04 A Killing Touch (26 page)
Taking her response as acceptance, he stretched a booted foot behind him and nudged the door closed. No longer caring about her nakedness, at least not for the first time, Jace hitched her skirt to her waist. She released him long enough to take off her thong while he stripped off his boots and jeans and pulled a condom from his wallet.
“You’re prepared.”
“A military man always is.”
“Because you have a woman in every port?”
“Some do. I didn’t.” He eased her jacket off so she stood before him in only her satin and lace camisole and stilettos. From her pale brown eyes to her swollen lips, her fist-sized perky boobs with erect nipples, to the tips of her stilettos the woman was walking sex. And she was his for the night. “Now stop talking.”
“Make me.”
The more she wanted out, the more they dragged her back in.
With A Vengeance
© 2013 Jacqui Jacoby
Daughter to murdered CIA officers, niece to a deputy director, Jaime Walsh has never known life outside the world of espionage. Until a high-action case in Buenos Aires leaves her gutted. Physically, emotionally…and professionally.
She’d planned for her long-overdue vacation to be a time to rest and reassess. With her longtime partner Stephen not far behind, it’s a tropical paradise away from work. A paradise where boundaries will be tested.
From their training days, Stephen Reid has watched Jaime kick ass while performing what has become his second job—watching her back. But now his feelings have grown.
As best friends look at each other in a new light, they like what they see. And Jaime dreams of a new life outside “the company”.
Except someone from their past won’t be satisfied until Jaime and the man she loves are hunted to the brink of death. Now Jaime must find the strength to trust her heart and let go of her fear. Before she loses everything…
Warning: This book contains world travel with stops in exotic locations, a kick-ass heroine who just wants to be left alone and a sexy hero who can’t seem to stop himself from watching her back.
Enjoy the following excerpt for
With A Vengeance:
Jaime, Collin and Stephen splashed through the drainage pipe, heading into the belly of the city, long since immune to the stench around them. The pipe narrowed two more feet, forcing them to hunch over. In the dark, they felt their way along the wall, knowing sooner or later they were going to find a manhole or drain from the street or something big enough to let them crawl out of this hellhole.
“Hawaii,” Jaime said, breaking a long silence.
“What about it?” Stephen asked, directly behind her. He kept one hand in hers, the other on the wall.
“I think I’m going to go to Hawaii.”
Collin chuckled from in front of her. Always the heroes, they had stuck her in the middle. Again. “When is that taking place?”
“As soon as I get out of here. I need a vacation.”
Now Stephen laughed. “You wouldn’t know how.”
She stopped to stretch. The roof was too low for her to stand, so she leaned over, stretching her back and arms. “I might surprise you.”
Here in Argentina their job had been simple. To ascertain the production of uranium was used for nuclear reactors and not nuclear weapons. So far, the job had been a piece of cake. Posing as American representatives of the civilian company, Agency of Nuclear Technology, they had easily obtained access to the Ezeiza Processing Plant and the Pilcaniyeu Enrichment Plant.
Rico Chavez, an employee of Ezeiza, had been born in Argentina and educated at MIT. Already suspicious of his superiors’ motives when Jaime had approached him with an offer of cash in exchange for a look into the Ezeiza records, he had readily agreed.
The records indicated nothing improper was happening at the plant, and the crew had been about to call it quits and head home.
Except now Rico Chavez had been hit and Jaime had been seen in the room.
God, I’m tired
. Jaime couldn’t even remember the last time she had taken a holiday.
Keeping to the left, they traveled through the maze.
The tunnels led to a ladder. A manhole. The street above. Two cars were parked directly beside them, blocking their ascent to the real world from anyone who might happen by. The rain fell, but it had lost its wrath.
When they crawled onto the street, they didn’t have a clue how far they were from where they entered the drains.
Collin replaced the cover and put his arm over Jaime’s shoulder. They walked off, Stephen two steps behind. The buildings they walked by advertised rooms for rent by the hour.
Collin detoured into a late-night market while Jaime and Stephen leaned against the outside wall.
Collin was back within three minutes, stuffing a small package into his jacket pocket.
They kept moving.
Walking past a dilapidated building whose neon window sign proclaimed the establishment simply as “Hotel”, they exchanged looks, walked over the threshold and got themselves a room.
The clerk’s eyebrows arched when he looked up from his newspaper. His chapped lips spread into a crooked smile over his short, dirty beard when they requested one room for the three of them.
“
Si
.” He leered. “
Si, si
.”
If they hadn’t been so tired, if they had cared one iota what this moron thought, they might have defended themselves. But they were and they didn’t, so they let him think his perverted thoughts, grabbed their key and took the stairs to the second floor.
The carpet had been red at one point. Torn and discolored, it fit perfectly with the spotted walls that screamed for paint.
Room 2A. Top of the stairs and to the right.
Stephen entered first, turning on the lights.
Collin shut the door behind them, snapping the lock.
“Bathroom. Now,” Stephen ordered Jaime.
She grunted as Collin pulled out the brown paper bag and tossed it to Stephen. Stephen caught it overhand.
Jaime sat down on the edge of the stained tub, her hands on her knees as she waited for the torture.
The three-by-five bathroom reeked of things living where they shouldn’t be living. Stephen sat on closed toilet seat and used the back as a table. Opening the bag, he pulled out the peroxide, aspirin, gauze and first-aid tape. Stretching his leg out, he reached into his jeans pocket and got out his Swiss Army knife.
She saw him in the mirror on the back of the door as he worked, the concentration etched on his chiseled features, his blue eyes watching his own fingers move.
“This could really use some stitches,” Stephen said.
“And?” she said, wincing when he dabbed at the wound with a cloth soaked in peroxide.
She could see her blood on his fingers and on his watch. A droplet was even running down the back of his hand, but he ignored it.
“FYI,” he said, tossing the cloth into the sink. “You scared me,” he added, looking her straight in the eye before cutting a couple of butterfly bandages.
“You should learn to drive better.”
He smiled. Jaime always loved his smile. It made even the worst times seem okay.
Like now.
“You do need to get another hobby besides babysitting me, you know,” she told him. He smiled again, only this time there was a mischievous edge to it and she knew she would pay.
She did.
He pushed harder on the cut, making her yelp.
“Bastard,” she said.
“Whiner,” he shot back.
Collin appeared in the doorway. “There’s no phone so we can’t check in,” he said.
Jaime winced as Stephen pulled the edges of the cut together with the tape.
“We’ll sleep here and call first thing in the morning,” Stephen said.
“There’s only two double beds,” Collin said. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a coin, positioning it on his bent thumb. “Head’s gets the single. Tail’s gets her.”
A Killing Touch
Nikki Duncan
He’s everything she craves. She’s everything he dreads.
Sensory Ops, Book 4
Journalist Lana Quinn has a way with hard-hitting news. The story she’s uncovered has potential, but she needs the help of her best friend’s FBI team. She’s been rescued by them, worked with them, and partied with them, but convincing the second in command to believe her theory—that a killer’s touch sets off a lethal allergic reaction—is a frustrating challenge.
Especially since he excites her, body and mind. He’s a danger she shouldn’t indulge.
Aidan Burgess is resistant to helping Lana, but not for the reason she thinks. She has a knack for landing herself in trouble, which means she needs protection. Protecting her means staying near her, a journalist, who like all journalists uses whatever—and whomever—it takes to get her story. It’s a case he wants to refuse.
Especially since she lights a fire in his blood. She’s a danger he can’t afford.
As Lana follows up on lead after deadly lead, learning to trust and rely on each other becomes their only lifesaving hope. If their pride doesn’t become their final pitfall.
Warning: This title contains a grudge-holding hero who gives “kiss my ass” new meaning, a heroine out to prove herself, and a danger that dares them to trust.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
A Killing Touch
Copyright © 2013 by Nikki Duncan
ISBN: 978-1-61921-473-6
Edited by Tera Kleinfelter
Cover by Kanaxa
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: March 2013
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