He nodded.
She took a few moments to process what he’d said, then skewered him with a quizzical glare. “But there are hundreds if not thousands of graphic designers working in television in this city. Why’d you pick me?”
“I didn’t pick you, the Agency did.”
She drew a quivering hand to her stomach. “Why? How did I come to the attention of the government?”
He closed his eyes, then rattled off the name of the documentary that had aired on Animal Planet, the one the task force had intercepted.
“I designed the opening and closing credits.”
“Yes, you did.”
“Tell me there wasn’t a hidden message in there.”
He pressed his lips together tightly.
She jumped to her feet. “Oh, God! Roman, please, I swear, I didn’t put any message for anyone in my graphics. I would never-”
With no reason not to, Roman reached out and took her by the elbows of her outstretched arms. “We know, Rachel. Someone else imbedded the message after you turned in your work. We found your original files, untouched. But those that aired were a different story. We’re still checking into who had access to your work, but first we had to investigate you. It was the first logical step.”
Despite how soft her skin felt against his palms, when she tugged to be free, he let her go.
“So that’s why you were at the network. Ours wasn’t a chance meeting.”
“No.”
“Were you sent to seduce me? To find out the truth over pillow talk?”
He closed his eyes and shook his head. The scenario sounded like something out of a spy flick or romantic suspense novel, but the truth wasn’t anything so dark and glamorous. He and all the other male operatives at the Agency only dreamed of such choice assignments.
“We don’t work that way, Rachel. I was only supposed to get to know you, check out your apartment, your friends, your computer. How I accomplished that task was entirely up to me.”
She jammed her fists on her hips. “You could have pretended to be anyone. A friend. A gay friend,” she offered, her voice lilting upward as if the idea sounded promising. “You didn’t have to sneak into my bed.”
Roman’s lips quirked into a grin. “Our first time wasn’t in a bed and, Rachel, I didn’t have to sneak.”
Yes, he’d been dishonest with her about who he was and why he’d sought her out-but he’d never uttered one mistruth about wanting her so much that his skin seared with need when she so much as glanced in his direction. The desire he’d felt for her had been instantaneous, incendiary and instinctive. The choices he’d made had been based on the primal part of him that had never been awakened-not to that degree-before Rachel.
He figured at first it was intense chemistry. Pheromones gone wild. But the more time he spent with her, the more times he heard her laughter pealing through her apartment or watched her chew her bottom lip as she furiously manipulated the graphic images on her computer screen, the deeper he fell. Every word out of his mouth had been a lie-except when he told her how much he wanted her-just as powerfully then as he wanted her right now.
And the sheepishly sexy grin on her face didn’t deter him one bit. “I guess I was pretty hot for you.”
He allowed a smile to lighten the mood even further, and he couldn’t help but tug at the insides of his pockets to lessen the tightening of material across his groin. “The feeling was mutual.”
“Is that why you stuck around, kept in touch with me, even after I left that job?”
He nodded. “I’ve been at two networks since then, investigating various design departments and independent contractors. My attention should have been one hundred percent on the case, but I couldn’t seem to get you out of my head.”
She stepped aside, clearly uncomfortable with the turn in their conversation.
“You checked out my friends?”
“Mario, Iris, your ever-absent roommate, your mother, your sisters and all the men they’ve dated, which is a rather impressive list.”
She smirked. “They’ll be thrilled to know you approve.”
“They can’t know anything, Rachel. Everything I’ve told you has to be in complete confidence. My job is already on the line because my cover has been blown. That shooting the other morning was the work of the terrorist group who wants to make sure the cell they’ve implanted in the U.S. gets the messages they’re sending.”
A chill of icy fear must have sliced through her bloodstream from the way she visibly shivered. Good. She needed to be afraid. Fear would keep her safe-and away from him.
“What will happen if you don’t stop this cell?”
He looked away, unwilling to impart on Rachel just how dire the circumstances were. The information he possessed could cause a national panic, or even worse, national paralysis. He wanted her safe, but he didn’t want her holing up in some desert bunker, afraid to walk outside. Afraid to breathe. Afraid to live.
“You don’t want to know. The bottom line is that the Agency has known for months that your work is legit. You’re free and clear of this whole mess. I can’t make the same mistake twice and keep you involved. After tonight, we can’t see each other again.”
She barely blinked. “Any idea yet who tampered with my graphics?”
The way her eyes narrowed, Roman knew she was ignoring the emotional fallout of what he’d said by focusing on the threat at hand. His respect for her rose a notch. Even if he had been at liberty to share a suspect’s name with her, which he didn’t even have, he would not have answered her question. He’d learned over the last seventy- two hours that Rachel Marlowe was not only beautiful, creative, interesting and sexy, but she was also determined, clever and stubborn as hell. He could imagine her taking serious umbrage to the fact that some terrorist sympathizer had used her work to spread a potentially lethal message-and judging by how she’d contacted him, he imagined she might do something reckless like pursuing the matter on her own.
“The investigation hasn’t turned up that information yet.”
Her chin dipped in a lost, little nod. She was processing what he was saying, but the brutal truth wasn’t going down easily.
“And the fact that you continued to be with me, intimately, all this time, that had nothing to do with your orders from this Agency of yours?”
He pressed his lips together and shook his head. “I caught all kinds of shit when they found out,” he confessed. “And you know what? It was worth it.
Their gazes locked, and he hoped like hell she could read the truth in his eyes, because as unaccustomed as he was to spilling information to an unauthorized source, he wasn’t sure he could say out loud what he felt so strongly in his body-and possibly, even his heart.
She slammed to her feet, her hands slapping decisively against her thighs. “All right, then!” she announced before she rounded the coffee table, looked him straight in the eye and reached out with her hand.
He didn’t touch her, but flicking his gaze between her hand and her eyes did the job of telling her he didn’t know what she intended for him to do with that hand if he took it. Give her a platonic shake, thank her for cooperating with the United States government and then send her on her merry way?
Her hand dropped a little. “Thank you for telling me the whole truth.”
He arched a brow. “You didn’t get the whole truth.”
She stared at him quizzically. “What part did you leave out?”
At this point, he knew what to do with her hand. He grabbed it and used her arm to reel her in as close as two people possibly could be with their clothes still on-a detail he hoped to rectify momentarily. With his chest flush against hers and her suddenly accelerated heartbeat egging him on, he pressed his lips just beside hers and whispered, “The part where I tell you I can’t live without you.”
CHAPTER NINE
HE KISSED HER WITH SUCH a rough, desperate intensity that all questions, protests and logical reasons why she should deny herself another taste of him disappeared. He’d confessed all to her, including the fact that although
