Shadows at Dawn Page 5

  He’d never dreamed if that night actually came, he’d be sleeping on the sofa in his living room.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  MINDY WALKED THROUGH the door of Jax’s apartment. He followed close behind her, a bag of groceries in his left hand, his right free to reach his weapon. She had never imagined having a bodyguard, but she was glad Jax had volunteered for the job.

  On the way to his house, he had suggested they order pizza or Chinese takeout, but she figured as a bachelor he ate that a lot. He’d been disappointed that he didn’t get the home-cooked meal, so she’d persuaded him to stop at the market. They were having spaghetti and meatballs, French bread and a salad with herb vinaigrette.

  Not that she was all that hungry.

  Still, she needed to stay healthy and to keep up her spirits. She believed in Jax. He was working with Hawk, Chase and the Dallas police. They would figure out what was going on. In the meantime, Jax would keep her safe.

  His one bedroom apartment was Spartan, with a dark brown tweed sofa and chairs in the living room, a coffee table made from the crosscut slab of a redwood tree varnished to a glossy sheen, and a huge flat-screen TV.

  The place was masculine in the extreme and suited him perfectly. It was also immaculately clean. Jax was former military. The lessons he had learned had obviously stayed with him.

  The kitchen was larger than her own. As Mindy started cooking dinner, water boiled in a pot on the stove, steaming up the room and the lenses of her glasses. She took them off and set them on the windowsill. She could see without them, just not that well, but certainly enough to cook. She returned to stirring the spaghetti sauce, simmering in the skillet, and looked up to see Jax walking in.

  Her breath hitched. He was the hottest, sexiest man she had ever seen.

  “Smells great,” he said.

  Mindy looked down and stirred the sauce. “I hope you like it.”

  “You cook for Wyman?” Jax asked.

  “Sometimes. He preferred going out most nights.”

  “If you were my woman, I’d have a hard time letting you out of the house.” He smiled. “And you can cook, too. How much better does it get?”

  A flush stole over her. If she was his woman? She refused to let herself imagine it.

  He grabbed the wooden spoon off the counter, reached around her to scoop up a bite and swore under his breath when he burned his tongue.

  “Be careful,” she said.

  He just smiled. “It’s delicious.” He was standing so close she could feel the muscles across his chest moving against her back. The front of his jeans rubbed against hers where they curved over her behind.

  She almost moaned.

  Jax eased away. “So...you and Wyman, you were pretty serious for a while, before he started drinking and doing drugs.”

  She nodded. “Smoking pot mostly, but still...”

  The pasta and sauce were done. She turned off the stove and turned to face him. “That wasn’t the only reason we broke up. There were...other issues.”

  “Yeah, like what?”

  Oh, boy. She wished she hadn’t opened this particular Pandora’s box. “We were...um...incompatible in other ways.” She could feel the color rising in her cheeks. Jax noticed, and his dark eyes sharpened.

  “You mean physical ways? You two weren’t compatible in bed?”

  She moistened her lips, barely able to force out the words. “That’s right.”

  Jax’s gaze held hers. “Why not?” He seemed to be demanding an answer. Her breathing went shallow. Her heart beat too fast. Did she have the courage to tell him?

  “Curt was pretty much...um...a beta kind of guy. He liked me to...um...take the lead in the bedroom. But that’s just not my thing.”

  She had barely seen him move, but suddenly he was closer, just inches away. “So you like a man who takes charge.”

  She swallowed. She could see the heat in his eyes, feel the hunger in every muscle in his body. He wanted her. This was her chance to fulfill every fantasy she’d ever had about Jaxon Ryker.

  She looked into his hard, handsome face. “Yes.”

  One step and he was pressed full-length against her. A big hand slid into her hair to cup the back of her head and hold her in place as his mouth came down over hers. Her eyes closed and her lips parted. Jax was kissing her, deeply and thoroughly, the way she had always imagined.

  She moaned and he deepened the kiss, ravaging her mouth, sending delicious shivers through her body, and still it wasn’t enough.

  “You want this?” he asked as he pressed his lips against the side of her neck. “You want me?”

  Her breath hitched. “Jax... I’ve wanted you for so long.”

  A low groan escaped. “Mindy, baby...” He kissed her again, and then he was lifting her into his arms and carrying her out of the kitchen and down the hall to his bedroom.

  He kissed her as he set her down beside his king-size bed and began to strip off her clothes. His big hands were everywhere, unbuttoning her blouse and tossing it away, unfastening her bra and sliding it off her shoulders.

  He cupped her breasts, lifted and caressed them with a reverence she had never imagined, then he lowered his head to take the fullness into his mouth. A soft moan escaped as he explored and tasted and drove her insane. Desire rolled through her, thick and hot. Her head fell back, shifting her long hair across her back.

  Jax returned to kissing her, and for a few precious moments, her passion-fogged brain functioned enough to shove up his T-shirt, urging him to strip it off over his head. Jax complied.

  Hard muscle surrounded her, deep sculpted valleys, six-pack abs, toned pecs, the perfect fan of curly dark chest hair, narrowing down in a single line that disappeared into the top of his jeans. She loved that he didn’t have Curt’s pale, hairless chest. Jax was all man and proud of it.

  She pressed her mouth against a flat copper nipple, and a shudder rolled through his powerful body.

  “I’ve got to have you, baby. I know I shouldn’t. I know it isn’t right, but I need you. Tell me I’m what you want, too.”

  “Yes... Oh, yes, Jax. Please...”

  “Jesus, honey...” The next thing she knew she was naked and he was lifting her, settling her in his big bed. He left her long enough to strip off his clothes, then he joined her on the mattress and started kissing her again.

  “I want everything from you,” he said, his hands moving over her breasts, skimming lower, sliding hotly, expertly down her body, touching, stroking, making her burn. “I want everything you’re willing to give. But I promise I won’t rush you.”

  She whimpered. She wasn’t that experienced with men, as apparently Jax could tell. Mindy pulled his head down and rained kisses all over his face, kissed the corners of his mouth.

  Jax framed her face between his palms and kissed her deeply again. She wanted more—wanted all of him.

  “I need you,” she said. “Please, Jax...”

  A growl came from low in his throat. He stroked and teased, didn’t stop until she was pleading, begging him to take her. His heavy weight pressed her down in the mattress, skin to skin, hard muscle to feminine softness.

  Pleasure rolled through her, sweet and thrilling as he finally claimed her, his movements sure and deep. Even with the difference in their size, somehow her body meshed perfectly with his. She picked up the rhythm he set and heard his low growl of passion.

  He increased the pace, took her and took her. A shattering climax struck, sending her over the edge, but Jax didn’t slow. Instead, he drove her up to a second towering peak before his muscles tightened and he followed her to release.

  Mindy clung to him, her skin damp, soft pleasure pulsing through her as, little by little, they began to spiral down. She could feel the thudding of his heart, felt the brush of his lips in a last soft kiss, before he left to dispose of protection. When he returned, he cuddled her against him spoon-fashion and just held her.

  “That was amazing,” she said.

  Jax chuckled. “I’d take you again, but you’ve had one helluva day.”

  She flushed, pleased to know he wanted her again so soon. She loved the way he felt wrapped around her, loved that he made her feel so safe. She was drowsy but not really sleepy. She wasn’t used to having sex more than once, but with Jax the idea shot a surge of heat right to her core.

  “Maybe having some dinner would help you regain your strength,” she said with a smile, surprised she felt comfortable enough to tease him.

  Faint laughter rumbled through him. “That sounds like a challenge.” He kissed the side of her neck, lightly nipped an earlobe. “Dinner’s done. Why don’t we wait, heat it up a little later?”

  Mindy smiled, rolled onto her back and laced her fingers in his short dark hair. “Why don’t we heat things up right now?”

  Jax laughed and kissed her.

  The second round of lovemaking was as good as the first. Everything would have been perfect, except that someone might be trying to kidnap—or maybe even kill—her.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “I WANT TO know what you’re doing to find that flash drive.” Susan DeMarco sat across from Elliot Russo in the living room of an elegant suite at the Houston St. Regis Hotel. She had flown down in the company jet ostensibly on business, but in reality it was purely an excuse to get away from her overbearing husband and relieve some of her own sexual tension.

  “If that joker from her office hadn’t interfered, the girl would have handed the drive over—I can guarantee you that.”

  “That joker is Jaxon Ryker. He’s a navy SEAL. Your men should have been smart enough not to take him on.”

  Elliot clenched his jaw but made no reply.

  “Apparently, you didn’t have any better luck at her apartment,” she said.

  “The men looked hard. They took every drive they could find, but I checked them out and none of them was the right one.”

  “That only makes things worse. Do you know what will happen if the information on that flash drive gets out? Jonathan will divorce me, and I’ll lose everything.”

  “Maybe she doesn’t know she has it. If she knew, she could have blackmailed you months ago.”

  “I can’t take that chance. Ryan swore he only made one copy of the video, and she was the only person besides him who had access. She has to be the one who has it.”

  “Why don’t you try offering her money? She’s a fucking receptionist. She can’t exactly be rolling in dough. She took the side job with Shipman to make some extra cash. Offer her ten thousand. For someone in her position, that’s a lot of money.”

  “It’s common knowledge how much Jonathan is worth. If I offer her ten thousand, she’ll want a hundred at the very least. And whatever I give her will never be enough. There’s no way to know if we have all the copies. We need to finish what we started. Force her to give us the drive, then get rid of her. With her and Ryan both out of the way, it’s over and done.”

  Elliot’s sensuous lips thinned. She figured he was silently berating her for being stupid enough to let Ryan make a video of them having sex in the first place. But it had been such a lark at the time, and he had destroyed the evidence right in front of her. At least he’d pretended he had.

  She sighed. Elliot was tough and clever, dark and good-looking. He knew people who could handle things, people who would do just about anything for money. As long as she kept him in plenty of cash and sexually satisfied, he was happy to do her bidding.

  Susan ran a manicured nail down his cheek. “You took care of it before. I trust you to handle it again.”

  Elliot’s expression filled with dark intent. “I’m the one you could always count on. You know that...even if you forgot for a while.”

  He was right. Her brief affair with Ryan had led to disaster. He was dead now, but she still wasn’t safe.

  She gave Elliot a seductive smile. He was five years younger, but at forty-two, she was still a beautiful woman. And her ruthlessness appealed to him.

  “If you bring me the drive,” she said, “take care of the girl, and don’t leave any loose ends, we’ll take a trip together. Go off somewhere for a couple of weeks where no one will find us.”

  Five-star luxury appealed to both of them; the Bahamas, perhaps, or Turks and Caicos. Elliot would keep her satisfied. She would play to his sexual kinks, and he would stay firmly at the end of her leash.

  “I’ll need to do some planning,” he said. “We can’t have any more mistakes.”

  “Fine, but you need to finish this as soon as possible.”

  Elliot’s hooded gaze slid over her, undressing her with his eyes. He expected a reward, and she was willing to give him one. She could trust Elliot to handle the problem, and things would get back to normal.

  She just needed to get the flash drive and get rid of the girl.

  * * *

  HE SHOULDN’T HAVE done it. Mindy worked for Chase. She was a valuable member of the crew, part of the family. She was a friend.

  Scratch that. Jax had never been able to think of Mindy Stewart as just a friend, not from the first time he had seen her. Certainly not after he’d gotten to know her.

  Definitely not after she had spent the night in his bed.

  He didn’t want to be Mindy’s friend. As she lay sleeping curled against him, he asked himself what did he want from Mindy?

  The answer came swiftly. More of her sweet little body, no doubt of that. He was fairly sure they didn’t have any sexual compatibility issues.

  But as he was getting to know her, he realized he wanted more than just physical gratification. From the start, he’d been attracted to Mindy’s sweet, feminine nature, had known she was smart. Now he knew she wasn’t afraid to stand up to him, knew she was strong in a way he respected and brave in a way he admired.

  He liked everything about Mindy Stewart, believed she was someone special. He wanted to see where the relationship might go, see if the incredible attraction he felt for her, and what Mindy seemed to feel for him, could become something deeper.

  Something he had been searching for but never allowed himself to actually consider. The odds of finding that special someone, the forever kind who made your life complete, were simply too great. Now he was beginning to believe there was a chance that special someone was right in front of him.

  She stirred beside him, shoved heavy dark hair out of her face, looked up at him and smiled.

  He reached over and looped a thick curl behind her ear. “Good morning.”

  “Is it? Morning, I mean?”

  “Almost.”

  Her expression turned troubled, and her soft smile faded. “I have to go see my mom, and then I have to go home and clean up the mess in my apartment.”

  “Don’t worry. We’ll get everything done.”

  “And we still have to figure out what’s going on.”

  “Yeah, we do.” He’d been about to get up, let her sleep a little longer, but the sadness in her pretty eyes drew him.

  He kissed her, felt her arms slide around his neck and her heightened breathing. He spent the next half hour distracting her with another round of mind-blowing sex, then left her drowsing while he went to make coffee.

  Jax sighed. He was in deep with this sweet, beautiful girl. Deeper than he’d ever been with a woman before. For once, Jax didn’t care.

  * * *

  SHE SHOULDN’T HAVE done it. As she showered and dressed for the day, Mindy had no doubt sleeping with Jaxon Ryker was a stupid, reckless thing to do. True, it had been wonderful, better than she’d ever imagined.

  But it was a fantasy.

  Jax wasn’t the kind of guy for her. He was too male, too rugged, his life too dangerous and unstable. She needed a guy who was nice and safe, with a good-paying job and a retirement account. The kind of guy who would give her kids and make a good father.

  This morning, the notion held little appeal. What man could compete with Jax Ryker? None she had ever met.

  They finished their coffee and prepared to head out when a knock sounded at the front door. Jax’s hand went to the pistol holstered at his waist—exactly the kind of thing that made him completely unsuitable. He checked the peephole, cast her a glance, and she stepped back out of the way.

  Jax pulled open the door.

  “Hey, lover! I was hoping you’d be home.” A beautiful blonde with long legs and a stunning figure stood outside on the porch.

  Every warning Mindy had just given herself flashed through her mind with shocking clarity. Through the crack in the door she could watch the exchange, and it made her insides churn.

  “It’s not a good time, Candace,” Jax said. “I’ve got company. I asked you not to show up unannounced.”

  The woman’s full lips curved into a pout. She tried to see inside, see who Jax was entertaining, but he blocked her view.

  “All right, fine,” she said, “if that’s the way you want it.” She smiled. “Call me when you get a chance. You’ve got my number. I’m in town for a couple of days.”

  “I’m busy, Candace.”

  The woman turned and started walking, her high heels tapping, her round behind swaying seductively. “Think about it, honey,” she called over her shoulder. “Remember the fun we had.”

  Jax closed the door and turned to Mindy. “Sorry about that.”

  She tried not to feel hurt, tried to ignore the sharp ache stabbing beneath her ribs. “It’s none of my business,” she said softly, trying to brush past him.

  “Wait a minute.” Jax caught her shoulders. “It is your business. I’m not interested in Candace. I haven’t seen her in weeks. The only woman I’m interested in is you.”