No.
Whatever emotion glowed in his eyes, it was swiftly concealed, tightening the muscles of his face. Cody seemed to recall who she was, and what had happened here this evening.
“I want to know,” he said in the lowest, most threatening voice ever, “why a puke slime of a bastard had you tied up to my bed, why you didn’t seem to be wearing any clothing save for—” in three seconds he’d covered the space to her, and in one more, he was raising her lonely little coat up to his line of vision—“this one coat, and I really, really want to know who that bastard was and what he has to do with my sick ass of a brother!”
She blinked. Her head must have gotten banged, because Cody Nordstrom never lost his cool. Never, ever. But now he didn’t sound all that much in control. He didn’t sound like a detective, asking cool questions. He sounded almost, almost, like a jealous husband.
Not the smartest thing, she knew, but it turned her on. It really turned her on, the way he was on the verge of losing control. Nordstrom was a master of appearances, of control, always outwardly cool, outwardly composed, but now—her nipples pricked in excitement and even though it wasn’t the moment, her body didn’t care.
After being so scared, her hormones were raging, she was on overdrive, over-sensitized. The place between her legs clenched with wanting. The adrenaline coursing through her veins seemed to have summoned other hormones into play, and she was aching everywhere. She wanted to be touched. Held.
Suddenly sexual frustration and fear needed some outlet, and she trembled with the need for release.
Seething with another kind of tumultuous energy, Cody set her coat on the bed, opened his chest of drawers, and yanked out a folded white shirt. Immediately he brought it to her, lowering his voice as he offered it for her to wear. “Did you see his face?”
“He was wearing some kind of hood,” she murmured, cradling his shirt to her chest, trying not to think of how good it smelled.
Cody glanced over at the window and restlessly plunged a hand through his blond hair. He wiped the back of his mouth and then yanked open the closet door, inspecting for differences inside.
“Perp was hiding here when you came in?”
She nodded.
He traced the steps to the bed, the exact same steps the man had taken. She didn’t know how he knew, but she was glad she didn’t have to explain the events that had transpired here, word for word.
“Was there a struggle?” he inquired, his brows furrowed. God, he was so handsome when he was all business.
Megan tried to remember what happened but only recalled the hands, the stench, the blackness that had enveloped her. She was still breathing loudly, and for the first time, she realized, so was Cody. The discovery brought a fresh pang of longing to her heart.
She’d imagined how they would sound, their breaths, as they made love.
Now she wanted to die when she realized she’d never find out.
This had been such a bad idea. She was such a needy, foolish little slut, she wanted to whack herself with a stick.
When she’d been tied on the bed, afraid, and had seen Cody, a little part of her had still gotten aroused. For a nanosecond, she hadn’t wanted him to set her free. She’d wanted him to take her. Like that. Caught and trapped, take her, all of her.
But he didn’t. He hadn’t.
He was so obsessed with protecting her, he never would, which was the saddest thing of all.
Cody sighed and came over. “Tell me what happened, Meg.”
His delicious scent teased her nostrils as he dropped down beside her and it made her want to erase that horrible name from her skin, made her want to forget the past hour entirely.
She furiously scraped the first I, but Cody caught her hands, stilling their movements. Her lashes rose, and their gazes held. He squeezed her fingers in reassurance, and the exquisite contact made her shiver with need. Solid. Warm. That was what his touch felt like. What I’ve always wanted.
She surveyed his expression, but there was no lust in his eyes, only anger. “Don’t scrape it off yet—” He urged her into his shirt and his face hardened, his jaw tightened as he explained, “Evidence.”
He gazed at her stomach with indecipherable eyes, but when he lifted his hand to trace her chin with the pad of his thumb, the touch was sensual. Lush. Sexual.
As the adrenaline left her body, something else arrived in its stead, something hot and wanting.
She caught her breath as he lowered his hand and, with that same callused thumb, grazed his brother’s name on her navel.
“Is it tender, does it hurt?” he asked in a low voice.
She didn’t know how to interpret the gruff emotion there, but his timbre wasn’t cold, and she knew that he was not unaffected. Was it her nearness that made him seem on edge? Unlike himself?
No. It was the fact that she had his brother’s name over her underwear.
“It’s sensitive,” she admitted, just a whisper at the blond top of his head. Sensitive because you’re touching it.
His finger trailed the last word, and then stopped, somehow, at the edge of her leopard panties. She felt so stupid all of a sudden, like this, with his shirt hanging at her sides, her red heels, her failed plan. She’d dressed for the perfect evening to seduce the man of her dreams, and instead, another man had seen her. Another man had tied her to Cody’s bed, and it had not been the man she wanted, nor
