Beneath the Burn Read online

  He chased the swollen nub with his thumb, flicking and squeezing. Then he went after it with his mouth, swiping his tongue against the fabric and dampening it with his gasps.

  The hard muscle embracing her produced a kind of tranquilizing effect. His arms supported her. The pillar of his body was her strength. Without lifting her hands from the vanity, she loosened her limbs and let her butt slip off the edge and into the waiting cradle of his rocking hips. The sculpted surface of his stomach contracted against her, invading her headspace and simmering heat in her pussy.

  Too soon, he raised his mouth from her breast and nipped at her chin with a grin on his beautiful face. He brushed her hair from her ear with a gentle hand and checked her wounds. Satisfied, he moved to her lips, tracing them with a finger, watching her steadily. “You build me up and turn me inside out. I’ve never felt so defenseless and yet…so daring at the same time.”

  Wasn’t that what intimacy felt like? She smiled, her skin hot and flushed. “Mission accomplished.”

  He curved his upper body around her with his hands on her hips, seemingly oblivious to how desperately she wanted to hug him back. His voice whispered over her cheek. “You said everyone has vulnerabilities. What’s yours?”

  Slick with sweat, her hands slipped on the counter behind her. She adjusted her grip and straightened to sit. If she were going to trust him, she needed to do it in the most important way. “Do you know what happens when you open up?” She looked pointedly at her legs, spread around his.

  A smile danced on his lips. “You get laid?”

  She snorted. “If you’re lucky.” She placed her lips against his, held them there for a long moment, drinking in the spice of his breath. Then she leaned back to look in his eyes. “There was a time when I wouldn’t have willingly sat like this with an aroused man between my legs.”

  His body turned to stone, and hers hardened in kind. His nostrils flared, but she pushed on. “I’ve been raped sixteen times in this position.”

  The hands on her hips curled into fists. He closed his eyes, and his chest rose and fell through rapid breath. His body shook against hers. Was he going to explode? He looked like he might puke.

  “Hey.” She squeezed his hips with her thighs. “Don’t shut me out. If I can’t talk to you, this stops. We stop.” She wanted him to have access to the place inside her she never showed Noah. A mistake she wouldn’t make again.

  He opened his eyes, and they were haunted and cloudy. He dropped his forehead to hers, and she could feel the tension sparking from his body. “Sixteen times?” A whisper.

  “I stopped counting after that.” The truth was empowering. It opened her chest and released the toxin. It also exposed her heart. Maybe Jay would crawl in and rip it to shreds. Or maybe he would fill in the cracks. “When I learned how to open up, do you know what happened?”

  He wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her neck. “It made you incredibly fucking strong.”

  She smiled and kissed the soft skin below his jaw. “It made me strong enough to enjoy the feel of you between my legs.”

  His shuddering breath bathed her in warmth. He kissed her neck, nuzzled it, and kissed it again. “Please don’t run off on me.”

  She cringed. “Your sunglasses are in my bag. I’m not sorry about that. You know why I did it.”

  “Yeah, Charlee.” He straightened, rubbing his hands along her spine, fingers circling her back. “It was brave and…romantic.” His eyes glimmered. Then they turned to brownstone. “And it nearly cost you your life. Until we bury Roy Oxford, you’ll be wearing a bodyguard.”

  Until we buried Roy. The we sounded dreamy and …brash. But his hell-bent expression dissuaded her from arguing. She wasn’t sure the bathroom wall would survive another Jay Mayard tantrum. “Shouldn’t your security team be done sweeping?”

  “They’ll turn over every stone within a ten block radius before they let us out of here.” He kissed her lips and explored her face, her neck, her shoulders with his mouth and hands. Her fingers tingled to touch him back.

  “Can I put my hands on you?” she whispered when he returned to her lips.

  A struggle of emotions swirled in his eyes and tightened the muscles in his cheeks. Maybe she was pushing, but pushing was what he needed.

  His flawless complexion glowed beneath the loose strands of his dark brown hair. After a few thudding heart beats, his deliberation settled into smooth skin and a soft gaze. “Hold your hands up, palms facing you.”

  She remembered how strong the angles of his jaw felt beneath her fingers the previous night as she held up the backs of her hands. “I touched your face last night when you were sleeping.”

  He widened his eyes, but they were smiling. “Next time, I’ll be awake.” He interlaced their fingers, palms to palms and brought the backs of her hands to his chest. “Baby steps, okay?”

  With all that thick brown hair curling around the tips of his ears, his dark round eyes and clear golden skin, he was way too beautiful to not be touched. She strained toward him. “Baby steps.”

  He moved their hands from his shoulders to his cheeks, flinching as her knuckles stroked his velvet skin. Then he gathered her fingers at his mouth where he nuzzled and kissed each one, sending trickles of pleasure over her hands and up her arms.

  What he did next, cut her breath. He let go briefly to turn her wrists, pressed her palms against his cheeks, and dropped his hands. He stared at her out of penetrating eyes, pinning her in place.

  A fever bloomed beneath her fingers, and his facial muscles bunched and lolled. His breath sped up, quietly at first. Then the whoosh of air pushing through his nose carried noisily through the small space.

  There was something pulling at the edges of his eyes, twitching the skin there, stretching from the corners, and spreading through his face. It settled on his mouth, twisting his lips away from his clenched teeth.

  She jerked her hands back. “Jay?”

  He was looking at her but he didn’t see her.

  “Jay, talk to me.”

  Not a blink. Not a twitch.

  Dammit, she wanted wrap her arms around him. Since she couldn’t, she tried to warm her voice with the comfort of a hug. “I’m here. Please, talk to me.”

  He closed his eyes and cupped his ears. One hand dropped to the front of his pants, rubbing whatever the bump was in his pocket.

  Fucking hell. Holding her arms out and away, she circled her legs around his hips, hooked her boots behind his knees, and closed the gap between their bodies, trapping his hand against his pocket.

  No response. He was lost in his head. Could she climb in there with him and pull him out?

  She stretched her neck to reach his slacked jaw and kissed his bottom lip. “Where are we, Jay?”

  He stopped breathing. He held his breath so long, she filled her lungs to shout for help—

  “The shed.” he exhausted in a shuddering gasp.

  Her heart slammed against her ribs. The shed? “Who’s with us?”

  “Alone. So dark.” His voice sounded small, younger. He brought his arms up between them and hugged his chest, rocking.

  Oh God, what memories was he hanging onto? “What are we doing in the shed?”

  “Hiding.”

  The childlike whisper chilled the room and coated her spine with ice.

  “I’m with you, Jay. I need you. I need you to hold me.”

  His eyes shot open, and his breath released in gulping waves. “Charlee.”

  “I’m here.” With useless fucking arms hanging at her sides.

  The sculpted cuts of his gorgeous face sharpened as he dropped his hands in her lap. “Put your hands back.”

  No way. She shook her head.

  He bent until their brows touched. “We’re so close. Please?” His timbre was stiff, forced.

  Shit. Shit. Shit. She clenched her fists at her sides. She’d wanted to push him, but not like this.

  Without warning, a hum vibrated in his chest. W
hat began as a purr, warbled into quivering notes. The first inflection of his voice sent a shiver through her. “Cut me open. Dipping deeper.” More soughing notes. “Heart in hand.”

  The pitch of his voice and its reflection of meaning wrapped around her, lulling her into a trance.

  He licked his lips and sang the next verse against her mouth. “With you, I float.”

  The effect his lilt had on her was visceral. Immediate. Erotic. His voice stroked her body, saturating her pussy and seducing her into a dripping wet puddle. So hypnotized, she didn’t register his arm moving until he gripped her wrist and placed her palm over his heart.

  His humming broke when her hand made contact, and his heart pounded against her touch.

  He began again. “It’s the only way to swim.” He held her eyes, his hand over hers, and murmured the rhythm as he sang. “In your blue seas.”

  Gasps broke through her parted lips.

  Nestling closer into the triangle of her legs, he brushed his lips over hers. The low melody of the song vibrated through the press of his lips and the thrum in his chest. Her heart pounded and she returned his kiss while he hummed.

  He leaned back and looked into her eyes. “That’s where I’ll be,” he sang. “Don’t disappear on me.”

  The tune reverberated through his closed lips. “Come to L.A. with me.” He ended with a sultry hum.

  Her chest tightened. She wanted more of his sexy voice, wanted more of this beautiful man. “When did you write that?”

  “Just now.”

  Wow. Music had always had an effect on her but..”Your voice…I’ve never heard you sing live. It was…” Dark. Deep. Panty-soaking. “Profound.”

  “You inspire me, Charlee.”

  She kissed him and he answered it, led it. The thrusts of his tongue were as enthusiastic as the beat of his heart against her palm. The sensation was overwhelming. She was spinning, falling. She pulled back. “This is crazy. What is this between us?”

  It was dreamlike, this moment, amidst of the chaos and dangers around them. On the heels of such a frightening and death-facing experience, they seemed to fall so easily into one another. Yet, wasn’t that what she’d done in the penthouse? In the threat of Roy’s presence, she’d focused on her memory of Jay, exploring it, growing it.

  “I don’t know, but it feels incredible.” He squeezed her hand on his chest to punctuate his words.

  A fist rapped on the bathroom door.

  They broke apart. The moment was interrupted but not lost, if the promise in his eyes were anything to go by. They had opened a window, one they would never close again.

  Nathan’s voice muffled through the door. “We have a problem.”

  38

  Nathan’s interruption kicked Jay off his Charlee cloud and into the dregs of reality. If his protective team wasn’t able to secure a safe evacuation route, the crowd must have swarmed out of control.

  He clasped Charlee’s hand and followed Nathan out of the bathroom.

  “You need to get rid of those clothes, Charlee.” Nathan glanced over his shoulder, his eyes flitting from the stain on her jeans to the smears on her shirt.

  She lowered her chin and picked at a splatter of dried blood as if it were something she saw every day. She shrugged. “Yeah. Good call.”

  What kind of shit had she seen in her life to be so nonchalant about wearing a dead man’s guts? Jay tucked the question in the back of his brain. He needed to focus on getting them out of there. Where was everyone? Other than his team leader, none of his guards were there. Not a good sign.

  Tony didn’t say anything as she left her post by the door and strode toward him. The lines etching her frown spoke for her.

  Had someone recognized him? Did they know he was there? Tingling invaded his body, accompanied by the usual feeling of a loss of control. Some of that was the lingering effect of the coke. The reminder of his drug use bubbled guilt through his gut.

  But he had Charlee’s hand in his and her strength by his side. “How bad is the crowd?”

  Tony was so exacting in her posture as she looked between Charlee and him, she could have been mistaken for a statue. “The crowd is gone. As is the body.”

  The crowd was gone? They obviously didn’t know he was in the building. Wait. “What do you mean the body’s gone? How does a dead man disappear?”

  Charlee sighed and released his hand to squat beside one of the duffle bags and rifle through it. “What about the sirens we heard? Did you uncover anything about the cops that arrived?” She tugged out a black footless stocking thing and climbed to her feet. “I guess I’m not surprised the Craigs cleaned up that fast.” She unbuttoned her jeans and pushed them down her thighs.

  “No.” Nathan paced a circuit in front of the curtained windows. “Since the police aren’t banging down the door looking for a murder suspect, it’s safe to assume they work for Roy.”

  The sight of her little red panties shot blood straight to Jay’s dick. Heavy warmth pulsed through his genitals and heated his face. What in the hell was she doing? “Craigs?” he croaked.

  Nathan stepped in front of him and blocked his view. “She calls anyone loyal to Roy a Craig.”

  Craning his neck, he could feel Nathan’s glare, but fuck, Jimi Hendrix’s 1968 Stratocaster wouldn’t have pulled his eyes away from the leggings sliding up her toned legs. “Why Craig?”

  “The Viet Cong were Charlie. Roy’s adherents are Craig. That’s all you need to know.” Nathan cleared his throat in a useless effort to distract his eyes. “And the body disappeared in the time it took Colson to escort you up here, search the area for snipers, and return to the alley.”

  She gripped the hem of her shirt. “So the Craig dispatched the crowd, the dead Craig, and the police? The latter would’ve been a phone call from Roy to an inside guy on the force. I’ve watched him do this too many times to count.” Her voice trailed off, quivering. “Now what? His thugs are out there waiting, without anyone to witness them attacking us when we come out?” She pulled off her shirt, unleashing waves of red hair tumbling down around her.

  Sweet suffering Jesus. The trembling in her fingers nullified him somewhat, but he could see her nipples shadowed behind the lace. Heat surged through his dick. He was mindless with the need to pull it out and stick it in her.

  Nathan droned on about blah snipers and blah blah tampered police reports and who the fuck cared? Her tits overflowed their red laced prison as she dug through the luggage. Any moment they would spill out in perfect servings for the cups of his hands.

  His dick hurt. Could he slip a hand beneath his leather pants and make an adjustment without being obvious?

  She stood, fumbling for the neck hole in a drapey-shaped shirt. Her leggings hung low on her waist, highlighting her fuck-me curves. With all that sleek skin stretching over her flat stomach and the arches of her tits, yeah, the chubby in his pants required some realigning. He reached for it.

  “Charlee.” Nathan pinched the bridge of his nose. “Please hurry. Your rock star’s about to rip through his thirteen-year-old-slut pants.”

  What was wrong with his pants? Besides the painful nut-hugging?

  Her eyes flew to his hand on his dick and widened. Then she looked down at her bra and tensed as if just realizing she was baring her assets to everyone in the room.

  She righted the shirt and shoved her head and arms through. The ivory tunic hugged her ass and hips and hung loosely off her shoulder and around her tits. She was a fucking knock-out, which did nothing to cool his erection.

  Face red, she scooped up her plaid Doc Martens and strode toward the kitchen nook. The apologetic look on her face shriveled him right up. She hadn’t been teasing him on purpose. Something was wrong.

  He side-stepped Nathan to follow, but the bastard blocked him again and leaned in.

  “She was stripped of her modesty a long time ago,” he whispered, low and stern. “Two months without clothes. She’s immune to nudity.”

  Slivers o
f what Nathan had shared that morning about her captivity pierced through him, stabbing his heart. A lesser person would’ve hidden her pain in shame, but she bared hers with a grace that outshone everyone. “She’s so fearless; it’s easy to forget.”

  “I know.” Nathan let out a sharp huff, but a smile twitched at the corner of his mouth. “Don’t beat yourself up too badly. I’ve had three years to get used to it, and sometimes…” He glanced over his shoulder and watched her rummage through the refrigerator. “I’m still a man.”

  That pissed him the fuck off, but the tension retreated when Nathan’s eyes strayed to Tony. It was a lingering look he hadn’t seen on the man before. Okay, Nathan wanted to fuck his bodyguard. That he could live with.

  “What’s the plan?” Charlee asked around a spoonful of yogurt and leaned her butt against the counter. Her posture exuded a deliberate calmness, but the way her jaw stiffened around each bite exposed her fear.

  He closed the distance and rested his palms on her hips, empting his face of his own fears. There could be men on the surrounding buildings with sniper rifles, hiding in dumpsters, riding by in passing cars. Hell, they could’ve been waiting in the apartment across the hall. If they couldn’t trust the police, they truly were on their own. “The protective team will be ready to move us soon.”

  Charlee rubbed her temple. “How many bodyguards?”

  “When we’re traveling, they’re a five-man team.” He had another five on reserve at home. Lot of good that did him. He pulled her against him and a quickening buzzed through his body, making him gasp. Maybe it was the stressful energy bouncing between them. Maybe it was just Charlee and the pulse of life itself.

  “So there are three of us…we’re principals?” She glanced up at him, arms folded behind her. “That’s what your bodyguards call us?”

  He nodded.

  “Three principals and five bodyguards.” She unlocked a hand from her back to chew a fingernail. “That’s doable, right? I mean, there are four in your band with five bodyguards.”