“Hey, you’re jumping the wrong dude here, ass**le,” Simon growled. “It’s not my dick tied in a knot with a woman hotter than the hounds of hell. Try telling him.”
“Try pulling out now,” he snapped. “You have escorts in position beginning one hour from your location. Move now, goddammit, no matter what.”
“Fuck.” Simon snapped the phone closed.
Major Sinclair was going to keep on; he was going to get his ass kicked.
“So?” Stephanie moved closer, wrapping her arms around his waist from behind as she laid her cheek against his back.
“So, we go,” he sighed. “Let’s hope they got enough, because we gotta trot, baby doll. My guess is, there are hounds baying at our heels and Dash knows it. He was amazingly reserved.” He grimaced at the Major’s curses. “We have escorts an hour from here, so my guess is Feline Cavalry is moving in as insurance.”
“Shit.” She pressed her head tighter against his back.
“Yep. That ‘bout sums it up,” he drawled. “Let’s get the kiddies moving and pray we’re ahead of the bad guys. I really ain’t lookin’ to tangle with government firepower here. That would be a bad thing.”
A very, very bad thing.
Stephanie moved to his side as Kiowa strode naked from the lake, breathing harshly, but the cold water had no effect on the erection straining from his body.
“Simon honey, that man is packed,” Steph remarked with no small amount of feminine interest. “But damned if I think I’d want a piece of it. He looks mean enough to bite.”
Simon snorted. Yep. And he was betting a lot of money Kiowa had bit. Very, very bad.
Chapter Ten
Stay down. Don’t risk being seen. Stay covered.
Definitely stay covered.
Amanda lay on her side, her back to Kiowa as she tried to hug the wheel cover and keep from touching him.
Cold hard reality had almost returned. Enough to realize what had happened and to remember in bleak clarity the hours before when it had all begun. How long had passed? It was nearly three in the morning now, Simon had told Kiowa a bit ago. The lights from the vehicle following them flipped in and out of the back glass, casting odd shadows around her.
Nearly three. It had been just after seven when she had closed her door on the trick-or-treaters. Seven hours. In seven hours her life had changed so drastically she was certain she could never right it again. She shuddered at the thought of it. Not in distaste. She wished it were in distaste, it would make it easier. It would ease the tears that slid silently down her face and the ache that lay heavy in her heart. What had she done? How had it happened? And why was she still being tortured with the need for more?
“How much longer, Simon?” Kiowa snapped from beside her, his voice harsh as he demanded the answer.
“A little over an hour,” Simon answered back. “Callan has one of the new cabins ready. They’re gathering intel now. We should have something when we get there.”
“Sinclair there?” His voice was a raspy growl. He was pissed. Good, so was she.
“He’s flying in with Elizabeth and Cassie now. He should be there just ahead of us.”
She could feel the tension filling the Jeep now. Between her and Kiowa. The more she burned, the madder he seemed to get.
Could he tell? she wondered. Did he sense the building arousal? Just what she needed. The son of a bitch didn’t just drug her with some kind of weird animal aphrodisiac, but he could sense the effect of it.
“Dash Sinclair is in on this?” She spoke up then, stilling the tears as anger washed over her. She had met Dash Sinclair and his wife Elizabeth. Their daughter Cassie was a sweet, if odd little child. They had met with her father during one of the endless meetings the month before.
“None of us were in on anything, Ms. Marion, but protecting your hide,” Simon told her harshly. “Things are turning out bad, I admit, but we did our best.”
“Your best sucks,” she informed him furiously. “They’ll find me.”
Her father would not take this lying down, she thought. If the Breeds thought they had trouble before, it would be nothing compared to what her father and brother would bring down on them now.
“They have to know you’ve gone first,” Kiowa snapped. “The five men I took out behind your house disappeared, Manda. And they didn’t walk away. Your security detail is still sleeping peacefully and breathing. For the moment. And your father doesn’t have a clue you’re gone.”
She blinked back at him. She remembered Tammy Brock then, her nervousness, her request to use the bathroom. How had they convinced Tammy to help them? Better yet, why had her bodyguards ignored the back door indicator light as they had? At no time was she supposed to use that door after dark. She never had.