Read Online Dateline: Kydd and Rios by Tara Janzen - Free Book Online Page A

missed her. Without a word he tilted her head back and let his mouth slide down to hers, teasing his memories of love back to life.
    The sweet invasion stole her last coherent thought, left her helpless, caught in a trap of unexpected tenderness. Her hands met at the back of his neck, her fingers tunneling through the hair lying across his collar. He groaned and pressed her harder against the garden wall.
    The overpowering strength of him swept her further from reality. She clung to him out of need. He’d come back to her as a lover, not as a friend, and until that moment she hadn’t realized how desperately she needed both. She had been alone so long.
    “Nikki, Nikki,” he whispered, kissing the side of her nose, the corners of her lips. Then he slipped his tongue inside her mouth to taste the rich sweetness that was hers alone.
    He’d made a mistake. Josh knew that the instant her lips parted and sent a shaft of desire spiraling through his body. The longing for her had been pent up for too many years, through too many sleepless nights. His hands slid down to her breasts, then back up under her arms, lifting her higher against him. He wanted everything she had to give, everything she’d given him once—the mindless passion, the complete forgetting of self and the finding of each other. He wanted to discover the woman inside the girl he’d loved.
    He wanted to unbutton her shirt and slip his hand inside. But now was not the time, and the Paloma garden wasn’t a safe place to linger, not with her body and her every touch distracting him beyond reason. Reluctantly, he tore his mouth away, ending the kiss with a soft groan.
    “Dammit, Nikki.” His voice broke with concern, and he lifted his hands to her shoulders. “What were you doing out there? Trying to make the front page with an obituary?”
    “No,” she whispered, barely making a sound, her heart beating wildly against his.
    “Where have you been? I’ve been here for two days, trying to avoid half the San Simeon National Security Force. The hotel is crawling with NSF cops. Why?”
    Confusion clouded her eyes. “The Paloma is being watched?” Breathlessly she parted her lips and slid her hands down to rest against his chest, straining his control.
    He removed his hands from her shoulders and braced himself against the adobe wall, forcing himself not to reach for her again. “Around the clock. Four men on every shift. Answer my other questions.” He had to know what was going on before he made another move.
    “I’ve been in Sulaco, and I . . . I don’t know,” she answered. Yes, she thought, he had kissed her, but it hadn’t taken him long to get down to business. She didn’t know what to make of the lightning-fast change, but she knew her lips were still warm from his mouth. She knew every time his heart beat beneath her palm.
    “Did I miss something in the message?” he asked. “Was I supposed to meet you in Sulaco?
    “No, I—” She stumbled in midthought, unsure of what to say next.
    “Then why were you there?”
    “A . . . a man,” she stammered.
    He said something obscene, glancing away. His eyes came back to her, darkened by the night and the unmistakable anger suddenly hardening his voice. “That’s a hell of an answer, Nikki. What kind of man? Your lover?”
    Lover? What was he talking about? Her confusion increased, and she lowered her gaze to the ground. She needed a minute, just a minute, to catch her breath, to believe he was really there, to figure out what was going on with his rapid-fire interrogation. Lord, she wished he hadn’t kissed her like that. It made everything so much more complicated.
    Josh didn’t miss the evasive glance, and it did little to lighten his mood. He’d thought about her taking another lover too many times not to believe it now. The idea had prompted more than one drunken binge that first year, and a few since. She’d been his, and he’d thrown her away.
    Damn her for asking him there for half