Anybody breaking in here would expect some kind of elaborate security system, all the while wasting time looking for it. Gives me time to counter.” Another one of those debilitating smiles overwhelmed her features, and he couldn’t help but smile back. Sullivan flipped one of the many burner cell phones he’d unearthed from the desk over in his hand. The sensation of lightness disappeared, however, the longer he studied her. Eyes narrowing, he tried justifying the last few hours since she’d broken into his office. Why him? Why now? “What are you doing here, Jane?”
A small burst of laughter escaped from between those rosy lips. She motioned toward the front door. “Well, I couldn’t very well leave you here alone after—”
“No.” Sullivan closed in on her, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end. “I mean why did you break into my office tonight? You had other options. Any number of bodyguards or private investigators in Anchorage would’ve jumped to help you for the right price. After all, you were ready to offer me anything.” He halted no more than a foot from her, reading those deep hazel eyes for any sign of hesitation. “Why come to me?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” She tried backing away but hit the wall beside the front door. “I had dirt on you and your family, and I knew I could use it to force you to help me. Saved myself a hell of a lot of money in the process.”
Heat prickled under Sullivan’s skin, crawling up his neck and warming his face. Only Jane crossed her arms across her chest and the strong pulse at the base of her neck beat unevenly. She didn’t believe a word she was saying. And, thinking about it now, she’d only pulled the blackmail card when he’d refused to help her the first two times she’d asked. “You’re lying.”
Color left her features, a telling reaction he’d noted back in his office. Jane curled her fingers into the palms of her hands, stance wide as though she intended to run straight out the front door. Nervousness? Embarrassment? Difficult to tell when she wiped any kind of emotion from her features so fast.
“What do you want from me?” He stalked toward her. No. She wasn’t going to hide behind that hardened exterior this time.
“I guess after what happened on the road, you deserve the truth. It seems stupid now, but I didn’t have anyone else I could trust.” She licked her bottom lip, but Sullivan refused to let the motion distract him this time. Answers. That was all he wanted. He’d risked his life—twice—for her. Now he needed to know why she’d pulled him into this mess. She cocked her head to the side. “I came to you because I saw how protective and dedicated you were to Marrok during his trial. And after I uncovered that photo in my phone yesterday, I needed a little bit of that in my life.” Raising that beautiful gaze to his, she let her shoulders deflate and she exhaled hard. “I needed you.”
* * *
“I NEED TO brief my team.” His gravelly voice played havoc with her insides, but Sullivan turned away from her, phone in hand. Refused to even look at her.
Every nerve in Jane’s body caught fire. That was all he had to say? Watching him, she noted the strain around his eyes, the slightly haggard expression on his features as he spoke into the phone in whispered, clipped responses. She was used to it. In their line of work, she’d learned anybody could be listening in. Phone taps, parabolic mics. Without an idea of who her stalker was, why they’d come after her or what resources they had access to, she and Sullivan couldn’t afford to be careless.
She headed into the kitchen. When had she eaten last? Her stomach rumbled. Too long ago. Sullivan turned toward her at the sound. The weight of his gaze slid across her sternum. Head down, she focused on her hunt for anything edible in this place. No luck. He obviously didn’t stay here often. The walls were bare, the counters covered in dust. She ran her fingers over the cream granite, but ripped her hand away at the low temperature.
“I sent my forensic investigator, Vincent, to your place with some backup.” Sullivan tossed the cell phone he’d been using onto the granite. Exhaustion played across his features, darkening the circles under his eyes. He hadn’t gotten much sleep after nearly dying. Neither of them had, but Jane was too wound up and too anxious to figure this mess out. “If your stalker has been there, Vincent will find the evidence and call me back. Could be an hour, could be tomorrow. Just depends.”
“Okay. What do we do until then?” She couldn’t sit around waiting for some maniac to make the next move. There had to be something in her case files, something in her work for the army that could point them in the right direction to an ID of who’d T-boned them back at the bridge.
“We dig into your cases.” Sullivan slid onto the bar stool on the other side of the granite countertop as though using it as a barrier between them. Probably a good idea. Because those heated, confusing minutes of them under the blanket in front of the fire together hadn’t exactly gone as Jane had expected. His skin had pressed against hers from chest to toes, his very prominent arousal at her lower back, and the way he’d feathered his fingertips over her shoulder... Jane swallowed back the memories. His touch had felt good, real. Then again, she’d lived the past few months as a hermit and wouldn’t know the difference between her own arousal and the simple need for human contact. Jane shivered. No. That wasn’t it. She’d recognized the difference. She just hadn’t felt that kind of drowning heat in a long time. Her insides burned to close the distance between them for another passing glimpse of it, however fleeting.
But Sullivan’s reaction had been simple biology. There’d been a naked woman pressed against him and his body had responded. He didn’t want her. Because no matter how many heated moments they shared, how many times they laughed together or how long they talked, Sullivan blamed her for his brother’s suicide. Plain and simple.
“I’m already having the files brought from your town house by another operative on my team,” he said.
Pressure built behind her sternum. Sullivan might not use all of his training from his military days for Blackhawk Security, but from what she’d read of him, he never missed a clue. She cleared her throat, stuffing her hands into her sweatshirt pockets. “Good idea. I’ve already gone through most of them, but another set of eyes might uncover something I missed.”
Jane’s stomach growled again.
“You need to eat and rest before Elliot gets here with the files.” Sullivan stood, his wide shoulders blocking her view of the living room and the fire popping and cracking in the fireplace. Muscles flexed across his chest and arms, and Jane swallowed the rush of saliva filling her mouth. “I don’t come up here often so I’m sorry to say there’s nothing more than a few MREs lying around, but there should be enough in the duffel bags we brought to last us three days.” He searched the living room. “Where did you put the bags after I tried to kill myself out there? I’ll make us something to eat.”
Jane’s responding smile to his willingness to feed her disappeared. Exhaling, she ran her hand through her hair. Crap. “I left them outside. I wasn’t thinking after I pulled you in—”
“Don’t worry about it.” He stepped right into her, that massive chest of his brushing against her. Staring down at her, Sullivan bent at the knees to look her right in the eye, his hands posed above her arms as though he didn’t dare touch her. And she didn’t blame him. The difference in height between them was laughable, but she appreciated the even ground now. His hands rested around her upper arms. Her insides flipped as his body heat spread through her, but she didn’t pull away. “You had your priorities straight. You saved my life. I’ll get them. About how far did you drop them?”
Good. He’d just go get them. Her breathing eased the longer he kept his grip on her, but it took a few seconds to clear her head of his proximity enough to answer. “Beyond the tree line. I don’t think it snowed enough to cover my tracks. You should be able to follow them to the bags.”
“All right. And when I get back, we’ll call Anchorage PD to have them put an APB out for that tow truck.” He dropped his hold on her, spinning toward his discarded gear drying over the fireplace. A shiver rushed through her, but Jane held her ground as Sullivan donned his shoulder holster and thick