Man of the Hour (19 page)

“If he’d wanted to do that, it would have been a hand grenade, not a gas grenade,” the young patrolman assured her. “But this qualifies under the terroristic threats and acts law, and we can also get him for breaking and entering.”

“If we can get any prints off the car,” an older officer amended quietly. He looked at Kirry. “Was he wearing gloves?”

She remembered Erikson’s hands on the wheel, and as they flashed into her consciousness, she remembered the black covering on them.

“Yes,” she said miserably.

“There goes the case. It’s your word against his,” the older man said.

“But…!”

“It’s the way the law’s written,” he said irritably. “None of us like it. Do you have any idea how many creeps prey on women and get away with it because we can’t do anything to help them? God, I’d give anything for a stalking law with teeth, but we haven’t got one yet! You aren’t the only victim, although I expect it feels that way right now.”

“It does.”

“Watch this guy,” the older police officer said suddenly. “You shouldn’t have been out here alone.”

Lang’s face went hard and he actually flinched. “No, she shouldn’t have,” he agreed. “I’m chief of security here, and I thought he’d given it up. My mistake.”

“It could have been a fatal one, for her,” the older man said brutally.

Lang’s eyes were anguished. “Don’t you think I know that?” He gritted out the words.

Something in his expression made the other man leave it alone. He apologized once again to Kirry and left with his partner.

“I have to drive it home,” Kirry said dully.

“You do not. We’ll lock it and leave it. For one thing, it will have to be cleaned before you can drive it again.”

“Oh. Yes, I see, I hadn’t realized…” She went to lock it, feeling numb from the brain down.

Lang helped her into his car and drove her back to her apartment. “I’m sorry,” he said through his teeth.

“It isn’t your job to watch just me all the time,” she said patiently. “You have lots of people to protect.”

“I really thought he was through. It’s been almost two weeks since we’ve even seen him. I acted like a green agent, not like a professional. I heard the call over the city band on my scanner on the way back to the office. I had no idea what I’d find when I got here. I should have known!” His hand hit the steering wheel hard with impotent rage.

His pride was hurt, she decided. He’d fallen down on the job because his mind had been on Lorna. He didn’t have to say so, but Kirry knew it. She stared out the window until he parked the car, and then she followed him inside the building and up on the elevator without a word.

She turned to him outside her apartment, feeling haggard and worn-out. “Thanks for bringing me home.”

He scowled. “Are you going to be all right?”

“Of course. I’m not bric-a-brac,” she chided. “I won’t break.”

“Keep your doors locked,” he said. “And don’t stand near any windows.”

“You’re getting paranoid,” she muttered. “He isn’t going to come at me with a high-powered rifle.”

“I don’t know what he’s going to do,” he said grimly, running a hand through his thick hair. “But we’re not going to get careless again. Got that?”

“I wasn’t careless. I looked, and I didn’t see anybody anywhere in the parking lot,” she said angrily. “I didn’t see him until I was standing right next to the car. I didn’t go close enough to get grabbed.”

“What if he’d had a gun, Kirry?” he asked in a haunted tone.

“Oh, for God’s sake, he isn’t going to shoot me!”

He didn’t answer her, or smile. He was seeing her lying facedown on the pavement, her eyes open, her body broken from gunfire. He’d seen other agents go that way. He knew, as Kirry didn’t, how unpredictable people like Erikson were.

“I’m all right,” she said, driven to reassure him. “Don’t go off
the deep end, Lang, I’m fine.” She hesitated. “And if you want to move out, I’ve already told Lorna it’s all right with me. I’m not afraid….”

He frowned. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Lorna told me that you were getting tired of having to live next door to me,” she said. “She must be insecure, because I get every little detail of what you do with her.”

“I didn’t say anything to her about moving out of here,” he told her angrily. “I wouldn’t even consider it until this Erikson situation is resolved, one way or the other.”

That made her feel light-headed with joy. Lorna had lied. He didn’t want to get rid of her!

“I didn’t know that she was having that much contact with you,” he said curtly.

“I’m having to handle her account,” Kirry told him. “The others jumped out windows and hid in rest rooms until I got saddled with her. She’s a perfectionist and she doesn’t like me, but we get along. I let her think she’s killing me with her tales of doglike devotion from you. Works like a charm.”

He didn’t like that. “Doglike devotion isn’t what she gets from me.”

“Oh, I know what she does get from you. She tells me
that
, too,” she added, and this time she couldn’t keep the sting it caused out of her face.

“There isn’t anything to tell,” he said through his teeth. “I’m not sleeping with her!”

She shrugged with majestic acting ability. “Don’t deprive
yourself on my account,” she said carelessly. “I’m certainly not nursing any hopes in that direction. When I marry, and I will someday, my husband is going to be my first lover.”

His pride felt as if she’d lanced it. His face felt hot as he glared down at her. “He’ll have to be something special, to settle for a virginal wife these days,” he said icily, striking out.

“Maybe he’ll think he’s blessed,” she countered, refusing to allow his words to bother her. “It takes an intelligent woman not to risk her health and her future husband’s for the sake of not standing out in a crowd.”

“You puritan,” he accused coldly.

“My morals are my own affair, and none of your business. You’re just the security chief for my company!”

His dark eyes slid over hers. “Try again.”

“You have no right to…Oh!”

He pulled her close in his arms, and his mouth was hard and hungry over her soft lips. She stiffened and tried to reject him, but his arms only closed more firmly, enveloping her against his big, powerful body while his mouth nudged and coaxed and teased until her lips finally parted.

Even then, he didn’t take immediate advantage of it. His open mouth brushed lazily over hers, tormenting it until she moaned and began pushing upward, trying to capture his elusive mouth against her own. It was yesterday, and she was in love and aching for Lang, all over again.

“Tell me what you want,” he coaxed. His hands were on her hips, now, pulling and dragging them against the hard male thrust of him, so that she could feel the evidence of his need.

“Lang.” She choked out his name.

“Come on,” he said, daring her, “tell me what you want me to do, Kirry.”

“Not…fair,” she stammered.

“Is life?” His hand slid into the thick short hair at her nape and contracted, tilting her face at just the angle he wanted. His eyes were vaguely frightening as they glittered down into hers. “Now,” he breathed, lowering his head, “now, open your mouth and taste me inside, and let me taste you. Make me forget…”

She felt his mouth, warm and moist, burrowing slowly into her own. The contact with his body, the strength of his arms, took her own strength away. She yielded, melting into him, unmindful of the past or the future while she savored the intimate touch of his tongue sliding into her mouth.

The erotic symbolism of the caress made her body go taut with sudden desire. She shivered, and he laughed, then deepened the kiss with a slow, teasing rhythm.

Knots coiled in her lower belly. Her legs trembled helplessly and she moaned as the fever burned higher between them.

His other hand dropped to the very base of her spine and began to move her against him. She made a sound that went right up his backbone, and his mouth echoed it in the stillness of the hallway.

Only the steady hum of the elevator broke them apart. He stepped back from her just as an elderly couple got off the conveyance, glanced toward them indulgently and walked hand in hand down the other end of the hall to their own apartment.

Lang felt too drained to move. He heard the door close in the distance and only then did he look at Kirry. She seemed to be as devastated as he. She was leaning back against her own door, and her soft mouth was swollen and red from his kisses.

“I could have you right now,” he said. His voice was deep with feeling. “You know it, too.”

“Let’s not forget Lorna,” she said through the maelstrom of emotions that were buffeting her mind.

“Damn Lorna! I want you!”

She had to drag her eyes away from his. “You’ve overheated, that’s all,” she said stiffly. “A nice cold shower should fix you right up.”

“Lorna wouldn’t send me into a shower,” he said in a soft, threatening tone.

Her eyes narrowed. “Then why don’t you go and see her, dear man?”

Her lack of cooperation made him furious. “Thanks for the suggestion,” he said. “I might do that.”

He whirled on his heel, in a furious temper, and stalked to the elevator. He jabbed the Down button furiously, and as if the elevator knew his mood, it appeared promptly from the floor above. He got into it without even darting a glance at Kirry.

She could have screamed. She wasn’t going to go to bed with him just to keep him away from Lorna, and if he thought she was, he still didn’t know her very well.

She unlocked the door and slammed it firmly behind her. How could he! Why had he kissed her in the first place? Now
she was going to toss and turn all night, sickened by images of Lorna nude in his big arms in bed. She hated him! How in the world had she ever imagined that she could love someone as cruel as Lang? She was going to have to get herself together. Lang was no longer her concern. The sooner she realized it, the better.

Lang, meanwhile, was driving aimlessly around town, and nowhere near Lorna’s apartment. He should never have touched Kirry that way. Now he was going to spend hours remembering her soft warmth in his arms, the hunger in her kisses. She wanted him; she couldn’t hide it.

But he’d let her throw him off-balance with those stinging comments she made. She was jealous of Lorna and afraid to trust him. That was the crux of the matter. He’d just have to learn to keep his temper and try harder. But meanwhile, there was Erikson to deal with. The gas grenade had shaken Lang as much as it had Kirry. He had to do something about Erikson while there was still time.

The next morning, Lang was more cautious than ever. He buzzed Kirry’s doorbell thirty minutes before she was due at work. She dragged herself out of bed in her short nightie and looked through the peephole before she reluctantly opened the door.

“Don’t stare,” she told him irritably, her hair tousled from sleep, her green eyes half-closed with it. “I’m not a peep show.”

“Darlin’, I never said you were,” he drawled, smiling at the
exquisite tanned length of her legs and the soft thrust of her breasts against the thin fabric. She had a devastating figure. “But in that rig, you could turn a blind man’s head.”

“I don’t want to turn your head. I just want to get dressed and go to work. There’s some coffee in the kitchen. You can drink it while I get changed.”

“You’re sure you wouldn’t like to go in like that?” he asked, smiling at the pleasure she gave him in the skimpy outfit.

She put her hands on her rounded hips and glowered at him. “It’s only a body. Lorna has one just like it, as I’m sure you found out all over again last night!”

His eyebrows lifted and he smiled. “Jealous?”

“Of Lorna? Hah! Why should I be jealous? I don’t want you!”

“You did last night,” he reminded her.

“I won’t dignify that statement with an answer. And I did not want you!” She whirled and went into the bedroom, pushing the door almost shut. She stripped off the nightie and was standing there in her lacy pink bikini briefs, fuming with bad temper, when the door opened and Lang’s eyes froze on her body.

K
irry couldn’t even breathe. The way Lang was looking at her made her go hot all over. “Don’t panic and start leaping for cover,” he said quietly. He put his hands into his pockets and leaned back against the door facing. “I can’t help staring—you’re unbelievably pretty like that—but I promise I won’t touch until you want me to.”

She felt hot and cold all over, and there were swellings in her body that were familiar, left from the days when Lang made soft, slow love to her without ever crossing the line.

She should get dressed, she told herself. She was brazen, standing there with her body open to him, letting him look. Oh, but it was sweet to feel his eyes! They made her throb with forbidden pleasures.

He saw the need in her face, in the faint trembling of her legs. With a soft sound in the back of his throat, he jerked away from the door and moved toward her.

Run, her mind said. But her legs wouldn’t work. He came closer, filling the room, filling her hungry eyes.

He still didn’t touch her. He searched her face in silence. After a minute, a soft smile flamed on his mouth. His hand went to his tie and slowly unfastened it. He tossed it aside. He slid out of his jacket, and it followed the tie into a chair, while Kirry shivered at what she saw in his face.

“I don’t…want to…now,” she whispered when his hands went to his shirt. But she still wasn’t moving.

“Neither do I,” he replied quietly. “But some things are fated, I suppose.”

His shirt was unbuttoned, removed, baring a broad, bronzed chest thick with black, curling hair. He brought her hands to his belt.

“Take it off,” he whispered.

Her hands trembled on the buckle and her wide eyes sought his for reassurance.

“I’ll take care of you. We won’t take risks,” he said, reading the apprehension. He saw her relax, despite the traces of guilt that remained in her soft green eyes. He bent and brushed his mouth over her closing eyelids, hiding the accusation in them. “I’ll take a long time,” he whispered. “Do you trust me not to hurt you?”

She moved closer, drawn like a magnet to the feel of his hair-roughened chest against her bare breasts. She shivered as the nipples went hard when she pushed into him and let her arms encircle his waist. “I trust you,” she stated.

He let out a savage breath. He hadn’t dreamed that it would happen like this. Years of wanting her, waiting, hoping…And she was giving in, without a single protest.

The stillness in the bedroom was haunting. Above it, he could hear faint street noises in the distance. Closer, he could hear Kirry’s tortured breathing, feel the warmth of it against his chest where her lips touched.

“Will you hate me?” he asked heavily.

She lifted her misty eyes to his. “Will you think I’m cheap?” she asked with equal concern.

He smiled. “You?” he whispered tenderly.

She pressed closer, resting her cheek against his warm chest. She clung, trembling, as the finality of it trespassed into her mind.

His big hands smoothed over her bare back, savoring its silkiness. “There’s a condition,” he said through a tight throat.

“What?”

“Afterward, you have to put the ring back on.”

Her eyes opened. She could see the heavy vibration of his chest. “The ring?”

His mouth brushed hungrily against her hair and his hands pulled her closer. “The engagement ring, Kirry,” he whispered, and his mouth quickly worked its way down her flushed face to her mouth. He took it hungrily and felt it open, felt her body quicken even as he heard her helpless moan of pleasure.

He interpreted her response as an agreement, a sacred oath. After that, nothing on earth would have stopped him.

He lifted her, his mouth still covering hers, and carried her to the bed.

She looked up as he laid her gently on the covers. “Are you going to close…close the bedroom door?”

“Who’s going to see us, my darling?” he whispered. He slid down beside her, letting his eyes caress the soft thrust of her breasts before his mouth lowered to tease and torment them into rigid peaks.

Kirry couldn’t have imagined the pleasure. It was frantic, all-consuming. She let him remove the final barrier and then lay trembling, watching him with hungry eyes while he undressed for her. She’d never seen him totally nude. She looked at him now without embarrassment, glorying in the perfection of his powerful body.

He lowered himself against her, smiling at her expression. “We can’t have secrets anymore, can we?” he asked gently. His mouth touched hers, and then roamed over her face while his hands began to learn her with infinite patience and tender caresses. He felt her tremble, heard her soft gasps as he went from one intimacy to another in the rapt silence.

She’d never imagined making love in broad daylight. Now it seemed natural, perfect. She led where he followed, awash in pleasure so intense that she had no control left when he finally paused for a moment to protect her, and then moved down. She felt his body slowly invade hers and she shivered, her hands clutching with anticipation and a little fear.

His mouth was at her ear, his breath hot and quick. His tongue
teased inside her ear. His hand slid down her belly and he touched her, laughing with intimate tenderness when she gasped and her hips arched up to accommodate him.

“Lang!” she cried out.

“Yes, isn’t it shocking?” he breathed with joyful conspiracy. “Shocking, earthy…” He pushed down and heard the breath leave her body. “And now you know it all, don’t you?” he whispered, as he possessed her completely. “You know me. All of me. And I know all…of…you.”

His body was moving. She felt him around her, within her, felt a tension that made her reach up to him, move with him, searching for the right pressure, the right rhythm. She swallowed, gasping. She felt the heat and dampness of him with wonder. She heard his rough breath at her ear, felt his control give way at last.

His lean hand gripped her thigh and the rhythm grew ruthless. She was beyond caring about how he held her. It was there, the pleasure was there, and she was…about…to touch it…!

She was sobbing. She heard her own voice with a sense of disassociation, as if she was no longer in her body at all, but sailing around with Lang in a miasma of golden heat and throbbing satisfaction. She cried out something and arched her back to prolong the exquisite sensations that rippled over her in waves of pleasure.

For a few seconds, there was nothing else in the world except Lang, who had become completely part of her.

Far away, she heard ragged breathing and felt a crushing
weight the length of her body. She opened her eyes. The ceiling was there, with the sunlight reflecting on the light fixture. She moved her fingers experimentally and felt the cold silk of Lang’s thick hair. She remembered then, and smiled.

He felt the smile against his cheek and lifted his head. His eyes, like hers, were soft in the aftermath of fulfillment. He lifted himself enough to see her face and smiled back.

Her body began to throb all over again. He hadn’t moved away and when she shifted one leg, she felt him intimately. His eyes grew misty with the return of desire, like her own.

He moved, too, and watched her lips part.

She reached up, arching her hips so that she caressed him in the most exciting way, and he reacted with incredible ease. His breath caught at the quickening.

“That’s impossible,” she assured him. “I read it in a book….”

“Written by a virgin, no doubt,” he breathed into her open mouth, and began to move again.

“Lang…isn’t it risky…?”

He stilled. “Yes.” He bit off the word. “My God, yes!” With anguish in his face, he lifted away from her, and fell onto his back. He lay there, his fists clenched, totally vulnerable while he fought to still the demons.

She leaned over him, boldly watching his face while he struggled with the desire he didn’t dare satisfy. His eyes held hers while he forced himself to breathe normally until the pain subsided. His gaze slid down to her soft breasts and lingered there. He pulled her closer and kissed them hungrily.

“I want to do it again and again and again,” she whispered softly, savoring his mouth on her body.

“So do I. But I don’t want to make a baby in the fever of it,” he whispered back. He held her close then, while they slowly came down from the heights.

She closed her eyes and went heavy against him, gloriously contented. “Do you really want to marry me?” she asked daringly.

“Yes,” he said.

She drew her cheek against his chest, and the clean scent of him came up into her nostrils. “When?”

“We can talk about dates later,” he murmured, oddly reluctant to pin it down to a certainty. He smoothed her hair. “We have to get to work.”

She lifted herself to look at the clock and groaned. “Oh, my goodness, I’m an hour late!”

“The world won’t end,” he murmured dryly.

“That’s what you think! I have a business meeting in a half hour!”

“Look at me.”

She did, and his smile was her undoing. “Don’t panic,” he said. “I’ll get you there in time.”

He kissed her gently and put her out of the bed, stretching lazily as he got to his feet. “Come on. We’ll have time for a quick shower.”

He led her into the bathroom and put her into the shower with him. It took longer than it normally would, because he
made her bathe him and that led to exploration and soft kisses that made him grit his teeth.

“I’m not prepared.” He chuckled, lifting her out of the spray. He turned the shower off and dried her. “No accidents.”

His concern seemed rather beyond what she might have expected. She felt insecure. “I’ll see the doctor,” she promised, “so that we can make sure nothing happens until we want it to.”

He studied her rapt face quietly. “Your career means a lot to you, doesn’t it?” he asked solemnly. “For now, at least?”

She read the thoughts in his face. “Yes,” she said slowly. She frowned. “You…do eventually want a child?”

He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Of course I do. Now, let’s get to work. Tonight, we’ll drive down to Floresville and tell Bob and Connie our good news.”

She wanted to pin him down on the subject of a family. Perhaps he was just thinking of her. But there had been something in his eyes when she mentioned children….

He smoothed down the frown. “Stop borrowing trouble and get dressed. Just look what you’ve made me do,” he said, glowering. “I’ve been seduced, for God’s sake!”

Her eyes twinkled. “Why, so you have. Would you like to press charges?”

“I’d like to press something,” he murmured, chuckling.

“I did offer,” she reminded him.

He bent and kissed her carelessly. “I’ll be prepared next time.”

“Or I will,” she added.

While Lang gathered his own clothes and began to dress, she
moved to her dresser and pulled out a bra and slip and quickly put them on with her back to Lang. Feeling a little shy now, she walked to the closet and took out a green, patterned shirtwaist dress and put it on.

“You look nice in green,” he said.

“Thanks.” She hesitated, suddenly remembering his abrupt arrival. “Why did you come by this morning?” she asked.

“I’m giving you a ride into work. And I wanted to know if you got any calls last night,” he said with a lazy smile.

She smiled back and shook her head. “There was nothing on the answering machine. Nobody bothered me at all. Is this some new tactic he’s using?” she asked then. “Is he trying to drive me crazy by waiting several days between incidents?”

“It’s a good psychological trick,” he agreed. “I wouldn’t put it past him. But that gas grenade was dangerous. Sometimes they start fires. If it had been beneath the seat, and it had exploded under you…”

“I get the message,” she said uneasily. Her eyes met his in the mirror while she put on makeup and ran a comb through her short hair. “In other words, we’re not out of the woods yet.”

He nodded.

She put down the brush and searched in another drawer for her panty hose. She put them on while Lang watched with appreciative eyes, then she slipped on her high heels and picked up her purse.

“What about my car?” she asked. “You didn’t get it picked up, did you?”

He shook his head. “Sorry. I’ll see to it this morning.”

She turned and looked at him blatantly. “Did you see Lorna last night?” she asked slowly.

He lifted an amused eyebrow. “If I had, do you think I’d have been so hungry for you?”

She flushed. “Well…”

He drew her against him. “You still don’t know much. Some men can go all night. I can’t. If I’d been with another woman all night, I wouldn’t have been capable this morning. Does that answer the question you can’t quite ask me?”

“Yes,” she said ruefully. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have pried.”

He frowned. “Kirry, you trusted me enough to let me make love to you,” he reminded her softly. “That gives you every right in the world to know about me. I haven’t slept with Lorna, and I won’t. I want to marry you.”

He said he did. But he wouldn’t talk about a date and he didn’t want to risk making her pregnant. She almost mentioned that, but what they’d shared was too new and exciting to spoil. She decided to live one day at a time. At least he did want her for keeps this time. She could settle for that. For now.

She reached up and kissed him very softly. Her eyes adored him. She tried not to notice the indecision in his. “Let’s go see if we’re fired,” she teased, and stepped away from him.

“Right.”

He drove her to the office in a faintly strained silence. He’d burned his bridges this time. There would be no going back. He’d compromised her, and as old-fashioned as it might seem
to another modern man, he felt obliged to do the right thing and marry her. He did care about her, very much. It was just that he was trapped now. It didn’t feel as comfortable as he’d thought it would, to be totally committed. And she wanted children.

He loved Mikey, of course, but it would be different when the child was his own, and he became responsible for it and Kirry. She was a working woman. She wanted a career. But she’d slept with him, and now his old footloose days were gone forever, because he hadn’t been able to hold back. He’d wanted Kirry to the point of madness. He glanced at her, remembering how it had been, and he couldn’t manage to regret that heated loving in her bed. No matter what the cost, it was worth it! He only had to get used to the idea of being committed. That shouldn’t be so hard, he told himself firmly. He’d gotten used to being on the road all the time when he joined the Company, he’d gotten used to wearing a gun. He’d even managed to live with worse things. It would grow on him. And as for children, he’d find some way to put her off. With that certainty in mind, he smiled at Kirry and broke into casual conversation.