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  “Don’t you need to look at the crime scene or anything?” she asked, her voice a little flat, a little lifeless, not quite caring where he lead her as her focus shifted inwards. Did I lead them to Jana? Would they have left her alone if I had not given her name to Nick? Should I have not gone and talked to her myself?

  “A team’s already there.” Nick stopped and, hands squeezing her narrow shoulders, forced her to face him. “Augusta, stop blaming yourself.”

  Her lips curved bitterly as she forcefully shrugged his hands off her and backed away from him. “I’m not the only one blaming me.”

  Chapter Twelve

  She was quiet on the ride back. It wasn’t, however, a peaceful quiet. Nervous, anxious energy thrummed through her system. Augusta fisted her hands, digging her nails into her palms to keep from drumming her fingers. Nick hadn’t even turned off the ignition before she was out of her seat. She fumbled with the keys on the way up the front steps. It took her two tries to unlock the door.

  She dropped her purse on the floor as she kicked off her shoes. The jacket was shed and joined the purse. The sound of the door closing and locking behind her was abnormally loud in her head. It was almost like a gun going off.

  Augusta spun around and closed the distance between her and the startled male.

  “Augusta?” Wariness. Uncertainty. He managed another sound before the small hands fisted in his shirt front pulled his head down and his lips to hers.

  It took only a moment. Then one hand cupped the base of her skull, the other traveled down her back, pressing every inch of her from chest to thighs into him, while he ravaged her mouth.

  A sound of want and need escaped her throat, and Augusta wrapped a slender arm around his neck, wanting to get closer. But he wouldn’t cooperate.

  Hard hands squeezed her shoulders, gentled and pushed her away, but they didn’t let her go. Holding her at arm’s length, he bent down, trying to capture her eyes. A short game of cat and mouse ensued before she blinked and met his gaze.

  “Do you know what you’re doing?”

  She tilted her head back, closed her eyes and tried not to think about how hard she was breathing. Or how hot and tight her pulsing core was.

  She opened her eyes and tried her damnedest to focus on him. She got as far as his damp mouth. “Nick, please.” Breathy. Chopped. She lowered her gaze. The pulse in his throat was throbbing as madly as hers.

  The small, hard shake he gave her was difficult to ignore.

  “I don’t want you using me”—he tightened his hold when she instinctively tried to jerk away—“like last night.”

  Frustration was evident in the frown that marred her brow. She took a deep breath. “Why are you making this so complicated?”

  “Because I want to mean more to you than Langan.” He bit the words off viciously, eyes boring into hers. “I don’t want to be another ‘friend’ you fuck as a distraction.”

  The short, harsh sound of her laughter was just a little reckless. “Trust me, Detective, I don’t think of you as a friend.”

  His fingers reflexively dug in. She gasped, but he didn’t respond.

  “Then what do you think of me as? A sleeping aid?”

  That burst of laughter again that held very little real amusement. “Anything but.”

  “Then what?” he demanded.

  Afraid he would shake her again, Augusta lifted her hands and clasped his thick wrists. His skin was supple, hair-roughened and hot. His heat seared her, melting her core. She tried to move in closer. He weakened and let her in until she could flick out her tongue and touch him.

  She did just that.

  The tip of her tongue traveled down the middle of his chest. His groan sounded as if it had been torn from deep within. She stretched on her tiptoes and moved her head to one side, unerringly finding his nipple through the cotton of his shirt. His hands roughly rubbed their way down to her middle arms, stopping just above her elbows. He pulled her closer. Off balance, her hands shot out and landed on the waistband of his jeans. Her mouth opened wider over his nipple as her hands traveled farther down. Her knees nearly buckled at the impressive feel of the heated bulge that met her palms. She rubbed against him in tight circles.

  It was Nick’s turn to lose his balance. He fell back against the locked door, legs spread, eyes squeezed shut as he groaned her name. Very deliberately, very lightly, she rubbed her open palm down the length of him. And back up. And back down. And her name became unintelligible.

  The harsh, masculine groan barely penetrated the hazy, steamy passion wrapped around Augusta. She was a seething mass of wants and needs. And all she wanted and needed was a visual to go with the impressive erection she was caressing. And taste. He seemed to swell even larger as she continued rubbing him through the rough material of his jeans. Definitely taste.

  Panting, she let her head fall, forehead pressing on his sternum, the sound of each strand of her hair rubbing against each other and against his shirt magnified until it was almost as loud as their erratic heartbeats. All her concentration was focused below on her clumsy, clumsy fingers. It took two tries before she popped the button of his jeans. It was a frustrating game of hide-and-seek as she searched for and found the metal tab of his zipper. They both groaned in relief when she managed to pull it down. Her hands shifted back up to his waistband and she dropped to her knees, taking his jeans and boxers with her.

  Before the jeans got beyond his knees, Augusta closed her eyes and gave into the demands of her body, enclosing his engorged tip in her mouth. Oh, God. Fingers ploughed through her hair, tightened and pressed down, silently begging her to take more of him. She did, sucking in as much of him as she could. Her fingers dug into each side of his hips as she drew back until only his tip remained in the wet cavern of her mouth, her tongue swirling over and around the head. Then back down the wet path until he nudged the back of her throat again. She wrapped one hand around the few inches of him she couldn’t reach, let him feel the edge of her nails. He was like velvet over hot steel in her palm, in her mouth, against her tongue.

  Augusta lost herself in the taste and feel of him, barely registering the litany that was a string of her name and curses and praises. She felt the hands trying to tug her mouth away from her pleasure, heard the ragged voice pleading with her to stop and ignored both. She wasn’t going to stop until she tasted his come. As if he read her thoughts, Nick’s control snapped and he went as rigid as a statue. Augusta tasted the salty liquid on her tongue and swallowed and continued swallowing. Only when there was no more did she allow him to pull her up and into his arms, almost enclosing her entirely with his body. His head dropped to her shoulder, and his breath was hot on her skin as he muttered, “Fuck, you’re amazing.”

  Augusta tiredly licked her lips, smiled and made a sound of amusement. Then the sound turned sultry when he touched the strip of exposed skin of her back between the waistband of her jeans and the hem of her cropped shirt. She closed her eyes and allowed her head to fall forward. Wanting her palms against his skin, starting at the bottom, she slowly slipped the buttons of his shirt out of their buttonholes. She took an extra-long time with the last button as her thoughts scattered when large hands smoothed down her back, slipped underneath her top and traveled back up, the rough feel of his hands against her smooth back sending ripples of heat through her once more.

  His mouth opened on the sensitive skin of her neck, letting her feel his tongue. Augusta fisted her hands in his open shirt, pulling it taut. He traveled down, wanting the curve of her shoulder, and met fabric. Making an irate sound, he pulled her shirt up and over her head and dropped it at their feet. He shrugged out of his shirt and let it fall as he toed off his shoes and socks. Hands braced against the wall of muscle in front of her, Augusta planted a foot in between Nick’s legs and stepped down, pushing the boxers and jeans down enough for him to step out of them. Free from the confines of his clothes, Nick started on the button-fly of Augusta’s jeans.

  By the thi
rd button, he made a rough sound and slipped his hand inside her jeans, searched, found her, covered her. She moaned and dug her fingers into his chest. He massaged her through the material of her panties, and she panted, barely able to remain upright.

  “Come for me,” he whispered harshly from somewhere above her.

  Augusta squeezed her eyes shut tight and struggled not to grind herself into his hand. But try as she might, she couldn’t stop the soft sounds of need from escaping her throat. Her hands fell down to his sides and dug in as he wrapped long fingers around one buttock and pulled her flush against him. The feel of his fingers manipulating her sex and the burning erection still wet from her mouth pressing against her bare middle made her toes curl, her body tighten and her sex spasm.

  Tired and her vision blurry, Augusta was only peripherally aware of automatically wrapping her legs about a hard waist as hands lifted her clear off the floor, uncaring of the slides that fell off her feet. Her surroundings spun dizzily around her, so she closed her eyes and rested her head on a broad shoulder, her body still trembling with the aftershocks. Then she was spilled onto a firm but silky surface. A bed. Hands unlocked her ankles and she let her legs fall, dangling over the end of the bed.

  At the feel of her jeans being peeled down her legs, Augusta lifted her lashes. A face taut with desire and something darker stared down at her, making all traces of lethargy disappear and tiny spasms go off between her legs.

  “You’re wearing too many clothes,” he said, pulling at her panties. There was a tearing sound and Augusta stopped breathing.

  “Move up,” Nick ordered thickly, at last taking in the body completely exposed to him. Her skin was pale, sharply contrasting with the dark V that gleamed with wetness between her thighs. He wanted to put his mouth there, to taste her, lick her. He wanted to so badly his abdominal muscles cramped. But he didn’t think he could last another second of not being inside her.

  A humorless, self-deprecating laugh sounded in his head. When she went down on him downstairs, that should’ve taken the edge off his need, but hell, no. This woman had changed the rules on him. Once just wasn’t enough. Anger darted through him at the realization that he had no defenses against her.

  Breathing ragged and eyes locked on his, Augusta wriggled up the bed until her head touched the pillow. Nick followed her onto the bed, kneeling between her thighs, looming over her. With a harsh sound, he hooked him arms under her knees, spread her wide, covered her body with his and was deep inside her with a single thrust.

  Augusta whimpered and clung to the gleaming shoulders above her. The rhythm he set was pounding, hard enough to satisfy her and yet leave her wanting more. She stretched her legs and crossed her ankles high up on his back, almost to his neck, opening herself even more. Eyes boring into hers, Nick planted his forearms on either side of her head, fingers tangled in her hair, and pounded her harder. He was pumping in and out of her with enough force that she knew she would be bruised in the morning, but she didn’t care. All her focus was on the rigid column of flesh that burned and created the most delicious friction inside of her. Her inner muscles clamped down and tried to hold him inside her with every fierce thrust, but he groaned and pulled out, only to come inside her and start it all over again.

  After interminable minutes, as drops of his sweat landed on her face, neck and chest and seemed to sear her skin, Augusta was lost to everything except for the desperate spiral of sensation coiling tighter and tighter inside of her. She couldn’t think beyond where her own sweat and heat merged with his, where their bodies met and joined. She panted as she strained toward the peak that was the culmination of every luscious surge of Nick’s body into hers. She was close.

  So close.

  There.

  There.

  There.

  Almost…

  There!

  She screamed.

  * * * * *

  Nick knew she was awake. He felt the subtle change in her breathing, then began to stroke her hair, occasionally sifting through the individual strands. She made a soft, almost purring sound of contentment as she shifted her entire body an inch here and an inch there, rubbing against him like a cat.

  Nick slowly, lingeringly stroked his hand down from her hair to her back to her lush bottom. He caressed it, squeezed it and made the return trek back to the silky mass of hair. He could’ve lain there forever, with her warm weight draped like a living blanket over one side of his body, her ear pressed just above his heart.

  “Are you still with me?”

  A sleepy “Hmm,” was his answer. Nick took that as an affirmative.

  “I’ve never screamed before,” she confessed in a whisper, sounding embarrassed.

  Nick couldn’t hold back the grin of pure masculine ego.

  “What brought on this…display of affection?”

  “Affection?” Her head rose to aim at frown at him. Then she pulled herself up on her elbows. “That’s a pretty tepid term for everything we did with each other,” she murmured, tilting her head to one side, spilling her mussed up hair over his chest, “to each other.”

  His eyes burned, and he knew she could feel him hardening and growing against her leg. Later, he told himself.

  “You never answered my question.”

  “What question?”

  “Augusta.” He very effectively infused the heat of warning into her name.

  Seductive playfulness was forgotten as she searched his eyes for a long time.

  “What do you want to hear?”

  “The truth.” Even if it killed him.

  Finally, she released a sigh laden with regret and settled back down.

  “I never realized that he loved her.”

  Nick reached down and tugged on the blanket, arranging it just in the middle of the back of the woman draped languidly over him once more. It gave him a moment to think, and to acknowledge to himself the reason for her urgency.

  “He never said anything, and close, thoughtful friend that I was, I never even suspected.”

  She swallowed hard. “This is like a Shakespearean tragedy. No, it’s a screwed up version of Midsummer Night’s Dream. Adam in love with Jana. And Jana still harboring feelings for Drew.”

  He waited for her to finish, but she didn’t. Instead, she asked, “What did the doctor say about Jana?”

  “Her face looks bad, but she won’t need reconstructive surgery.”

  “I can’t believe they broke her arm and cracked her ribs.” Her voice lowered to a bare whisper. “And her knee.”

  “She has some of the best doctors in New York working on her.”

  “She’s a fighter. She’ll pull through.” Her fingers curled and dug into his chest. “I think it was more painful watching Adam. I’ve never seen him like that.”

  His hand found the swell of her bottom and stayed there, warming her skin. “You had no idea of his feelings for her?”

  She made a low sound in her throat. He took it to be a negative response.

  “I thought the two of you were close.”

  “We are, or at least I thought we were. Adam and I were very close in the beginning, then Drew came into the picture, and I suppose Adam and I…drifted a bit. Then Drew and I got married, and Adam and I spent even less time together.”

  “It sounds like he kept everything pretty quiet.”

  “Adam’s a private person. He and I are very much alike in that way. It’s what drew us together in the first place.”

  “How did you two meet?”

  The tension that stiffened her entire frame was instant. She braced one hand on his chest, as if ready to flee. Nick splayed one hand against the bare skin of the small of her back and rubbed the narrow area between her shoulder blades with the other, hoping to soothe her away from her flight response. After a while, her body relaxed once more.

  “I met Adam when I was fifteen. That was about a year and a half after I moved to New York with my mother. I didn’t know anyone, so I used to do a lot of strolling
through Central Park on the weekends. That was the extent of my social life back then.”

  “You strolled through Central Park? Back then? Alone?”

  “Not at night. I was a teenager, not a complete idiot.”

  Nick bit back the retort that was on the tip of his tongue. He swallowed, hard. “Go on.”

  “For a few weeks, I noticed this serious, skinny kid sitting on the same bench every Saturday with a sketch pad in his lap. He was very protective of it, as if afraid someone would sneak a peek at his drawings and critique them. Then one Saturday, I snuck up behind him to see what he was always so busy doodling in that pad of his. And it was me. He was really embarrassed at first. I’ve never seen anyone turn so red so fast.” She laughed softly. Then her voice gentled as she continued. “It was a very good sketch. And the ones he had done previously were close to brilliant. He captures you at your most candid. Adam has real talent. But I wasn’t mature enough to be flattered by it, so I told him he had no right to draw me and that he had to fork over the sketch.” She swallowed, and he heard the thickness of emotion in the sound. “He got so flustered that I took pity on him.”