Protecting Justice (The Justice Series Book 4) (16 page)

One tech specialist for a whole group of agents wasn’t ideal, yet Fallyn understood the skeleton crew. She ran her team the same way. It had to be people with certain personalities and those who understood the intangible side of the cases they dealt with. A rare breed.

Tony’s phone buzzed with an incoming call. He saw the ID, clicked the call over to voicemail without missing a beat.

“Sister?” Fallyn asked.

Tony shook his head. “My supervisor at the Court. He probably wants to remind me my vacation time ends soon.”

“And?”

“What?”

“Are you going back?”

He zipped his lips and sat up, making a lot of work out of putting his phone away. He stood, the couch jostling her as his weight disappeared. “I assume you want to talk to Senator Oren?”

“Oren won’t talk to me. Not if I so much as mention the CanAir disappearance and my sister’s research. I mean so far, no one but us and the cops even know Heather’s death is suspicious. If I do mention that the CanAir disappearance and Heather’s death might be connected, no way Oren will put her neck out. After all, she could be next.”

She reached up and touched Tony’s hand. Didn’t grab it, just lightly caressed those long fingers. “Tony, what happened to the chief justice wasn’t your fault. I know everyone tells you that, and you probably disagree, but it’s the truth.”

A slight shudder went through him at her touch. He cleared his throat, looked away. “I was his protection detail and I screwed up. Now the man is dead. How is that not my fault, Fallyn?”

Her heart went out to him. “I read the reports, saw the video. Neither you nor the chief had any idea that man on the bridge was staging the road rage fight in order to get at the chief. Justice Turner bailed out of the car before you could do anything. I know from a lot of reports that he was a tough cookie and did whatever he wanted. You couldn’t have stopped him from jumping out of the car to play peacemaker anymore than I could have.”

“I
did
try to stop him and he didn’t listen, but that’s not the point. Don’t spin this like you would one of your client’s problems.”

Okay, that stung. But she didn’t stop touching him. She wasn’t backing down.

Standing to her full height, she was glad she still had her heels on. He towered over her by a few inches but she was close enough to nearly meet him nose for nose. This would have to do.

She held tight to his hand, even when he tried to pull away. “I know what you’re going through. I’ve been there, believe me, with a similar situation and it killed me for years. I know that there are some things you can’t forget, you can’t take back. No matter how much you wish things were different and you flagellate yourself over them, they are still there. Little demons waiting to rip at your heart and eat your soul every time you start thinking about the what-ifs. You blame yourself and those demons love that shit. That’s what keeps them strong.”

His gaze bounced around her face, her hair, anywhere but her eyes. “Tony, you can’t give into them,” she said, forcing him to look at her. “One way or another, you learn to move around those demons when they pop up. You tell them to get lost because what you do today matters, not yesterday. What happened yesterday is in the past and the only person dwelling on it is you. You can’t change it, but you can make a difference
today
. Learn from the past and all that cliché stuff and forgive yourself. You go over, under, or around those demons, but you get through them one way or another and keep helping the people who need you. Keep loving the people who love you.”

He started to move away. “I appreciate the pep talk, but—”

She clamped onto his hand and jerked him back. His chest crashed into hers. “Shut up,” she said. “I’m not done.”

The corner of his mouth twitched and he let out a long-suffering sigh as if he were merely tolerating her, but she didn’t care. She had something to say and he was damn well going to listen to her.

“I didn’t know the judge personally, but I do know from all accounts that he was a man who lived his life the way he wanted. No regrets. He wouldn’t want you struggling with this, Tony, and making yourself miserable. He would want you to move on and live with no regrets like he did.”

A muscle in his jaw moved but he didn’t look at her. At least not for a long minute. When he did drop those sexy dark eyes down and meet her gaze, she saw a hint of challenge, but also of acceptance. She’d hit the nail on the head.

“He was like a father to me.”

The judge. His uncle. Both father figures. “I get that. And now you honor his importance in your life by living the way he showed you—by his example.”

That muscle in his jaw went a little crazy again, as if he were grinding his teeth to keep from spewing something. His gaze dropped to the floor, long, dark lashes obscuring her view of his eyes.

For the first time in a long time, she wanted to wrap her arms around someone. Hug them. God help her, she wanted to fix him, even if it meant nothing but hard, fast sex to make him forget the pain for a few minutes.

Or a few hours. She was good with either.

Gently, she brought her other hand up to caress his face, lingering on that muscle in his jaw. It would be so easy to kiss him, to lean in and close that last little bit of distance between them…

Tony grabbed her wrist and jerked her hand away from his cheek. His other hand went around her waist and he tugged her forward, her breasts smooshing up against his chest once more as he drew her up those last few inches and put his face right in front of hers. The edge was back in his eyes. A boatload of pain too. “Don’t do that, Fallyn, unless you want trouble.”

She knew that pain. Had felt it a time or two herself. “Let me help you.”

“I’m not one of your clients.”

“I never said you were.”

His dark eyes held hers, scanning, searching. For what she wasn’t sure. Permission to let their hot, hot chemistry out of its cage? To shut off their client/bodyguard relationship for a little while and just be a man and a woman who wanted each other?

“I don’t need to be psychoanalyzed,” he ground out. “I don’t need fixing.”

“Good. I’m not a therapist. Doesn’t mean I don’t understand what you’re going through or that I can’t tell you to stop beating yourself up over what happened to the judge.”

“Are you going to shut up and kiss me or talk me to death?”

Well, when he put it that way. She tipped her lips up, an open invitation. “Do you really need to—?”

Message received. His lips crashed down on hers, sucking the breath out of her. She couldn’t move, his arm holding her against his body, his hand locked around her wrist as he bent her backward from the force of his kiss.

But she didn’t want to move away. She wanted to be his. Wanted that deep satisfaction of making him forget everything for a few mind-blowing minutes. Lifting her free hand to the back of his neck, she ran her fingers through his soft hair, tugged a little.

He broke the kiss, his eyes downcast again. “Wait.”

Fallyn’s heart sank as they both panted like runners for a moment in silence. She knew what was coming even before he said it. She wasn’t his type. He never mixed work and pleasure. Any excuse he could come up with to make her back off.

She scared men, plain and simple. The harder and stronger they were, the more she scared them. “What’s wrong, Tony?”

He completely let go of her, stepping back with his hands in the air. “This is a bad idea.”

The sudden loss of his presence left Fallyn off balance in more ways than one. His touch, his heat, his very power gone, creating an ache between her legs and in her chest. “I want you,” she said. “You want me. Why is that a bad idea?”

His eyes finally met hers. “Tell me why you don’t like to be touched.”

What? Where had that come from? “I was just touching you. Obviously, I
do
like being touched. By the right person.”

His eyes narrowed, causing little crinkles at the corners. “Right person?” He shook his head and laughed under his breath. A derisive laugh. “I’m
not
the right person for you.”

She kissed him lightly on the jaw where his muscle was going crazy. “Sorry, but I get to decide who’s right for me, not you.”

He took a step back, still keeping his hands in the air but grinding his teeth again as if willing himself not to touch her. “Neither one of us in a good spot right now. Sex only complicates things. I won’t take advantage of you.”

She couldn’t help it, she burst out laughing. “You really think any man could take advantage of me? Ever?”

“You’re still processing your sister’s death. I get it, you want to blow off steam and have some fun. Get away from murder and conspiracies and the shit in your head. I could use a little of that myself, and honestly, I may self-implode if I don’t get inside of you soon, but that would be a huge mistake, and I don’t need anymore mistakes of that magnitude.”

“Having sex with me would be a huge mistake? Boy, you really know how to charm a girl.”

“I’m being realistic.”

“You’re being stupid.” She stepped forward and trailed her hand down the buttons of his shirt to his waist, tugged the white shirt free from his pants. “I’m not some helpless girl you, or anyone else, can take advantage of because I’m grieving for my sister, and you know it. I think you’re scared and you’re using that as an excuse not to follow wherever this leads.”

“Is that a challenge?”

She shrugged, unclasping the top of his pants. Her self-control had seen it limits. If he didn’t take her in the next thirty seconds, she was going to implode right there along with him. And where was the fun in that? “Take it however you want to, but let’s do this.”

He grabbed her around the waist, lifting her off the floor with one arm as he backed her against the wall. She hit so hard, the picture hanging three feet over, bounced and nearly fell off. “I’m going to make your world spin.”

Pinned to the wall, she wrapped her legs around him and tilted her head back as his lips went to her neck.
Finally
. If her instincts were right, and they always were, Tony knew how to make a woman very, very happy.

He licked her skin, bit her earlobe. The sharp sensation went straight to that spot between her legs and made her throb with need. He was strong, holding her up with no problem as his hands worked under her silk shirt and cupped her breasts through her lace bra.

“Hell, yes,” she breathed as he tweaked her nipples, his erection straining between her legs. She clasped her legs tighter around him. “I want you, Tony. All of you. Don’t hold back. I won’t break.”

He stopped for a moment, nestling his face against her neck, his big body tense with unspent desire, warm breath raising gooseflesh on her skin. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t.”

She wrapped her arms around his neck, ran her fingers through his short hair. His fingers dropped to the hem of her skirt and he shimmied up the material, hands brushing her thighs and pausing for a moment on the top her stockings.

“Jesus.” He let out a string of curses. “If I’d known you were wearing this,”—his fingers traced her garter—“I would have imploded for sure before I got my hands on you.”

Ah, a lingerie man. She’d seen him staring at her heels earlier, gaze following the contours of her calves. “If I’d known that’s all it would take to get you inside me, I’d have skipped the talk and went right for the strip show.”

He moaned and released her, setting her feet on the floor. Before she could protest, he reached behind her, unzipped her skirt and let it fall.

His gaze dropped with it, taking a long, slow, agonizing stroll up her legs and stopping at her panties. He touched her thigh, letting his fingers caress the nylon before heading for the silk. She was wet and ready and sucked in her breath when he parted her folds with his expert touch.

He kissed her, teasing her with his tongue. His thumb found that sensitive bundle of nerves between her legs and did the same thing there. Teasing, stroking, building a fire inside her. Fallyn parted her legs, giving him better access.

His lips, his tongue, this fingers…they all led her to the edge of her climax, his strokes between her legs becoming harder, faster. She moved with the rhythm, grabbing onto his upper arms and arching her back as he took her over the edge.

Her vision blurred, whited out, tremors racking her body. He caught her as her knees gave out. Held her. When the orgasm receded, he carried her to the couch.

She was still shaking from head to toe. Tony kissed her deep, running his hands up and down her legs.

A blaring came from the coffee table—her phone. The tone was a familiar one that she hadn’t heard in a while, interrupting her bliss as Tony drew back.

Cracking an eye open, she cut her gaze to the side. All her muscles tensed when she saw the caller ID on her screen.

White House
.

Tony saw it too, his face going stormy as he handed it to her. “Guess you probably want to take this.”

She could barely sit up, but she managed to cling to him as she answered and tried not to sound out of breath. “Fallyn Pasche.”

“Ms. Pasche,” the woman on the other end said. “Please hold for the president.”