Rogue Alpha (Alpha 7) (10 page)

Seth narrowed his gaze on Diana. “I don’t need to make you do anything. I said you aren’t coming with us, and that’s the end of the subject.”

Her chin rose another notch. “I’m the one he’s been following for days. It was my hotel room and apartment he wrecked.”

“I
said
you aren’t coming.”

She gave a snort. “And I’m sure this he-man act usually works with most women. But I’m not most women.”

No, she wasn’t. What she was becoming was a thorn in his side.

Enough to make Seth regret agreeing to help her?

No, he couldn’t bring himself to regret that. For some reason, Diana was in danger. He wasn’t going anywhere until he knew why and had dealt with whoever was responsible.

As for Diana, she had been scared and distrustful of everyone when she came to him yesterday. She had changed in just those hours, regained her confidence. He had no doubt she would have done that without him eventually, and in all probability confronted the man following her on her own. With dire consequences.

No, he wasn’t going anywhere until he knew it was safe for Diana to live her life in peace.

“He-man act?” he echoed dryly.

Diana raised her eyes heavenward. Everything else she had said—and done—and Seth had chosen to pick her up on that one offhand remark. “Well, look at the two of you.” Her gaze ranged over both him and Jonas Grayfeather. “You’re like a two-man army, both armed and ready to kill.”

Seth’s mouth tightened. “Only if we have to.”

“And how often have you
had to
?”

“Often enough that we don’t make that decision easily,” Jonas dismissed in a hard voice that welcomed no further questions on the subject.

Telling Diana she had stepped over a line. Just as she knew that half her reluctance to stay here, while these two men went out later tonight, was because she didn’t want to be left here on her own. What if the man following her had discovered where they were and had the same idea about paying them a visit? What then? How was she supposed to fight him off if he should decide to—

“I’ll leave one of my spare guns with you, if that will make you feel safer.”

Her eyes widened. How many guns did he have with him if he was offering her
one
of his spares?

Much as she appreciated his offer, and she did know how to shoot a gun, it had only ever been at a shooting range and at inanimate targets, never at an actual person.

Desperation had made her seek out Seth in the first place. Would that same desperation make her pull the trigger and shoot a man if she had to?

She wasn’t sure she wanted to find out.

“No, that doesn’t make me feel safer at all.” She grimaced. “If the two of you go, then I’m going with you.”

“This isn’t called a safe house for nothing!”

“I’m going with you.”

“You—”

“She has a point, Seth,” Jonas put in quietly. “Left here on her own, she’s vulnerable.”

Seth turned to glare at the other man. “More vulnerable than if she comes with us?”

“Maybe.” Jonas shrugged. “Do we really want to put it to the test?”

“Oh, to hell with this.” Seth threw up his hands in defeat. “Okay, you come with us,” he bit out harshly. “But you do exactly as you’re told, understand?”

She eyed him mockingly. “Don’t I always?”

“I haven’t noticed it so far, no.” He gave her a pointed glance.

Diana’s cheeks warmed as she recalled how she had “disobeyed” him only minutes ago. Not that Seth had fought her too much on the idea after his initial protest.

She avoided his derisive gaze. “At least I’m consistent.”

“Oh, you’re that, all right.” He nodded tersely. “Okay, let’s get dinner out of the way, and then we can all go to Montmartre and talk to this guy.”

He made it sound as if they were going to pay a social call.

Something Diana knew it certainly wouldn’t be.

Chapter 7

“You should get a coat like Jonas’s,” Diana murmured to Seth as the three of them moved on foot through a darkened back street in the Montmartre district of Paris, having first taken a cab to within walking distance of the
pension
Jonas had followed the other man to earlier this evening.

The black leather duster and Jonas’s blue-black hair made him almost invisible as he glided silently from shadow to shadow.

Seth’s glance conveyed his impatience with her remark. “You like the duster, hm?”

“Very sexy.”

He gave a shake of his head. “You want me to get a duster because it would look sexy on me?”

Diana thought it would look very sexy on him, yes.

“Or maybe it’s just our resident Apache you find sexy?” Seth’s voice was hard.

“An Apache?” Her eyes widened on the man in front of them. “Really?”

“Really,” Seth echoed dryly.

Her brows rose. “What’s an Apache Indian doing working for an English company like Grayson Security?”

“Long story—”

“The two of you do realize we’re supposed to be making a covert approach on the
pension
?” the subject of their conversation cut in, the exasperation obvious in his tone.

“Sorry.” Diana gave an apologetic grimace.

“The mystery of the savage works its magic charm again,” Seth muttered, as if it happened a lot.

“Well, this savage is going to be beyond pissed if the two of you alert the bastard to the fact we’re here,” Jonas warned softly. “I didn’t give up an evening with a bottle of that fine wine we discovered in the cellar but haven’t been able to drink as yet, just so the two of you could blow the operation with your inane chatter.”

“I do not chatter inanely—” Diana broke off with a gasp as her arm was firmly grasped and she was spun round, only having time to give Seth a startled and questioning glance before his arms moved about her waist to pull her in close against the hardness of his body and his mouth claimed hers in a kiss that totally robbed her of breath.

A deep, searching kiss it was impossible to resist, Diana’s hands moving up, her fingers clinging to the width of Seth’s shoulders as she readily parted her lips for the invasion of his tongue.

“Oh, for fu— There’s a time and a place for that, Seth, and this isn’t it!”

Seth’s teeth gave Diana’s bottom lip an almost painful nip before he broke the kiss, holding her gaze with his for a second or two before glancing over at the other man. “Best way I know of to silence a woman.”

Best way he knew to silence
a
woman…? Not a specific woman, but women in general.

Diana’s cheeks blazed with angry color as she pulled out of his arms and stepped away. Not only had she kissed this jackass back, but her nipples were uncomfortably hard and aching to be touched. From a single kiss.

She shook her head, expression derisive. “I think I preferred your previous method of silencing me. He knocked me out in Colombia,” she confided to the listening Jonas.

Seth scowled as the other man began to chuckle.

He had no idea what had compelled him to kiss Diana— Not true. He might be trying to fool her and Jonas, but he should at least be honest with himself. He had kissed Diana as a direct reaction to the interest she showed in Jonas. This woman had given him so much pleasure earlier, controlled that pleasure as she had controlled him, and it grated to hear her expressing interest in another man only hours later—

Am I jealous?

Oh fuck…

He’d never felt jealousy in his life. Never hung around a woman long enough, or cared enough to even know what the emotion felt like.

He knew what it felt like now. It fried his brain. Totally distracted him. Was making him behave irrationally.

And talk to myself.

This desire for Diana was officially driving him insane. Totally, fucking insane.

Fucking…

That’s what was wrong here, Seth realized with relief. He’d touched and kissed Diana, and given her pleasure. She’d touched and kissed him, and given him pleasure. But they hadn’t actually fucked yet.

He instantly gave a wince at using that word in connection with Diana. She was better than that. Deserved lovemaking, at the very least—

Irrational.

This whole situation was fucking irrational.

And it had to stop. He had a job to do. And part of that job was keeping Diana alive. “Fine,” he snapped. “I’ll bear that in mind for next time.”

“There won’t be a next time,” Diana assured him between gritted teeth.

Seth’s moods were too mercurial for her even to try to keep track of them. One minute he was mocking. The next teasing. Then businesslike. Then the next he was arousing her with such deep and passionate kisses, they made her toes curl.

Kisses that were only meant to silence her, she reminded herself.

She straightened her shoulders. “Okay, let’s do this.” The sooner it was over, the quicker she could get on with her life, Seth could get on with his life, and the two of them need never see each other again.

Why was that such an unpleasant thought…?

“Need I remind you that you’re an observer on this mission?” he snapped now.

“I think you just did—”

“Would the two of you shut the hell up before I decide to shoot both of you so I can get some peace!” Jonas glared at them, very tall and intimidating as he blended into the surrounding darkness.

Seth’s mouth quirked in amusement. “Our resident Apache isn’t big on conversation.”

Diana had noticed that as the three of them prepared and then ate dinner together. Jonas was a man of few words, but the ones he did speak were to the point.

Which meant he was probably serious about “shooting both of you so I can get some peace.”

Her mouth twitched, then she began to smile, and then to chuckle. “You only had to ask.”

“I’ll never understand women,” Seth muttered in utter disgust.

Diana’s humor disappeared as she gave him a cool glance. “I very much doubt you’ve ever tried.”

“Save it,” Jonas rasped as Seth opened his mouth to give a pithy comeback.

Yep, Diana was driving him totally, irrationally insane.

As Jonas had just witnessed.

“So what happens now?” Diana prompted once she and Seth had returned to the château.

Seth knew what he wanted to happen now. What he had been wanting since he kissed Diana earlier.

The coolness she had been showing toward him in the interim told him it wasn’t going to happen.

He gave a shrug. “Jonas is staying to watch the
pension
tonight and he’ll call me if Eduardo comes back. Or vice versa if he should come here.”

They had drawn a blank at the
pension
earlier. Apart from an overnight bag sitting on top of the bed, Eduardo’s room had been empty, the uninterested and not particularly clean man on the front desk not in the least helpful either, when he told them he didn’t ask his guests where they were going every time they went out.

They’d all hung around in the shadows outside the
pension
for a while, and then Seth and Jonas had decided it was ridiculous for them all to lose a night’s sleep. The two men had flipped a coin for who would take the first watch. Jonas had lost.

Which meant that Seth and Diana had returned to the château alone.

And with that knowledge, the desire Seth had felt earlier tonight when he kissed her had reawakened with a vengeance. So much so that he had a raging hard-on that Diana would be able to see if she looked at him closely. Which she didn’t show any signs of doing.

She grimaced. “I know that part. I was asking about the sleeping arrangements for tonight.”

What would her answer be if I said I want the two of us to share a bedroom and a bed tonight?

His already aching cock gave an approving twitch. A painful twitch, considering how tightly it was constricted inside the confines of his jeans. “What would you like them to be?”

Diana flicked a glance in his direction before quickly looking away again. The color that instantly warmed her cheeks told him she was now well aware of his erection.

She swallowed before speaking. “I don’t normally do casual sex.”

As if Seth hadn’t already known that. “You didn’t seem to have a problem with it earlier this evening. Not that I’m complaining,” he assured her as she glanced at him sharply. “And there was nothing casual about it. It was most definitely specific to me.”

Diana knew she deserved that. That her actions earlier had been the total opposite of what she just said. Of what she was about to say now. “You irritate the hell out of me, you know that, right?”

“I know that.” He nodded.

“You’re also arrogant, and a complete pain in the ass. But,” she continued firmly as Seth would have spoken again, “that doesn’t seem to change the way I feel about having sex with you.”

He quirked one dark brow. “Which is?”

She wanted it. Wanted
him
. Badly. And that want was becoming more intense the longer she was with him. Was starting to get in the way of everything else. Including, if their distraction earlier tonight was any indication, the two of them staying alive.