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her, willing to stay if she wanted.
She blinked back the sudden heat of her tears at his offer, but shook her head. “No. This
needs to end.”
He drew a deep breath, and she felt as a heavy tension covered his frame as if he wanted to
say something, but one more breath later, it was gone. He nodded and caressed her cheek.
“I‟ll be right back.”
She realized, with no small shock, that she would willingly wait for him every day, forever, as
he walked with the Secret Service guy into her house.
* * * *
55
DIANA DERICCI
Silence. What an amazing sound. Blessed silence. A good silence, the quiet of nightfall at her
home.
No more questions, no more strangers tromping through her house, over her yard, or a
dozen cars parked like an auto-maker‟s fence line at the street. The moon was just rising beyond the
row of houses across the street, somehow making the last hour or so seem very surreal. All she had
to do was turn around to know it had all happened.
The front door was ajar behind her where she sat on the porch, watching the moths dance
and flutter beneath the streetlamp over the sidewalk. It wouldn‟t close properly until it was repaired
and that would be tomorrow at the earliest. Her window screen would also need to be repaired.
Thankfully, the medics who‟d arrived to tend to the shot victim had also dealt with the guy who‟d
electrocuted himself into a numb stupor right outside her bedroom door. She hadn‟t seen any of the
aftermath, but had received several impressed looks for the idea.
Silently, she sent a prayer to her dad. Her mother was still hurting for the brave, loving man
who‟d been shot in the line of duty doing what he loved outside of his family, and she couldn‟t
blame her for her pain. As Stacee got older, she‟d understood that pain better, but she would never
forget the things he‟d taught her.
Warm thighs pressed against hers as Jonas sat behind her on the porch, wrapping himself
around her in a cocoon of warmth. The strength of his steeled arms circled her, and she never felt
safer.
“You shouldn‟t stay here tonight,” he said, leaning until his chin rested on her bare shoulder.
“No power, a door that doesn‟t lock.”
“It stinks inside,” she added offhandedly.
His chest moved with a short laugh. “Is that why you‟re out here?” he asked, pulling her
closer.
“Some of it.”
She shivered when his hands found skin and massaged. “You‟re cold. It‟s still too cold at
night to be out here in shorts, baby.”
“I could call Kay,” she told him absently, loving the feel of his palms on her thighs, rubbing
warmth back into her. She arched back into his chest and he dropped a kiss on her exposed throat.
Warmth seeped into her quickly, her body recalling what had happened between them just a few
hours before.
56
WATCHING HER EVERY MOVE
“I don‟t think so.”
“Oh?” she breathed, quickly falling under the tease of his fingers and lips.
“Come with me,” he beckoned in a seductive voice that sent a thrilling shiver down her
spine.
Her hands landed on his, halting his rubbing, which had slowly been maneuvering toward
the inner part of her thighs. A delicious sensation that she hated stopping. “You want me to come
home with you?”
He sat in contemplative silence for a moment, then laced his fingers through hers. “Actually,
I want you to come home and stay.” Wicked heat flared when he taunted her earlobe with his
tongue.
“Jonas?” This was moving fast between them, into territory she wasn‟t very familiar with.
She‟d been out of the dating game for a long time. Attraction was one thing, even lust. Taking it to
the next level? She wasn‟t sure if she was that ready.
“Hm?” he answered, deeply engrossed in the slope of her neck and shoulder, dropping
heated and seductive kisses where he could reach. He did that a lot, given the opportunity.
“I don‟t do one night stands.”
He shrugged behind her. “I don‟t either. I told you earlier, it wasn‟t just that once. Not by a
long shot.”
Her mouth popped open, but he silenced her with a finger over her lips. “Just come home
with me,” he purred against her ear. “Let the rest sort itself out.” He slid his hand with a teasing
lightness down the front of her throat until he found the weight of her breast. She moaned as he
circled sensitive skin and teased her nipple to a hard point beneath her tank top. She shivered with
renewed desire as he worked his magic over her, finally caressing her, arousing her only the way he
could.
The warmth of his touch flowed until it rested on the top of her thigh, his fingers between
her legs, just there. Not moving, not seducing, not inciting. They both knew what he was capable of,
but he wasn‟t using that to force a decision. But the memory of the pleasure he‟d given her was
burned into her.
He was the devil reincarnate. She agreed completely overrun with a delicious hunger for his
touch, a passion only he could give her.
* * * *
57
DIANA DERICCI
Jonas helped her while she packed a couple bags with clothes and womanly necessities. She
locked her car in the garage, and he installed a heavy security lock on her front door to keep it as
safe as possible when they left.
He didn‟t doubt what he was doing, but it still made him nervous. His future with this
woman was hinged on two things. Whether or not she could accept him and his secret, and if she
couldn‟t, if she‟d ever forgive him for using the bonding of sex to keep her if she couldn‟t accept his
nature. Because he wasn‟t going to let her go. Not now. Not ever.
He hadn‟t had a lot of time to assimilate that afternoon‟s tryst in her car, but it had driven
home just who she was, and that she was meant to be with him. He‟d never felt so compelled,
consumed like he did like when he was with Stacee. The world could blow up and he wouldn‟t
notice, and likely not care so long as he had her in his arms. Her scent, her flavor, the silkiness of her
skin and the brush of her hair. All of it drove him wild, in a deep primal way. Even then, after hours
of questions and telling and retelling of the facts, he couldn‟t remove the taste of her from his
tongue. He craved to taste her heat for himself, to lap up the pure honey of her pleasure. If he was
the big dog, she‟d reduced him to a rub-my-belly puppy.
He knew the truth, what he was skirting around like a kid on hot concrete running around
the pool on his toes with anxious skips, wanting the coolness of all that water, but terrified of the
leap. He didn‟t fear it, but just the same, it left him tangled in knots to know what he was facing.
That this could be the biggest change of his life, or the worst relationship he‟d never escape. Give
him a shoot-out in a dark alley any day. This was going to kill him without ever touching a gun.
“You know, my mom is going to love you,” she said in a low distracted voice from her side
of the vehicle.
“Oh?” he asked with an arched eyebrow, surprised that mentioning her mother was the next
thing she‟d bring up. It told him that he wasn‟t alone on this thoughtful train.
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