Lucy Monroe - Satisfaction Guaranteed

“Exactly. You aren’t close with any of them. Does this other friend know your birthday?”

“His wife does.” Ethan grimaced. “Queenie ratted me out.”

“Your great-uncle’s paramour?”

“Paramour, what kind of word is that?”

“One that seems to fit a woman who was dating your eighty-something-year-old uncle when he died.”

“I see. And what do you call yourself in relation to me?” His hand turned and cupped her shoulder.

The movement should have been casual, but she felt branded. She sucked in air.

“I don’t know.” She was more than a coworker, but less than a lover. Especially since the no sex rule she’d instigated. “Your friend?”

“You said I don’t have any.”

“Maybe I was being harsh.”

His brow rose. “You, harsh?”

“I’m not, usually.”

“I know.” The words felt like a caress. “I also know what I’d like to call you.”

“What?”

“My woman.”

“Your lover, you mean?”

“That, too.”

“I thought the sex was too intense for you.” She thought she’d been too intense for him.

“I’m going crazy not touching you.”

“You touch me all the time.”

“For the sake of possible watchers. I don’t take advantage.”

“Don’t you?”

“No, damn it, Beth. I don’t.” He jerked his hand away and sat back. “I’m a good agent. The best. I cover every angle, but I don’t take advantage of women. In any way.”

Beth felt bereft without the warmth of his hand connected to her, but there were unresolved things about the night roiling around inside her. She wanted him and the more they were together, the more the wanting grew until it was an aching need that reached more deeply than physical desire.

It clawed at her very soul.

But she had enough instincts of self-preservation left to know she couldn’t give in to it if certain things were true.

“I have a very good sense of smell.”

“What?” he asked.

“I grew up learning to judge a woman’s place in the social strata by the perfume she wore.”

“That’s a handy trick. Your mom teach you?”

“Yes. My dad encouraged her. He was proud that I could tell so much about people by their scents.”

“Not all women wear perfume and a lot of men don’t wear cologne.”

“I graduated to learning to recognize almost everything. Dad made a game out of it, teaching me to identify other types of scents and what they might mean as well. We used to call it the Sherlock Holmes game. The smell of mothballs on a designer suit that said it wasn’t new or worn often. The fragrance of certain spices that linger after a meal on people can tell you where they’ve eaten, or even what they eat usually and can reveal a lot about their culture and background.”

“That’s very cool.”

“You think?”

“Yes.”

“It’s come in handy a time or two.”

“And you are bringing it up now because?”

“I could smell Miss Fournier’s perfume all over you.”

“All over me?”

“Yes. You were making love to her, weren’t you?”

Ethan reached down and laced his fingers through her hand, stopping her from playing with the chiffon. He rubbed gently over the back of her hand with his thumb. “Tell me why we went tonight.”

“To learn what we could. So, you’re saying you were using seduction to get information out of her.” She tried to tug her hand away, but he wouldn’t let go.

“No. We also went to plant listening devices, remember?”

“Yes, but I don’t see how putting a bug down her bra is going to help us find out what Prescott is up to.”

He laughed. “You’ve got an acerbic tongue when you want to, Sunshine. I didn’t touch her bra. I touched her throat.” He brushed his fingertip lightly over a spot on Beth’s neck. “Specifically, here. With the correct amount of pressure exerted, you can cause a short blackout in your opponent.”

“Are you trying to say you had to fight her off?” Her voice came out husky with an invitation she was trying very hard not to give him.

“No. I’m saying that I used her as a blind to get to the second floor, where I caused her to go unconscious without hurting her so that I could exit through the window and plant a receiver outside the master bedroom window.”

“Why do you reek of her smell?”

“Her hands were everywhere after she yanked me onto the bed. She pressed herself against me.”

“Did you kiss her?”

“No.”

“Is that part of the special training you were talking about me needing?”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t like the idea of you using your body for the cause.”

“We’re even. I didn’t like the sight of Prescott’s hands on you at dinner.”

“He barely touched me.”

“It was enough.”

“Would you have kissed her?”

“I didn’t kiss her…by choice.”

“Would you, if you had to?” She took a breath and then asked the question that mattered most of all. “Would you use your body…if it meant getting what we needed?”

“No. Not for the sake of the case and not because of desire. I don’t want anyone else. Only you.” He pulled their entwined hands so they rested on his thigh, all the while keeping up the soft massage with his thumb.

“But what if-”

His finger moved from her neck to press against her lips. “There are no buts. I couldn’t make myself touch another woman with intent right now, Beth. Not for this assignment. Not for anything.”

“Even though I said no sex?”

“Even then.”

“But I have no hold on you.”

“Apparently, you do.”

“I don’t want to. I don’t want you to have a hold on me.”

“I know I’m not the kind of man you see in your future, but that doesn’t change that right now, we are bound together. Like it or not. Think it is smart or not. You are mine and I am yours.”

The words were more seductive than his touch. “But we aren’t sleeping together.”

“I know and it’s killing me.”

“Is it?”

“You know it is. Don’t play innocent. You know how hard you turn me on, how much you excite me.”

“You don’t like my intensity.”

He laughed, like she’d said something really, really funny. “You are so wrong. I purely revel in it, baby.”

“But you said-”

“That it made doing my job harder and it does. I’ve never been less than one hundred percent focused on my objective on any assignment. It’s different this time, Beth. No matter what I’m doing, a little part of me is always focused on you. I thought it was just the sex, but it’s not. I’m attuned to you like I’ve never been with another person. You make me feel needy, damn it.”

“You sound angry.”

“I am angry. These kinds of feelings are what make great agents screw up.” Even angry and frustrated by feelings that clearly blindsided him, the man was ultraconfident in his assessment of himself.

“Are you sure about that?”

“Having my attention divided is always a risk.”

“But we aren’t having sex.”

“And I told you it doesn’t matter.”

“It sounds to me like you’re the intense one.” Which was a revelation. A nice one.

“You could say that.”

“But it bothers you.”

He sighed, frowning. “Yes.”

“You aren’t bothered by who I am though, are you?”

“No. In fact, I’d feel a lot less like a fool if you shared a little of this intensity, Sunshine.”

“You’re not a fool.” She was admitting to feelings she’d rather pretend did not exist, but living outside her fantasies meant admitting to realities she didn’t like as much as being willing to take risks on making dreams real.