Your To Take - Connaghers 03 (14 page)

Cupping her cheek, Elias kissed her so tenderly her eyes
burned again. Tenderness from him—or her—was as rare as her phone calls to Mama
in the last few years.

Jesse sat up, a sheepish look on his face. He scooted away
and began to stand up, but she turned and reached for his hand. “Where are you
going?”

“It’s late. I ought to leave you two alone.”

“Not without a kiss goodnight.” Elias’s voice sounded
normal, but when she searched his face, she noted that his jaw was tight. “I
might be a mean son of a bitch, but I’m not cruel. We did a lot of tormenting
and play today. He’s going to need a little more from you than a peck on the
cheek.”

“Are you sure?”

“I need to see how I’m going to feel when I see you touching
him.” He ran his hand through his hair and ground his teeth. “I’ll be honest,
Vik. It’s going to be damned hard for me to watch. But we need to start
somewhere.”

Jesse slipped off the couch and moved over to kneel in front
of her. The sight of him waiting on his knees made her heart thud heavy and
hard. Her pulse jumped, her blood hot and sweet, rushing through her veins. The
light in his eyes was intoxicating. Touching him, even her fingers stroking his
cheeks, increased that feeling of rising desire.

She kissed him, trying to keep it fairly clean for Elias’s
sake. She didn’t want him to see her gobbling up another man, but the way Jesse
melted against her made her crazy. Boneless, he sank into her embrace, soft,
open and willing for anything she needed. All too quickly, she found herself
gripping his bottom lip in her teeth. She dug her fingers into his buttocks,
pressing him as close to her as possible.

Breaking the kiss, she dropped her head to his shoulder and
concentrated on breathing. Damn it, what had happened to her control? Her
desire to protect Elias as much as possible? Another few minutes and she would
have shoved her hands down Jesse’s jeans.

“Are you okay?” She didn’t dare lift her head to seek
Elias’s reaction. Jesse didn’t answer—he knew who she was asking.

“Yeah,” Elias replied in a graveled voice that made her
shiver. “I’ve never seen anyone go so limp and eager like that. It’s like he’s
giving you every single thing he’s got. His breath. His will. God, no wonder he
makes you so hot, Vik. He’s begging you to ravish him.” He must have leaned
close because his hot breath moistened her ear. “Show me some more.”

Elias had never thought of himself as a Peeping Tom, but he
couldn’t deny that he was rock-hard and throbbing at the sight of his woman
kissing another man. It wasn’t any man, though. If it were anyone but Jesse in
her arms, he’d probably be dead. The kid wasn’t a threat to him. Vicki wanted
him, but she gave Elias no doubts about how much she wanted him too.

She released Jesse’s ass to jerk his T-shirt over his head.
Using the soft cotton, she tied his hands together in the small of his back.
She’d been feeding him well, because he wasn’t as painfully thin as when she’d
first taken him in. “What do you want?”

“Rough me up a little,” he gasped. “Pull my hair or bite me.
God, I’d love it if you’d bite me hard enough to bruise.”

She wound her fingers in his hair and gave his head an experimental
jerk. “Like that?”

“Harder. Force me to bend to your will.”

Elias made himself hold his breath for a count of ten and
then let it out slowly. Damned if he was going to embarrass himself by
hyperventilating…or coming in his pants like a pimply-faced teenager.

She pulled Jesse’s head back, forcing him to arch his neck
and upper body away from her. She had strong hands, so Elias knew she was
pulling hard, giving him what he’d asked for. With her other hand, she began
unbuttoning Jesse’s jeans. His breathing was loud, rasping through his strained
throat.

“Make me wait,” he ground out. “Don’t let me come without
your permission.”

“Okay.” She twisted her fingers tighter in his hair and
pressed her mouth to his neck.

By the way he jerked and groaned, she wasn’t kissing him.
There was a reason Elias joked that she was like a shark or a crocodile—she’d
always loved biting, and the neck and shoulder were her favorite targets. She
ran her mouth down Jesse’s neck to his shoulder, leaving bites as she went, harder,
really working the underlying muscle. He moaned louder, his breath panting, his
skin a sheen of sweat.

Finally, she got his jeans unbuttoned. His shoulders
bunched, tendons standing out in his neck.

“Not yet.” She let out a husky laugh, tracing his ear with
her tongue. “You said to make you wait.”

“I’m going to die.”

“Good,” she purred. “Elias loves it when I do this to him.”

“The hell I do.” He did, though, and she loved it too,
because he gave as good as he got. “Why don’t you dig those claws into him?
He’ll really like that.”

She cupped Jesse’s balls, using her nails to grip that
fragile skin. His eyes fluttered shut. Completely surrendered to her, his body
hummed and vibrated like a delicate instrument in her hands. It was all Elias
could do not to jerk open his own pants. Then she could have a cock in each
hand. Maybe even have a contest over who could last the longest when she
started using her mouth.

Christ, all the blood must have leaked out of my skull
for me to even think about such a thing.

Shifting around to Jesse’s side so he was between them,
Vicki stared over his shoulder at Elias. Her eyes were dark, gleaming pools of
need. She tightened her hands, drawing a louder cry from Jesse. Defenseless,
eager, softly pained male, it was a sound that Elias never thought he’d hear,
let alone one that would turn him on. But it did. Because the woman he loved
had drawn out that sound from the other man’s throat.

Still holding his gaze, she bit Jesse’s left shoulder,
gripping the top muscle in her teeth firmly like a pit bull. He arched in a
trembling, straining bow, his cock rising hard and desperate to rub against
her, but she only bit him harder. “Please!”

She released him enough to speak. “Say my name.”

He shuddered, as though she’d told him to stick his finger
in a light socket. “I can’t. I’ll come, I swear it.”

“Then come.” She jerked his head to the side and sank her
teeth into his straining neck.

“Vicki.” Just a whisper that Elias barely heard, but Jesse’s
body erupted, shaking and twisting in her arms. She held him firmly, unwavering
in her strength, and it was so damned moving that Elias couldn’t look away.

He could imagine exactly how desperate and wretched Jesse’s
life must have been on the street. How many times had someone hurt, used and
then discarded him? When had anyone cared about his welfare? Had he been able
to trust anyone at all to take care of him?

Yet nothing but absolute trust and love gleamed in his eyes
when he looked at Vicki. She deserved that trust and that love. Her strength would
never falter.

Unlike mine.
Shame pierced Elias to the core. He’d
abandoned her when she’d needed him the most. He hadn’t held her like this when
she’d been alone.
I failed her.

Trembling in the aftermath, Jesse sagged against her. She
held him, smoothing her hands over his chest, shoulders, and arms. She kissed
the marks she’d left in his throat and whispered something in his ear that made
him smile, a slow, heavy-lidded sensual curve of his lips.

Fed by his own guilt, Elias’s jealousy suddenly hit the flash
point. His stomach churned like he’d eaten nothing but her killer chili for
days. Nothing could change his mistakes or roll back the past. If part of his
atonement meant he had to share her with another man, then by God he’d swallow
his pride and let her have him.

How am I going to keep my sanity when she decides to fuck
him for real?

After she jerked the makeshift cotton bindings off his
wrists, Jesse pulled up his jeans and stood. He cleared his throat, shifting
his feet, and finally muttered, “Good night”, in Elias’s direction. All he
could manage was a curt nod, but that seemed to satisfy the kid.

Unable to meet his gaze, she leaned back against him. He
wrapped his arms around her and she whirled around to burrow deep into his
embrace. “Sorry. I know that had to be hard.”

He didn’t say anything, but he couldn’t help the involuntary
spasm of his arms, clutching her tighter as though he could rip her away from
the other man entirely. To reassure her, he kissed the top of her head.

“I know we’ve talked about the possibilities, but the
reality is going to be difficult, embarrassing and emotional. For all of us. I
don’t want to hurt you, Elias.”

“I’m all right, babe.” So why did his voice sound like he’d
swallowed broken glass? He forced himself to continue without clearing his
throat like a hapless fool. “It was actually rather hot. You know I love your
passion.”

She pulled back enough to look into his eyes. He tried to
smile, but it was lopsided and he could only hope agony didn’t glint in his
eyes like tears. “What can I do to make it up to you?”

“That’s easy.” He nuzzled her neck, sliding his hand down to
knead her ass. “I’m as cheap as a two-dollar whore when it comes to you.”

Solemnly, she stood and turned to face him, refusing—or
unable—to joke and help him push his emotion away. Holding his gaze, she
undressed, not making it a show at all, but a slow, deliberate gift. She looked
at him with those dark eyes, so deep and naked with longing for things he
didn’t know he could give her let alone voice. Had he ever told her that he
loved her, really loved her? How could he admit that part of him wanted to
murder Jesse, even though he knew that would hurt her?

She slid onto his lap, unbuttoned his shirt and pushed it
off, running her hands over him lovingly as she’d done to the kid just a few
minutes ago. No matter his turmoil, his erection hadn’t faded at all. She took
him into her body but it was different. She moved slowly, giving instead of
taking, staring endlessly into his eyes, and she was too damned beautiful to
bear.

She was tying him in knots and ripping open scabs from
wounds he didn’t even know he possessed. “What are you doing to me, babe?”

“Loving you.” She cupped his face in her hands and pressed
soft, gentle kisses over his face. Angel’s wings. “What are you doing to me?”

“Loving you.” He clutched her, his grip too hard and
painful, but he couldn’t help it. He found her ear and whispered raggedly, “I
do. Always have.”

“I know.”

Yet shame choked him. She deserved all the words, his heart
laid bare. She deserved a ring on her finger, his name, every goddamned thing
he possessed. Why did he hold back and reserve judgment, protecting himself
with that cold, rigid logic that swore she couldn’t handle him or his job?

Despite his turmoil, he couldn’t hold back his lust. Desire
roared through him, consuming him. In seconds, he climaxed, too quickly for
her. Shuddering like Jesse had moaned in her arms, he tried to calm his
breathing and find his mental faculties again, but all he could do was clutch
her. “I don’t want to lose you.”

“You’re not losing me, Elias. Look at me.” She pulled his
face up and the stern, strong woman who’d marched into courtrooms for battle
glared down into his eyes. “You’re not losing me. I love you more than ever.”

“But I left you. I was out of the picture, as Mama put it so
elegantly. I screwed up, babe.”

She tucked his face against her breasts and ran those
strong, powerful fingers down the back of his skull, kneading his neck gently
to help ease the tension vibrating his body. “You’re back now. Just don’t leave
me again.”

Chapter Fifteen

The silence in the truck was deafening, but Jesse didn’t
feel inclined to talk. Trapped in a vehicle with Vicki’s other man in rush-hour
traffic—it had to be a new circle of hell.
Let him break the ice. See if he
has anything nice to say for once.

“Here’s the deal.” Elias finally spoke but didn’t glance
away from the bumper-to-bumper traffic. “Rodgers is a big-mouthed braggart who
thinks he has the biggest dick on the squad. He’s been giving everybody a bad
time, but especially Colby because he’s the youngest detective in our division.
We’re hoping to teach him a lesson tonight that’ll convince him to back off
before one of us busts his mouth.”

“So you’re going to let him think he’s the greatest card
shark in Dallas until he’s in deep and then take him for everything but the
shirt on his back.”

“No.” Elias spared a quick glance at Jesse, his mouth
quirked with a dark glint in his eyes. “I want his shirt too. This asshole has
been riding my partner hard, and Colby’s taken everything Rodgers dished
without complaint. But enough is enough. That’s where you come in.”

“You want me to help you play him, get him to bet larger.”

“If Colby or I start winning, then he’ll know he’s being
played and he’ll jump ship before we can teach him a lesson. He doesn’t know
you. Nobody on the force knows you. If you play some cat and mouse with him,
really get him to playing along and betting heavier, he’ll never see it
coming.”

Jesse turned his head and stared unseeing out the window. “I
can do that, sure. Just pretend you don’t know me. I’m assuming you can spot me
enough cash to lure him into heavier betting?”

“I’ve got you covered. Besides, it’ll be pretty obvious I
know you since I’m bringing you to the game. I’ll just say you’re Vicki’s
friend.”

Friend.
That word burned a hole in Jesse’s heart.

Elias drove in silence a few minutes. When he started to
speak again, he had to clear his throat. “Look, Rodgers is a real ass. I can’t
vouch for his manners, if you know what I mean.”

The cop almost managed to be magnanimous. Jesse grinned at
him. “Watch out, Detective Reyes, I might start to think you care about what
happens to me.”

Elias snorted. “Vicki’ll kick my ass if I let anything
happen to you.”

When they walked up to a dingy, tiny apartment, Jesse had no
idea it was Elias’s until he used his key to open the door. Inside wasn’t much
better, just more beige. No pictures on the wall or any color softened the
room. The only bright spot was a picture of him with Vicki. Elias was decked
out in his dress uniform, and Vicki wore a gorgeous but simple black dress. The
smile on her face warmed the room as much it touched Jesse’s heart.

“Pretty shitty, I know.” Elias tossed his keys on the
counter and jerked his head toward the table in the corner where he’d set up
the game. “That picture’s from the Policeman’s Ball two years ago. I didn’t go
last year.”

His last partner’s death hung in the silence. For some
reason, Jesse felt compelled to say something in her defense. “She cried that
day. She kept asking herself over and over what she’d do if that’d been you.”

Elias let out a noncommittal grunt, gruff and brash as
usual, but Jesse noted the man kept his back to him as he pulled beers out of
the fridge.

“If anything ever happened to you, she’d be devastated,”
Jesse added softly. “But she’s proud of what you do.”

Elias was saved from having to answer by the doorbell. Colby
walked in with another man, but it was clear from their body language that they
were far from friends. Rodgers was a meaty, balding man with the reddish nose
and cheeks of a hard-core alcoholic. He set those bloodshot eyes on Jesse and
guffawed. “I never thought you’d find a more useless excuse for a man than Wade
here, but I do believe you’ve achieved the impossible. Who’s this little cream
puff?”

“Jesse, meet Detective Frank Rodgers. Frank, this is Jesse
Inglemarre, a friend of Vicki’s.”

Rodgers took a seat directly across from Jesse and helped
himself to a beer. “You marry that broad yet? Wait, I know that answer. By the
looks of this dump, you haven’t.”

Colby smiled, just a good-old boy innocent grin that didn’t
fool Jesse one minute. This man had killed in the line of duty and burned to do
it again. “Isn’t that why we’re not at your place, Frank?”

Rodgers harrumphed beneath his breath. “Are you going to
hand over this month’s pay to me or what?”

As they started playing, Jesse concentrated on simply
watching, quiet and unassuming. Elias and Colby joked about people at work and
their various cases, but Rodgers had nothing positive to say whatsoever. For
the first three hands, no one even spoke to Jesse. However, he didn’t miss the surreptitious
looks from Rodgers, slow and reluctant, as though he hated looking but couldn’t
help himself.

With each look, the man’s eyes burned darker with ugly
emotion, and Jesse felt himself shrinking moment by moment, hiding, trying to
disappear as he’d done on the streets. Lost, dirty, weak, feelings he’d thought
he’d left outside of Vicki’s home.

Unfortunately, he knew this sort of man all too well.

Rodgers was the kind of man who’d beat the crap of out
him…while raping him.

Never again.
He closed his eyes and took a deep
breath, held it, and then relaxed it slow and easy. He already knew he could
survive just about anything, but this time, he had friends. No one was going to
hurt him. As Elias had said earlier, Vicki would tear a new hole for anyone who
even thought about it.
I don’t have to take anyone’s shit anymore simply to
survive.

Just thinking about the way her eyes would spark, her body
tight and controlled as she stomped over to plow her fist into Rodgers’s meaty
gut made Jesse smile.

He caught Rodgers’s glance again. The man didn’t like that
smile for all the wrong reasons. So Jesse smiled more. He deliberately made his
bottom lip pouty. Thinking about Vicki, he let his eyes smolder.
Just let
this asshole try something.

The more he smiled, the heavier Rodgers bet. And the more he
lost.

When Elias’s phone rang, he called a pause to the game so he
could take the work call in the other room. Jesse took the opportunity to slip
into the dark galley kitchen. Breathing rapidly, he rested his head against the
fridge and concentrated on deepening each breath. He almost felt high, his
brain buzzing, his muscles so loose he didn’t know if he could stand for long.

He wanted to laugh. He wanted to call Vicki right now and
tell her how afraid he’d been, but how she’d helped him get over it without
even being here.

The memory of her scent washed over him, hot and spicy, her
hands strong as she held him, her reluctant passion that blasted them both. She
made him feel confident, powerful in a way he’d never known before. She gave
him the safety to ask for exactly what he wanted and needed, without fear or
shame.

How could he ever be afraid again?

A hard hand seized his shoulder and whirled him around.
Rodgers loomed over him, trapping him in the dark shadowed corner, his breath
sour with beer. “Exactly who are you, boy?”

His life on the streets flashed through his mind. Trapped in
a dark alley, hard hands forcing him to his knees, the reek of fear and rotting
trash and old whiskey in his nose. The sick pit in his stomach as a stranger
jerked open his pants and grabbed his head.

Instead of fear, rage bubbled up inside him. He shoved
Rodgers hard enough the man reeled and cracked his head on the cabinet behind
him. “Don’t touch me!”

Deadly fury twisted Rodgers’s face.

Time slowed. Jesse saw the fist coming, but fear didn’t
cripple him. He ducked enough that the meaty fist only grazed his mouth, while
he jerked his knee up into the cop’s crotch. It might be a girly move, but
nothing disabled a man faster than a hard knee to the family jewels.

Rodgers let out a guttural roar. His face blazed red, his
fists ready to pound Jesse into a pulp, but for once in his life, he didn’t
back down. He even managed to smile at the man despite his sore lip,
deliberately emphasizing his dimples. “Come at me again, you son of a bitch,
and I’ll—”

Suddenly Elias slipped in front of him so fast that one
minute Jesse was glaring at the belligerent cop and the next he could only see
Elias’s broad back. He lunged and Rodgers crashed against the table. Chips
clattered to the floor. “What the fuck is going on in here?”

Rage pulsed in Elias so thick and dark he couldn’t breathe.
He’d neglected to protect an innocent person, let alone a friend, in his own
home. Worse, he was the one who’d brought Jesse into harm’s way. He’d known
exactly what sort of asshole Rodgers could be. Anyone stupid enough to hassle
Colby—a former Marine with combat experience—would chew Jesse up and spit him
out.

“Hey!” Jesse tugged on his arm, trying to pull him away from
the other cop. “I don’t need your help.”

Elias turned enough to look into Jesse’s face and his blood
ran cold. “You’re hurt. That son of a bitch hit you!” Whirling around, he
seized a handful of Rodgers’s shirt and jerked him up on his toes, shoving his
face down toward the other man’s. “How dare you come into my house and put your
hands on my guest?”

“The fucking pansy came on to me!”

Jesse surged forward, fists clenched at his sides. Now it
was Colby’s turn to hold him back. “That’s a lie!”

“He was flirting with me! You both saw it, unless you’re as
blind as a bat.”

“So that explains it,” Colby drawled.

“What?” Rodgers retorted.

“Why you lost so much.” Colby winked at Elias and gave Jesse
a friendly slug on the arm. “You were too busy making eyes at our good-looking
friend to pay attention to your cards.”

Reining his temper back was like holding on to a snarling
rabid pit bull with a single strand of thread, but Elias forced out a hard
laugh. He eased back on the intimidation factor and released Rodgers. “I can’t
wait to tell the boys downtown. We finally know Frank’s weakness.”

Rodgers flushed so dark that his cheeks were a vivid purple.
“Not a word, Reyes, or you’ll both regret it.”

Elias burned to simply snarl and bite a hunk out of the
bastard. “Everybody knows you’re just driving a desk until you can take your
pension. Don’t fuck it up by pissing in my territory again, Frank. You leave my
friends alone, whether we’re on the job or not.”

“This little—”

Elias could see the slur forming in the man’s eyes. Before
he could say it, Elias stepped back into the man’s space, chin jutting, fist
aching to slam into the man’s mouth to shut him for good. “Don’t even think
about it, Frank.”

“I’ve got pull with the lieutenant. I can get you thrown
back on a beat over in Fort Worth with a snap of my fingers.”

So much for his plans to keep this away from office politics
as much as possible. It was all Elias could do not to drag his fingers through
his hair and curse. He shouldn’t have put Jesse in harm’s way. Then he’d
compounded that mistake by losing his temper and putting his hands on Rodgers.

Son of a bitch. I fucked myself into a corner.

“Oh, now, detectives, we don’t have to get nasty, do we?”
Jesse drawled in a buttery purr that made Elias’s eyebrows rise. With a coy
little pout, he sidled up to Rodgers and playfully walked his fingers down the
man’s chest. “You like it rough, huh? How many times has someone noted that you
roughed up a witness, just a little? I bet they’ll all believe me when I admit
that you bloodied my mouth before trying to force me into sucking you off.”

Rodgers sagged against the wall. “Never. They’d never
believe it.”

“He has witnesses.” Colby looked over at Elias. “Don’t you
have a camera handy so we can take a picture of the evidence?”

“You didn’t see a thing!”

“It was so dark in that kitchen,” Colby replied, his voice
going hard and mean. He’d been chomping at the bit to get back at Rodgers for
too long. He sure wasn’t missing out on his chance now. “I’m not sure what all
I saw but it won’t look good for you.”

Elias could see through Rodgers’s bluster. His eyes darted
toward the door and sweat poured down his meaty face. If the bastard didn’t get
his blood pressure calmed down, he’d probably have a coronary before he got
home.

All he wants to do is get out of here and forget it ever
happened.

“I’ll tell you what,” Jesse said in an even, calm voice that
still echoed with an undercurrent of power. Elias had to do a double take,
because he’d never heard the kid talk in such a confident, nearly aggressive
way. “You lay off
my
friends, and I’ll forget about getting backed into
a dark corner in the kitchen. Deal?”

Rodgers straightened and ran a hand over his balding head to
smooth back his comb-over. He studiously avoided meeting any of their gazes as
he headed for the door and walked out.

“And
I
was never here,” Colby said in a dramatic
voice, breaking the ice.

Laughing, Elias started to clear off the table. The other
two men helped in companionable silence. A new sense of equal footing echoed
between them. Jesse had managed to surprise him yet again, confidently dealing
with Rodgers’s violence and hatred without falling apart. He must have seen a
lot of crap like that on the street. Yet he’d managed to clean himself up and
had stayed drug free. He’d gotten his life back on track. Yes, Vicki had
provided the opportunity, but Jesse was doing the work himself. He’d even
managed to help Elias out of the nightmare he’d created by losing his temper.

“Hey, thanks,” Jesse said quietly once Colby had moved into
the kitchen.

“For what?”
Bringing you here to deal with an asshole and
getting your lip busted open?