Tempting the Fire Read online

  He lifted his head and they stared at each other, half in shock in their post-orgasmic haze. He eased Marlena’s legs from around his waist and steadied her when her feet hit the floor.

  Her BDUs remained on one leg and he bent quickly and got them back on her. Because they were coming for her—for them—and no one would see his woman naked but him.

  His woman. Shit.

  Before he could say anything, explain—and what the hell kind of explanation could he give anyway?—Shep burst into the room.

  “What are you doing?”

  Chance wheeled away from Marlena and faced Shep, who had a pistol pointed directly at him.

  “Back the fuck away from her now,” Shep ordered.

  Chance heard a low growl … and spun, searching for the source. Until he realized it had come from him.

  What happened next was both completely unexpected and strangely natural, and like most things he’d done in his life, he simply went for it.

  BITING THAT WOMAN ON THE EARLOBE HAD BEEN ONE OF THE stupidest things Logan had ever done in his life, because it had made the whole I’ve-been-in-the-jungle-for-a-month-without-a-woman thing start screaming inside his pants.

  God, she was pretty. Pretty and sweaty and pissed as hell, which, yeah, was another one of his turn-ons, right up there with the whole earlobe thing. She’d tasted a little salty, smelled like vanilla, and fuck it all, why, today of all days, was there actually hot water in this godforsaken shower when he most definitely needed cold.

  He was horny as hell, and it was at times like these that he thanked God he wasn’t fully a machine, that he could still feel all the normal male urges. That he wasn’t a complete monster like the one Frankenstein built, full of wires and steel and mechanisms.

  Since the accident and subsequent rehab, his emotions felt flat—he’d been unable to feel truly passionate about anything he did work-wise. Or anything-wise. Sex was the only way he could convince himself that he was still capable of feeling, and hell, that was something.

  Now he leaned his forehead against his arm, which was propped up against the wooden wall of the outdoor shower, his body still soapy, the dirt running down the small hole that acted as a drain.

  He was rock hard, uncomfortably so, and Sela was waiting a few feet away, handcuffed to a pole with no choice but to wait for him.

  “What’s taking you so long?” she snapped—and oh, yeah, if he could keep her talking …

  “You miss me, darling?” he called, the hoarseness in his voice apparent to his own ears as he palmed his shaft and closed his eyes and pretended she was touching him. Stroking him. Maybe even getting on her knees to take him in her mouth. She’d be hot and wet and would put that sharp tongue to use in much more pleasant ways. He could already feel it swirling around his glans and flicking over the tip while her lips created a groan-inducing suction.

  “I want to take a shower too,” she said, and Christ, the thought of her in here, with him, almost made him lose it.

  Too soon—he needed to enjoy this. Deserved to, since he’d been pulled out of the office and into the fucking jungle to clean up another mess. And yeah, he was about sixty seconds from making a fucking mess of his own, considering he hadn’t been able to keep his eyes off Sela’s ass instead of on the tracks leading to the escaped animal.

  She’d been huffing a little as they’d gotten farther into the brush, each sound, each breath sounding like … like fucking sex noises. He needed to get this job over and done with and get this woman out of this country and away from Chance and the beast running free in the wilds of the Amazon.

  “You can join me, in the name of water conservation,” he called back, imagined her slick, soapy body rubbing his. He’d bet anything she was wild in bed; she was the type—all buttoned-up and serious on the outside, but once she got turned on … she’d probably rake her nails down his back when she came.

  Oh. Fucking. Yeah.

  He stroked himself harder, the build up nearly too much, and he forced himself not to bite down on his own arm. She’d probably bite. And scratch. She’d lock those long legs around his waist and tease him by rocking her slick sex, her swollen clit, along the length of his shaft, working her honey all the way to his balls.

  Which were drawing up, boiling with come. He imagined her palm cupping them, rolling them between her long fingers as she arched up, finally taking him deep. They’d both shout at the joining, and she might even reach her first orgasm when his cock raked a sensitive place inside.

  “Do you think you’ll be ready soon?” she persisted.

  “Yeah,” he panted. “Really ready.”

  God, she’d be hot and tight—his hips rocked a little as he thrust into his fist.

  “Because then we need to discuss the fact that you’re keeping me prisoner …”

  Sela in handcuffs in the shower naked with him. “Yeah. Prisoner.” At his mercy, spread-eagle and calling his name …

  “Logan, do you hear me?”

  “Mmmmmhmmm.”

  “Because that’s against the law.”

  “Oh, yeah. Against.” Pressed against, her nipples rubbing his chest, her core contracting around him, and fuck, he was at the edge and he was going over fast.

  “Why are you suddenly being so agreeable?” Her voice had turned suspicious and he was seeing the white light behind his eyes. He pumped his hand faster, long strokes from base to tip, adding a twisting motion at the head that made the white light turn blinding.

  “Because … it feels … so damned good,” he ground out. Sensation sizzled like a lit fuse down his spine to groin, where the pressure that had been building combusted. His balls tightened and his dick pulsed in his hand and he came, hard and fast, shooting on the floor while the water ran down his back like a soft caress.

  There was dead silence on her end, and then, “I hope you enjoyed yourself in there, as that’s the closest you’re ever getting to being with me.”

  He finished rinsing off and opened the door without bothering with the towel. In this weather, he’d never dry fully anyway. Fucking humidity. “Who said I was thinking about you?”

  “You said my name when you came,” she said dryly before she turned away, as if she didn’t see anything that impressed her.

  Chuckling, he pulled on a fresh pair of jungle camo BDUs. She had sass, and dammit, he liked sass.

  He uncuffed her, watched her rub her wrists. They were a little red, but that would fade quickly. His little shower fantasy, however, would not.

  CHAPTER

  Four

  Sela rubbed her wrists, mentally cursing Logan and praying that Marlena could start work on seducing him. “Where is Marlena?” she asked, and he smirked at her.

  “My boys took her to the medical tent. It’s reinforced, doubles as our holding tank.”

  “Will she be okay? I saw the way your boys leered at her.”

  He scowled. “Yeah, you’d think they’d never seen a fucking woman before.”

  Oh, he was one to talk, given what he’d done in the shower while she was right outside the door. And what the hell was up with that? Sure, she’d discussed sex toys in the jungle to get him worked up and his mind in the gutter, but it was supposed to be there with Marlena and her vibrator, not Sela.

  And now she was the one with her mind stuck in the gutter, because when he’d stepped out of the shower, water running in crystal rivulets along the valleys of his sharply cut muscles, she’d had to turn away to keep from staring as though she’d been in the jungle for a month.

  “Logan!” Dax’s shout rang out at the same time as the sound of a scream and an inhuman snarl. “It’s Chance … Quick! He’s attacking Shep!”

  Logan sped toward the medical tent, and Sela’s heart nearly busted through her rib cage. That was where he said they’d taken Marlena. Sela ran after him, the sounds coming from the tent scaring the daylights out of her.

  Logan tore open the door and drew up so fast Sela ran into him. “What the fuck is that?” he
barked, and Sela wished to God she knew the answer.

  Shep was on the ground, moaning, blood streaming from his mouth, scalp and nose. A naked man stood over him … at least, she thought it was a man. His skin was grayish, textured like a reptile’s, and his teeth … God, they were sharp, fanged.

  Marlena was huddled on a cot, cuffed, her clothes askew, and Sela wondered if this man-creature had attacked her. He watched them with slitted eyes, his entire body coiled inside and ready to strike. An injured animal preparing to defend itself from predators.

  And judging by the way he seized Marlena’s forearm, he was prepared to defend her too.

  Or maybe eat her.

  “Someone get a goddamned tranq!” Logan shouted, and the man-thing snarled. Logan held up his hands and lowered his voice. “Chance. It’s okay. Let the woman go.”

  “Fuck off.”

  Alarm skittered up Sela’s spine at the man’s deadly tone, but Marlena, to her credit, remained calm despite the fact that she was in the grip of something that wasn’t entirely human.

  A man in BDUs and with a stethoscope around his neck eased into the tent, a tranquilizer gun in his hand. Two men behind him carried pistols.

  “Doc,” Logan said quietly, “flank me.”

  Logan gestured to Dax, and in the next instant, Dax grabbed Marlena, and the doctor and Logan shoved Chance onto the cot.

  “Get Shep and the women out of here!” Logan shouted. Chance roared, his struggles knocking Logan and the doctor, whom Dax called Wes, off balance.

  A set of arms circled Sela’s waist as Dax dragged Marlena out of the tent. Sela elbowed her attacker in the ribs. He grunted, but his hold tightened, and she felt herself being tugged backward. As hard as she could, she brought her booted foot down on his, and at the same time, she rocked her head and cracked the back of her skull against his mouth and nose.

  “Ow! Fuck!” His agonized curse accompanied a rough slam to the ground and a knee in the back of her neck, another jammed into the small of her back.

  Sela’s breath was ripped from her lungs by the impact, and she gasped like a fish on the bank of a river. Memories of the beating she’d suffered flashed through her head like a movie on fast-forward, but mercifully, the man holding her down made no move to hurt her, and awkwardly, she cranked her head so she could see, past Dax, the struggle between the three men.

  An ungodly, high-pitched screech pierced the air.

  “Oh, Jesus.”

  Sela didn’t know who spoke, but suddenly, Logan flew backward, landing in a heap next to her.

  Wes hit one of the tent poles, cracking it in half. One side of the tent collapsed, and then, standing near the bed where Chance had been, its eyes glowing red and drool dripping from its tiger-long fangs, was a fucking chupacabra.

  They were real. Dear God, they were real.

  THERE WAS A MOMENT OF SILENCE, AND THEN CAME A CLICK OF a weapon and the huff of a dart gun. The chupacabra roared, clutching at the dart in its belly.

  The man holding Sela down leaped to his feet, giving her the opportunity to come to hers.

  “Oh, my God,” she breathed. “You’ve got a chupacabra. But how? It was a human. How did it turn—”

  “Fuck if I know,” Logan said, as he eased toward the creature, which had slid to the floor. If he was surprised that she recognized a chupacabra, it didn’t show.

  It began to writhe, and slowly, its form changed to human again. “What … happened …?” Chance panted, clutching at his belly.

  Logan crouched next to him. “Hey, man. It’s okay. It’s me, Logan.”

  “I … remember. What happened in the jungle.” Chance swallowed, panted. “Attacked … attacked by some creature. My team … dead.”

  “I know.” Logan looked at Wes. “Did you see any signs that this could happen?”

  “No. Nothing.”

  Okay, so these guys were clueless. And clearly, they hadn’t known the injured guy was going to turn into a monster.

  “Who is this man?” Sela asked, though given what he’d said, she suspected he was a member of the SEAL team that had been slaughtered in the jungle.

  Instead of answering, Logan signaled to the guy who had grabbed her earlier. The one whose nose was bleeding from her head-butt.

  “Get her out of here.”

  The jerk came at her, but she ducked and darted to Chance. “Chance. Hey. Did the thing that attacked you have spines on its back? Red eyes? Claws?” Like you had.

  “Yeah,” he rasped. “Yeah.” He closed his eyes, his breathing settling into a steady, shallow rhythm.

  “He’s out,” Logan said. “Anyone want to share a theory on what the fuck just happened?”

  Sela frowned. “Was he normal before this?”

  “Before he was attacked, you mean?”

  “Yes.”

  Logan and Wes exchanged glances, and Logan shook his head, as if telling the other man to keep his mouth shut. He turned to her. “Go with Eric. Now.”

  “I can help,” she snapped. “I’m a cryptozoologist, and chupacabras are my specialty.”

  Logan cocked an eyebrow. “Really? I thought you collected bugs.” Sarcasm dripped from every word.

  Clearly, he hadn’t bought her lie, but then, she hadn’t wanted him to. “I didn’t think you’d believe me. But obviously, you’re running some sort of scientific operation here, and you have your own pet chupacabra. So yeah, I’m thinking you’ll believe the truth now.”

  He crossed his arms over his broad chest. “Fine. Tell me what you know, O great chupacabra expert.”

  “You’re an ass.”

  He stared at her. The ass.

  “Maybe you could start with what’s going on with this man.” She crossed her arms over her chest in a blatant imitation of Logan’s arrogant stance.

  “We don’t know. We found him injured in the jungle.”

  “And what are you doing here in the first place?”

  He didn’t miss a beat. “We’re researchers. Studying the local fauna. It’s our job to know what kind of dangerous wildlife we could run into.”

  “Really? Do all botanists carry semi-automatic weapons and set up military base camps?”

  “We hired mercs as guards. This area is a hotbed for drug cartels.”

  He made it all sound so legit. Too bad she knew his company made even the worst drug cartel seem like a bunch of kittens. Anyone who dealt with Itor needed to be taken down.

  She glanced at the men standing around her, all armed except for the doctor, who was listening to Chance’s chest with a stethoscope. “Look, maybe we could talk in private? Call me a wuss, but I’m a little unnerved by all this.”

  Besides, rule number 246 in spywork was to get your target separated from others. A man alone was less likely to censor his words.

  Logan narrowed his eyes at her, but after a moment, he nodded. “Let’s go.”

  She followed him to a tent near the shower. It was smaller than the medical tent but still sizable, with a cot, two folding chairs, a small table scattered with papers, a laptop computer and an open satellite phone case. A duffel large enough for her to climb inside took up one corner.

  “Have a seat,” he said, gesturing to one of the chairs. She sat on the end of his cot. One corner of his mouth tipped up, and he reached for a bottle of Glenlivet. “Drink?”

  “Make it a big one.”

  He poured two fingers of Scotch into a clear plastic cup and handed it to her. “Sorry about the plastic, but we’re not running a country club.”

  She clutched hers to hide her fingers’ trembling. Her adrenaline still raced from coming face-to-face with a creature she hadn’t believed existed, and now she was alone with another creature, who was better-looking but no less dangerous.

  “So tell me about chupacabras.”

  “Have your boys bring Marlena first,” she countered.

  He cocked a dark eyebrow. “Why?”

  “Maybe you didn’t notice that she was cuffed inside a tent with a d
angerous creature? She’s got to be terrified. Maybe hurt.”

  “I’d have been informed by now if she’d been injured.” Still, he went to the tent flap and shouted for Marlena to be brought to him.

  A minute later, Marlena arrived, somehow looking like she’d stepped out of the pages of Playboy. She’d taken her hair out of the ponytail, and now it fell in soft waves around her shoulders. Her tight tee outlined braless breasts, and she’d tied the hem in a knot that exposed her flat stomach. Her BDU bottoms, specially made by ACRO for her build, rode low at the hips, giving her a dangerously wanton appearance.

  “See?” Logan said, giving her a lingering once-over before gesturing to a chair. “She’s fine.”

  Maybe Marlena wasn’t injured, but she was far from fine. She was too pale, her posture too stiff. What had happened in the medical tent had shaken her. Marlena sat, but before Logan could do the same, Sela stood.

  “Logan? Could I get a minute alone with Marlena? Please?”

  He narrowed his eyes at her, but nodded. “You have one minute.” He slipped out of the tent, and Sela knelt beside the other woman.

  “Are you okay?”

  Marlena smiled so brightly that Sela could almost believe that nothing had happened. “I was scared for a few moments, but really, I’m fine. We see weird things all the time.”

  At ACRO, yes, weirdness was the order of the day. But it wasn’t often you got chained next to a man who turned into a mythological creature. “Look, we’ll forget the plan. You just take it easy—”

  “Sela.” Marlena’s voice cracked like a whip. “I’m fine. I can handle this.”

  “But—”

  Marlena grabbed Sela’s wrist, her nails digging in as she put her lips to Sela’s ear. “Don’t treat me like I’m a fucking China doll,” she whispered harshly. “I will do my job, and don’t you dare tell Dev otherwise.”

  Okaaaay.

  “Now, this is the kind of thing I like to see,” Logan drawled, and Sela leaped to her feet. He was smiling, that cocky, sexy one she hated. “I knew you two were a thing.”