Dragon and the Dove (13 page)

That’s what Cooper had thought.

Jessica woke with a start, her heart
pounding, her senses alert in the darkness.

“Shh.” The comforting sound was whispered
close to her ear. “It’s just John making tea in the kitchen.”

John, Jessica repeated in her mind. John was
Dr. Liu’s brother, Cooper’s security guard and houseboy. He was
also a warrior. She had felt the power of his body in his handshake
and in the finely focused energy of his dark gaze.

The voice whispering to her was equally easy
to identify and recall. Cooper was a warrior too. He was also
incredibly close, lying behind her on the couch, his body pressed
against the length of hers. His hand moved on her waist, caressing
her through the light cotton of her T-shirt. With effort, she
resisted the impulse to lift into his touch.

“You haven’t been asleep very long,” he
murmured, his breath warm and soft on the back of her neck. “Why
don’t you try to get more rest. Your brothers have gone to bed.
John and Yuxi have everything under control.”

Everything except you, she thought, and
wondered how they had gotten into such a compromising position. She
remembered meeting the other two men and settling on the couch to
wait out the dawn. She didn’t remember Cooper joining her.

He should have had more sense.

“Yuxi is checking the outside perimeters of
the house and yard, and I just checked the children.” His hand
stroked over her hip and back down to her waist. The movement was
gentle and caring, intimate and sensual.

She groaned to herself and covered her face
with one hand. He wasn’t the only one who needed more sense. She’d
been divorced for three years, and her sex life had disappeared
long before the divorce. She had missed sex, but she hadn’t been
compelled to search it out at any and all costs, not by any stretch
of the imagination. She was a mother, a woman with
responsibilities.

Now Cooper Daniels was touching her, his
hand on her waist, his breath on her nape, his chest warm and solid
against her back, and all she could remember was that she was a
woman. It was nerve-racking, unsettling, and sinfully exciting.

His hand slid up the curve of her hip again,
and she bit down on her lower lip to keep from making any sound. He
had her trapped between his body and the back of the couch,
surrounding her with his maleness and weaving a spell with his
caress. She had to get up.

“Excuse me,” she said so quietly she barely
heard herself. Regardless of her abruptness, she hoped he would
take the hint and move.

He didn’t. His hand tightened and held her
steady as he shifted his weight more fully against her. She caught
her breath on a soft gasp, stunned by what she felt. He was
aroused, the hard length of him pressed against her buttocks.

“You’re so damn nice to hold,” he said
huskily.

“You—you can’t do that here.” Good Lord.
They were in her brother’s house, in the forest of the living
room—yet despite the obvious constraints, she was on the receiving
end of a quiet, inexorable seduction.

“I know,” he whispered just before his mouth
came down, warm, wet, and open on her neck.

Melting heat swept through her body. She
groaned aloud, and his breathing grew ragged.

He gnawed on her delicate skin, running his
tongue across her neck to soothe the love bites he gave. He was
both rough in communicating his needs and gentle in eliciting her
response, kissing her and shifting her in his arms until he could
claim her mouth. When she was beneath him, he covered her
completely, his size and weight controlling her with a tantalizing
tenderness.

He felt like heaven, moving over her, using
his body to tease and incite. His hand was under her T-shirt,
cupping her breast and sending a wave of desire to pool in her
loins. She’d forgotten how hot a man’s hand could be. She’d
forgotten how erotic it was to be wanted, how a man’s needs could
act as a catalyst to awaken long-lost passions. He rocked against
her in the most primal of rhythms, and she wanted nothing more than
to open herself to him, to welcome him into her core.

She grasped his shoulders, her fingers
digging into his shirt, and he angled his mouth over hers for a
deeper kiss.

It wasn’t enough. It would never be enough
as long as it was just a kiss. Cooper kept himself on the edge of
no return, knowing there was no way on Earth he was going to get
too much closer to what he wanted.

He wanted her. He wanted her with an ache he
could feel right down through the center of his body, with the
heaviest ache between his legs. He was hard . . . and she was so
damn soft.

He broke off the kiss with a muttered
curse.

His labored breathing filled the space
between them, making him feel like a fool. He should have known she
would go to his head like a fine wine cut with grain alcohol. He
swore again, looking down into the most beautiful eyes he’d ever
seen. They were languorous and confused, wanting what he wanted,
but she had the same damn reasons for stopping that he had.

“Do I have a chance in hell of getting into
your pants tonight?” He’d had to ask. He knew he’d put it crudely,
but that was his only defense against the sure rejection.

She shook her head, and he could see tears
forming in those beautiful, cinnamon-colored eyes. Women.

He wasn’t angry with her. He was angry with
himself.

“I don’t suppose you’d like to get in mine
for about five minutes?”

“And do what?” she asked, obviously shocked,
her eyes widening with surprise.

The ingenuousness of her question brought a
much-needed grin to his mouth. At least she wasn’t going to cry
now.

“You’re a smart lady, Jessie. I bet if you
give it a little thought, you’ll come up with something.”

She blushed, and his grin broadened.

His smile was short-lived, though, lasting
no longer than it took him to feel her next breath bring them
closer. He rolled off her before he forgot he had a few rules of
his own when it came to women. He’d kissed her three times, and
when he thought about it, he realized she’d either cried or been on
the verge of tears all three times. That told him something he
ought not forget.

He understood how sex might be considered
physically threatening by a woman. He even understood how it could
be emotionally threatening. In truth, he understood the emotional
threat better than the physical threat, having experienced it
himself. He did not understand why kissing would make a woman cry,
and he wondered how many times he’d have to kiss her before he
found out.

“Would you like some tea?” he asked, keeping
his distance by walking to the other side of the cheetah table.

“No,” she said, and he could hear her
straightening her clothes as she stood up. “I think I’ll go sleep
in Christina’s room.”

He turned and watched her as she left, her
silhouette making a shadow in the doorway in the instant before she
was gone. It was a sensible plan, he thought. She’d be safe in
there, safe from him.

* * *

They both looked like hell, like two people
who hadn’t gotten much sleep, and there wasn’t a person milling
around the kitchen who didn’t have something to say about one or
the other of them.

“You kinda look like a raccoon, Mom,” Eric
said, “with that dark smudge
sitting under
your eyeballs.” He tilted his head back and gave her a scrunched-up
scrutinizing. “It’s neat.”

“Thank you, honey. Eat your granola.”
Jessica sighed and continued rummaging through her purse, looking
for the extra-strength aspirin she kept there. Children were so
beautifully, simply, painfully honest. A mother’s self-esteem
didn’t stand a chance.

Shoving aside her key ring with a small
flashlight attachment and the paperback she always kept handy in
case she got caught in traffic, she finally found the plastic
bottle she was looking for.

“The woman is out back on the patio,
Cooper,” John Liu said, referring to Cao Bo. “She seems recovered
from her ordeal. If you think you’re up to it, we could talk to her
now.” A mischievous wryness shaded his voice. Cooper gave him a
drop-dead dragon glare.

Jessica didn’t bother to hide a tired grin
at his expense. His irritability was the only solace available for
her wounded ego. They’d gone further than a kiss in the night, and
she was trying to figure out why. She was a mother, and mothers
didn’t neck on couches.

He and John refilled their coffee cups on
their way out the door, with Cooper taking an extra cup for the
messenger.

Jessica got up from the table and warmed her
own cup, watching the two men walk across the first patio and drop
down a couple of steps to the second level. Ms. Cao awaited them
there under the shade of a tan-oak tree. Cooper really did look
like hell. His hair was sticking up from all the times he’d plowed
his fingers through it. Beard stubble darkened his jaw, and his
clothes were wrinkled.

“Looks like he had a rough night,” Tony said
conversationally, coming up behind her and pouring himself a cup of
coffee.

Jessica made a noncommittal reply.

“Hmm.” Tony took his first sip, then said,
“You don’t look so good yourself.”

“Thank you.”

“I guess you should know Paul set him
straight this morning,” her brother said, reaching over her head
for a cereal bowl.

She shot him a wary glance. “What do you
mean?”

“Don’t worry. He did it nicely.”

“Did what?” She hardly dared to ask.

“Told him about Ian.”

Great, Jessica thought, not bothering to
sputter out her indignation. Now her humiliation was perfectly
complete. Someday Paul would grow up and realize that being the
oldest man living in the house did not make him the oldest, most
responsible person living in the house. He was her little brother,
not her father. Macho posturing had its unbearable moments, and
this was one of them.

“I don’t know why he bothered,” Tony
continued, rustling around in the cupboard for his favorite cereal.
“Looks to me like you and Cooper have it all figured out.”

Jessica had no idea what he meant, and even
though she was dying to ask for an explanation, she didn’t have
enough courage to listen to his answer. She kept her reply short
and off the subject.

“Eric has the granola on the table.”

“Oh.” Tony looked over his shoulder toward
his nephew. “Thanks. Hey, shortstuff, you better go get your school
clothes on. Tell Christina we’re leaving here in ten minutes.”

“Okay, Uncle Tony.” Eric got up from the
table, his last piece of jelly toast in his hand, and ran over to
wrap himself around his mother’s legs. “I missed you, when you were
gone
, Mom.”

Jessica leaned down and kissed his
honey-blond head. “I missed you too, sweetheart. We’ll do something
fun together on Saturday, just you and me, so think up some ideas.
Okay?”

“Okay, Mom.” He raised his face to give her
a toast-crumb-and-jelly kiss on the cheek.

After he’d left the kitchen, she looked over
and caught Tony’s eye.

“I’m sorry about last night,” she said.

He shrugged. “Not as sorry as your boss will
be if anything happens to you or one of the kids because of his
business problems.”

“I should have known better than to bring
the woman home.”

“I’m not sure you had much choice, Jessie.
She was sick, exhausted, and she wouldn’t go anyplace else.
Sometimes we have to make decisions we’d rather not have to make.
This one should turn out okay. When I called Luke last night, he
started a quiet investigation to have Cao Bo checked out from
Immigration to Chinatown. If anything turns up, he’ll be on
it.”

Jessica nodded her thanks. Their oldest
brother, Luke, was a detective with the San Francisco Police
Department, with enough years behind him to have a net of
connections stretching across the Pacific Rim. If Cao Bo had
brought trouble with her, Luke would find out about it.

“I’ll call him later to see if he’s come up
with anything,” she said.

“Okay, Jess. There’s one other thing.”

“Yes?”

“About John Liu and Yuxi. Why did you have
Cooper bring them in? You know nothing could happen around here
that you and I and Paul can’t handle.”

“I know. I just thought we’d all be safer
with another line of defense in the house.”

“We,” he asked, “as in you, me, Paul, and
the kids? Or we as in Cooper Daniels?”

Jessica took a sip of coffee, hiding behind
her cup and wondering if she had any secrets left at all.

“Well, Jess?” Tony pushed for an answer to
his question.

“He’s in trouble,” she admitted. “He needs
help, and I’m not the only one who thinks so.”

“I would hate to see you get hurt,” Tony
said, his voice growing soft and his eyes looking wiser than their
years.

“Me
,
too.”

“Do you care that much?”

“I shouldn’t,” she said, lowering her
gaze.

She heard him rise from the table and walk
across the kitchen floor. He stopped and gave her a quick hug on
his way out, but she couldn’t tell if he was giving her support or
consolation.

She definitely felt like she needed both.
Cooper had done nothing but aggravate her and set her off from the
first moment they’d met, and drive her crazy with illicit
imaginings. She could hardly look at him without thinking about the
way she’d first seen him—naked—and thinking about him naked made
her think of a whole lot of other things.

With a subdued sigh, she tore off a paper
towel and used it to wipe the jelly off her cheek. One look at her
legs confirmed that she would need to wash her jeans to get the
fruit and butter off them.

It was Monday morning, and despite a
near-irresistible urge to crawl into bed and not surface for a
week, she downed the last of her coffee and braced herself to meet
the day.