“What-” she asked from the inside, and Noah whipped the door back open, meaning to say something cool but calming. Only instead he kissed her hard and quick. “I’ll be back, don’t make a sound.”
He just hoped that for once, she listened.
Chapter 18
Bailey stood there in the pitch-dark closet and tried not to hyperventilate. She’d seen Shayne’s face, she’d heard “problem” and she knew.
Stephen and his men had found her. God, oh, God, if anyone got hurt because of her…Just thinking it, her legs went weak, and she sank to the floor, hugging her knees close to her chest.
When Alan had died and she’d found out her life had never been what she’d thought, she’d been hurt and angry but determined to change things.
Then she’d had her little run-in with Alan’s thugs, and she’d expected to die. She’d expected to die many times since.
But in a last ditch effort, she’d used Noah to take her to Mammoth on the off chance she could find the money, and once again, everything had changed.
It was almost as if she’d been living in black and white, and he’d colored her world. And a secret, deep dark hope burgeoned inside her-that she’d find the money, she’d pay off Stephen and his men, and she’d go back to her life, to teaching. She loved the world her kids lived in, the sweet innocence, their precious minds that were like little sponges.
In fact, she’d always dreamed of having her own, but that dream had recently been set aside for the more pressing one-living to see her twenty-ninth birthday.
But now she had a new secret dream-Noah.
Where was he? Worry and fear knotted within her. She stood and slipped her hands into the deep pockets of her skirt and felt the comforting weight of her cell phone.
She debated for a moment, then pulled it out and turned it on. She needed to hear from Kenny, and indeed she had a waiting text message. A WHERE R U?
SAFE, she typed and sent.
To her utter shock, she got an immediate response: DID U FIND IT?
Before she could respond, the closet door handle turned. Before she could even squeak, it opened. A tall, dark shadow slipped inside, pressing her back, shutting the door, which meant she was alone with-
“It’s me,” came Noah’s unbearably familiar voice.
Relief spilled out of her along with her breath when his arms encircled her.
“What happened?” she demanded, but his answer was to cover her mouth with his. She had no idea how he did it, but with his mouth open on hers, his hands all over her, it was hard to think past the sensual, earthy haze he created.
And that wasn’t the only thing hard. With a startled little hum, she pressed even closer to his amazing body, afraid she wouldn’t ever be able to get close enough.
And that thought was just deep enough, real enough, to nearly shatter her. Then he turned her, pressing her back against a wall-a shelving unit, she decided, because things fell from it to the floor. “Noah-”
He ran a hand down her spine and then back up again, beneath her sweater, his warm palm on her bare skin. “Noah-”
Before she could get out anything else, his mouth covered hers again, and since hers was open, his tongue slid right in and danced to hers in a slow, sinuous, sensual movement that made her knees wobble.
There were other reactions as well, and when his hand came around, up her torso to cup a breast, his thumb gliding over her hard nipple, he discovered that very thing, and a low, hungry sound escaped him. It tightened her body even more. Then he shifted angles to get even closer, deeper, which drove her wild because his kiss was hot, melting, and only a taste of what she really wanted, which was him deep inside her, sliding in and out like his tongue. This need for him shocked her because she’d never felt it before, all consuming and as necessary as air.
But Noah…Noah made her that way, and she climbed all over him trying to get closer, inside of him.
The pitch black only added to the sense of intimacy. She felt the heat of him burning into her, igniting every single erogenous zone she had, which was a hell of a lot more than she’d known about, all of it turning her on in spite of herself, when she really had no business getting turned on.
The men were here.
She had to talk to him, had to know what was happening, but he cupped her face, tilting it up, pressing her into the wall, pinning her between the plaster and his even harder body. “Noah-”
“I know. Christ, you make me hot.” He slid a thigh between hers, ripping a dark, needy sound from her throat. Her head thunked hard back against the wall.
His hands slid up, into her hair, massaging where she’d hit while his mouth made its way down her throat.
“Tell me,” she whispered, putting her hands on his chest to push free. “Is everyone okay?”
He slid his hands down her arms, taking her wrists, lifting them over her head so she couldn’t move, leaving her stretched out on the wall for him.
“Noah-”
His mouth was busy at her jaw, her neck…and she lost her train of thought. “Uh…”
Holding her upright with his hands, his body, the thigh he’d thrust between hers, she discovered that the darkness lent a freedom all in itself. She found herself riding his thigh, wishing their clothes would fall away, so that there was no barrier between them.
His clever, clever mouth found a way beneath her sweater. Dragging her bra cup aside with his teeth, his warm breath teased her nipple, and she thought she’d die of pleasure. Then he gently rubbed his jaw over it.
Another sound escaped her throat at that, and then he leaned in and sucked her into his mouth. Her knees buckled, but with his thigh between hers, she wasn’t going anywhere.
Nor she did she want to. It was a startling realization, and when he let her hands go to unbutton her sweater, she clutched at him. “Noah,” she gasped. “Please tell me what happened out there.”
“They’re gone.”
She knew he was in one piece, no bullet holes, but she ran her hands over him again just to feel him, to be sure. “I can’t keep doing this to you, I won’t-”
“You’re not.” He cupped her breasts, his fingers driving her straight to heaven. Unable to stop herself, she touched him too, ran her hands over his shoulders, his belly…the hard bulge behind the button fly of his jeans, loving the raw, hungry sound that escaped him when she outlined him with her fingers. Pressing her face into his neck, she just breathed him in.
“They’ll be in Cabo,” she whispered. “I’m going to tell them again, that I don’t know where the money is, and that killing me won’t change that.”
“They still won’t believe you. But the cops can-”
“No. They said no police or they’d hurt Kenny. And now you. They’ll hurt you.”
“Princess, it’s not me they wanted.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “If you knew who they were, then Shayne’s brother could-”
“Noah.” Guilt ate at her. She did know who they were. “I, um…” She swallowed hard. “I haven’t told you everything.”
He went still.
She closed her eyes, but it didn’t matter. The closet was still pitch-dark, and she was still about to really screw everything up. “I know who the men are.”
Noah shifted, and she heard a click, and then the closet was flooded with light.
Noah’s body still pressed hard against her, his eyes unfathomable. “You said you didn’t know who they are.”
“I know,” she whispered. “I’m sorry.” Sorrier than he could ever know. “I think…I think I should go to Cabo alone.”
