Unleashing the Storm (11 page)

Derek
silently wrapped his hands around Tom’s throat. Tom struggled for a breath,
brought his leg up hard between Derek’s. Derek shouted in pain, must have
released his grip just enough, because Tom shouldered the other man’s arms
away, and then, in a motion so fast she didn’t see it until it was over, he
smashed his hand into Derek’s throat.

Derek
made a half gasp, his eyes wide, shocked. Then they glazed over, and his chest
stopped moving.

Panting,
Tom fell back on his hip, sat there watching her as he caught his breath. He
said nothing, just gazed at her with hooded, impassive eyes. He looked
exhausted, but she knew if she moved—for her room, for the phone, for
anything—he’d drop her in a heartbeat.

In
her arms, Luke stirred, and she closed her eyes, let his thoughts wash over
her. He was confused, somewhat hungry and pissed as hell. She wanted to smile,
but there was a dead man bleeding all over her floor, and the man who’d killed
him was staring at her like she might be next.

“How’s
the dog?” he rasped, and she blinked.

“Why?
Are you going to kill him now?”

He
didn’t answer. He merely stood, winced and prodded Derek’s body with his foot.

Swallowing
sickly, she helped Luke to his feet and pushed him back when he looked like he
might still want a piece of Derek. She got to her own feet, stood there on
shaky legs. She glanced at her bedroom door, wondering how fast she could get
inside and get the door locked. Maybe she could escape out the back window.

“Don’t
even think about it,” he said.

“What—”
She swallowed again, tried to get the lump of terror to go down. “What
happened? Why did you kill him?”

He
fisted his hands at his sides, looking from Derek to her, saying nothing. She
inhaled deeply, needing to know where his emotions were. The danger scent had
faded, but a new, sharper one sank into her lungs and sent her pulse into a
pounding throb. Her body was answering his, even if the scent of lust rolling
from him had come about from an adrenaline rush and a battle. Unbelievable. He
could kill her right now, and her body wouldn’t care as long as he had sex with
her first.

“Answer
me,” she snarled. “This is my life—so, damn you, answer me!”

He
stood there, all dark and menacing, and a chill ran through her because she
knew she wouldn’t like the answer he was going to give her.

“HE
WAS GOING TO kill you, Kira,” Ender said finally, barely recognized his own
voice. But it was something about the way she stood there, looking so brave and
strong, that stopped him from being a total asshole. Instead, he showed her the
handcuffs Derek held, the tranq gun stuck in the guy’s back pocket with a large
enough dose of ketamine to take down a few horses.

It
was a lie, of course. Derek’s plans went far beyond killing her, but she was on
a need-to-know basis, and right now, she didn’t need to know anything but what
he told her.

She
looked between him and the body, no doubt reliving the fight scene inside her
mind. Her hands shook slightly, and she fisted them while she stared up at him.
“Who are you?”

There
were so many ways to answer that.
A killer
was the first that came to
mind, followed shortly by
The guy who fucked you like an animal earlier,
but she already knew both those things. That’s not what she was after.

He’d
have to settle on something she’d like and give her a little of the truth—a
combined plus. “I’m the guy who just saved your life.”

She
snorted, not buying it. No way, not after she’d spotted him running earlier,
the way he’d fought Derek.

“Am I
supposed to take you at your word?”

“Yes.”

“I
don’t understand any of this,” she said, wrapping her arms tightly across her
chest. “I don’t think I want to.” She nodded down at Derek’s body. “What are
you going to do with him?”

“I’ll
take care of it,” he said. “But you’ll have to come with me.”

“Are
you crazy? I’m not going with you to bury a dead body.”

“Actually,
it’s not just one. I’ve got four to bury, but it shouldn’t take long.”

“Four?”

“I
found your two missing farmhands,” he admitted.

“Oh,
my God,” she whispered, and swallowed sickly. “Jack and David…” She leveled a
dark, angry gaze at him. “And what about the third body? You just picked up an
extra one for good luck?”

“Something
like that.”

She
shook her head and stepped back, as though easing toward her bedroom door. “Who
do you work for?”

“As
of yesterday, I work for you.”

“Not
anymore.” She stalked to the end of the hall and grabbed the cordless phone
from the table against the wall. “Get out. I’ll give you a head start before I
call the police.”

He
almost laughed. She was all show, no action. She had no one to call, and the
police weren’t an option. For the next couple of days he was going to be Kira
Donovan’s entire world.

He
left her staring at an empty palm as he slid her phone into his pocket.

“How
did you do that?” she demanded, but her voice shook beneath the bravado.

The
good-ole-farm-boy act was over. Done with. For everyone’s own good. “I work for
an agency called ACRO. They know all about you. They want you to come to work
for them.”

He
didn’t have the touch for this shit, the special, touchy-feely,
everything’s-going-to-be-okay-baby attitude the rest of the agents who did this
job had. Besides, his ribs fucking hurt where Derek had ripped into him, his
kidneys ached and he’d be peeing blood by morning. He was going to lay it on
the line to her, tell her what she needed to do. Noncompliance was not an
option.

If
it is, you’re going to have to kill her…

“Why
do they want me?”

“Because
they know you’re an animal whisperer. They want to develop your skills, take you
off the market before someone else grabs you. Someone far more dangerous than
my organization,” he said.

She
glanced over at Derek’s body, then back to Ender’s face.

“And
you work there. As what? A thug? A killer?”

“I’m
an operative,” he said.

“Is
that what they call it?” She shook her head and narrowed her eyes at him. “Why
are you so fast? They experimented on you, didn’t they? Some sort of crazy
government research.”

“Trick
of the moonlight,” he said, but she pushed her palms against his chest, put all
her weight behind it. He didn’t give her an inch.

“Bullshit.
Tell me what you are.”

Dammit—he’d
always hated that question, never knew quite how to answer it. Dev had always
gotten a good laugh out of the fact that Ender never lumped himself in with the
special-ability types. Then again, he hadn’t known there was a name for what he
was until he was recruited into ACRO eight years earlier.

You’re
an excedo,
Dev had told him.

I’m
a killer,
he’d answered back, and Dev
had shaken his head and taken him into the ACRO fold despite major resistance.

He’d
just thought he was some kind of freak. Still did in many ways, but it didn’t
bother him. A lot of the rare operatives loved to moan and gnash their teeth, a
woe-is-me attitude toward the special gifts nature had bestowed on them.

As
far as he was concerned, if Mother Nature wanted to throw something extra his
way, he was all for it. She’d bestowed on him super eyesight and the ability to
move at cheetah speed. A human blur. Super eyesight and speed were the best of
all combinations, in his opinion, static gifts that he put to good use on a
regular basis. That and a bigger-than-average cock, also put to good use on a
more than regular basis. Because sometimes nature insisted that it was time to
just slow down and enjoy the ride.

Now,
of course, was not the time to slow shit down. It was time to start convincing
Kira of what she needed to do to stay alive. “I’ll explain more as soon as I
take care of a few things,” he said. His time, his schedule. No one else’s ever.

“I’m
not working for anyone but myself, especially not some mysterious agency that
sends thugs to do the recruiting.”

“You
don’t have the luxury of that choice anymore,” he told her, the words coming in
a low growl.

“What,
like it’s your way or the highway?”

“More
like, it’s my way,” he said, baring his teeth slightly, because he was so done
with this pre-convincing shit.

“You’re
an asshole.”

“What’s
your point?”

She
stared at him and slowly shook her head. “You can tell the CIA or NSA or
whatever to go fuck itself.”

He
snorted. “ACRO’s not government.”

“Military?
Derek said you were Army. He said you’d been dishonorably discharged.”

“Derek
was correct about that. Probably the only thing he was right about since he got
here,” he told her.

His
own Delta Force days were more a blur than anything, a way to legally pass the
time and burn off the constant, extra energy he always possessed. A way to stay
out of trouble. Lots of excedos led a nice, productive life of crime, and true
to form, Derek had gone down that road for a while before joining Itor Corp, a
smaller agency of rare operatives that regularly went head to head with ACRO.

“What
did you do to get a dishonorable discharge?” she asked.

“Don’t
ask questions I can’t give you answers to, Kira. Answers you don’t want.”

“Here’s
an answer I’m sure
you
don’t want—I’m not joining your agency. Ever. And
there’s nothing you can say or do to convince me. I’ve lived through worse than
you,” she said. “Now you need to get the fuck out of here before I call out my
dogs.” But her voice lacked a certain conviction even though he was pretty sure
she meant what she said.

Something
else was wrong.

He
stared at her, the tank-top strap falling off one shoulder, the hastily
pulled-on shorts, her hair loose around her face and shoulders. And there it
was—the need was back in her eyes. He could tell she was torn between hating
him and wanting him.

Join
the club, honey.

She
wrapped her arms around her chest, squeezed her legs together tightly like she
was trying to keep from reaching out and grabbing him. Even her jaw tensed, and
she closed her eyes momentarily, swayed a little like she couldn’t control her
own body.

“Let
me take care of what I need to,” he said. “We’ll talk more about this in the
morning. When you’ve calmed down. When you’ve gotten your needs met and you can
think clearly.”

“No.
I can’t stay here with you tonight,” she said. “I have to go find…someone.
Seeing how you killed my backup.”

“You’re
not leaving my sight.”

“Then
you can come with me and watch.”

“And
give you an opportunity to escape or get help? I don’t think so.”

“I
have to, dammit.” The need was burning bright in her eyes, and she shifted from
foot to foot. Part nerves, part lust. “Tommy, you need to let me go.”

The
way she called him
Tommy
reverberated straight to his dick. “You need
me,
”
he said. “And I’m all yours.”

“I’m
your prisoner,” she snapped. “I can’t trust you. And I don’t.”

“I
don’t trust you either. That didn’t matter the last two times, and it can’t
matter now. I know how to help you.”

“You
don’t know anything about me.”

“That’s
where you’re wrong. Very wrong,” he said.

She
hesitated briefly, the adrenaline almost visible around her, before she took
off out the back door, and in a dead run through the empty field behind the
barn. She had to know it wouldn’t do her any good, but he gave her credit for
having the balls to try.

He
was on her within seconds, tumbling her to the soft earth and pinning her
underneath his weight. For a minute, he just lay there, his face inches from
hers, letting the hard planes of his body feel every soft curve of hers,
reveling in the fact that she didn’t try to struggle.

The
adrenaline from the run seemed to have taken the edge off her craving slightly,
but the heat from her body began to rise all around him, scorching through his
T-shirt and making his skin prickle.

“Want
to play This Is Your Life, Chastity Belle?” he murmured roughly against the
side of her cheek.

“No,”
she spat out through gritted teeth. Her eyes shot fire at him. “And it’s
Charity,
you asshole. But you knew that.”

He
grinned, because yes, he had known that. “Too bad. We could talk about the fact
that you’re much more used to wearing handcuffs than you let on to Derek. The
fact that you’ve been arrested at animal-rights rallies.”

“Big
deal. Protesting the unethical treatment of animals is something I have every
right to do under the Constitution,” she said.