much and not enough. And then suddenly, just that fast, her breath was hitching. Her lungs felt raw. He never looked away. Never let her look away. Her body came apart and she saw herself in his eyes, saw the wide, shocked look, the dazed pleasure that only he could bring her and then her body clamped down like a vise on his, taking him with her. It was heat and fire, a blaze she didn’t anticipate, consuming her. Consuming him.
He lay over top of her, still staring into her eyes. A slow smile lit the dark intensity of his eyes. “I forgot the condom.”
She didn’t look away. “You don’t forget things like that. I do. You don’t.”
His smile widened into a grin. “That’s true.”
“Gino, you haven’t even lived with me yet.”
“What do you think we’ve been doing, princess?” He brushed kisses over each eye. “We’ve been living together. I’m sure. Aren’t you?”
“Yes, but I want to be with you for a little while before we bring someone else in. I need time to do research on parenting and homemaking. I need time with Nonny.”
“No, baby, you don’t need any of that. Nonny’s wonderful, but she isn’t you. I want you exactly as you are. If you like to research those things, just for fun, go ahead, but you don’t need to do it for me. Our home is about us. You. Me. Eventually our children. What you learn online isn’t how it has to be. It’s how you feel.”