Lowering his head, he nuzzled the side of her neck, his lips savoring the taste of her sunshine-fresh hair as he kissed the golden strands. Loosening his tenacious hold, he ran his hands up and down her arms. "No, that hasn't changed." He felt her stiffen, knew she was already withdrawing from him. "I've arranged for a bodyguard, and I don't want any arguments."
She whirled around, her brown eyes wide, her soft lips parted on her indrawn breath. "I don't want... Oh, Nate, is it really necessary?"
"Sam Dundee is waiting for you in Sweet Haven. He's going to follow you home tonight. He'll keep an eye on you until Nick Romero can arrange protection."
"Protection? More than a bodyguard?"
Taking her hands into his large ones, he pulled her toward him. "Government protection. Ryker works for the Marquez family, the leading drug dealers in Florida. Romero and the DEA are involved, at least, unofficially."
"Why must I... why...?"
"Because I can't protect you and keep you away from me at the same time."
"I could stay with you," she said hopefully, gazing up at him with such love in her eyes that he thought he'd die from the pleasure-pain that her fearless devotion gave him.
"No, Brown Eyes. I want you far away when I meet Ryker." He turned her hands palm up, and lavished hungry kisses across her tender flesh. "I want you to promise me to be careful. Allow Sam Dundee to do his job. I'll call when Nick has a man in place so you'll know the change has been made."
"When will I see you again?" she asked, breathless from his nearness. She ached to hold him, to take him into her arms and into her body and find again that hot, sweet, secret place where they had gone together in the moments of total fulfillment.
"Not until it's all over. One way or the other."
"Nate, I don't understand any of this, especially Ramon Carranza's involvement." Before Nate could reply, Cyn gave him a warning look. "Don't try to deny that there's something going on between you and Señor Carranza."
"I'm not sure about Carranza. That's something else I'll have to deal with once I've eliminated Ryker." When he felt her cringe at his choice of words, he regretted his blunt-ness.
When she tugged on her hands, he released her. "Do I have to leave you tonight?" she asked.
No, his heart screamed. Stay. Stay with me forever, his soul cried. "Yes," he said.
She slipped her arms beneath his jacket and around his waist, hugging him tightly. She ran her fingers over the smooth leather sheath that held his knife. She willed herself not to tremble, not to be repulsed by the deadly weapon strapped to his body. "I don't want to leave you."
He grabbed her, lifting her off her feet. "Do you think I want you to go?" He took her mouth with all the savage hunger within him, longing to devour her sweetness, desperate to know again the pure pleasure that her loving heart and body could provide.
She accepted his marauding lips, the conquering pillage of his thrusting tongue as she returned, full force, the power and passion with which he took her. The world around her seemed to fade into a haze of swirling darkness, a sea of brown, edged with pale light. This man, his virile energy, his intense masculinity, surrounded her. She could feel him drawing her into his body, consuming her femininity, taking strength from her womanly power.
Nate trembled. Dear God, he had to let her go! No matter how much he wanted her or how badly he needed her, he had to send her away. To keep her safe.
Slowly, reluctantly, he eased her down the hard, muscular length of his body, allowing her softness to slide over every inch of his pulsating manhood. She clung to him, her slender arms draping his neck, her lips parted on a sigh of pure pleasure as their bodies caressed each other's.
"You have to leave," he told her, but his big hands still lingered around her waist.
She didn't say a word, only looked at him, her eyes speaking for her heart, pleading with him. It might be the wrong time and the wrong place, but the feelings were right. Nate had never been so sure of anything in his life. He had never truly needed anyone. He'd made sure of that. He had spent a lifetime protecting himself from the weaknesses that dominated other men's lives. No one had ever broken through the protective shell Nathan Rafael Hodges had constructed around his heart, a barrier of solitude and indifference that kept him safely apart from the emotional attachments to which most men succumbed.
But Cynthia Porter had done what no other woman had ever done. She had put a crack in Nate's defensive armor. She meant more to him than she should. If he allowed his selfish need to overcome his common sense, he would be putting her life in danger. But her life was already in danger, he reminded himself.
He swooped her up into his arms, leaving her breathless and clinging to him with all her might as he carried her inside her cottage. Kicking open the slightly ajar front door, Nate entered the living room. Without hesitation, he lowered her onto the chintz sofa and covered her body with his own.
"I need you," he breathed into her ear, his mouth moist and hot against the side of her neck. "I need this." He ground his hips against hers, crushing her trembling body deeper into the sofa.
"Yes." She would have refused him nothing, so powerful was her desire, so overwhelming her love. Even knowing that he would send her away afterward, she still wanted to give herself to him.
He kissed her, his lips masterful in their seduction. Moving his fingers to the hem of her cotton pullover sweater, he jerked it up and under her arms, revealing her lace-covered breasts. Lowering his head, he took one nipple into his mouth, sucking greedily through the lacy barrier.
"I want you naked," he told her, lifting her up to remove her sweater. Quickly, he unsnapped her bra, removed it and tossed it to the floor.
He buried his face between her breasts, allowing his tongue to paint an erotic trail from one erect nipple to the other. She arched against him, thrusting upward against his throbbing arousal.
"Oh, Nate, I want you so much." Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, distant and haunting.
He grasped the elastic waistband of her slacks, tugging downward until he encountered her bikini briefs. Slipping his fingers inside the top of her panties, he lowered both underwear and slacks down and off.
When she fumbled with the buttons on his shirt, Nate lifted himself off her and removed his jacket, tossing it toward a nearby chair. In his haste to rid himself of his shirt, he popped several buttons.
"I want to feel you against me." Lowering his body back down onto her, he rubbed his broad, smooth chest over her breasts, the action tightening her nipples to diamond-hard points. "Woman... woman... you make me crazy.''
"I want you so much, I'm hurting." She reached out, trying to undo his belt and was startled when he pushed her hands away. "Nate?"
"I want you aching even more." He ran his hand between her thighs, delving his fingers through the tight blond curls and between her moist folds. "I want you so wet and hot and throbbing that you'd do anything to have me inside you."
She moaned, squirming beneath the knowledgeable strokes of his fingers as he fondled and petted her sensitive flesh. Beginning at her breasts, Nate aroused her to a fever pitch with the repeated licking and sucking motions of his mouth and tongue as they created a fiery path downward. He eased her legs further apart, his kisses coating the inside of her thighs.
She writhed beneath him, her body responding to his every touch as if it had never known a man. And indeed, Cyn thought, her mind dazzled by torrid sensations, every time with Nate was like the first time. Powerful. Hungry. Lustful.
His mouth covered her intimately. She groaned.