The Risqué Target (10 page)

Or, was he so impervious as he made out? She saw his neck was tense. The veins corded down to the neck of his snug t-shirt. Muscles were etched in his broad chest, tapered waist, and beneath the long, lean legs of his jeans. His silhouette was robust and dark, but now his eyes were darker. They no longer sparkled like the ocean but had morphed into a turbulent green. His handsome face was menacing, an unstoppable force. Despite her field experience, she was frightened.

She held the gun, but as Nancy had warned, he had more potent weapons. Tantum Maddox, the cold-blooded killer, was closing in on her.

“I'm going to move forward until I reach you, Nala. To stop me you’ll have to follow through.”

Her hand shook. The gun quivered.
What is wrong with me?

I must protect myself.

Five feet. Four feet. An arm's length away.

She closed her eyes and pulled the trigger.

Nothing.

Fear closing in, she gave way to the terrible twos, pulled the trigger again. The click of the empty gun ricocheted through the room.

He took it from her hand, pushed her back into the recliner, and crouched over her, possessing her personal space. “You really meant to shoot me?”

She met his baleful eyes steadily. “You bet your sweet ass I did.”

Seizing the arms of the recliner, he practically picked it up as he shoved her and the chair back into the wall, then whipped a handcuff from a back pocket, closed it around her wrist and snapped the other cuff on the radiator. He gave her arm a good tug to be sure she was secured.

“You unloaded the gun. You were playing with me all along,” she hissed.

He flicked back a few strands of hair that fell over his forehead. “Never underestimate your opponent, Nala.” He pushed over the end table before she could kick it at him.

She wasn't going to make it that easy for him.
Oh, hell no!
Nala stomped her feet on the floor and screamed for help at the top of her lungs. It was eight in the morning, and she knew someone had to hear her.

He shook his head and started to talk, but she couldn’t hear him. “… Brooklyn's shop…  your mother works not far from here at Dekker & Beret’s law firm… ”

“What did you say?” she asked in panicked disbelief.

“I said, a gun isn't the only way to hurt or kill, Nala. There are things called bombs. Ever heard of bombs, Nala? You know, the kind you can set off at any given time or from any given place. Ever tried using one of those?”

“Now we see the real Tantum Maddox. Are you threatening to blow up my family?”

“No.” He turned around. “You are.” He walked over to the sofa, kicked his feet up on the table and closed his eyes. “Get some sleep. You're going to need it.”

First he threatened her family, then he suggested she sleep?

Although it sounded like a bluff, she was investigating him for a bombing.

Her mother and sister weren’t players. They were innocent people. Could he really stoop that low?

The other burning question she couldn’t answer was,
what does he want?
She'd left him in the motel, and for all he knew, she could’ve been leaving him to be killed, executed.
Does he want revenge for that?
It didn’t seem plausible.

He had protected her in Boston, shielded her body with his own, seemingly fine with adding another scar to his collection in order to keep her safe. She didn’t know what to think. His behavior had changed.

This is the real Tantum Maddox
. The thought repeated in her head. She closed her eyes, taking herself back to that burnt motel where she'd held Gabe, unable to stop him from dying. That powerless sensation numbed her. A life drained away, a life she had grown to admire, and she couldn’t do a damn thing about it. The memory had burned a scar permanently into her heart. It left her hardened and cold, unwilling to trust or love again. She carried that scar everywhere. To the store, visiting her family, and even watching a senator's daughter take too much for granted.

She had thought she was in love with Gabe. She'd been young. Gabe was a few years older, not overly good-looking but intelligent, and a complete gentlemen. As she matured and the scar continued to harden, she acknowledged what she’d felt wasn’t really love. It was hero worship. Still, she had cared deeply for him. Someone needed to avenge his death.

She glared at Tantum. His eyes were closed, but the tranquil look of deep sleep hadn’t set in yet. The scheming brute probably slept with one eye open anyway. She reached down with her free hand and pulled the lever to recline her chair. If he slept, she needed to. She couldn’t risk exhaustion.

****

The clink of metal woke Tantum. He found Nala fidgeting with the handcuffs.

Sleeping beauty's awake, and what a beauty.
He'd watched her sleep and couldn’t help falling for her soft, pursed lips and her ivory skin. Her dark blonde hair was messed carelessly across her peaceful face, making her seem an innocent woman. He knew better, though. This was Nala Dekker.

His Target, and his nemesis. Not only did he have to keep her hostage, he had to fight his overwhelming desire for her. He'd been with beautiful women before, but his body responded differently to this one. With the others, he could detach, but not with Nala. Maybe it had something to do with her lingering eyes. When she glanced in his direction, she held it a second too long. Locked in the depth of her blue eyes was some wild passion begging for release. She thought she kept it secretly caged, but he caught her denied desires, and though he knew it was male ego, he wanted to be the one to unleash them. He wanted to tear down the wall and break through all her protections. He wanted, needed, to touch her, kiss her until he set the wildness inside of her free.

He couldn’t get the feel of her lips out of his head. He'd opened a file in his mind and shoved her into it, but it wouldn’t leave his desktop. She was there every time he attempted to think about anything else, every time he sought to open another file in his head.

Something hit him squarely on the head, hard. Her sneaker.

He tossed it back to her. “Who trained you?”

“Trained me?” she asked, her expression blank. “Trained me for what?”

“Don’t be coy. If I know your name, Nala, wouldn’t I know you work for NESA?”

She sighed as if fed up.

Shrugging, he retrieved the file he’d begun going through during the night.

She scooted as close as the restraint would allow, her eyes nervously shifting to the counter where he'd found the file, empty now. “What are you reading?”

“Why don’t you tell me?” he inquired, aware that if the information before him got into the wrong hands, he'd have a huge problem. Its evidence incriminated him, right there in black and white. “I'm not going down for this.” He pointed to the file. “Do you hear me? I'm not sure who’s got you working on this or where the hell they got this information.” He took a deep breath to calm his jumpy nerves. “There's way more to this than the bullshit presented here. Do you even know who was the intended Target of bombings?”

Confusion
. He caught it scurrying across her face. He paused. “Have you even read this?”

“Yes,” she replied with an assurance he didn’t believe.

He arched his brow. “Then what’s it say?”

Her chin lifted. “Says you’re a killer,” she proclaimed.

He studied her silence, her remote demeanor. “You don’t know, do you?” He tilted his head thoughtfully. “Oh my God, you haven't even read it yet,” he said, his hand dropping as the realization seeped in.
What does she know? Why's she pegging me as a killer?

He gathered the papers and put them back into the envelope.
Intimidation isn’t going to work. She may lack experience, but the fundamentals are there. She's smart.
After all, she'd found him, not Marcus Richards but Tantum Maddox. Still, he had no idea why he was her Target. He trapped his confusion deep inside and smirked at her.

The little vixen smiled impishly back at him.

If she were any other woman, he would have used his charms. Seduced her. He’d have her screaming out her fucking intentions between each thrust. But Nala was not like other women. He’d sensed that the moment she threw her arms around him at the airport.

She didn’t back down from his look. Instead she matched him with her own spanking gleam.

Damn
, he thought.
I could easily fuck her, have her moaning in minutes, but I want her too much
. Contradictory as that seemed, it wasn’t. If he took Nala, he'd be doing it for his pleasure, not for answers to his questions. His desire made him too vulnerable.

Her gaze flitted around the room. He could see her mind working. She scanned every inch of her apartment, seeking a means of escape.

She ran her hand over her wrist, drawing his attention to the cuffs. “I need to make some coffee, use the bathroom, take a shower.”

A few seconds went by, but he had known this time would come. Surely she needed a bathroom break, and coffee sounded damn good. “Stay away from the door. And the windows.”

He kept his eye on her, but permitted her to freely roam her apartment. That was a mistake, as he learned when he saw her stooping to a kitchen cabinet, her ass cuddled by her jeans. She riffled through her cupboards, made the coffee, and went into the bathroom. He heard the shower go on and breathed easier.
Control, Tantum. Maintain control.
He glanced down at his crotch.
Why can't you behave? She's no good for you. She wants you dead
.

Nala locked the bathroom door and leaned against it. Safe inside, she slid to the floor and expelled a relieving breath. She needed to get her hands on that file. She had to find out what was in it, what got him so riled, so defensive.
What did he mean? Not going down for what? And who the hell is the Target he's talking about?

The shower cleansed away his adept kisses, his touches on her body. She dried off, applied her lotion, and methodically went through her normal routine, pampering herself and dismissing, if only for a moment, the perilous man waiting outside the door.

Preparing for the unknown, she psyched herself up and encouraged the image in the mirror.
You’re strong too, Nala.
She had always thought she could handle any situation the agency tossed at her, but Tantum was an unstable situation.

She couldn’t stand the thought of putting the same grimy clothes back on. Her quick dash in a towel to her bedroom stopped short from the sound of the TV newscaster’s voice.

“Bombing… salon… Brooklyn Dekker…”

Her eyes flitted from the television to Tantum. “Turn that up! What are they saying?” But she didn’t need his answer when the images on the screen changed to her sister's old salon, burning, blazing, engulfed in flames.

She heard the word again. “Bomb.”

The same numbing sensation took over her body as when she'd discovered who Tantum was, and when she'd held Gabe's lifeless body in her arms. The dreadful, gut-wrenching feeling walloped her insides. Tantum hadn’t moved. His calculating eyes waited.

“You!” she shouted and lunged at him. “You said you’d bomb her salon, and you did it!” She went for his eyes.

He caught her wrist in midair, but he didn’t anticipate her other hand following with a swift, hard blow.

He blinked once, but stood resolute.

“I’ve got to go to my sister! If you’ve killed her—” She made another swing.

He stepped aside.

Her towel was loosening, but she didn’t care. “Let me out of here, you fucking son-of-a-bitch!” she wailed.

His jaw flexed. She saw his eyes, that sparkling, beautiful color, that misleading glow. “Shut up!” he ordered with a rough growl and spun her around. She fought, but one hand clamped over her mouth, and the other clasped her hands together in front of her. “Do you want to be next?” He shoved her toward the door.

Is he really going to kill me too? Then why not do it here, where nobody can see him? Brook! Oh God, Brook!

He opened the door, scoped out the hall, and guided her out. A slight twirl and she was against the wall, but he still held her mouth closed. She struggled to breathe through her nose. He pressed close, and she realized only his body kept the towel from its inevitable fall. “Nala, listen to me,” he demanded in a low, gruff whisper. “Your apartment’s gotta be bugged.”