He held her close, his heart beating almost painfully against her chest, his scent filling her nostrils. Too male. Too close.
Panic set in and her mind went blank, leaving her a reactive mess, a body twisting against the bondage of a man. This man.
Not because she was scared or feared he’d truly hurt her, but because she wanted him.
“Think, Ana.” Ty’s voice came through to her consciousness. “Think.”
She focused on his words, remembering she wasn’t really fighting Ty. She was fighting her feelings for him. He wanted her to prove she could let a man touch her sexually without freaking out, but little did he know that she only cringed from his touch because she wanted it too much.
She needed to turn the tables on him.
And suddenly she knew how she was going to do it.
Slowly, she softened her movements, replacing twisting with writhing, struggle with acceptance. She turned her face to his and let her breathing slow, opening her lips so that each breath caressed his cheek. Startled, he turned his face to hers. And then she kissed him. Licked his lips. Thrust her hips against his, then angled her body to rub her breasts against his chest. Let a gasp escape her throat and deepened the kiss, going limp in his hold.
Yes, she thought. This was what she’d wanted all this time. And funnily enough, he’d given her the means to get it. Because she pretended it was all part of her training. That she was only giving him what he wanted, not what she needed.
Ty let go of her hands and groaned, but the sound wasn’t of pleasure. He sounded like she was torturing him. Teasing him with something he couldn’t really have. He swept his tongue through her mouth, toying with hers, then quickly ripped himself away.
Breathing hard, he stared at her. His eyes were heavy-lidded, his face flushed, his lips red and swollen. His fists opened and shut several times before he seemed to deliberately relax his fingers. He nodded. “Good. That’s a good start. You can fake sexual interest to get away from a man.”
But she hadn’t been faking, she wanted to say. She did desire him. She wanted him. And suddenly, despite the fear that had been driving her to get away from him before she revealed too much, she wanted him to know it.
Before she could say it, however, before she could even open her mouth, he was gone.
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
The next day, in Belladonna’s formal dining room, Ana let her fingers drift down the smooth, polished hardwood table that could seat at least twenty people, aware of her own reflection in the sheen. She’d used makeup to cover the dark circles under her eyes, evidence of the restless night she’d had after that incident with Ty by the pool. She’d spent half of her waking hours alternately trying to imagine more intimacies with him while berating herself at the same time for her attempts. She’d spent the other half wondering about the team she was supposed to meet today.
What were they like? What had brought them here? What had Carly promised them?
In the end, however, it didn’t matter. They didn’t need to understand each other. They didn’t even need to like each other. All they needed was to be able to work together.
She’d been living a lie these past few days. Enjoying her time with Ty as if this were some kind of vacation. But if Ty walking away from her by the pool hadn’t been enough to drive that point home, there was the fact that she’d spent a sleepless night in her bed, aching with her need for him. Everything Ty did was a means to an end, not a genuine display of affection for her. So he could get an erection around her. Big deal. Right now, she was the only other woman on the premises. It was to be expected. He didn’t truly want her. He didn’t care for her. She meant nothing to him. She had to focus. All that mattered was finding Gloria.
She might not mean anything to Gloria, either. Not anymore. But given what Ana had been told, she was beginning to hope that wasn’t true.
It was now possible to believe that Gloria had cut off all contact with Ana not of her own free will, but because she’d been under the influence of cultish mind control. If that was the case, Ana had the chance to regain the most important person in the world to her.
She took a deep breath and looked around the semicircular library. Leather-bound books lined shelves that ran twenty feet high. Three sliding ladders hung from iron rungs. Leather club chairs in deep hunter green crowded around small tables with reading lamps, and in the middle of the room was a larger table with a speaker, Carly’s preferred method of communication. Either the woman was seriously paranoid, or she truly had enemies. And with the type of work Belladonna seemed to be conducting, Ana was betting on the latter.
“Like what you see?” A man’s deep voice came from behind her.
Ana whipped around, staring at the stranger who’d entered. Like Ty, this man was tall and broad with dark eyes. His hair, however, was slightly lighter, a tawny brown.
“No weapon,” he calmly observed, looking at where her hand was.
She realized she’d grabbed at her waistband out of habit. Once upon a time her switchblade had always been there, a vital accessory to her daily outfits. Part of her, when you got right down to it. She’d always gone for it when members of other gangs entered her turf.
But she hadn’t worn a knife in years. And when she’d first arrived, Ty had insisted she leave her gun in her bedroom safe. “For everyone’s safety,” he’d said, acknowledging that he was probably going to piss her off more than once in the coming days.
“What were you reaching for? A knife?”
Ana just continued to stare at him, which made his lips twitch, as if he was suppressing a smile. “You know how to throw them?” he asked.
Thanks to Ty, she did now. But for some reason, she didn’t tell him that. “In the hood, you don’t throw away your weapon.”
“A bit different than Covert Ops. We had two knives—one for throwing, and the other for stabbing our enemy in the guts. Or slicing across the throat. Why not carry two?”
She suddenly got who he was. “You must be Peter Lancaster.”
“Avoiding my question?” he asked, his eyes twinkling and the corner of his mouth rising up in what she guessed was a smile.
“No. Why didn’t I carry two knives?” Ana shrugged. “I only wanted to protect myself. Pulling out a knife quickly was usually all we needed to stop an enemy. You, on the other hand …”
He nodded. “Had been instructed to kill the enemy.” He crossed the room and stuck out his hand. “And you are right. I’m Peter.”
She shook his hand, aware of how small hers felt in his.
He was attractive, but not as attractive as Ty. Not to her, anyway.
Madre de Dios. She did not need to be thinking about how handsome Ty was. She commanded her body and mind to let go of images of the man who’d brought her into this whole mess and focused on the voices she now heard just outside the library doors.
“That’ll be Ty and the others,” Peter said, watching her closely.
The library doors opened, revealing three women … and Ty.
She practically devoured him with her eyes, then made a point of ignoring him when the woman he was with, the one with short brown hair and glasses, arched a brow at her.
Five minutes later, introductions had been made. The average-size woman in her early thirties with the glasses was Collette Parker. She was an ex-cop, but in her nicely worn jeans and button-down paisley shirt with sleeves rolled to the elbows, she looked more like a soccer mom. The woman with dark skin and darker hair and an unmistakable air of sensuality was Justine Maverick. And the slim, elegant blonde with sophistication and prestige and wealth stamped across her forehead was Barrett Miles.