Time Thief (The Anomaly Trilogy) (8 page)

She tapped a hand against her thigh. “Once we get inside, we split up. I’ll check the office, you take downstairs.”

The idea of her being alone and unprotected didn’t sit well. “We should stick together.”

“Everything’ll be stopped. We get in and get out. Easy.”

Experience warned him missions were never easy. But she was good at looking after herself. “In and out.”

“Any chance Leven’ll be at the cabin?”

“Slim. He doesn’t visit it often and only on weekends. His…business dealings keep him busy during the week.”

“Crime takes effort.” She stood and started pacing. “After I burn the damn book, I’ll send him the ashes.”

Bay the woman was slipping away and Bay the survivor was back. “It’s late. We should get some sleep.”

She lifted a shoulder. “You go to bed. I’ll go and watch some TV or something.”

He eyed the stiff set of her shoulders and wondered how many other nights she’d spent stewing over an upcoming attack. “Something wrong?”

“I’m fine.”

“Universal phrase of a woman with something on her mind.”

“My thoughts, my mind.”

Oh, no
. It was too late now for her to push him away. Screw that.

***

Bay’s shoulders were rock hard and her mind raced. She never slept before executing a plan.

“Hey.” Sean laid a hand on her shoulder. “You’re rigid.”

She wanted to lean into him, absorb some of his warmth and borrow some of his formidable strength.

Instead she shrugged his hand away. “A little wound up, that’s all.”

He snaked an arm around her waist. “Bay. You aren’t alone this time.”

As she was dragged up against him, her back to hard chest, edginess morphed into anger. “Look, despite what happened earlier, we don’t know each other. So let me go.”

His warm breath fanned over the side of her neck. “We
do
know each other.” He nipped at the shell of her ear. “You might want to hide from that and push me away, but I don’t think that’s what you really want.” Another nip. “Is it?”

She sucked in a breath. Her entire body trembled. “You have no idea what I want.”

“Really?” His hand opened against her belly. He slipped his palm under her shirt. “I think you ignore what you want, all in your quest to punish Leven.”

She tried a scoffing laugh, but it sounded hollow. “Revenge
is
what I want.”

“Does it keep you company at night?” Sean squeezed her tighter, flush against unyielding muscle. “Does it hold you close?”

Her throat tightened. He felt so good. So solid and sexy. His fingers brushed her skin, toying with the loose waist of her borrowed shorts.

“Does it share breakfast with you? Kiss you? Smile at you?” He spun her, one hand gripping her chin. Gray eyes bored into her. “Does it love you?”

“I don’t know anything about love.” She stared into his chest. “I lost that ability a long time ago.”

He pressed his face to her hair and breathed in. She closed her eyes and yearned.

“We’re in this together.” His lips moved over her temple.

Her hands gripped his sides. “I don’t know how to do ‘together.’”

“Let me show you.” He slid his arms around her. “Lean on me. Just a little.”

She was so tense. The drive for retribution was familiar, like an addiction she couldn’t ever give up. He was the unknown—something wonderful she was too afraid to reach out and take.

Sean traced the seam of her mouth with his tongue before sweeping inside. She told herself to pull away but instead she leaned into him. He picked her up and laid her on the bed. His hands skimmed under her shirt.

“I wish it was my shirt touching your skin, not Matt’s,” he murmured.

As he cupped her breasts, she arched into his touch. Words wouldn’t form.

“I love looking at you.” He pushed the shirt up and with her help, pulled it over her head.

She managed a strangled moan.

“And touching you.” He cupped her shoulder, kneaded. “Turn over.”

She studied his tough face then rolled over. His hands skimmed her spine. Down, back up again.

A tender kiss on her back. “How’s the shoulder?”

It took her a second. “Feels much better.”

He shed his shirt and straddled her hips. He went to work on her neck, kneading her tight muscles. Bay swallowed a moan. He moved over her shoulder blades, exquisitely careful on her sore one.

“Skin like cream.” Tracing each knob of her spine, he worked lower.

Her muscles started to relax. His fingers brushed the top curves of her buttocks. He worked the tightness there.

“Relax,” he murmured.

“Easy to say…”

“You’re just out of practice.”

She laughed. The sound muffled by the bed cover. “Not much time to relax when you’re running for your life.”

His hands stilled. “I’m sorry for what Leven’s done to you. Sorry that he made me a part of it.”

She pressed her cheek to the bed. Trust Sean to feel guilty. “Not your fault.”

He leaned forward and pressed his lips to the nape of her neck. He kissed along her shoulder, nipping with his teeth.

Before she knew what was happening, he reared back and turned her over. His hands shaped her breasts as he tasted one peak, teasing the nipple to hardness. He kissed the lower slope, then moved to the other, lavishing it with the same slow attention.

“Sean.” Bay moved restlessly beneath him.

“No.” The muscles in his neck strained. “No rushing this time.”

As he moved down her body, trailing his lips over her, her hands gripped the blanket. Her legs shifted and when he dipped his tongue in her navel, her hands slid into his hair. Tugged hard. “I need you.”

He looked up. His eyes burned hot. For her alone.

In seconds, he’d shucked his borrowed jeans, yanked off her too-large shorts and covered her body with his. Gripping her thighs, he pushed her legs up and out. Then, with his gaze glued to hers, he pushed inside her.

He moved slowly. Inch by tortuous inch. Bay’s nails dug into his firm shoulders and she couldn’t think of anything but him. Her eyelids fluttered closed.

“No, don’t close your eyes.”

The intimacy of staring deeply at each other while he filled her was a sensation she’d never shared with anyone before. Sex was quick, pleasurable. It wasn’t this intense, soul-stealing experience.

She’d never felt so connected to someone before.

Sean was fully lodged inside her, long and thick, filling her up. Her lips parted. As he began to move, a slow, tantalizing slide, she sank her teeth into her bottom lip.

The delicious friction had desire twisting in her belly. She wanted to race to the finish, to find the intense pleasure of a hard orgasm. But he didn’t go fast. His muscles shuddered as he reined in the urge to rush.

“Sean.” Her nails scraped over his shoulders. “Please…”

He leaned down and nipped her lips. “Please what?”

She sunk her nails deeper. “Move. Now.”

He did. Increasing the rhythm, driving them both closer to that jagged edge. Then he slowed again.

Bay wanted to scream. He repeated the pleasurable torture—fast, then slow, fast, then slow—until she was mindless, lost in her pleasure.

Soon his teasing drove him beyond his own control. He lost the battle and pounded into her.

“Say my name,” he growled.

She struggled to focus. “What?”

“Say my name. I want to hear you say my name as you come.”

He was like some primal deity, demanding, commanding. A god the foolish mortal would never forget, whose loving she’d dream of until the end of days.

Her body tensed, muscles turning rigid. She threw her head back as she plummeted and screamed his name.

Lost in the intensity, she heard Sean groan his own release, spilling himself inside her.

When Bay could finally sort out her thoughts, she was lying against the warmth of his body. He curled around her, holding her as close as he could. Like he’d never let her go.

She squeezed her eyes closed. She wanted to imagine he’d never leave her. That she could always lean on him, wake beside him. That when the brutal reality of life got to be too much, he’d be there to catch her when she stumbled.

Breathing in his scent, she imagined her little beach fantasy. That house by the white sand, the pleasant lap of the waves. For the first time in her life, she wasn’t alone in her fantasy. Sean was there, his strong, scarred body emerging from the surf. A wide smile just for her and the shadows gone from his eyes. Inside, she felt at peace with her own demons.

She blinked and the dream evaporated. The wrench in her gut was painful.

It wasn’t ever going to happen. Sean Archer was just a man passing through her life. A damaged man whose mission coincided with hers. For now.

Eventually they’d part ways. He’d heal from his grief and loss, find some All-American girl to settle down with and have two-point-four kids.

Bay would never heal. She’d never be whole.

Her family’s death had broken something inside her. The years of dedication to revenge had infected her, rotting her from the inside out.

She was no good for anyone, least of all this tough, loyal man who needed someone happy and uncomplicated to help him heal.

Uncomplicated she was not.

But she snuggled in closer to Sean’s warmth. Felt the answering tightening of his arms, the gentle brush of his lips on her hair.

For this one night, she’d let herself pretend. She’d let herself imagine he was hers. But tomorrow, the fantasy ended. Bay knew she’d never survive Gabriel Leven. She’d never told anyone her endgame.

When the time came to take Leven’s life, Bay never planned to survive the fight.

Chapter Eight

The next morning, Bay stepped into the sundrenched kitchen to find Matt Deakin standing at the granite counter chopping onions.

“Ah, hi.” Her gaze automatically dropped to his leg.

He tapped the high-tech prosthetic with the hilt of his knife. “I can run almost as fast I did before.”

“But you still use the crutches?”

“When I need a break. The prosthetic can hurt sometimes.” He went back to chopping. “How’s an omelet sound?” He shot her a knowing smile. “Figured you’d both be hungry.”

She cleared her throat. “Sounds great.” She hopped up on a stool and rotated her shoulder. It was much less stiff and the pain was down to a dull throb. When Matt shoved a coffee mug her way, she snatched it up, needing the jolt of caffeine.

After she and Sean had finally stopped touching each other, she hadn’t slept.

Instead she’d watched Sean sleep.

She’d been mesmerized by the rise and fall of his sculpted chest. Loved seeing the lines of his face relax. She’d kept her palm pressed to the steady beat of his heart until the deep of night had given way to the early hours of the morning.

Then she’d left his warm embrace.

She’d showered, in cold, bracing water and dressed in her own freshly cleaned clothes. The well-worn, beaten armor of her reality.

“Thanks for washing our clothes,” she said.

Matt transferred the onion to a pan. It sizzled on contact. “No problem. So, you planning to break Sean’s heart?”

The change of subject made her choke on the hot coffee. “Ah—”

Matt waved a wooden spoon in her direction. “He’s a good man. The best. His men loved him.”

“And he cared about them. He’s still trying to find justice for them.”

Matt frowned. “Justice? They died in Afghanistan.”

“I mean, he still thinks about them. All the time.” Would give his life to avenge them.

Matt stirred the contents of the skillet, then leaned a hip against the counter. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you. Like you’re a light in the darkness.”

Bay’s stomach clenched. She wasn’t anyone’s light. “We really don’t know each other that well.”

“Really?” Matt arched a brow. “That’s not what it looks like. Looks like you’re both leaning on each other. Connected.”

Okay, maybe she felt that connection, that sense of rightness. But their lives were crazy. How they’d collided…they could never turn that into something real.

“Bay?” When she looked up, Matt set the spoon down and gripped her hand. “Just take care of him, okay?” He squeezed her fingers. “Sean’s always taking care of everyone else, sacrificing for others. He deserves some happiness.”

She agreed. One hundred percent. But she wasn’t the woman to make him happy.

As she opened her mouth to respond, she saw Matt’s eyes glaze over.

His arm slipped away, hung at his side. He looked a robot robbed of power, just standing there staring at nothing.

Bay’s heart skipped a beat. She slid off the chair. “Matt?” Was he having a seizure or something?

“He can’t respond.”

She spun. A tall, curvy silhouette stood in the doorway from the living room. Bay recognized the voice. “Mara?”

Her roommate stepped into the kitchen. Deep red hair tumbled over her shoulders. Her long legs were encased in dark denim and an emerald shirt had enough buttons open to show off generous cleavage.

“It took me all night to find you.” Mara strode forward, her boot heels clicking on the wooden floor. “We need to get out of here.”

Bay’s brain raced. “How’d you find me?”

“No time. Let’s go.”

Bay glanced at Matt. He was…empty. It was like all the charming personality had leeched away. “What did you do to him?”

Mara flicked Matt a glance. “We really don’t have enough time for me to explain.”

Bay backed up a step. She’d trusted Mara…to a point. But now… “I’m not budging until you tell me what you did.”

The redhead thrust her hands on her hips. “You think you’re the only one with power?”

The floor shifted beneath Bay. She glanced around the room. Matt was motionless but the clock on the far wall ticked, the onions sizzled in the pan. “You aren’t a time thief.”

“Nope. Time’s not my thing.”

“What is your thing?”

“You can trust me, Bay.” Mara held out a hand. “I’ve only ever looked out for you. I’m trying to save you now.”

“Mara, quit stalling.”

Her friend huffed out a breath. “I’m a mind raider.”