Predatory Game (GhostWalkers 6)

Pure feeling. The ground seemed to shift beneath her, colors whirled and blended. Her body was no longer her own, familiar, under control. It flamed into life, craving, crawling with the need to be touched, caressed. If any man in her life had ever kissed her before, Jess wiped him from her mind for all eternity. His mouth was on hers, hot and hard, so that her brain melted into mindless compliance, branding her as irrevocably his.

Saber moaned softly in despair. She was losing herself, clutching desperately at his heavily muscled shoulders to anchor herself to some reality.

Jess lifted his head reluctantly. She was so beautiful, staring up at him with such sensuous confusion he nearly ignored her distress. Saber pushed at the wall of his chest with her small hands, her strength easily overcome, but he obediently straightened, leaning back against the solid tree trunk. She sat up hastily, scrambled what she thought was a safe distance away, and kneeling, faced him.

"Lord, Jesse." She breathed his name in awe. "We can never do that again. We don't dare. We nearly set the world on fire."

A slow smile curved his mouth. "Personally, I was thinking it would be a good idea to repeat the experience. Often."

She touched her full lower lip with a cautious fingertip. "You should be outlawed, a woman isn't safe around you."

He resisted the urge to caress her face with his hand, not wanting to destroy her illusion of safety. "It wasn't just me, angel face."

She shook her head in adamant denial. Jess ignored the gesture, intrigued by the play of light in her shining hair. God, he wanted her. It was far more than a relentless physical craving. It was everything wrapped into one. He'd had beautiful women and flash affairs, but he'd never felt like this. Not where love and lust met, intertwined, and became so tightly woven together they were one and the same.

"This can't be," Saber said. "I have to go, Jess. Things are getting out of hand and I can't control them. I don't want to control them."

As she started her retreating move, Jess's hand snaked out with lightening speed and shackled her wrist. "Oh, no you don't, baby, you're not getting away from me." His grip was immensely strong, but he didn't hurt her--he never did.

Blue eyes flew, startled, to his dark ones. Dragon king, she always called him. He was wreaking havoc on all her senses. "Jesse," she made a breathless little protest, already feeling lost.

"It's too late, Saber. You're in love with me, you're just too damned stubborn to admit it to yourself."

"No, no, Jesse, I'm not." She sounded more frightened than convinced.

"Sure you are." Relentlessly, he drew her back to him until she was so close the heat between them threatened to erupt into flames. Beneath his hands he could feel her trembling. "Think about it, honey. Who makes you laugh? Who makes you happy? Who do you run to when you have a problem?" His fingers found the nape of her neck, sending little tongues of fire licking along her spine.

She took a deep steadying breath. "It doesn't matter. Even if you're right, which you're not, it wouldn't matter. I have to leave."

His fingers curled over her shoulders, gave her the gentlest of exasperated shakes. "Stop saying that. I don't want to hear it again. Don't you think I'm aware you have some deep, dark secret in your past? Somebody you're running from? That's what doesn't matter. You belong here, Saber. In Sheridan, Wyoming, with me, in my home, right by my side."

She went pale. "You don't know what you're saying. Jesse, I don't have any deep, dark secrets, I just like to travel. I can't help myself. I just get restless and pick up and go." He knew. He knew about her. How? Or maybe he didn't. Maybe she was panicking and he really thought she had a creep for an ex-husband and she was hiding from him. Let it be that. Please, please, let it be that.

He released her with a smile. "You can't lie worth a damn, Saber."

"Really?" She stuck her chin out at him. "Well neither can you. You have a few deep dark secrets of your own."

He nodded. "I'll admit it. I have a high security clearance and can't talk about my work much, but that shouldn't affect the two of us or our relationship."

He was admitting it. Her heart went into overdrive, pounding so hard she pressed a hand to her chest to alleviate the ache. He was a GhostWalker, highly trained in dealing death. And he was skilled in psychic abilities. Wheelchair or not, she wasn't safe with him. Pressing her lips together, she ducked her head. She didn't want to pursue the matter any further. Not now. Not today. Most of her life was pretense. This was her one chance at a day with Jess. The only one she might ever have.

Jess could sense the panic in her, the confusion and reluctance. He sighed and let it go. "We'll drop it for now. Just make me a promise; give me your word of honor you won't ever try to leave without discussing it first with me."

"You won't discuss it," she said in frustration. "You'll stop me."

"Promise me."

"That's not fair."

"Saber." He tapped her chin with his index finger.

"Oh, all right. I promise," she gave in with bad grace. "I'm hungry. I didn't have breakfast, lunch, or anything else in between. Are you going to feed me or what?"

Jess would take his small victory. Backing off, giving her space, seemed the lesser of two evils. Saber's mood swings were mercurial. He could easily read her rising panic. He needed to soothe her, alleviate her fears. She was desperately hiding the truth from him, but it didn't matter, because he already knew she had to be one of Peter Whitney's experiments.

Whitney had taken girls from orphanages around the world, kept them locked up, and performed psychic and genetic experiments on them long before he had done the same to grown servicemen. He'd given them the names of flowers and of seasons--Winter. She used the name Saber Wynter. Winter was more than likely what Whitney had called her.

He had entered the GhostWalker program of his own free will. And he'd known when he'd made the decision to enhance his psychic abilities that he would remain government property for the rest of his life. Wheelchair or not, he was still a powerful and dangerous weapon. No one was going to just forget about him and let him live his life out in peace. He had agreed to the bionics experiment partly for that reason.

Okay. He'd agreed to it because he missed the action of combat. Riding a desk just wasn't his thing and never would be. But then along came Saber and he suddenly wasn't thinking about saving the world anymore. Settling down seemed much more appealing, and she'd been with him long enough now that he couldn't imagine his life without her. But he'd made the choice as a grown man. Whitney had taken these girls, these infants, and instead of giving them a decent home, he'd made them into science projects.

He felt the hot surge of anger and deliberately forced it down. "You're closest to the picnic basket, angel face," he said very gently. "Pass me a sandwich."

Saber, grateful for the change of subject, dug into the wicker basket. "Cream cheese?"

"That's yours. I get ham," he said.

The color was slowly coming back into Saber's flawless skin, the tension easing out of her. She avoided touching him when she handed him his sandwich. He let her get away with it. "Drink, woman," he commanded. "Where's my drink?"

Saber handed him a mug of hot chocolate. "Tell me about Chaleen."

He nearly choked. "Why would you want to know about her?"

Because she was still hanging around and Saber didn't trust her for a moment. But she didn't mind playing the jealous woman if it got her what she wanted. "She's after you. I think that was made pretty plain. She gave me the look women reserve for competition. So tell me about her."

"If you want to know about Chaleen, I'll tell you, although there's really not all that much to tell." Because he had to be careful.

She could tell he was reluctant. "You don't have to." She tilted her head. "But I did overhear part of your conversation and it sounded as if she was warning you about an investigation you're conducting." She held up her hand when his piercing eyes went flat and cold. "I'm not fishing for details, but I think she's a lot

more than she wants you to know. She's coming off as your friend warning you, but I could feel..."

She had a million secrets she couldn't tell him, so it seemed unfair that he would have to reveal something obviously private to her--but she did want to know. She needed to know, because Chaleen was a dangerous woman, and she had to figure out just how dangerous she was to Jess.

Jess shrugged. "I met her skiing in Germany. It seemed innocent enough and she was beautiful and intelligent and loved doing all the things I did. She seemed perfect. Of course she was too perfect and I should have seen that, but I was too wrapped up in the sex to be thinking I might have been set up."

Saber winced. Sex. She didn't want to think about him having sex with perfect Chaleen, but she'd asked for this. She bit her lip hard to keep from interrupting.

Jess leaned back, pressing his head against the wide base of the tree. "It was so stupid, really. I knew better. I wasn't some dumb kid. She began asking me questions about my work. Nothing big, nothing to raise alarms, but still, it should have. I just took it that she was interested, and believe it or not, I actually felt guilty that I couldn't tell her anything."

Saber drew up her knees and rested her chin on them. She could see clever Chaleen manipulating a man into feeling guilty.