Star Witness (17 page)

“Harte,” she rasped. “I can’t stand any more—” Her words were cut short by his rumble of soft laughter.

“You’re going to have to,” he said. He ran his palm down her body to the drawstring of the scrub pants. He untied it, then slid the material down over her hips and past her knees. She kicked them off, leaving her completely naked.

She didn’t care. She twisted until she straddled him, then leaned down and gave him back the kisses he’d given her. Putting her hands on his bare chest, she used her fingertips on his nipples, teasing them to instant arousal and drawing a pained moan from his throat.

“Do you like that?” she asked as she teased the erect tips unrelentingly.

“No—” he gasped, taking hold of her wrists. His arousal pulsed against her, belying his words.

Harte arched, thrusting upward in unfettered response to her playing with his nipples. It was an unfamiliar, slightly uncomfortable sensation, and yet each touch arrowed straight down to his throbbing arousal.

She peered at him from under her lashes, a seductive smile on her face, and then twisted her wrists out of his clutches. Placing her palms on his chest, she bent and kissed him again.

“Slow down,” he muttered, “or it’s going to all be over.”

“I don’t want to slow down,” she whispered in response. “I want you in me, now.”

“Too soon,” he protested. “You’re not ready.” As he spoke, he slid his hand down over her belly to the slight rise of her mound.

“Yes, I am,” Dani gasped, so turned on by the twin pressures of his hand and his arousal against her that she could barely breathe, much less speak.

When he curled his fingers into the patch of hair that hid her sexual center, then slowly, gently, slid a finger between her soft, sensitized folds, she cried out, certain she was going to faint. He pressed into her, testing her readiness to receive him.

Her thighs tightened involuntarily, whether to hold on to the sensations he was stirring or to slow down the inevitable explosive conclusion, she didn’t know. She was becoming lost in erotic ecstasy.

“Yes, you are,” he whispered.

In answer, she lifted herself and guided him into her. He pushed carefully and steadily until he was buried inside her. She moaned and threw her head back, losing herself in a climax that went on and on.

Harte felt Dani’s delicately intense contractions, and they triggered his own. With his breaths sawing in his throat and his muscles and sinews straining, he came, driving into her welcoming body as she met him, thrust for thrust.

Finally, drained, he collapsed back against the wall and Dani melted, as if boneless, atop him.

Chapter Thirteen

After a long time, Dani felt Harte lift her off him and set her gently down on the fleece blanket, then stretch out beside her. She didn’t open her eyes. She didn’t want to face reality yet. Her entire being was still floating on an ethereal cloud of fantasy.

A fantasy where there were no storms, no thunder, no soaking, pounding rain, where the sun was warm and bright, where no bad guys were chasing her and where the man with whom she’d just shared sweet, erotic sex would still want her once the danger was over. But trying to preserve the fantasy was a fruitless effort. She could feel reality hovering, looking for a way in. The reality of their separate lives—hers as a public defender who had to live on a government salary, and his as an assistant D.A. who was wealthy in his own right. They lived and worked in two different worlds.

Harte spread something over her, the pink hoodie maybe, then slid his arm under her head and shifted so she could rest her head on his shoulder. It helped a little. But reality was still out there, lurking.

She had to open her eyes sometime, and when she did, she’d be defenseless against the surge of regrets that were waiting to hit her. How many mistakes had she made when she let that one careless second pass—that one instant during which she could have made the decision
not
to kiss him?

First and foremost, she’d exposed herself to him—physically, yes. But also emotionally. The thing she’d vowed not to do. For her, sex was not a casual romp. It was too intimate, too exquisitely satisfying, to take for granted. She never took it lightly and she’d never had regrets.

Until now. Once they got out of here, she knew she’d never be able to face Harte in court again. She could picture him now, standing before the judge in one of his impeccably tailored suits, with his expensive briefcase and a knowing smile as she walked into the courtroom. Her face burned just thinking about it.

She might have been able to work with him if all they’d done was kiss. She’d still be fascinated by him, still be amazed at how one person could be so unrelentingly gorgeous and sexy. But now they’d made love, and Dani knew she’d never be the same. What had been a silly office crush was no longer silly or just a crush to her.

She’d just put herself on a fast track to a broken heart. And she didn’t even want to think what her granddad would say if he knew. She moaned silently.

“Dani?”

Harte’s soft voice startled her. Her eyes flew open and met his dark gaze.

“Hey,” he said, smiling. “I guess you were asleep. I thought you said something.”

Dani lifted her head from his shoulder and scooted backward, holding the hoodie in place over her breasts and thighs.

He leaned up on one elbow.

“No, no,” she said. “I didn’t say anything.” She wanted to sit up, to take some sort of control, at least of her body’s position, but the hoodie wasn’t big enough to cover everything she wanted covered. Any move she made would expose something.

“So I did wake you,” he said. “Sorry.”

She kept shaking her head. “You didn’t wake me at all. No. I was awake already. I didn’t go to sleep. I was just—” She stopped, clamping her jaw. She was babbling. “I need to—get dressed.

Harte held her gaze for a beat as something shadowed behind his eyes, and then he nodded. “Sure. Give me a second.” He rolled away and sat up with his back to her, straightening and tying the drawstring waist of his scrub pants.

Without turning around he said, “I’m going to take a look around. See how much more damage the storm has done. See if anyone’s moving around outside.”

Dani’s face burned like fire as she looked around for the panties she’d forgotten to put on earlier. She’d let him take all her clothes off, strip her naked. And he’d never even dropped his pants, just opened them. Like a quickie. She grimaced and her hot face got even hotter.

To him, she’d been a quickie. Mortified, her cheeks burning and her eyes stinging, she glanced over to be sure he wasn’t looking, then pulled on the panties and grabbed the scrub pants. She held the hoodie against her breasts as she took off in the direction of the storeroom.

Harte shook his head as he heard her padding quickly toward the back of the store. He’d never claimed to understand women. The things they did never ceased to befuddle him.

Sex with Dani had been better than he could have imagined. Her body was exquisite. Sleek and smooth, enticingly curvy where a woman should be. He’d been entranced with the mix of eagerness and shyness she’d displayed. Then there was their lightning-fast, nearly simultaneous climax. Her immediate, sensual response had surprised him.

His own hair-trigger climax had blown his mind.

Both of them had collapsed afterward, drained. He’d felt sapped, and had basked in the afterglow with Dani’s soft hair against his shoulder and chest as her soft breaths echoed in his ear. He’d thought she was basking too. But despite her seeming boneless as she’d collapsed against him when he’d pulled her close and rested her head on his shoulder, she’d acted embarrassed and escaped as soon as she could.

She didn’t strike him as one of those women who was embarrassed about her body. Shy maybe. He shrugged. That could be it, he supposed.

Now that she had run to the back of the store, he came back around the counter and looked for the long-sleeved T-shirt she’d found for him. Then he remembered. It was in the storeroom. He’d dropped it when she’d screamed.

Not wanting to disturb her, he headed toward the racks of T-shirts to find another one. Just as he got to the rack, she opened the storeroom door and came out. She was dressed in the scrub pants, the Big Easy T-shirt, the pink hoodie and her wet sneakers. She stopped short when she saw him. Her gaze skittered down his torso to the drawstring on the scrub pants, then back up.

She blinked. “Here—here’s your T-shirt.” She held it out for him.

“Great, thanks,” he said. He took the shirt by the tail, shook it out once, then pulled it over his head and down. A slight shiver went through him. He ran his palms down each sleeve, then down his torso. “That feels good,” he said, meeting her gaze.

She looked away. “These wet shoes don’t.”

“Yeah,” he said, looking down at his own wet loafers. “I know.” He patted the pockets of the scrubs. “Where’s my phone?” he muttered. “I must have left it in my jeans.”

She moved out of the way of the storeroom door. “Your jeans are on the floor,” she said, then headed toward the front of the store.

Harte quickly retrieved his phone and followed her. “Damn it,” he said when he checked the display. “No reception.”

Dani pulled her phone from her purse. “Oh, I have a voice message,” she cried.

Harte moved to where he could look over her shoulder. “From Lucas?” he asked.

“Don’t know. I’ll put it on Speaker.” She pressed a button on the phone and they listened.

“We’re sorry, you cannot access voice mail at this time. Please try again later.”

“Great,” Harte said, checking his display again. “Yep. Zero bars. I thought maybe since the storm had passed over, we’d be able to call for help.”

Dani dropped the phone back into her big purse. She raised her head, then suddenly moved away from him. It was as if she’d just realized how close he was standing to her. She still hadn’t looked directly at him.

For once, he was sure he understood
this
woman perfectly. She regretted sleeping with him.

“Listen, Dani—”

“So, what now?” she interrupted, and immediately bit her lip. Her cheeks turned pink. “I mean, now that the storm is over, should we get out of here? Try to get to a police station or something?”

Harte turned to look out the front windows. “Yeah. The sun’s going to come up soon. I’m going to go out and scout around.”

“Then I’m going with you,” she said.

“No. It’s too dangerous. We could run into those men any second.”

Dani propped her hands on her hips. “Exactly. Or a utility truck or a policeman. You’d have to come back and get me. That’s just dumb.”

Harte winced. She was right and she knew it. He could tell, because she gave a little nod of her head. Not much, just enough to say
So there.

“Get ready to go,” he said, then pointed his finger at her. “But I’m checking around the building first. You’re not stepping one foot out of here until I’m sure the coast is clear.”

“You’re not going out there unarmed.”

“What do you suggest I use? Your lock picks? Or maybe a water gun from the toy aisle?” he shot back.

With a look designed to wither him where he stood, she dug into her purse and pulled out—

“What the hell is that?” he snapped, staring at her hand.

She gave a short laugh. “It’s a gun,” she said with mock patience. “A SIG Sauer, to be specific.”

“Where’d you get that?” he demanded. “Have you had it this whole time? Banging around in that—” He gestured. “Do you know how dangerous that is?”

She flushed, but not with embarrassment. She was angry. He could tell by the fire in her eyes and the lift of her chin.

“Yes,” she snapped. “I know exactly how dangerous it is. Granddad gave it to me
and
taught me how to use it and care for it. You don’t think for one minute that he would be so careless as to give me a weapon without making sure I could handle it?”

“How would I know what your grandfather would do?” Harte said irritably. “I do know this. Apparently, he skipped some basic precautions—like having enough respect for your partner to inform him that you’re
packing
sometime within, say, the first eight hours or so of running for your lives.”

Dani’s face drained of color.

He realized immediately what he’d said. “Dani—I wasn’t trying to insult your granddad—”

“You go to hell,” she grated, then turned and stomped away. Her slender shoulders in the too-big hoodie were stiff and straight; her walk was regal.

Harte sighed in frustration and wiped a hand across his stubbled cheeks and chin. He’d crossed the line with his rude comment about her grandfather.

Hell, he’d crossed more lines in the past few hours than he ever had in his life. Insulting Freeman Canto wasn’t the worst thing he’d done by far. No, the worst was forgetting his vow to keep Dani safe. He’d given in to the explosive attraction between them and taken advantage of her.

And now they were back to square one. Just like the day they’d faced off in court. Rivals, even enemies, in every sense of the word. The fragile trust he’d built with her by vowing to keep her safe had been strained by their lovemaking, but now he’d shattered that trust. And it could get Dani killed. Because they were going to have to make a run for it.

He glanced at his watch. Almost six o’clock in the morning. Any minute now the sun would start lightening the sky. That was good and bad. They’d be able to see street signs and landmarks, but it also meant they’d be visible. Reluctantly, he had to admit that he was relieved that they had a weapon. But they needed more than one.

What kind of weapon could he find in a drugstore? Pepper spray or a knife? He hoped like hell the men chasing them would not get close enough that Dani or he would need either of those.

“Harte!” Dani cried.

He rushed toward the front of the store and saw Dani crouched down behind the counter. “What is it?” he hissed.

She gestured at him. “Down! Get down! I saw something moving out there. I think it’s them,” she whispered urgently. “What are we going to do?”