Dare Me (Take Me 2)

Nikki had spent years recovering from her personal trauma. Had survived it because of her own expertise—and because of her best friend, Kate, who’d proved to be an anchor that helped to keep Nikki on an even keel.

As Nikki’s gaze remained locked with Damen’s unwavering one, his eyes glowing heatedly, she willed the tension in her chest to loosen. She forced herself to breathe easier. She found her center.

Perhaps he was an anchor, too.

Her fingers grazed the grooves of his abs and the involuntary flexing of his muscles, his automatic reaction to her touch, ignited her nerve endings. She wasn’t sure how far this dangerous attraction was supposed to go. Yet she sensed…it couldn’t be denied any longer.

Damen murmured, “Understand, Nikki, that if we make love…it won’t be a one-time thing.”

She blinked.

He told her, “I won’t let you just walk away afterward. I’ll protect you. I’ll help you any way I can. I’ll get you to Switzerland, if it’s what you still want. Or I’ll take you to D.C. You can meet my niece. You can see the operations at QTango. We have a state-of-the-art med facility. A large psych unit with a diverse group of doctors. You might actually be…fascinated.”

“With the spy world?” she asked, breathless.

“It’s filled with people who want to make a difference, who want to effect positive outcomes. Save lives.”

His expression turned pointed.

“It’s risky business, Damen,” she said. “A deadly business. I can’t—”

“You could.” He gave a slight shake of his head and amended, “You might be able to accept it. To help, even.”

“I help survivors…I help SAR efforts and dedicated teams… I don’t—”

“What you do is no less dangerous than what I do, Nikki. You’re on the frontline—where anything could happen. Another earthquake, another explosion, another shooting… You’re willing to take those risks.”

She was about to say it was different, but true fact… She did put herself in harm’s way more often than not because of her professional specialty.

Damen carefully added, “The ops campus is actually a very safe space. Heavily guarded, monitored.”

She stared at him a moment, as something clicked in her brain. Then she said, “You want me in D.C. In this safe space.”

“I told you I’d get you to Switzerland,” he contended. “If that’s what you really want.”

Nikki drew in a deep breath.

This conversation was not one she’d anticipated having.

He was offering an alternative to being on the frontlines in a physical proximity sense. Because she suspected the mental health professionals on the campus were most certainly on the “frontlines” when it came to dealing with agents who’d suffered not only disasters and catastrophes and terrorist attacks, but deaths…killings—by their hands or another’s.

Just because it was an agent’s job to protect the innocent, or the country—and pull a trigger in order to do so—didn’t mean it was an easy reality to reconcile in their minds. In their souls.

Nikki would be lying to herself if she didn’t find that yet another level to strive for, to reach, in her career…helping someone suffering from that sort of trauma overcome the chilling end-result, along with the guilt, the torment.

Because just like the heroes she was drawn to, Nikki possessed a similar trait that made her want to save every tortured spirit she could.

However… There was a tiny part of her that reminded her she had her own fate, her own destiny to pursue. And that everything Damen was suggesting was impossible to contemplate, let alone accept. The spokesperson for that tiny part of her told her to walk away now.

It was the smart, sensible thing to do.

Unravel from all of this before she was so twisted up she’d never break free.

And that was where the rest of her—the overruling majority—rallied so that a different voice reminded her she’d once had something pretty fucking amazing in her life. Conner. A partnership by way of a marriage and by way of a solid, simpatico work ethic. They were cut from the same cloth, held the same values, chased the same dreams.

They’d made one hell of a team.

And she missed that closeness, that unity, that common thread.