She shivered, her breaths growing faster with the heavy rush of his. Nothing was sexier or more sinful than grooving up against this man. She wanted to live in his arms and do this for the rest of her life.
But doubt and duty trickled in.
Why was he dancing with her? Touching her? Staring at her like he was into her? Was it another trick?
How many women had he fucked in the past six months? After seven years of celibacy, surely he hadn’t gone back to abstaining. He was too sexually charged, too goddamn filthy-minded to go without.
And his dancing? Yeah, he had moves. All the moves. He was by far the best dancer in the discotheque. Maybe in all of Italy. She didn’t have to stretch her mind to guess who’d taught him.
So what was he doing with her? With his good looks, sexy confidence, and dirty dancing, he wouldn’t be hard up for pussy. He could get it anywhere, anytime.
Even now, every woman in the nightclub was eye-fucking him. The ladies corralled around, shaking their hips, waiting for him to toss away his current distraction and notice them.
If he noticed them, he didn’t show it. His dark brown eyes never strayed from her. The longer he held her in his gaze, the more adventurous her hands became. Chiseled pecs, solid shoulders, corded neck, pillowy lips—she touched him everywhere, rubbing, caressing, stroking, and burning up.
She was soaked between her legs, made worse by the blatant need hardening his body. He didn’t ram his erection against her, but he couldn’t hide it. She was intimately familiar with its shape in every stage of hardness. She knew his girth as he stretched every orifice of her body with dominating force.
She knew it and missed it terribly. She missed him.
The scent of him warmed her senses with outdoorsy undertones of leather and earth and masculine pheromones. Yeah, even without the beard, he still smelled deliciously lickable and distinctively him.
He rocked against her, changing up the tempo, bringing her hips in for a slow grind. Then he gripped her nape, bringing her mouth in for a heated exchange of breaths, teasing her with a brush of lips, taunting her with the promise of more.
Every action was sensual and calculated, wildly hungry and terrifyingly confident. Damn, but he knew what he was doing.
He scared the shit out of her.
So when his mouth fully captured hers, she tensed and tried to pull away. He grabbed her head, trapped her waist, and deepened the kiss, chasing her tongue and decimating her resistance.
Controlled by desire, they attacked each other in a frenzy, dancing and moaning to their own music, spinning in their private orbit of touching, kissing, biting, licking, and grabbing. Whatever this was, it was impulsive, carnal, dangerous, and real. They weren’t capable of stopping. It was too potent, too infectious, taking over and twisting them up.
He kissed her until she melted. Until they were panting together and pulling at each other’s clothes. She needed more of his touch, his hands on her skin. Her body had never felt more alive, her breasts heavy, and her breaths shallow and fast.
She was so caught up in it she hadn’t realized they’d drifted away from the crowd. With her eyes screwed shut and all five senses wrapped up in Cole, she didn’t know he’d danced her into a nearby passageway until her back hit the wall.
Her eyes flew open, and the air evacuated her lungs as he pinned her body with the weight of his. There was no one in view, this part of the club currently unused. It was just her and him and the fingers trailing up the outsides of her thighs.
This was it. He’d separated her from the crowd, pulled her away from witnesses. He was going to fuck her or kill her. Probably both.
She deserved it. She’d let him seduce her again and was officially too stupid to live.
“What do you want from me?” She lifted her chin.
“The truth.”
Don’t trust him. It’s another manipulation.
She was prepared to fight, but she wouldn’t kill him. She couldn’t, and that put her at a severe disadvantage. She blanked her expression.
“Who’s Mike?” he asked. “Who is he to you?”
“My partner.”
“You’re fucking him.” A shadow passed over his beautiful face.
“Why do you care?”
“Do you love him? Every night, every city, you share a bed with him.”
“You creepy pervert.” A chill ran down her spine. “You’re watching me?”
“Who are you watching? I told you where to find the hard drive. He’s in Romania, not in a nightclub in Rome. Why are you here?”
“You told me where. I’m working on how.”
“Explain.”
“Are you going to help me?”
Please, help me.
“No.” His eyes hardened. “Who’s trying to kill you?”
“You?”
“Who else? These men who are hunting you…they’re connected to the team in Texas. But I can’t trace their employer. Who is it? Who hired you to seduce me?” At her silence, he asked, “What’s on that hard drive?”
“Help me retrieve it, and I’ll tell you.”
“Tell me how you’re connected to it, and I’ll think about it.”
“What?” Her breath hitched. “You will? You’ll help me?”
“No. Fuck.” His jaw flexed, and he swiped a hand down his face. “I can’t, Lydia. I spent a year embedded in the Romanian mafia, searching for the traitor who sold that hard drive. Darius Skutnik knows me. He knows my face, my disguises, my loyalties. My cover’s blown. Bridges burned. And besides, I don’t get involved in political or government affairs. Not anymore.”
“Then why are you here? Why are you following me?”
His expression clouded.
“Is this about revenge? Do you want an apology?” She cupped his strong jaw, holding his gaze. “I won’t give it. I’m not sorry. I’m not sorry for meeting you or fucking you or learning how strong and resilient you are. You scare the bejesus out of me and fascinate me and turn me on like no other. If I were a normal girl with average problems, I would chase you and date you and do all the normal-girl things with you. Because this? You and me? It’s real.” She lowered her hand. “You wanted the truth. That’s my truth.”
She pressed her tongue against the back of her teeth, immediately regretting her verbal ejaculation. She’d said too much, overexposed herself, and couldn’t take it back.
How many times would she stumble and fall over this man?
Maybe this was the last time. Maybe he would try to kill her now, and she would finally learn to keep her guard up around him.
“I’m not interested in normal girls.” His finger traced circles on her thigh, invoking goosebumps.
In the span of an eternal moment, her life flashed before her eyes. She lived, and she died, but she didn’t regret. He’d woken her from a long, cold dead sleep, and she wouldn’t change that for anything.
Slowly, his hand dipped between her legs, going straight to the stiletto like he knew it was strapped there. Of course, he knew. She’d rubbed it up and down his leg while they were dancing.
He made no attempt to take it as his fingers crept upward, seeking something softer, warmer, more welcoming.
A tremor crashed through her, and she rose on her toes, trying to slow the climb of his hand. “What do you want from me?”