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“I don’t dance often,” she tried to cover her reaction to him even as she fought to make sense of it.
“Neither do I.”
The hand at her lower back urged her closer without demanding it. Risa flowed into him, her fingers curling against his shoulder at the feel of his erection pressing against her belly, the feel of the warmth of his body surrounding her.
Her eyes closed and her head settled against his chest. Slowly, she forced herself to relax, let herself feel what it was like to be a woman, rather than a frightened child.
The fear was still there, waiting to attack. But oh God, this was…pleasant. More than pleasant, actually. It was comforting even as it made her feel more sensitive, more alive, than ever before.
One broad male hand stroked her back; the other held her hand against his chest, so close to the side of her breast. If she moved just right, she could feel his fingers stroking against the needy mound.
She didn’t want the song to end. She didn’t want the night to end. She wanted to become trapped in this moment, to relish the feel of his body against hers.
“You move like a fantasy,” he whispered at her ear. “As graceful and fluid as a doe.”
She wanted to believe him, and she couldn’t, but the words stroked the pain and fear inside her.
Neither of them spoke then. Risa let herself be caught in the moment, let herself relax and flow against him, let her body move with his, closer, warmer, until her arms were around his neck, his wrapped around her back, holding her closer. His head was bent, his cheek against the top of her head. She could feel him wrapped around her, holding her, and there was no fear.
She could do this.
She lifted her head and stared up at him. “We don’t have to stay here,” she whispered. He might not be able to hear her, but she watched his eyes, saw the flare of heat in the darkened color, and knew he understood.
“Are you sure?” His lips moved; his expression shifted for just a second, a hint of male hunger showing through the normally still set of his face.
“I’m sure.” She was already shaking inside.
His hand ran up her back, a whisper of sensation against the silk material covering her, then across her bare arm until he had her hand in his and drew back.
“We’ll need to let our friends know we’re leaving,” he warned her gently.
Risa nodded. Yes, she would have to face her friends and their concern.
“Very well.” With his free hand he tucked her hair behind her ear again and allowed his thumb to caress her jaw. “We’ll leave now.”
ORION WATCHED the couple as they moved from the dance floor, carefully controlling the frown that would have creased his forehead. It wouldn’t do to show interest in them. At the moment he was allowing a particularly slutty little brunette to run her fingers up his thigh and pretending interest. But he kept his peripheral vision on the man and woman.
He knew that man; he knew he did. He never ever forgot a face or the name that went to it, but in this case he couldn’t put the face and the name together. How odd?
Plastic surgery? he wondered. That had to be it. Otherwise, he’d have instantly recognized the man who led Risa Clay from the dance floor.
He wanted to grimace at the thought that her companion had that look of a man who intended to fuck the woman he was with.
Even with makeup and the very appealing little slip dress, the girl wasn’t particularly pretty. She wasn’t as ugly as she had been as a teenager, but she wasn’t exactly attractive, either. There was just a quality to her that offended his refined senses.
What was it about that girl that just bothered him? he wondered. Her cheekbones were high, her eyes slightly tilted. The odd pale blue color of her eyes showed up more with the artificial highlights in her hair.
She cleaned up okay, but he still couldn’t find it in him to forget how very ugly she had once been.
He had hoped he wouldn’t receive the job to kill her. He remembered, eight years before when she had first been kidnapped, her face had been in the papers. He’d grimaced then. Two years later when Jansen Clay’s death had been announced, he’d had that vague premonition of what was coming.
It was a shame. His employer should have been more picky in his friends and the women he fucked. If he hadn’t been with Jansen that night to take his pick of the girls, then he wouldn’t have been stuck with only one choice, the Clay girl.
He’d done her, though. He’d pushed her face to the floor of the cargo plane and in front of her father, he’d pushed her skirts to her hips and rammed into her.
He’d been furious, he’d told Orion. The girl had been so pumped on Whore’s Dust, his employer had been certain she wouldn’t remember the event. But it appeared she had remembered parts of it, and he had learned she could be remembering more. It wouldn’t do for her to remember who had raped her.
Orion was going to have to kill her. Damn, it would be so much easier to just put a bullet in her brain, but he just couldn’t bring himself to kill her in such a manner. He was proud of each job he took and if he didn’t bleed her, then no one would believe he had been the one to do her.
