“Drop the gun, Derek,” a voice said from behind him, and Marc wanted to groan at the poor timing of Tony’s interruption.
DeWinter whirled around immediately, pointing his rifle at Tony, and Marc had his Glock pressed against the back of his neck before he could blink. “Set it down, nice and easy,” he murmured. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt.”
For a moment, Marc feared DeWinter wouldn’t cooperate. If he shot Tony, Marc would have to shoot him, and that would be a hell of a mess. Infinitely worse than losing his job over sexual misconduct.
When Derek engaged the safety and laid his weapon down, Marc felt almost dizzy with relief. Tony secured the rifle, and Marc put his gun away.
“Are you stealing my plants, Tony?” Derek asked in a hoarse whisper.
“No,” he replied, shooting a glance at Marc that promised vengeful retribution. “I would never do that.”
Derek looked back and forth between them. “What are you doing here, then?”
Marc brought his badge out of his front pocket. “Why don’t you invite us back to your place,” he suggested. “I’ll explain everything.”
It was well after midnight when he arrived at Sidney’s house. Lacy opened the door to him without a word, her eyes heavy from sleep, strawberry-blond hair tousled.
“What happened?” she asked.
“DeWinter’s got a couple of different buyers, one who comes down from L.A., another who meets him in Yuma. Last year, someone ripped him off an entire plant. About a pound. He has no idea who, or even when, exactly.” He shrugged. “It could have been anyone.”
She studied him carefully. “Are you taking over for me?”
“Yeah. Go on home.”
At the door, Lacy paused. Marc knew she was aware of his relationship with Sidney. She was a woman, and a cop, and therefore twice as intuitive. “Do you have any idea what you’re getting involved with, Marcos?”
She used the name on purpose, to get his attention. Marc’s greatest ambition in life was to be nothing like his father, who he’d been named after. In that, he’d failed. He couldn’t make a commitment to save his life. The idea of staying with one woman and giving his heart to her, knowing she might take it with her when she left, as his father had done over and over again, paralyzed him.
Every time he looked in the mirror he saw the old man’s face.
“No,” he said, blinking away that image. “I don’t.”
“Be careful,” she whispered, kissing the corner of his mouth. For the second time of the evening, he was caught in a tender, nonsexual moment with an attractive woman he cared about, but didn’t want to sleep with.
He was definitely losing his mind.
Before going upstairs to Sidney, he showered in her outdoor stall on the patio and put his dirty clothes in the machine to wash. Raiding marijuana fields was sweaty work, and he didn’t want her to know where he’d been.
It hadn’t escaped his attention that the man who’d spied on them could have wielded something a lot more deadly than a camera. Such as a sniper rifle.
While under his “protection,” Sidney had been in constant danger. He’d taken her to crime scenes, used her to lure out Derek DeWinter and allowed her to be photographed in a compromising position. Twice.
Yeah, he was doing a real bang-up job as her bodyguard.
In her room, she was lying on her side, fast asleep, both hands tucked under one cheek. Her chest rose and fell with even breathing, drawing his eye to the front of her dolphin T-shirt, which had ridden up above her cotton bikini panties to expose a silky strip of her stomach.
He lay down beside her carefully so he wouldn’t disturb her, getting as close as he could without touching her. For a long time, he watched her sleep, memorizing the lines of her face and the curves of her body, as if her image could sustain him.
Maybe if he concentrated hard enough, he could keep this part of her, a picture locked away inside him, to take out and cherish after he’d gone.
Chapter 17
Sidney awoke before the alarm was set to go off, as usual, and she knew Marc was with her before she opened her eyes.
When she turned to look at him, all of the anger and confusion and disappointment she’d felt with him last night got mixed up in a rush of love so intense tears flooded her eyes.
He was lying on his back, his forearm draped across his lap, one knee bent, touching hers. Sometime during the night, he’d pushed the sheet down past his waist, revealing his naked upper body. His exceedingly masculine presence seemed to take up an inordinate amount of space.
She’d need to get a larger bed.
His face was troubled, even in sleep. There were faint circles beneath his eyes and a worried crease between his brows.
Her need to ease him was overwhelming.
Pressing her lips to the tips of her fingers, she touched the stubble shadowing his jaw, traced the hard line of his mouth. Trailing her fingertips over the long, brown column of his throat, she skimmed the sexy ridge of his Adam’s apple. As she moved her hand down farther, exploring hard pectoral muscles and warm skin, he shifted, causing the sheet to inch farther off his hips, exposing a dark line of silky pubic hair.
Apparently his lower body was naked, too.
Heart thumping with excitement, she sat up and drew her T-shirt over her head, wanting to feel his bare skin against hers. She brushed her fingertips over her jutting nipples, stifling a moan. Feeling a dull ache throb between her legs, she rubbed herself there, too, watching his penis thicken and elongate under the thin sheet.
Her eyes flew up to his face.
“Take off your panties,” he said in a rough voice, his heavy-lidded gaze fixed on the apex of her thighs.
She should have been embarrassed to be caught touching herself while she stared at him, but she was too enthralled by his arousal to be ashamed of her own. She also knew if she took off her panties, he’d bury his head between her legs and pleasure her with his mouth until she couldn’t remember her name.
Which was all very nice, since he seemed to enjoy it as much as she did, except that making her lose her mind was his subtle, insidious way of maintaining control.
This time, she wanted him to forget
Instead of removing her panties, she slipped her hand inside them and began to caress herself lightly, studying his face. He couldn’t see what she was doing, but he didn’t have to.
“Don’t tease me.”
“Tease you? Never,” she promised, then bent her head to his lap and proceeded to do just that. Pulling down the sheet, she placed her open mouth on the inside of his thigh. His penis jerked, stiff and upright, saluting her efforts like a proper soldier.
“Sidney,” he protested, his voice husky.
“Mmm,” she replied, rubbing her cheek across his engorged flesh with a slight smile, basking in the glory of her feminine power.
He watched while she circled her fingers around his thick shaft and stroked him up and down. When a pearly bead appeared at the tip, she moistened her lips with it then licked his taste off them with delicate slowness.
Groaning, he let his head drop back against the pillow, surrendering to her ministrations. Instead of taking the blunt head of his erection into her mouth, as he clearly expected, she touched her tongue to the heavy sac below.
He shuddered. “Jesus, Sidney-”
“Don’t you like it?”
He didn’t say no, so she did it again, lapping at him like a kitten until he moaned, thrusting his fingers into her hair and bringing her head up. With his other hand, he gripped the base of his shaft and brushed the swollen tip across her parted lips.
