Best of Temptation Bundle Page 16

  “But I betrayed you,” he said, not quite believing that she could be so accepting, so understanding.

  She slowly shook her head. “No, you didn’t betray me, Adam. You were doing your job. You couldn’t have known what would happen between us. I didn’t know.” She leaned against an iron bedpost and dropped her gaze. “What matters is that you told me the truth now, when it matters.”

  A profound relief enveloped Adam. He was hard-pressed not to haul her into his arms. Bury his nose in her sweet-smelling hair, crush her all-too-lush body to his. But he couldn’t give himself over to such forgetfulness. He had a job to do. Something he had somehow forgotten over the past three days. Something he needed to concentrate on now. No matter how much he’d like to push all that aside and devote the next few hours to Eva and Eva alone.

  “So,” she said quietly. “What conclusion did you come to about me and my possible involvement with Sheffert?”

  “That you’re not. Involved, I mean.” He took off his glasses, finally glad to be rid of them. Wishing he could rid himself of his need for the woman in front of him as easily.

  She gazed at him long and hard. Then she gave him a soft, sexy smile. “All along I knew there was much more behind those glasses than an inexperienced nerd.”

  “It doesn’t bother you? To find out I lied about my true identity? That for a time, anyway, I considered you a suspect?”

  She caught her bottom lip between her teeth, then released it.

  She gazed down at where she worried her hands in front of her. “Yes, it does. But there’s more involved here than phantom ledgers and tax evasion, isn’t there?”

  He scanned her body from head to foot, hesitating at her waist. A waist that was still narrow and fit, but would soon be swollen with the child she carried. But his feelings for her went oh so much deeper than physical desire. Despite Eva Burgess’s pregnancy, he wanted her, longed for her, needed her in a way that scared him to death.

  Yes, there was far more at work here than his assignment.

  “My gun.”

  Eva blinked and Adam knew that she didn’t have any knowledge of its whereabouts.

  “It came up missing after the break-in.”

  “I…I didn’t know you had a gun.”

  Adam stepped nearer to her and gently grasped her arms. “Eva, now that I don’t have to pussyfoot around, is there anything odd you’ve come across in the time you’ve worked for Sheffert? Any accounts that didn’t make sense? Anything that struck you as unusual?”

  She started to shake her head, apparently searching her memory, even as she swallowed hard. The skin of her arms was silky and hot under his fingers. He realized he’d abandoned his urgent grip and was now caressing her, drawing goose bumps he wanted to smooth.

  “Wait,” she said, her gaze fastening on his. A gaze jam-packed with conflicting emotions. “Yesterday when I tried to access one of the Honeycutt diskettes I took from Sheffert’s office, I found some sort of game.”

  “A game?” Adam repeated, forcing himself to release her for fear that he wouldn’t be able to stop touching her no matter how important the conversation.

  “Yes.” She shrugged and crossed her arms, giving a shiver. “I found it odd, but when I realized the disk didn’t have what I needed on it, I put it aside.”

  “Do you have it?”

  She went to her attaché case and slipped a black three-and-a-half-inch disk out of an inside pocket. “My brother has a PC in his room. You can check it out there.”

  Adam flipped the disk over in his fingers.

  “Eva, I’m sorry.”

  She blinked at him several times, apparently trying to discern the meaning of his words.

  Finally, she smiled in a way that was sad and provocative all at the same time. She tucked her hair behind her ear and lifted her chin. “Yes, so am I.”

  Adam wrenched his gaze from her alluring face and strode toward the door.

  “What are we going to tell my family?” she asked, catching him before he walked out.

  He took in the view of her standing next to that bed, wanting to tell her to say nothing. To let him have just one more day as their son-in-law. More important, he longed to ask her for one more night as her husband. To allow him to indulge himself just a little longer. Instead he said, “Tell them whatever you need to. But know this. Everyone here is safe. So you don’t have anything to worry about there.”

  Somewhere deep down, he knew he was putting the ball in her court. The case might be over, but that didn’t mean they had to be, did it?

  EVA DIDN’T TELLher parents.

  That awareness crowded everything else from Adam’s head as he slipped the Honeycutt diskette into Pete’s PC, then slid a glance at the woman in the chair next to him.

  Over the course of the past hour, he’d locked himself up in Tolly’s warehouse office making calls. Weckworth had been less than overjoyed to hear from him.

  “Where in the hell have you been, Grayson? Damn it, I was expecting you to call me back after you reported that break-in yesterday.”

  Adam had reminded Weckworth that he wasn’t in the midst of the Aryans in Search of Domination group where his life had been in danger every moment of every day. But being filled in on the theft of Eva’s laptop, Weckworth swore graphically.

  “I’m pulling you out now. You’ve screwed this one up, Grayson. All because of a woman.”

  All because of a woman.

  Now Adam glanced at the way Eva crossed her legs, the material of her skirt sliding off to the side, giving him a tantalizing view of her knees. It was also because of that woman, he’d explained to Weckworth, that he couldn’t leave. Not yet. Not until he had this case wrapped up and he was sure she’d be safe.

  “There,” Eva said, leaning forward to point at the screen. “See how it did that?”

  Yes, Adam did. The moment he opened the file, the computer loaded what appeared to be an intergalactic game of some sort. Yellow stars crisscrossed the screen around the 3-D title Triumph of the Gladiators. He pressed the needed buttons to enter. Nothing but a game. And an unsophisticated one at that. A colorful take on one of those video tennis-ntype games. Except instead of two cursors batting a ball back and forth, a gladiator and an alien tossed fireballs at each other, then deflected them.

  He spent the next half hour trying to find a back door to the program, then exited. Nothing. Nothing but a game.

  He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed, scanning the title page. Given the simplicity of the game, it couldn’t have taken much space on the high-density disk. He exited again and listed the directory. The file of interest took far too much memory for the simple game he’d just played.

  He snapped upright.

  “What is it?” Eva asked, leaning closer, her breasts brushing his arm.

  Adam nearly groaned. His body yearned to forget all this in exchange for losing himself in the intoxicating woman next to him.

  “I don’t know yet,” he said, going back to the title screen.

  He sat back and looked long and hard, trying several key combinations that might give him access to what he was convinced was a secret passageway into the program. Nothing.

  Next he resorted to clicking the mouse on different areas of the program. He positioned the pointer arrow on the helmet of the gladiator and the game screen vanished.

  “Now we’re onto something.”

  He spent the next five minutes urgently entering different key combinations. It wasn’t until he had the arrow in the far right-hand corner of the screen, and pressed the control and escape keys simultaneously, that a menu system blipped up that had nothing to do with games, and everything to do with hidden accounting activities.

  “Got you, Sheffert,” Adam muttered with Eva looking on.

  EVA DIDN’T KNOW much about undercover operations, but she knew enough about accounting and the law to spot a phantom ledger. And that’s exactly what Adam had pulled up on the Honeycutt account. All the secret transacti
ons made to look clean on her accounts. All the sly little ways to shuffle money around and keep it out of the tax man’s hands. And all the crafty distribution of monies and assets to make it appear that Honeycutt owned far less than they actually did. They were all mapped out in front of her like a white-collar criminal’s guide to tax evasion.

  She rubbed her temples, realizing that the FTC audit on Honeycutt’s account she had been preparing for had more to do with this than the simple clerical errors she had been led to believe by Norman Sheffert himself.

  “You’ve got him,” she said quietly, slipping her hand to lay against Adam’s arm.

  His grin was a thousand percent pure Adam Grayson. An alpha male who knew where he stood in the world and knew exactly how to manipulate it for his own purposes. And, Eva realized, he could use those same charming skills on women. While his grin affected her in a more profound way than any of Adam-the-geek’s smiles had, she also recognized that Adam-the-alpha would never have broken through the charm-proof barriers she had erected after Bill had walked out on her. No, it had taken nerdy Adam to slip past those. But it was definitely a combination of the two Adams that had made her fall in love with the man next to her.

  And she did love him. More profoundly than she’d ever loved any man before him. And, she feared, more acutely than she would love anyone else again.

  “Yes, I’d say I definitely have Sheffert by the shorts.”

  Her hand grew hot where she still touched him, but she didn’t remove it. “So, I did end up having what you needed.”

  The grin faded from Adam’s handsome face. Replaced by an intense expression that seemed to say so much more. “Yes. You did end up having what I needed.”

  With his other hand, he lifted hers from where it rested on his arm and brought it to his mouth. His brown eyes darkened as he pressed her palm against his lips, then nipped at the flesh there. Eva gasped softly, her body humming to life even as he abruptly released her and shut down the computer, slipping the diskette into his front shirt pocket.

  “Where are the troops?” he asked.

  “Gone. They went to my aunt and uncle’s for dinner to celebrate Labor Day. They wanted…” She trailed off, her heartbeat growing heavier with each breath. “They wanted us to go, too, but I bowed out, telling them I wasn’t feeling well.”

  As they stood, the fact that they weren’t touching had little effect on the heady currents running between them.

  “And are you feeling well?”

  “I’m feeling just fine.”

  ADAM DIDN’T KNOW what it was about this incredible woman that had touched him so. But as he led her to the bedroom, then closed the door and crushed her against him, he knew that she’d touched a place he hadn’t allowed anyone even to glimpse before.

  Up until now, his life had been a series of undercover assignments, where he switched from identity to identity with the ease of an actor. He had seen the undercover demands as part of his job, his disguises a requirement. Now he questioned whether he required the concealment the job provided. He suspected he hadn’t been merely doing his job. He had been hiding. Hiding from love. From true commitment. From anyone and everyone who could ever touch his heart and open him up to pain.

  Then there was this weekend and Eva. Sultry, earthy, Eva Mavros Burgess. In turns, a competent, independent professional. A caring, dedicated daughter. A promising, loving mother. Then there was the woman he held against his hard length now. The passionate siren who knew what she wanted and knew how to make him want it too. It was her presence, her wit and her uncommon desire that had proved to him that without pain there also could be no true joy.

  Odd that he should feel both so acutely now. Pain because he knew he’d soon be losing her. Joy because he had these next few hours to indulge in the wonderful fantasies that had changed during their time together. Dreams that would never be realized to their full extent.

  Eva drew slightly away and switched on a small lamp in the corner, filling the room with soft, yellow light.

  “I want to see you,” she murmured.

  Adam smoothed the dark cloud of hair back from her face, then rested a hand against her cheek, drinking in the expression she wore just for him. He slowly brushed his lips over hers, reveling in the way she allowed him to take charge for this one instant. Content to hand him the reins, her lips parted, her sensuous olive green eyes watching him through the fringe of her dark lashes, her body still. Her surrendering of control touched off an overwhelming sense of power to know he had caused this wondrously independent woman to trust him. To give herself to him completely, with no promises.

  He drew slightly back, holding her gaze captive, reading in her expression what he knew to be the truth. That there could be no promises. She wasn’t ready to commit to him. And he couldn’t commit to her. Not in the way she needed him to. No matter how strongly he wished he could. Four days ago he didn’t think he’d ever commit to a woman. Now he was faced with a woman carrying another man’s child. And living with the aching knowledge that he had nothing to offer either one of them beyond now.

  With a low groan, he slid his hand to the back of her head, entwining his fingers in her thick dark hair, tugging on the wavy strands so her neck arched, her mouth tilted upward, her impossibly sexy lips inviting him to take them.

  And take them he did. He claimed her mouth with such hunger that he could bury himself within her that moment and explode with the ferocious intensity born of long-denied need. He’d always been the one to take control in a relationship, but though Eva’s stillness represented surrender, Adam realized that she was the one in charge of them both. With a word, she could stop his seduction. With a touch, she could take them both further.

  His tongue plunged in and out of her mouth, probing the soft flesh of her inner cheek, the smoothness of her teeth, tangling with her tongue, challenging it to come out. He wasn’t going any further until she openly invited him to, encouraged him to touch her. Until she let him know with her actions that she wanted him as desperately as he needed her.

  The moment she did proved to be one of the sweetest, most defining moments of Adam’s life. Eva melted against him, slipping her arms around his waist, opening her mouth to take him in and using her tongue to let him know she needed him as much as he needed her.

  He slid his arms over her lush body, running his fingers slowly, intently, down from her shoulders. Pressing a path over the hollow of her back, then grasping the firm flesh of her bottom before crowding her to his erection.

  A groan ripped from his throat. He leaned his head back, marveling in the feel of her softness against his hard length. Streaks of fire blasted through his groin and abdomen, stoking a blaze of a different kind already burning in his chest. It was then he knew what he suspected all along. That what was to happen between them now would be much more than sex…it would be the sweet uniqueness of making love. It would be magic.

  Dragging his hands back up to her face, he held her still, exploring and claiming her mouth with increased need. A man incapable of probing deeply enough, tasting nearly enough to satisfy.

  Eva shoved the material of his shirt up and out of the waist of his slacks until her fingertips touched his overly aware flesh. She drew long lines up and down his back, not quite scratching his skin, but not quite caressing it either. Then she plunged her hands into the waist of his pants and circled her fingers around the band to the front. Adam sucked in a breath when she brushed her knuckles against his stomach, persuaded to loosen his grip on her as she fumbled with his zipper.

  Within moments her hot fingers curled around his erection. Holding tight. Making him feel that everything that was him resided there and was hers for the taking. He surged against her grasp and she began a slow up-and-down movement that stoked his fires even higher.

  “Eva, I want you…need you,” he whispered fiercely against her mouth. “More than I’ve ever needed anyone else before.”

  Her eyelids fluttered open. “I’m here, Adam. I’
m here.”

  And that she was. Every delicious inch of her.

  Moving his hands from her rear, he ripped at the shoulders of her dress, too impatient to slide out the buttons he had fantasized about undoing with his teeth earlier. Satisfied, he watched the tiny buttons pop out of the stretched buttonholes. Finally her breasts were bare but for a scrap of satin and lace. She reached around and hastily removed her bra, so even that barrier was taken away.

  He lowered his head to smother and lave her dark nipples. One, then the other and back again. His hands teasing, squeezing. His mouth suckling, licking and tasting until he heard her breath come in rapid, ragged gasps. He fastened his lips around her right nipple and suckled deeply, then opened his mouth and took in more of her breast even as he dropped his hands back to her waist. Yanking up the hem of her skirt, he sought the panties clinging to her perfectly curved bottom, then eased his fingers inside the elastic. He slowly drew the tip of his index finger along the swollen folds of flesh that protected her until it rested against the tiny, puckered aperture just beyond.

  Eva whimpered. She lifted one long leg and wrapped it around him, catching her knee on his hip. She pressed hard against his erection while Adam teased her from the other side, shifting his fingertip and gently parting her silken folds, then dipping his finger into her sweet, hot wetness.

  There was pure power in knowing he could make her come apart with his hand. But Adam reminded himself he had already done that. Now he wanted her fully, wanted to bury himself deep inside her, feel her sleek muscles contract around him, pulling him deeper, pleading with him to stay.

  Eva eased her hold on his arousal and tunneled her hands into his hair. She coaxed his mouth up to hers, her hunger a palpable thing.

  Slipping his fingers from her dripping sweetness, he yanked at her panties. Eva tugged at the front of his pants until she freed him, the scraps of silk and lace and white cotton dropping to the floor. Scraping his callused palms up her legs until they rested against the backs of her thighs, he boosted her up.