Fever Zone: Danger in Arms Series, Book 1 Read online

  He followed her down to the mattress and she reveled in his weight crushing her. He was as urgent and driven as she was, all restless energy and driving lust as his hands and mouth, teeth and tongue roved across her body hungrily. They rolled and struggled like a pair of wrestlers, testing each other’s power and flexibility in a contest of wills. Eventually, his superior strength began to prevail.

  He braced himself over her, but she gripped his biceps strongly and ground out, “No.”

  Disbelief blossomed in his stare.

  “Tell. Me. Your. Name,” she bit out from behind clenched teeth. It was one of the hardest things she’d ever done: stopping herself from grabbing him and going for it.

  “Mike,” he finally groaned.

  She drove upward, and his entire body uncoiled as he met her, driving downward and pinning her to the mattress with his glorious size and strength.

  “Yes, Mike. Yes. Like that,” she panted. “More.”

  Pillows went sailing. She clenched the brass spindles in the headboard and his fists closed over hers, gripping tightly, making her his willing captive. He stared down into her eyes and she stared back, holding him in her thrall as surely as he held her in his.

  Pressure built to epic proportions inside her and she fought to hold it all back. To let it build until its explosion tore her completely apart. And Mike, damn him, did the same. His jaw muscles rippled as he clenched his teeth, visibly fighting against the explosion building inside him. Quickly, it turned into a contest to see who could last the longest without having a gigantic, soul-destroying orgasm…and at the same time pushing the other person over the edge.

  The amusement in his stare faded into determination, and from determination into gluttonous pleasure, and from gluttonous pleasure into mindless delirium. She knew the feeling. Words failed her, and she heard herself panting his name over and over in a bad parody of a porn flick. She fought to the last inch of her being to hold back, but the dam gave way utterly and completely, without warning, crashing in on her and deluging her with waves of pleasure so powerful that she was flattened beneath the weight and power of them. The good news was that Mike shouted and let go at nearly the exact same instant.

  She collapsed against the damp sheets while he supported his upper body with his elbows on either side of her head.

  “You killed me,” he finally mumbled.

  Ditto. Aloud, she only managed to breathe, “Wow.”

  Gradually she caught her breath, and the heaving of his chest slowed against hers. His heartbeat, frantic against her breast, slowed as well. And with the return of oxygen to her brain came a sudden and alarming burst of sanity. She’d just fallen in the sack and had the hottest sex of her life with a total stranger. She’d had to ask him his name mere seconds before the actual act.

  “I won,” she declared.

  “Did not. You so came first,” he retorted.

  Hah. So it had been a contest. “Yeah, but I had the best orgasm,” she replied.

  He grinned down at her. “You go ahead and think that if it makes you feel better, honey.”

  Eyes narrowing, she purred, “Yes, but I’m ready to go again. Right now.”

  He threw his head back and laughed richly. It was an infectious sound and her lips couldn’t help curving up in an answering smile. Until she felt his flesh stirring inside her, though. The smile faded and she stared up at him in shocked anticipation. Soon, a new erection filled her and he began stroking her lazily into oblivion once more.

  “Before I lose the ability to form sentences,” she murmured, “how are we going to define a win, here?”

  He studied her thoughtfully.

  “Most orgasms? She suggested hopefully.

  “Oh, no. You’re not stacking the deck on me like that. Loser’s the first person who can’t stand and walk across the room.”

  Oh, my. She hoped she lost.

  * * *

  It took a couple of hours, but she was officially declared the loser when Mike managed to roll out of bed with a groan and shamble into the other room to fetch them bottles of water. The ceiling fan turned lazily overhead, sending sultry air wafting across her flushed skin. It was going to be a month before she could summon the strength to walk again.

  He came back and sat down on the edge of the bed, gloriously naked. He was possibly more intimidating without any clothes that he was fully decked out in warrior’s gear. Like this, she could see all the layers of rock hard muscle, the collection of scars that spoke of winning more fights than he’d lost, and the overall toughness of the man beneath the fancy equipment. The sharp reminder that she was not as well equipped physically as a man to be out here on the edge of Hell all by herself.

  Holding a wadded sheet to her chest, she sat up and finally took a good look around his place. It was decorated as luxuriously as any seraglio. Colorful and complicated Turkish rugs covered the floors, and carved wooden furniture tastefully adorned the corners. “You decorate this place?” she murmured.

  “Hell, no. It came like this. I squat here and keep it from getting looted, and the owner doesn’t tell anyone I’m here.”

  Abundant mirrors gave both the bedroom and living area a sense of open space…and reflected her disheveled image from a half-dozen different angles. Her lips looked rosy and swollen and her hair went every which way in a wavy mess around her face.

  Beyond a doorway obscured with long strings of beads, her gaze lighted on a toilet and a claw foot bathtub. She threw him a sour glance. “And to think, I’m living in a one-room dump with an Army cot and a chamber pot.”

  He grinned. “With the sewers destroyed, I have to pay a boy to clean out the septic tank every other week. But I repaired the cistern on the roof. I have running water.” He added slyly, “Late in the afternoon when the sun has heated it, I can take a hot bath.”

  “Show off.”

  As he stepped into camo pants, he asked over his shoulder, “Hungry?”

  “Thirsty.” He disappeared into the other room and she hunted around until she found her panties wadded on the floor. Her bra had landed on the back of an armchair in the far corner. She shimmied into both and then scrambled into her pants and tank top. Embarrassment overcame her at having just fallen into bed with a man she barely knew. Blushing furiously, she stepped into the living room.

  Mike tossed her a bottle of water from over by the kitchenette. She caught it neatly with one hand and proceeded to down it. She tossed the empty bottle back. Unfortunately, he turned and snagged it before it could bean him in the back of the head. Good reflexes.

  He said dryly, “We got a little sidetracked before, but we do need to talk.”

  Not a conversation she was looking forward to. But he was without question stronger than she was—she knew that from first-hand experience—and he could force her to stay here, and to talk for that matter, if he wanted to.

  She scowled while he put a bunch of grapes, dates, and crackers on a plate and sliced open a pomegranate. He paused on his way over to the low, occidental-style dining table and pulled the long chain dangling from a ceiling fan. It began rotating lazily. He put the plate on the table, sank down cross-legged on a cushion, picked up a date, and bit into it. “Are you going to join me, or are you just going to stand there and stare?”

  Her scowl deepened as she plunked down on the cushion opposite him. “Who are you?”

  He grinned. “Funny, but I was going to ask you the same thing.”

  “You first,” she snapped.

  “No, you,” he snapped back.

  “No, you,” she retorted, “I asked first.”

  “I caught you, and I’m feeding you.” He added archly, “And I did win our contest.”

  Jerk. She glared but answered, “My name’s Piper Roth. You?”

  “Mike McCloud.”

  “Who do you work for?” she demanded.

  “Ah, ah, ah. I caught you, remember? Who do you work for?”

  She nibbled a cracker. Sipped more water. Glanced up
at him as if she’d forgotten the question. He shifted a foot so his knee stuck up and propped his elbow on it. And waited. Studying her with disconcerting intensity. God, she could get lost in those piercing green-on-brown eyes of his.

  Work, Piper. Focus. He wasn’t going to buy her cover story for a minute, but she might as well throw it out there. She replied, “I’m an aid worker. I’m here to give kids vaccinations and vitamin shots. Teach women proper nutrition for their kids.”

  “While toting around a sniper rifle?” He snorted. “Who signs your paycheck?”

  “Who says I’m collecting a paycheck?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Nobody comes to this place for random shits and grins. You’re on a job. Aid worker, huh? That’s a pretty thin cover for a woman in this part of the world.”

  He would not be wrong. She just shrugged in response and replied, “Who are you working for?”

  “I’m U.S. military.”

  Translation: military intelligence, or maybe straight up Defense Intelligence Agency. Or, he could be part of a Special Ops Team. “Where’s the rest of your unit?” she asked.

  “I’m a one-man show.”

  “No way. Nobody’s dumb enough to come to this place without back-up.”

  “Where’s your back-up then?” he challenged.

  She huffed. “I don’t need back-up to give kids their shots.”

  “Your employer sent you to the most dangerous corner of the globe with that crappy a cover? Are they trying to kill you?”

  Frankly, she’d said pretty much the same thing to her boss before she left on this assignment. But the intel she was chasing down had been hot, and time had been short. She’d been tracking the American separatist group calling itself the Patrick Henry Patriots—PHP, for short—for longer than she cared to think about. She was by far the most qualified person to be over here finding out what a bunch of bubbas from Idaho were doing in a place like this. She knew all of the group’s members on sight. Knew their MO’s.

  Her host declared forcefully, “Your boss is an asshole for sending you here. Quit this job and go home. Now.”

  She shrugged. “I like the job.”

  “Why?” He looked like the question had fallen out of his mouth before he could stop it.

  “Giving poor kids from a rotten place a better shot at surviving is good work. Satisfying.”

  He shot her a skeptical look over her insistence on sticking with her lame cover, so she switched subjects. “Why are you here, Mike McCloud?”

  “Mom and apple pie?“It was her turn to snort. “Try again.”

  “I like to kill shit and blow stuff up.”

  That sounded more accurate. “Be that as it may, why are you here? It looked to me like you’re acting purely as an observer. What are your marching orders? No wait, let me guess. Don’t interfere. Just watch. Don’t let anyone know you’re here.”

  He didn’t bother to deny the truth of her guess and merely retorted, “What are your orders?”

  It was her turn to shrug. “Vaccinate as many kids as I can…and don’t die.” And find out who the PHP guys were here to meet and why.

  Thinking back to where his rooftop observation post had been, she probed a little more. “Are you here to watch El Noor? You were pointed at the edge of his sector—what does the U.S. government want with a local warlord like him?”

  “Local today. International tomorrow.”

  So. Military intelligence thought El Noor was looking to expand his operations, huh? Interesting. But not germane to her investigation of a bunch of American separatist nutballs. “Good luck with that, G.I. Joe.”

  He grunted. “Good luck to you, too. You’re gonna need it, honey.”

  She lunged across the table and grabbed him by the throat with both hands before he even blinked. Plates and fruit went flying, clattering on the tile floor. “Important safety tip, Tonto. Don’t call me honey.”

  McCloud surged to his feet, meeting her threatening move with one of his own. His hands, bladed like knives, struck the insides of her wrists sharply enough to send her hands flying. He stared down at her from a range of about twelve inches, one-hundred-percent a killer. And pissed.

  Piper froze, appalled that she’d just assaulted a trained killer. It had been pure reflex. Her father had always called her honey and just hearing the word made her react violently.

  Very carefully, she used her palms to pet his chest soothingly. Nice tiger. Good kitty. The warm bulge of his pecs registered under her fingertips and her breath hitched at the raw masculine appeal of the man. She jerked her hands away and stepped back, breathing altogether too quickly for her peace of mind.

  “Why didn’t you break my wrists for that?” she asked in a small voice.

  He murmured, his voice low and charged, “You know I can break them, right?”

  “Yes,” she replied warily.

  “Then there’s no need to prove it, is there?”

  A tiny, unwilling smile flitted across her face while shock roiled through her gut that she’d escaped that giant mistake unscathed. Her father would never have let her off the hook like that. “You’re a cool customer.”

  He shrugged, his mesmerizing stare never breaking contact with hers. “Whatever.”

  Okay, so maybe cool wasn’t the right adjective for him. Icy came closer. She took another step back, seeking escape from his overpowering magnetism. But he followed her. He even planted a hand on the wall on either side of her head. Her hands itched to touch him again. To rub all over those glorious muscles. To grab his ass. Pull him closer for another round of—

  She swore mentally.

  He leaned in closer, abruptly dead serious. “Look. I’m not going to turn you over to El Noor. I think you’re working for an American agency of some kind. Which puts us on the same side out here. So give me a straight answer. What could possibly have persuaded a young, attractive woman like you to come play in hell?”

  His husky voice slid across her skin like whisky, smooth but with a sexy bite. “Is that where we are? Hell?” She gazed around his place over his shoulder. “This isn’t so bad after all. I pictured a more brimstone-and-torment decor.”

  He grunted with scant humor. “I give you two weeks in Khartoum to change your mind. This place’ll make a cynic out of even a Pollyanna like you.”

  “I’m no Pollyanna.”

  “I’d say you’re damned optimistic to think you can come here alone and plan to walk out alive.”

  She glared at him indignantly, and he smirked back. His head bent down until their lips were about three inches apart. Close enough to taste the sweetness of dates on his breath. To remember all the unrestrained lust from before. To crave more of it.

  He muttered, “Why are you here, Piper?”

  “I already told you. Why won’t you believe me?”

  “Because I can smell a lie at twenty paces.”

  “Oh yeah? What do I smell like?” she asked breathlessly. Her entire body felt electrified. Energized.

  “Cinnamon,” he murmured. “And peaches. You smell spicy and warm. Like slow sex in summertime.”

  Oh. My. God.

  “You can trust me,” he murmured, his words a caress against her lips. Another inch or two and they’d be kissing each other’s lights out. Sucking tonsils and tearing off clothes and going at each other like horny beasts. Again. It would be epic.

  She struggled to recall what he’d just said. Oh, right. Trust. “It’s not about trust. It’s about what I am and am not allowed to talk about.”

  His head lifted enough for his sharply intelligent gaze to read her eyes astutely. “Allowed, huh?” he breathed. ”’Nuff said.”

  Dammit. She’d revealed more than she’d wanted to. Using the word, ‘allowed’ implied a boss. Classified information. An agency whose name could be reduced to several alphabet letters.

  He stepped back abruptly, leaving her feeling cold and deprived. Goosebumps lined both of her arms. Whoa, the effect that man had on her was unnerving.<
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  He shrugged casually as if she hadn’t had the slightest effect on him. “Maybe you’ll make it a full month, then. Hard to tell. You were reasonably agile on that staircase where I tackled you.”

  Memory of his hard body slamming into hers, pressing her against the ground flashed through her mind. Crap, this guy did weird things to her head. “Gee, thanks. Was that actually a compliment from you?”

  “Nah. If I wanted to compliment you I’d tell you that, cleaned up, girlied up, and out of those combat boots, you might not look half-bad.”

  She scooped up her sniper rig and slung the nylon strap over her shoulder. “Go to hell, McCloud.”

  He chuckled and raised his water bottle to her in a mock toast. “Already there, darlin’.”

  Eyes narrowed, she said tightly, “Thanks for the diversion, but it’s time for me to get back to work.”

  “I’ll walk you back to your place.”

  “I don’t need a chaperone.”

  “Yeah,” he said flatly, “you do. Particularly since you’re wearing western garb.”

  “I’ll put my hair up back under my hat and no one will know I’m a girl. I am wearing combat boots, after all.”

  He snorted. “One look at that tush, and nobody will mistake you for a guy.”

  She glared at him and he glared back.

  She took satisfaction from the fact that he was first to speak. “This is a Muslim town, chica. Unescorted women are asking for trouble. As much as I’d enjoy laughing at your funeral, my John Wayne genes won’t let me send you out there alone.”

  “Neanderthal,” she muttered.

  “Feminist bitch,” he muttered back.

  Glaring at each other, he opened the door for her and she stepped past him onto the landing outside. Even brushing by him without touching him made her pulse accelerate alarmingly, damn him. Mike McCloud was trouble with a capital T.

  He did walk her home, and she didn’t know how she felt about that. But she definitely felt something.

  Three