Nori's Delta (Delta Team Three #1) - Lori Ryan Page 0,26

How to kiss her and tease her and bring her to the point of begging before letting her orgasm in his arms.

She shook her head and stepped back, wanting to step forward instead. Wanting for all the world to lose herself in this man’s arms.

Her action seemed to break the spell that hung between them and he moved away.

“I’ll wait outside while you get yourself ready. Call for me when you’re done.”

Eleanor nodded and picked up her toiletries and her night clothes.

She would shower and dress and wash the cobwebs from her brain. It was all too clear that she wasn’t thinking the least bit clearly. And that would be dangerous going into a job like this.

Chapter 11

Heath watched Eleanor sleep, knowing she needed to be well rested today. For that matter, so did he. He needed to be sharp to make sure nothing happened to Eleanor, but somehow he’d been nothing but off kilter since the start of this assignment.

He’d been dozing in the armchair in her room, but the pain in his arm had woken him at three in the morning and he hadn’t gone back to sleep again.

She looked so beautiful sleeping. When they were dating back in high school, they’d never spent the night together. They had stolen moments at her house when her mom was at work or in the back of his Mustang parked on Hillman’s Pass at the top of the overlook where all the high school kids went to make out. But he’d never been able to fall asleep with her and wake up with her in the morning.

Not that this was really sleeping together, him in a chair and her on the bed. He wanted to curl up in the bed with her and pull her to him, but that wasn’t a smart move. He couldn’t continue to be stupid where this woman was concerned.

He wasn’t one of those people who fantasized about what couldn’t be. Not since he was a kid when he’d thought he could somehow earn his dad’s approval if he just tried hard enough to be the son his dad wanted. There was no making yourself into something you weren’t.

She mumbled something incoherent and rolled in her sleep, snuggling deeper under the covers.

Closing his eyes, he ran through all the scenarios for the morning. All the plans in place for getting her in and out of the compound safely. That was where they would be most at risk, on the way to and from the negotiations.

The compound itself should be fairly safe from attack. Demir and his men kept it fortified and guarded from any outside attack by the Kazarus military.

Unless an attack came from the inside.

Heath’s job was to think of any and all possibilities, to know where an attack would come from before it did.

So why did this feel more like him panicking over what could happen to Eleanor than him being prepared?

“You’re not sleeping,” Eleanor said sleepily, pulling him from his thoughts.

He shushed her, not wanting to disturb her sleep. “It’s all right. I was just thinking.”

“Can’t sleep?” She asked, shifting again so the sheet shifted, revealing one long lean leg to the thigh.

Hell, she was going to kill him. She needed her sleep. He should get up and leave and take his insomnia somewhere else.

“Heath, I want to say something and I want you to listen to me and not try to stop me, okay?”

He fought not to freeze at her words. “Okay.”

She didn’t look at him when she spoke, keeping her eyes focused somewhere over his shoulder.

“I want to say I’m sorry, Heath. For so much, but mostly for hiding that night, for getting you into trouble with your dad.”

Now Heath did freeze. What the hell was she talking about?

“Sorry?” He tried not to let the words come out as a growl, but it wasn’t easy. “What the hell do you think you have to apologize for?”

Her eyes found his but then dropped just as quickly as she looked away from him.

“If I hadn’t hidden after …” he saw her swallow, “after it happened, you wouldn’t have been picked up by the cops. And if I’d just talked to you after that, maybe you wouldn’t have gone after Jason. Your dad wouldn’t have forced you out. You wouldn’t have had to join the Army. All of it. I’m just… I’m just really sorry it all happened.”

Heath’s head swam. He couldn’t say he wasn’t sorry it had all happened. The night his football