Predatory Game

CHAPTER 12

“Okay, now is the time, while I’m feeling all warm and fuzzy toward you, for you to tell me how you ran after me using your own two legs.” Saber tilted her head back to look up at him. She couldn’t talk about love. Not without feeling like her heart was going to be ripped out.

“It’s classified.”

“No kidding? What a shocker. You are classified, Jess. I’m classified. Of course whatever you’ve done to yourself this time is classified as well.”

“But technically, you aren’t in the military because you don’t exist.”

“You have my file,” she pointed out with a small sniff of disdain. “And so does your lady friend.”

“Lily. Lily Whitney-Miller.”

Saber turned away from him and stared down into the bubbling water. “The doctor’s daughter.”

“Don’t you start on Lily too. Lily gave the file to me, not the other way around. And she’s trying to find the other girls-women-that her father experimented on. She saved my life, Saber. I got to know her and I’m telling you, she isn’t in league with him.”

“How lucky for you that you’re so certain.”

His eyebrow shot up. “That was sarcasm.”

“You bet it was.”

“If it’s any consolation, she doesn’t trust you much either.”

Saber burst out laughing. “Actually, that does make me feel better. If she pretended to accept me immediately, I’d be alarmed.” She tipped her head back to rub against his shoulder. “What is she doing to you? Dr. Whitney’s daughter and the other one. What are they doing?”

“Dr. Eric Lambert,” he supplied. “Eric and Lily saved my life.”

“And?” she prompted.

He sighed, but really, if Whitney already knew about his legs, what did it matter? “I’m in an experimental program for bionics.”

She whirled around, splashing water in all directions. “You’re what? I saw Whitney’s…” She trailed off. “Lily Whitney asked you to do this?”

“No, she wasn’t involved at all in the beginning. Eric and I were looking at the idea of using the external bionics the army is experimenting with. Eric made a few cracks about a couple of old television shows and how it really was possible to have internal bionics. He said that it had already been tried using a ‘smart sleeve’ to pick up and register movements of the existing muscles and use that to trigger movement of the appropriate part, but in theory it was possible to regenerate or stimulate existing nerves so the bionics would work completely with my own brain and body. The idea took off from there.” He caught her chin when her gaze dropped away from his. “What did you see in Whitney’s office? What were you going to tell me?”

She closed her eyes briefly, shaking her head, not wanting him to know, but realizing she had no choice. Not if she was going to keep him safe. She was beginning to realize that loving someone was really difficult. She scooted away from him just in case, because she was going to have to confess to planning a premeditated execution. If Jess condemned her, if he couldn’t understand, then there was no hope at all for them. She stared down at the bubbling water.

“Whitney gave me orders to take out a United States senator and his wife. I knew I had to escape. There was no way Whitney would just let me go. Eventually he’d run me down and either kill or reacquire me, so I decided that since I was an assassin and the best way to save my life was to kill Whitney, I would have to do it before I escaped.”

She stole a look at his impassive face. Jess waited in silence, giving her no hint of what he was thinking or feeling. She moistened her lips and forced herself to continue. “I knew his schedule at the facility, so I waited for him to come back. He always went into his office late at night to work. The security was unbelievable and he had his own personal guards-enhanced soldiers.”

“How many do you think take orders from Whitney personally?”

“Maybe ten enhanced. He has two teams that he keeps with him at all times. They travel with him and answer directly to him for his personal use as well as for his protection. He has others, but they’re sent out on assignments for the government. The men who are with him are completely different.”

Jess sucked in his breath sharply. “So you’re saying aside from Ryland’s team and ours, there are others?”

“At least two other teams that I know of for certain and then Whitney’s guards. The men on the teams aren’t your enemy, Jess. They’re in the same situation you are. They’re military and they run covert missions.”

He nodded. “Keep going. What did you see when you went into his office?”

“He had a couple of files lying on his desk. One was a file on bionics.”

Jess shifted, his eyes sharp and piercing. “What was the other file?”

“The senator and his wife. My targets. He had a picture of them circled with a red marker and the file was very thick.”

The only sound was the flow of the jets and the clock ticking on the wall. Jess’s gaze met hers. “Could you read the files?”

She nodded her head. “I did. I thought I’d wait for him to come back, so I positioned myself beneath his desk and spent the time reading. He didn’t come back. Apparently he had locked the office and left the facility on other business.”

“Saber.” Jess studied her face, his eyes like that of a hawk, so intent they burned right through her-except that they were cold and distant. “Dr. Whitney’s files are encrypted in numerical code.”

Saber let her breath out slowly, a chill skittering down her spine, although she was sitting in hot water. “You don’t believe me.” She crossed her arms over her breasts, suddenly aware of her naked body. She had tossed the shirt aside, it was somewhere, but…She looked around a little helplessly.

“He changes the code all the time, but it’s always numerical. Always.”

Her chin lifted, and her teeth came together with a small snap, but she forced herself to breathe away her anger. How many times had she believed he was her enemy? Not after making love, but still. “It wasn’t code, it was typed neatly in plain English and I lay under that desk for four hours reading both files.”

“One of the reasons we have such a difficult time knowing what he’s doing is because we have to decode everything on his computer. Lily knows him best, her brain even works in numerical patterns, but it’s still time-consuming.”

Okay, now her temper was kicking in. She smacked the surface of the water before she could stop herself, sending a plume right at his face.

The water stopped in midair, hung there, and dropped back into the Jacuzzi. There was a small silence while she just stared at him.

“Holy crap, Jesse.” There was genuine awe in her voice. “Why couldn’t I get to do something like that? That’s just awesome.”

“It isn’t nearly as useful as you’d think. It takes too much concentration. If anything else had been going on I wouldn’t have been able to do it.”

“Besides being an anchor, you’re a shielder too, aren’t you?”

He raised an eyebrow. “We’re getting a little off the subject, don’t you think?”

She shrugged as casually as she could. “What’s the point? I’m obviously not going to convince you, so anything I say is suspect, isn’t it? Because, you know, it makes so much sense that Whitney sent an assassin to spy on you. That’s not a waste of a serious weapon, is it?”

Jess could see the raw hurt in her eyes and no matter how hard he tried not to let it get to him, his heart was in serious jeopardy. He swore under his breath as he suddenly comprehended the implication of her question. “Saber, you’re a shielder. That’s why in all the months you lived here, I never felt a rise in energy.” He hit his forehead with his hand. “How can you shield, but not anchor?”

She cleared her throat. “He said his masterpiece was flawed.”

His fists closed and he kept his hands out of sight. It made more sense to him now, the way she could kill and not suffer immediate and severe repercussions. A shielder was rare. They could keep an entire team from detection. They could shield areas from weapons attacks for a short period of time. Whitney wouldn’t want her dead. But if he thought she was flawed…“He’d want another one, to work with,” Jess murmured aloud.

Saber’s fingers curled around the edge of the Jacuzzi, as if she might bolt, but she remained where she was, looking smaller than usual, but her eyes were defiant and her chin looked stubborn and set.

Jess shook his head and raked his fingers through his hair again. “He sent you to me because he wants another one. He arranged for an opening at the radio station and waited for you to take the bait.”

Saber shrugged. “You’re not telling me anything we haven’t already suspected.”

“He has a breeding program, Saber. He wants babies. I’m a shielder and an anchor, and although you aren’t an anchor, you are a shielder too. He knows we’ll be physically attracted because when he was busy adding to our genetic code and bumping up our psychic abilities, he made certain of it. He’s busy playing God again.”

Beneath the bubbling water, Saber pressed a hand to her stomach as if feeling for a child. “I’m not certain what you’re trying to say.”

“I’m saying you’re right, he wouldn’t want to get you back, not without you being pregnant.”

“He wants me to have a baby?”

“My baby. He wants you to have my baby. He has to be convinced that our traits are going to show up in the child, possibly stronger than in us.”

She pressed her hand harder. “We didn’t use protection, Jesse. I didn’t even think about it. How totally irresponsible is that?”

She sounded so close to panic, Jess reached for her and pulled her back to him. “I thought about it, I just didn’t care. If you have my baby, I’m fine with it.”

Saber shook her head. “This is crazy. Do you see what he’s done? He’s taking away all our choices. I don’t want to get pregnant and worry every second that he’s going to take my child away from me.”

“He’s always going to be hovering around the edges of our lives, Saber. Whitney isn’t going to go away because we want him to, no matter whether we’re together or whether we choose to have children.”

Jess wrapped his arms around her. She was trembling and he needed to comfort her even as he was telling her the truth as he saw it. “He’s there, and he’ll always be there until he’s dead. And even after that there could be others working with him we don’t even know about.”

She let out a strangled gasp, and he nuzzled the top of her head.

“And that brings me back to the files in his office. Why would he plant something in his office for you to find when he knew he was sending you to me? Because if it wasn’t coded, Saber, it was there for you to find and read. Whitney doesn’t ever make amateur mistakes. He wanted you to read those files.”

“On bionics? I could type it all out for you, every single detail in both files, but I have no idea why he would want to give me medical information.”

“Unless he knew I was going to be having the operation and needed to get information to me.”

“What are you saying, Jesse? That you think he was trying to help? And that would mean he knew months ago that you were going to have the operation. How would he know something like that?”

She sounded frightened and his heart lurched. She was beneath the water, her breasts floating invitingly, her eyes almost violet in her alarm. His hands slipped to her upper arms. “Come here, baby.”

He wanted to hold her, comfort her, take the fear from her eyes and replace it with desire. He kissed the side of her neck, bit gently at her shoulder, slid his hand down her arm to try to bring her around in front of him.

Saber’s blue eyes darkened. Heated. She moistened her lower lip. “Jess. We have to think about what we’re doing here. We’re caught in the middle of some giant spiderweb. I’m really afraid.”

“Come here.” He tugged on her arms to bring her closer.

This time she came to him, a little reluctant, but she moved to stand in front of him. Water pushed between them, the bubbles ferocious, fizzing against his skin, adding to the slow buildup of heat spreading through his body. Keeping her gaze captive, he pushed her legs apart and drew her over him, so she was straddling his lap. She braced herself, using her hands on his shoulders as he cupped her bottom to bring her over his body.

“I know you’re afraid of Whitney, angel face, but in the end, only we matter. He’s always going to be our bogeyman, but we can’t let him stop us from leading our lives. That’s our choice. We don’t let him rule us or make us afraid to live life.”

Her lips trembled and he leaned in to kiss her, capturing her bottom lip between his teeth and playfully nipping and tugging. All the while his hands cupped her bottom, massaging and kneading while the bubbles burst against her bare skin. She rocked her hips, back and forth, a deliberate or compulsive motion that rubbed over the broad head of his cock. Each time she slid over the sensitive head, his body jerked and hardened more.

Jess leaned forward and nibbled on her neck and then teased her earlobe. “I want you to sit on me, Saber, and wrap your legs around my waist.” His voice was husky, almost hoarse. The need for her swept over him fast and furious, a vicious fist of lust that only seemed to build as he watched the bubbles fizz and break around her body. He kissed his way down her neck and the slope of her breast. Her body shuddered as he licked the side of her breast and traced the curve with his tongue.

All the while her hips moved in that slow steady rhythm that kept pushing heat through his body. Her breath caught in her lungs and her fingers tightened on his shoulders as her legs threatened to give out.

Jess pulled back to lock eyes with her. He wanted her until he couldn’t think straight, couldn’t find air enough to breathe. The need had risen sharp and fast when he should have been sated already. Her skin was so soft, all bare, glistening as if the morning had covered her in dewdrops like rose petals. Still keeping her gaze locked with his, he leaned forward and licked at her scented skin, breathing her in even as the pads of his fingers began to explore.

Saber gasped and trembled beneath the stroking caresses. He had to go slow, not simply devour her as he wanted to do. She was all woman, yet this was a new experience and, although she responded eagerly, there was a hesitance that told him she was a little frightened. He had never felt such a fever of absolute need. She tore him up inside with wanting her. For the first time in his life, he actually considered that his control was in jeopardy. His gaze dropped to her nipples, the hard pink tips. He blew out his breath and licked his lips in anticipation.

Saber’s body reacted with a convulsive jerk. Her stomach muscles bunched, hands tightened on his shoulders, and once more her hips rocked, sliding the warm, wet entrance over the broad head of his cock. He shuddered, his heart pounding in reaction. That had never happened either, that entire consuming chain reaction of body, mind, and heart dissolving into one single desire so sharp and piercing it became such a physical pain he was desperate for relief. He’d never been so hard, so ready to burst.

Her body was flushed, the creamy mounds of her breasts inviting. He leaned forward until his face brushed against the soft swell, until he could taste with a lap of his tongue. She gasped, a soft moan of pleasure escaping, shredding his control even further. His tongue curled over the nipple in a lapping rasp before his mouth covered her and began to suckle, using his teeth to tug and scrape gently until her fingers bit deep and she threw back her head, arching into him.

His hand slid up her thigh under the churning water. Her gaze, cloudy now with arousal, jumped to his face. He switched his attention to her other breast, interspersing teasing nips with the laving of long, curling strokes. His hand covered her hot, waiting mound and she jumped, her eyes going dark with lust, a soft cry escaping.

“Look at me, baby,” he whispered when her lashes swept down to cover her expression. He didn’t want that-wouldn’t have it. He needed to see her pleasure, needed to see her desire.

He waited, his hand pushed into her heat, his mouth at her breast until she opened her eyes and locked her gaze with his. He slid his finger into her tight depths. She cried out again, eyes glazing over. He curled a second finger inside her, exploring the soft heat, circling her most sensitive spot while her hips pushed hard against his hand. He pushed deeper and her muscles clenched around his fingers, her small, gasping cry sending pulses of fire shooting through his body straight to his groin.

She was in so much trouble. She recognized Jess was binding her body to his. She was in danger of becoming an addict, obsessed with the need for his touch. Pleasure swept through her, and her body grew tight and hungry.

Jess caught her hips and held her directly over his hard shaft. She could feel the broad head lodged in her tight entrance. Fire raced down her thighs and back up into her feminine sheath. Every muscle contracted. He held her still.

“I love how responsive your body is to mine. You love this, don’t you?”

How could she not? It didn’t seem to matter what he did, where he led, she was going to follow, because she wanted it all-wanted him and the burning pleasure he could give her. She hadn’t even known it existed, but now, every time she looked at him, her body was going to flood with heat and need.

Holding her still, he filled her slowly, pushing through the tight, velvet-soft muscles, the fiery channel that gripped him until she had a stranglehold on him. She tried to move, tried to force him to fill her, but he held her firmly and took his time, watching her face and the dazed pleasure flushing her delicate features.

“Do you know how many times, how many ways I’ve fantasized about having you like this?” he asked, his voice husky, nearly hoarse with desire. “I want to sleep wrapped around your body, my fingers inside of you, my mouth on your breast. When you’re in the kitchen in the morning wearing nothing but my shirt, I want to sit you on the counter and devour all that honey simmering hot and spicy just waiting for me.”

Her head fell back, a soft groan escaping, his erotic images springing clearly into her mind while he ground himself deep into her, lodging against her womb. Her muscles tightened even more, her womb clenching, her body fighting hard for the freedom to ride him hard and fast. All the while the bubbles fizzed like tiny tongues licking at her sensitive bare skin.

Jess leaned forward and took her nipple into his mouth with a gentle bite, sending waves of heat crashing through her. A small scream escaped, and her nails bit deep. She flooded his cock with liquid fire. Holding her locked in position, he lifted her and then drove her body down while he thrust upward, hard. She gasped as he filled her, his shaft pushing through soft, tight folds, the friction creating a fiery tango of sensation in the sensitive knot of nerves.

She could barely breathe as her body tightened and clenched, every part of her on fire. “I don’t know what to do.” Because she had to do something or she was going to go crazy.

“Ride me, baby, just like this.” His hands urged her into a rhythm. He lifted her hips to let her feel his cock, hard and hot, sliding like so much steel, cutting through velvet folds. His breath came out in a rush and the muscles of his thighs bunched under the onslaught of pure feeling. “Oh, yeah, you’re getting it,” he encouraged, stopping her just before they were separated. “Does that feel good?”

It was amazing how he stretched her, filling her completely as she moved in a slow downward glide. She moaned softly as she impaled herself on his thick shaft in a long, languorous rocking motion, inducing such pleasure she nearly screamed. His hands came up to tug at her nipples while he drove again and again through her silken heat. Each time was harder and deeper, sending streaks of fire racing through her body.

“You like it hard like this?” His eyes glittered at her, dark with a mixture of lust and unmistakable love. She could see his muscles bunched, his teeth set as he fought for control, fought to keep the pace slow and leisurely while she learned how to pleasure herself with his body.

She could only nod while her hips rose, her muscles gripping and squeezing around him. He was going to shatter her, take her apart before he was done. She lowered herself again while he thrust upward, another slow inch by excruciating inch, killing them both with a riot of sensations pouring into them. She’d never felt so wanton as she arched her body to get a different angle, to feel the thick length of him, as hard as steel, pressed against her throbbing clit.

Her breasts thrust toward him and he leaned in to rake his teeth over the gentle curves. Electricity sizzled, hot and wet from her breasts to her womb to streak like liquid fire through her feminine core.

One hand threaded through her hair and he kissed his way back up her throat to her lips, once again holding her still. She shuddered, her muscles clenching, her body clamping hard around his, the silken walls of her channel milking him even as he kept her hips from rocking. Her head tossed, her eyes dazed and dark with desire.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered. “Like this. Loving me. You’re so damned beautiful it hurts to look at you.”

Beneath her bottom, his thigh muscles bunched into hard ridges, and then he was changing the pace, taking her over, plunging deep and hard with exquisite purpose, building the heat until it was out of control. Her breath came in ragged gasps as the piercing pleasure built and built until she thought she might not live through it. She felt as if she were burning alive from the inside out, and if he didn’t keep filling her, stretching her, if he didn’t do something to quench the fire soon, she wouldn’t survive.

“Please, Jesse.” The soft cry was wrenched from her before she could stop it. There didn’t seem to be inhibition or self-respect. She knew she was pleading-begging for release, but the pleasure was too much, it had to end soon or she was going to go insane. Her mind seemed to be shutting down altogether, and her craving for Jess Calhoun knew no bounds.

“It’s all right, Saber, love. Go with it. Let yourself fly. Come with me. Just come with me.” He gripped her hips and plunged deeper, lodging himself against her womb, swelling thicker and larger than he’d ever been in his life, and his balls grew tight and hard, his thighs shaking.

He moved again, setting a harsh pace, deep long strokes that invaded and receded, each harder and stronger than the last as he pumped into her hot, moist flesh. Around him, her tight, silken channel gripped him hard, milking until the erotic torture nearly strangled him with pleasure. He couldn’t stop the bone-wrenching, muscle-tightening explosion as he climaxed, her body melting and rippling around his.

She screamed, the sound vibrating through his groin as he flooded her tight sheath with hot jets of his release, as he surged one last time into her, his hoarse shout joining hers. She collapsed against him, falling onto his chest as he fought to drag air into his bursting lungs. She lay with her head pillowed on his shoulder, exhausted, a limp rag doll, her heart pounding so hard she couldn’t bring it under control.

“Are you all right?” he asked gently.

“No. I’m never going to be all right again,” she said, meaning it. “Jesse, I was looking for normal. I don’t think that’s what this is. This is obsession, addiction, something crazy. We could kill each other.”

He rubbed his mouth over her neck. “There’s so much more. I could spend days, weeks, showing you more.”

“I wouldn’t survive more,” she said, knowing she had to have him again and again. And she wanted-even needed-the more. “What have you done to me?”

“Nothing that you haven’t done to me.” He stroked caresses over her hair and waited until she stopped trembling, until the little aftershocks lessened to small ripples. “Whatever you’re feeling, multiply that by a thousand, angel face, and that’s what I’m feeling.” He turned off the jets. “The water’s getting cold and we’re going to turn into prunes.”

“Well,” she said, wrapping her arms around his neck. “We didn’t solve the world’s problems, but right at this moment, I’m not caring so much.” Because, could he really believe she would betray him if he made love to her so thoroughly? She kissed his throat and nibbled on his chin.

Jess kept his arms around her, holding her to him. “You solved my most immediate problems, baby. I’m thinking we need to get to bed. It’s almost morning and we’ve had a full night.”

She lifted her head from where she was tracing the line of his heavy chest muscle with her tongue. “I don’t have a bed right now. I’m not sleeping in that room.”

“Of course not. I was thinking you’d be sharing my bed.”

There was a small silence and she pulled back to look at him. Very slowly she slipped off his lap to move to the side of the Jacuzzi. “I’ve never done that before. Sleep with someone. Doesn’t it make you feel vulnerable?”

“I wouldn’t know. I had sex with people, I didn’t sleep with them.”

“You thought you were going to marry Chaleen, didn’t you?”

He shrugged. “We were together, but I don’t know that I thought about the future all that much. Maybe at first I thought we’d be together, but after a while, I didn’t push it. And no, we didn’t sleep in the same bed. I always made some excuse and she was always happy to accept it. That should have told me something.”

She raised her eyebrow at him. “You think?”

He slapped water at her. “You can look smug when you want to.”

“I know.” She really hated the idea of turning her back on him to get out of the Jacuzzi. She didn’t mind being naked, but she detested him looking at her back. For some reason, she couldn’t overcome the shame, as if somehow she’d allowed the torture. They’d made certain she couldn’t touch them, but maybe she could have scared them into believing she would have hunted them down. Now that she was older, that was exactly what she’d do, but back then, she’d been so frightened, and what they wanted from her had been repulsive. She’d loathed herself and her capabilities.

She waited until Jess shifted to first the stair and then the platform before she climbed out and made certain his chair was locked so he could swing into it. She caught up Jess’s shirt and pulled it on.

“Chaleen was here tonight.”

He straightened up in his chair, frowning at her. “I know that, Ken told me, but how did you know?”

She tried not to look or sound smug, since he’d just accused her of it. “I went out reconning tonight and saw her.” She studied her fingernails. “Blew right past both of your enhanced supersoldier GhostWalker guards.”

“You got past Ken and Mari? Both of them?”

“It was a walk in the park.”

Jess studied her face. It was obvious she was telling the truth. “Ken sent Chaleen packing.”

“If the CIA sent her here, Jess, it means they have suspicions that you’re more than a SEAL, and if they think that, who knows who else does?”

“You think a foreign government has sent someone to spy on me?” He thrust with his hands, powering the chair through the house toward the bedroom.

Saber followed at a more leisurely pace, holding the edges of his shirt together around her. “Don’t you think that’s a possibility?”

“I suppose. But I think my radar would have gone off sooner.”

Saber put on a burst of speed and caught up to him, catching at his chair to stop him. She waited until he’d turned to look at her. “So, Jess, what if something else is going on here, something not all about Whitney? Yes, I think he orchestrated our being together, but for what purpose? Just to grab me? Why go to all the trouble of the two of us living together for a year? If he provided the opening for the job and knew I’d take it-and who else could have known?-then why not grab me immediately before you called in the other GhostWalkers. Whitney had to have anticipated that move, right?”

“Yes. There isn’t a doubt in my mind he wants us to have a child together.”

“Well, I don’t have a clue why he wanted me to read those files, but this suddenly doesn’t feel like Whitney. I don’t know why he’d do this when it isn’t logical. Whitney may be a megalomaniac, but he has his own logic. He believes himself to be a patriot. He’s not going to be giving other countries supersoldiers, so who is leaking the information? Who’s looking for confirmation that you’re enhanced?”

Jess shook his head, his expression thoughtful. “It isn’t Chaleen. Her job is to find out what I’m doing besides working for Rear Admiral Henderson at NCIS. My team has been out on enough assignments to raise a few rumors, especially after the Congo incident. Senator Ed Freeman was involved with that. He’s high profile. Maybe it has something to do with the Congo, or the senator.”

She nodded. “He was my target. He and his wife. Whitney wanted them dead. He was in a recent accident and it’s rumored he’s in a coma.”

“He was shot in the head and taken to an undisclosed location. They’re keeping his condition very quiet, but you can bet every agency from here to hell and back is looking into it and there are going to be rumors and conjecture about an elite fighting team. Since the CIA was already suspicious, after the senator’s disappearance, I’m sure they want answers. What was in his file?”

“Whitney considered him a traitor and wanted both the senator and his wife dead. He actually arranged for me to attend a state dinner and shake hands with the senator. The plan was for me to induce a massive heart attack, and when his wife knelt beside him to do CPR, I would aid her, long enough to release a blood clot into her system. Then I was supposed to disappear before she went down as well.”

“You can do that?”

She was so small, yet she held so much power in her slender body. And it was somewhat disconcerting to think she’d been in his home, he’d introduced her to his sister and friends, and he’d never suspected that she could kill with a touch. The innocence in her eyes and the youthful features were all the cover she really needed. No one would ever suspect her. As a shielder, not even Violet, the senator’s wife, would have known that Saber was an assassin.

Saber shrugged. “I told you I could.”

The significance of what Saber told him sunk in. She had left the house in full assassination mode. “You slipped past Mari and Ken in order to kill Chaleen, didn’t you?”

She’d hoped he’d missed that. Jess didn’t miss very much. “Someone was out there watching you. I was afraid they’d been sent to kill you, so yes, I thought I might do something about it in order to protect you, but I changed my mind.”

“Ken came along.”

She shook her head. “He would have been too late. If I wanted her dead, she’d be beyond help by the time he arrived. He almost stepped on me.”

Jess shook his head, a slow grin of admiration escaping when he knew he shouldn’t feel that way. “He’s going to hate that.”

“Don’t tell him. Don’t tell any of them.” She ducked her head. “I don’t want them to know what I do.”

“Eventually they’ll have to know. You’re one of us. We work as a team.”

“Assassins don’t work with a team, Jesse. I go out alone. The orders come in and I play whatever part, slip in and out, and no one ever knows it was a sanctioned hit. I’m the weapon everyone’s been looking for. I can take out our enemies and no one will ever be able to prove a thing.”

“That doesn’t negate the fact that you’re one of us. We all have different-and lethal-capabilities, Saber. They’ll understand.”

“Do you really believe they’ll walk up to me and shake my hand the way they did earlier? They’ll be terrified.”

“I’m not terrified of you, Saber,” Jess said.

She lifted her lashes. “Well, maybe you should be.”

A slow smile softened the hard line of his mouth. Her heart lurched. He looked so sexy. It was no wonder that she’d fallen for him-she would have without Whitney and his pheromones.

“You said that before. I like to live dangerously.”

“You’re a nut.”

“Come on, baby. Let’s go to bed.” He held out his hand to her. When she put hers in his, he kissed her palm and then placed it on his shoulder so he could maneuver the chair through the wide hallways to the master bedroom.

Saber walked with him. “I’ve been thinking about this thing with Whitney. We’ve got him and the sicko who jacked off in my bedroom. Maybe they’re connected, maybe not, but I’m leaning more toward the theory that we’re missing some vital piece here, Jesse. Something right in front of our noses.”

He wasn’t going to discount her radar, because he was feeling the same way. Whitney had nothing to gain by snatching Saber before she was pregnant. Not when he’d gone to so much trouble to orchestrate the two of them meeting.

His bedroom was enormous, the four-poster bed dominating the room. It was low, custom built to make it easy for him to lock his chair and slide into the bed without help. The room was always surprisingly neat. Jess tended to toss his clothes over the backs of chairs or onto the nightstand, but everything else was in place.

“I’ve always been intimidated by that bed,” Saber said, stopping just inside the doorway. “It’s huge.”

“I won’t let you get lost. We just have to make certain Patsy doesn’t come barging in and find you here or we’ll be dragged to the nearest church and married before the day is out.”

“Don’t even say that. Patsy would be thrilled to catch me in your bedroom. She has visions of you producing like ten kids or something.”

He laughed. “My sister would make the best aunt in the world.”

“She needs to have children. You’d make a great uncle.”

The smile faded from his face. “She was so in love with David. I have no idea how to tell her David died because of me. I never thought my job or the choices I made would ever touch my family.”

“Oh, Jesse. Oh God.” Saber’s hand fluttered to her throat and then shot out to brace herself against the wall. “Patsy.”

He stiffened at her tone, pausing in the act of transferring to his bed. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

“We have to go to Patsy’s house right now.”

“Saber, it’s four o’clock in the morning. Why?”

She bit at her lip, frowning. “When Patsy was here earlier, I didn’t like the way her heart was acting.”

Jess straightened up immediately. “What do you mean, you didn’t like the way her heart was acting?”

“I don’t know. Her rhythm was off.”

He looked grim, fierce. “Something is wrong with my sister’s heart and you didn’t say anything?”

“I tried to get her to see a doctor. I didn’t think you knew about me. I was afraid to say anything, but I planned, when I left, to tell you in a letter to get her to the doctor.”

“Why did you check out her rhythm?”

His tone sent a chill down her spine. Saber gripped the doorjamb harder. “Someone had dropped a listening device in the pocket of her jacket. It was giving off a small energy field and I picked it up when I was close to her.”

“Let’s go then,” Jess said. “It will take a few minutes for me to get dressed.”

Saber hurried to drag on jeans and a T-shirt. Jess hadn’t been happy that she allowed Patsy to leave without saying anything, but he hadn’t condemned her for it. It seemed that she kept asking him to accept more and more from her. She would have warned Patsy, though. She liked her a great deal and she never would have left without first making certain Patsy knew she had something wrong with her heart.

Guilt didn’t ease up as she ran for the van. Jess was already in the garage, rolling his chair onto the lift to take him inside. He caught her outstretched hand as she leapt to join him.

“I’m sorry, Jesse. I honestly don’t know if it’s a minor thing that doesn’t really matter and will never harm her, but it’s just not right.”

“I understand.” He locked his chair into place and glanced over at her to make certain she was settled. “The thing is, baby, Patsy means the world to me. If anything happened to her…” His voice trailed off and the van engine started.

“I know. I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner.” She was miserable with shame and guilt weighing her down.

He lost them. Lost them. Everything was falling apart. He had to regroup. He could still save this. He went down the stairs to the basement and walked through the waiting room. Her room. Once he had her where she belonged, her voice would only be for him. She’d speak only when he allowed her, say only things meant for his ears.

Manacles hung from the ceiling and the wall. He had everything laid out for her-ready for her. She would come to love him in time, love the things he could do to her. And she’d know he was her master, the one she was born to please. She’d be what he wanted her to be, live only for him at his whim, at his pleasure. He sucked in his breath. He was so close. No one would ever find this place. Not the cripple, not the supersoldiers, and certainly not that bastard Whitney.