Undercover Mistress

She looked at him over her shoulder, rolling her eyes in an as if kind of way. “That is so TV sitcom, don’t you think?”

She went out, leaving Roy with silent laughter bumping against the sore places that still lurked through his insides.

Sweet, sexy or siren, he thought, the woman did know how to stir a man’s juices and kindle fires where, by rights, there oughtn’t to have been any fuel left to burn. While he still felt that lightness, that sense of well-being he’d woken up with, now he wondered how much of it was due to the fact that he’d fought a bare-knuckle brawl with death and won, and how much to the predictable effect a sexy and beautiful woman had on him.

One thing he did know. He’d lost-and was continuing to lose-precious time.

I have to call Max.

He was combing the room with his eyes for some evidence of a phone and trying to assess the odds he’d keel over if he got up to look for one when Celia came back.

“I found some sweats,” she announced as she sailed into the room, trailing articles of clothing from both arms like a department store sales clerk. “They’re going to be short on you, I’m sure. I don’t care if you cut them off, so you don’t go around looking like Alice in Wonderland after she nibbled the wrong cookie.” She broke off, no doubt having noticed the fact that he was sitting upright and tense, with a frustrated light in his eyes. “What is it? Is something-”

Then, evidently sure she knew the answer: “Oh-duh. You need to use the bathroom-right. Do you need me to help you?”

Roy winced. “Lady, do you have any idea what it does to a grown man’s pride to be asked that kind of question by a beautiful woman? Makes me feel about two years old.”

“Sorry,” she said, unrepentant, this time letting the compliment slip by as if it were no more than her due. She handed him the sweats. They were baby blue, with UCLA embroidered across the shirt in yellow script. “Here you are, then. If you need me for anything, holler.” She turned on her heel and headed for the door.

Damn. “Wait-” So much for his masculine pride.

She pivoted back to him, eyebrows spiked up in a way he knew good and well was mocking him. “Yes?”

Reminding himself-again-that she had, after all, saved his life, he said grudgingly, “There is one thing you can do for me.”

Something flared in her eyes, not long enough for him to figure out the subtle differences between gladness and triumph. “Sure. What do you need?”

He was thinking how it would be if he were himself, a healthy man, red-blooded and strong, sitting in bed watching a woman such as this come toward him with a smile lurking and eagerness in her eyes… His voice deepened and his smile came, naturally as breathing. “I sure could use a phone, ma’am.”

“Oh-sure. I’ll bring you the cordless.”

Quickly, before she could turn away again, he added-only a little grudgingly, “Before you do that…if you wouldn’t mind waiting until I get my pants on, I guess I could use a little help getting to that bathroom.”

Again he caught that brief but unmistakable spark in her eyes, but she was either too good at shielding herself or too good an actress to let him know exactly what she was thinking.

“No problem,” she murmured, hiding the light behind demurely lowered lashes. “Call me when you’re ready.”

Once again, he watched her walk away from him, feeling too frustrated to laugh, too weak to swear.

The truth was, beautiful though she may have been, she wasn’t the kind of woman he’d normally have any interest in. Roy liked his women simple-not meaning lacking in intelligence, but in the sense of uncomplicated. He liked them warm and funny and accommodating and encumbered with a minimum amount of emotional baggage. He might be called shallow because of that, but he got plenty of intrigue and mental stimulation, and more than enough complications and challenges, in his line of work. When it came to women, what he wanted was recreation. He wanted to relax and enjoy himself-and them-which was not something he could ever see himself doing with a woman like Celia Cross. Getting involved with her, he had a feeling, would be like one big long sword fight-whether that meant the delicate thrust and parry of a fencing match or an all-out duel to the death, like in those old Hollywood swashbucklers.

No thanks-not for him. It made a shiver go down his spine just thinking about it.

Reasonably assured Celia wasn’t going to pop back in on him to see how he was getting along, Roy shoved the damp bedding away and eased his legs over the side of the mattress. Oof- still weak…still woozy. He waited until the worst of the dizziness had passed before tackling the sweat pants. If anybody had ever tried to tell him how complicated a job it was to put on a pair of pants one leg at a time, he’d have thought they were nuts.

By the time he was on his feet and more or less upright, there was a howling wind blowing through his ears and a hollow drumming in his belly, and it was all he could do to summon the strength to croak, “Ready.”

She must have been waiting outside the door for his call, because it seemed to him she was there in less than an instant. The muffled, “Thanks,” he mumbled when he felt her arm come around his waist was both humble and sincere.

He was grateful, too, for the strong shoulder she tucked in under his arm and acutely aware of the feminine shape of her snugged up against his uninjured side. She was a good height for him, he noted; not an Amazon, by any means, but tall enough, sturdy enough to be a real help to him. And at the same time, soft where a woman ought to be. An observation…nothing more.

She turned her head toward him, her hair sliding across his arm like silk, and his skin shivered and his nipples hardened. “No problem,” she said. “Just take it slow…”

“Is this how Nurse Suzanne does it?”

She gave that the answer it deserved-a short, mirthless laugh.

She guided him into the bathroom and left him holding on to the cold porcelain sink as if his life-or, at the very least, his dignity-depended on it. He waited until he heard the door close behind her before he lifted his head and confronted his image in the mirror. It was a good thing he’d waited, because what he saw hit him like a fist to the belly.

No wonder she’s not impressed with your looks and charm.

He tried to make light of it, but the truth was, the gaunt, bearded and battered stranger looking back at him from the mirror shocked the hell out of him. His eyes stared at him from blackened sockets like wild creatures lurking in caves, and his nose was a different shape than it had been before. What it was, he realized, was his own mortality in the flesh, and he was feeling chastened and thoughtful as he attended to his most pressing need.

Back at the sink, he splashed his face with cold water, but while he was patting his dripping jaws dry with an embroidered hand towel, he studied the reflection of the tiled stall shower behind him with longing. Inevitably, as his various aches and pains diminished, he was becoming aware of secondary discomforts-the itch of sand, the sting of salt, the stickiness of blood. He knew he probably wasn’t supposed to, given the bandages, the bullet wound, and all, but…

What the hell, he thought, and turned on the water.

He showered with his hands braced against the tile walls, letting the water sluice unimpeded over his bowed head…his upturned face…his aching body, bandages and all. Eyes closed…mouth open…teeth clenched in a grimace of overwhelming emotion…he let the water run and run, the pleasure of that simple thing so intense he wanted to cry.

Afterward, he crawled out of the shower and felt his way to the towels, bent over like an old, old man. He had to sit on the commode to dry and dress himself, but it had been worth it.

He pulled himself up and made his way slowly to the door; when he opened it, he found Celia there, gazing at him with luminous, unreadable eyes.

She looked at him for a long time without saying anything, and he looked back at her and didn’t say anything, either. He wished he was better at reading her, because there were several times when it seemed to him she was on the verge of saying something…well, hell, he didn’t know what he thought she was going to say, but something that was probably going to change his opinion of her for the better, put it that way.

Then she did speak, and instead of something sweet and nice, it was in her usual way-smart, cool, edgy. “You