Page 35 of Live a Little!

“Aw, you wouldn’t. Wally’s like family, ain’t you, littlebuddy?”

“I have to leave now,” Cynthia whispered urgently to Jake, rubbing her hand frantically against her jacket. “They have rats here. Rats carry diseases like the bubonic plague, and are generallyrevolting.”

Jake shot her a warning look and put a finger to hislips.

Okay. She was losing it. In some recess of her mind where a smidgen of sanity remained, she recognized that she was losing it, but her only coherent thought was to get out of this horrible rat-infested nightmare as quickly aspossible.

Likeyesterday.

“I really have to leave,” shewhispered.

“How are you going to get out?” he whisperedback.

“I’ll crawl past them. They’re playingcards.”

“The rat’s up there.” Was it her imagination or was he laughing ather?

It was the last straw. She’d had a miserable evening, learned absolutely squat, and her last meal on earth could turn out to be a candy bar. Not only that, but Jake, her brand-new lover, hadn’t even bothered to tell her he’d be dropping by. To top it all off, a rat had run over her hand. And Jake thought it wasfunny?

“Excuse me,” she said furiously, and tried to shove her way pasthim.

Next thing she knew, he had his hand clamped over her mouth again, the other just under her breasts, and he was hauling her backward. When he’d finished manhandling her, he bumped her down onto his lap, and she found herself leaning against his chest, while he leaned against the sacks. The smell of coffee, pungent and unattainable, made her stomachgrowl.

Jake held her still and began whispering soothingly into her ear. “Relax. They’ll probably do rounds every couple of hours. Next time they do, we’ll leave.Understand?”

She shuddered, but sanity had returned. Her panic was already ebbing as he cradled her, his words warm and reassuring in her ear. Somehow she felt nothing too terrible could happen to her now that Jake was holding her. In her head she knew how stupid that was, but he felt solid and warm beneathher.

“Just try torelax.”

She felt his chest rise and fall as he whispered, imagined she could hear the steady pounding of his heart against her shoulder. His whispered breath sent shivers down her neck, and unbidden, images of him naked in her bed last night flashed before her eyes like a particularly lusciousfilm.

His hand rested just under her breasts as though it belonged there, and suddenly she didn’t want to goanywhere.

She heard the slap of cards and the low rumble of the guards’ voices, not fifty feet away. She should be cowering in terror, but instead, a warm, powerful urge pervaded her body. It was as though all the fear and tension, all the adrenaline that had coursed through her body moments ago, had settled, hot and insistent, between herlegs.

Relax? Not achance.

She shifted her hips, doing her own private version of a fully clothed lap dance, and all thoughts of rodents fled. Maybe it wasn’t the smartest thing she could be doing under the circumstances, but she was unable to control the raw need that grippedher.

The hand under her breasts tightened, grabbing her ribs as though to stop her movements, but it would have taken a full body cast to prevent the instinctive gyrations of her woman’s body urging her mate to fill her. She heard a muttered oath, then felt Agent Wheeler’s breathing change, as did the topography of hislap.

“What’s on your mind, Cyn?” No longer soothing, his whisper was as ragged as a torn curtain, revealing his ownurges.

Since he didn’t move his hand from her mouth, her only way of answering him was with body language. She wiggled, as suggestively as she knew how, against the bulge pressing against herbackside.

He nipped her earlobe, then traced its shape with his tongue, hot and wet in the cool, dank atmosphere of the warehouse. “I guess we don’t have anything else to do for the next couple of hours.” He still didn’t move his hand from her mouth, but the other hand slipped inside her jacket and began to trace the contours of her breasts, while his lips trailed over the back of her neck, making her shiver allover.

She arched against him, rubbing her hands on the outside of his thighs, up to his waist as far as she could reach. All her fear had sublimated itself into an arousal so fierce she burned withit.

Helplessly her movements changed from the controlled gyrations she’d started with. She began squirming on hislap.

“Can you keep quiet?” hewhispered.

She debated with herself for a moment. Could she? His left hand was doing such delicious things to her nipple that she felt a moan building in her throat. With two hands on her flesh, he could have her crying aloud in no time. And his right hand was such a talented hand. Clapped over her mouth the way it was, it just wasn’t living up to its potential. There were areas of her body that needed that hand much more than her mouth did. Figuring the presence of the guards would act as a pretty efficient gag, she jerked her head up and down.Yes.

His hand released her mouth and, stopping to tug the glove off with his teeth, he reached down between her legs as if he’d read her mind. She pulled them open, as though she were doing a frog kick, and sighed softly as he cupped herheat.

“I like you better in skirts,” he whispered in frustration. He undid the button at her waist, eased down her zipper and together they wiggled and pulled until her black skinny jeans were half way down her thighs and cool air fanned her intimateparts.

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