Sinful Deception (Covert Affairs Book 3) (11 page)

Brooks nodded. “I understand. Where did you get the gun, Tova?”

Another wave of guilt pressed in on her. “My dad. In Mexico. Our streets were rough. My dad taught me to shoot. My brother taught me to fight.” Then she smiled softly. “And all my mom wanted me to do was dance.”

“Agent Brooks,” one of the officers called from the door.

She nodded to the man, then turned her gaze back to Tova. “We called your parents earlier for information on Cedro. They know you were abducted, so you might want to call them and let them know you’re okay.”

Tova covered her mouth. “Oh my God.”

Brooks excused herself and started toward the other officer.

“Here,” Marcus said, “use my phone.”

Tova’s shaking hands couldn’t dial, and she felt helpless when Marcus took it and punched in the phone number for her.

Her mother picked up, worry drenching her tone. “Hola?”

“Hola, mama.”

“
Dios mios, mi’ja
!” Her voice was filled with terror and relief and love. “Are you all right? What happened?”

“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you tomorrow. I just wanted you to know I’m fine, and for you and Papa to keep your guard up.”

“
Sí, sí
. It’s so good to hear your voice.”

“Yours too.” She pressed her fingers to burning eyes. “I saw Cedro for his birthday. We met at the fence.”

“Is your brother in trouble,
mi’ja
? Did he bring you into it?”

“I don’t know. He’s not answering his phone. Do you know where he is?”

“No,
mi’ja
, just like I told the police. He went to Tijuana with some friends from work. That’s all I know.”

Tova’s tired brain chugged to life. “Friends from work?”

“
Sí
. Something new. Some type of tour guide.”

Tova’s stomach tightened. “He told me he got laid off three weeks ago.”

“He did, from the packaging plant. But he’s had this new job for about a week. We were relieved he found work so fast.”

Tova closed her eyes and pressed her forehead to her hand. Maybe he’d lied to keep them from worrying. She didn’t know what to think anymore. “If you talk to him, will you tell him to call me? It’s really important, Mama.”

When she disconnected from her mother, she called her brother and left a message. “Cedro, we have a big problem.” She drew a breath, but her voice still wobbled a little when she said, “Two men kidnapped me tonight. They said you owe them money, and if you don’t pay them, they’ll come back for me. Please call me back. I need to know what’s going on. I need to know you’re okay.”

She hung up with fear, frustration, and futility swirling deep inside her. “It’s been like this with him his whole life,” she told Marcus. “He’d get a new girlfriend and suddenly be in debt to his friends. He’d go dirt bike riding and not come home for two days. Mama, Papa, and I spent our lives worrying about him. One of the reasons I waited so long to come here for college was because I was afraid of what he’d do without me there pounding common sense into his hard head.” She looked up at him. “God, Marcus, I’m so sorry. I’m pulling you into this the same way he pulls me in.”

“No, you’re not.” Marcus drew her close and pressed a kiss to her hair.

She curled her hand into the shirt at his chest and opened her mouth on his throat, tasting him.

A soft groan rolled beneath her lips; then he was gone.

“Good news.” Brooks’s voice startled Tova before she realized that was why Marcus pulled away. “They’ve arrested your assailants.”

Tova eased to her feet, hands clenched. “What happened to the one I shot?”

“He’s still alive but critical.”

She folded her arms, confused by the numbness spreading through her at the news.

“Tova,” Brooks said. “Can you come down to the station tomorrow for a lineup?”

“Yes—oh. What time? I have class, then work…”

“It might be good for you to take a day off.” Marcus squeezed her shoulder.

“Well said,” Brooks said with a lift of her brows. “And it might be good if you took a little of your own advice, Agent.” She settled her gaze on Tova again. “Until we know who these men are associated with, it would be best if you weren’t alone. Do you have someone you could stay with for a few nights?”

Discomfort curled in her belly. She deliberately kept her gaze off Marcus. “Um…I could… Yeah. I’ll…find…”

“I’ve got her,” Marcus said. “I’ll make sure she’s tucked in safe.”

“All right, then.” Zoe glanced at them both. “I’ll call you as soon as I know when we can get the lineup together. The crime scene guys will probably be here another hour or so.”

Marcus walked Brooks to the door, and they spoke a moment. Tova forced her gaze off Marcus, where it wanted to stay and lounge, conjuring fantasies, and turned toward the hall, where her bedroom light shone through the door.

She didn’t feel comfortable calling anyone right now. Not because she didn’t have friends who would take her in. She did—her former dance team members, Carrie, a couple of other waitresses at the diner. But calling someone meant explaining what happened, and she didn’t feel up to that. She could go to a hotel, but it would drain her already low bank account.

A hand touched her shoulder, and Tova jumped and shrank away. Marcus lifted his hand, palm out. “Just me.” The tension melted away, and she lowered her forehead into her hand. “You’re gonna be jumpy for a few days. That’s normal.” He slid his arms around her and pulled her close. And, God, to be held like this… It had been so long. It felt so good. And that damn banked lust burned to life again. “You’re safe now.”

Eight

Marcus couldn’t quite read Tova now. He’d convinced her to allow the paramedic on scene clean and patch the scrapes on her legs from hitting the pavement and gotten her to take some pain meds, but she’d adamantly denied his suggested visit the hospital. They were now almost to his town house, and she’d gone completely quiet. He’d learned everyone reacted differently to trauma, and because he didn’t know her very well, he wasn’t sure how to treat her.

He pulled into his parking spot and turned off the engine. Tova didn’t move from beneath his arm where she fit perfectly beside him on the bench seat. Didn’t pull her distant gaze from the windshield or stop the curl and release pattern of her fingers in his shirt over his belly, movement that kept shooting sensation between his legs during the drive and accounted for his nearly painful hard-on.

“Have I said thank you a hundred times yet?” she murmured.

“You’ve thanked me as many times as I’ve reminded you that I didn’t do anything.” He lifted his hand from her shoulder and ran it over her hair. He couldn’t get enough of the silky strands. “Talk to me, baby. What’s going on in that pretty head?”

“Probably not what you think.” She took a slow, deep breath and, when she exhaled, her body sank heavier against his. “It probably makes me seem, I don’t know, inhuman or hard core or something, but after growing up in Mexico, surrounded by violence far worse than what happened tonight…” She shook her head, shrugged. “Maybe it will hit me tomorrow. Or maybe I’m just more desensitized than I realized…”

He waited, but when she didn’t go on, he said, “It’s good to follow your gut in situations like this, when your logical mind is shut down.”

She turned her face up to his, and in the overhead lights from the parking lot, her eyes looked as golden green as a summer meadow. And God, she was so much more beautiful in person. A little smile lifted her full mouth. “My gut says I want to maul you.”

He sputtered a laugh. “Like I said…”

The humor in her expression transitioned into heat, and her gaze lowered to his mouth. “I don’t want to talk. Don’t want to think. I really just want…you.”

She lifted her mouth to his. The kiss was simple and sweet. He let her lead, even though he wanted way more. Her lashes fluttered open, and her hand slid up his chest and around the back of his neck. Then she pulled him into another kiss. This one solid, deliberate. And she opened, stroked her tongue along his bottom lip, then slipped it into his mouth. Everything but Tova faded away.

The first glide of her tongue against his made him moan. She tasted real and warm. She tasted sinful. And she spent long, delectable moments getting to know his mouth, suckling his lips, tilting her head at different angles, tasting different parts of him. Letting him taste her.

He was lost in her mouth, in the way her fingers scraped his scalp and curled in his hair when she lifted one leg over his lap and slid across to fit herself against him, the same way she’d been fitted to him earlier. Perfectly.

Her body melted against his, belly to belly, chest to chest, and she deepened the kiss. He wanted to touch her, to devour her, but was afraid to push. He slipped his arms around her and stretched his arms up her back. Slanted his head and swirled his tongue with hers on a moan. She rocked her hips, rubbing him with the softness between her thighs, and pleasure flooded his groin, spread across his hips, snuck up his spine.

He broke away, breathing hard. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not that fragile. I never have been.” She cradled his face in her hands and pressed light, slow kisses to his lips. “I’m fine, and when I’m touching you, I forget all about anything that hurts.”

She tilted her head and kissed him again, deeper, hotter, and moved her hips in a way that made him need to return the pressure. The friction exploded between his legs, shot heat up his spine. And fuck, that felt so good.

“Whoa.” He turned his head to break the kiss and gripped her hips to still them. “Tova, it’s been a while for me, and we’ve been building up the foreplay. If we don’t slow down, I’m not gonna make it to the bedroom. And I need to get to the shower before that happens.” Her lips moved along his jaw, tightening his throat. “I’ve been working all day, baby. I’m dirty, sweaty—”

“Bedrooms are overrated.” She hummed with her mouth against his neck. “And you taste delicious, smell like raw man, feel like heaven, and we can shower after…” She pulled back and looked him directly in the eye. “Unless…you don’t…want to.”

“N-no. I mean…I do. I just… That’s not why I brought you here. I don’t want you to feel like—”

She pressed her fingers to his lips. “I can feel grateful without feeling obligated. And, yeah, it’s been a rough night. And, yeah, I’d love to have you help me forget all about it right now. But, honestly, those are incidental compared to the fact that you are hotter than the devil. I liked you from the first time we talked, and if we’d met and done nothing more exciting than had coffee tonight, I’d still want to jump you right now.”

With a little quirk of her lips, she said, “Are we good here?”

“I…uh…yeah,” he murmured. “Good. I just…you know…”

She covered his mouth with hers again, cutting off that nervous blabbering with a kiss both searing and erotic. Marcus tightened his hands at her hips, opened to her, and took everything she gave. Her hands crept underneath his shirt and stroked his skin in greedy sweeps. Sensation burned beneath her fingers, shooting heat everywhere as her mouth tasted, her tongue licked, and her body moved. This was the hot, drunk, uninhibited, gotta-have-you-now kind of passion that made him high, but one he rarely experienced, and then only when he and his date had drunk way too much. Only neither he nor Tova had been drinking.

“Tova.” He gripped her arms and pushed her back. “Let’s at least get inside.”

She leaned away with a hot little smile. “I guess.”

He opened the door and climbed out, carrying her with him, then set her on her feet and reached back into the cab to grab her bag. Her arms circled around him from behind and cupped him through his jeans.

“Fuck.” Marcus’s knees gave, and he planted both hands against the truck’s doorframe to stay upright. “Baby, I’m not going to make it to the house.”

He pushed off the truck, turned, and swept her off her feet. She gasped and clung to him the way she had earlier, but this time she was laughing. And kissing him. Everywhere she could reach—forehead, cheeks, eyes, mouth. Marcus stumbled to the door and fumbled with the key.

“This would go faster if you’d let me—” he started.

She kissed his mouth, slid her tongue against his, and he moaned as he pushed the door open.

It hit the wall. Marcus dropped Tova’s bag and closed his arms around her, still kissing her, pulling her body up against his.

The light over the porch and one over the stove were the only illumination, and he wanted so much more. Wanted to see every inch of her, every touch of her flesh on his.

Her hands were already working on his jeans. She struggled. Swore. Then finally got past the barriers and took him into her hands.

“Holy
fuck
.” Once again, Marcus’s knees went out. He pressed his hands to the wall, holding himself up while his body caught fire. “Baby… Shit…”

Her hands left his cock for a moment. Another zipper rasped. The rustle of jeans sounded. “Condoms,” she said, breathless.

“Wallet.” He started to reach back, but she got it first. Tugged out a condom and ripped it open. “Honey, let me—”