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Although he'd never tasted sexual release, the need for it now drove into him with razorsharp talons. He felt Corinne writhe beneath him, heard her moan as he slid his hands up the length of her arms. The need to possess her, to claim her, slammed into him with every throbbing beat of his pulse.
It took him a moment to realize Corinne was still moaning, not with the same fierce hunger that throbbed in him but with something that sounded disturbingly like fear. He had her hands pinned above her head, his fingers clamped around her delicate wrists like shackles. She was writhing beneath him still, and through the dull haze of his selfish need, he suddenly understood that she was struggling, squirming to get free from the unyielding press of his body.
Her moan broke like a whimper, then a breathless sob.
Appalled at himself, Hunter rolled away from her at once. "I'm sorry," he blurted, feeling worse than stupid as she scrambled up from the floor, her arms crossed over herself like a shield.
"Corinne, I didn't mean to ... I'm sorry."
She slid him a withered glance. "You don't have to apologize. I shouldn't have let you. I should have known I couldn't do this," she said, sucking in a hitching breath. "I'm not ready for this, Hunter. Maybe I'm crazy to think I ever could be."
When she turned away from him, he struggled to drag himself back to his senses. "Is it because of Nathan?"
Her head snapped back to him. Her expression was aghast, eyes wide with alarm. Her voice was hardly audible. "What did you say?"
"Nathan," he replied. "That's the name you called out in your sleep, just before you woke from your nightmare. Is he the reason you're not ready? Is it because your heart belongs to another male?"
She wasn't breathing. She stared at him unmoving for what seemed like forever. "You don't know what you're talking about," she answered at last, the words clipped with finality. "I didn't call out anyone's name in my sleep. You must have imagined it."
He hadn't, but he refrained from pushing her any further. Their moment together was shattered, over in that very instant. Although his pulse was still thrumming, his sex still rampant and aching for release, he could see that she wanted nothing to do with him now. Her silence lengthened, her face shuttering as she backed away from him, wary now. The look in her eyes seemed to accuse him somehow, as though she'd suddenly remembered he was a stranger to her ... maybe even an enemy.
He felt awkward, embarrassed, confused. Things that were foreign to him until now, because of this woman. Because of his care for her, and the cornered look that she gave him as she put even more space between them.
Mira's vision came back to him like a slap across the face. Corinne's pleading. Her tears. Her begging for him to spare the life of the male she couldn't bear to lose. And now Hunter was sure he knew that male's name.
Nathan.
He didn't know why the knowledge should set his teeth on edge, but it did. He clamped his jaws together so hard his molars ached.
"Hunter," Corinne began, breaking off to inhale a shaky breath. "What happened between us just now - "
"It will not happen again," he finished for her.
When lust and pride bit into him with twin spurs, he mentally tamped the useless emotions down. He grasped for the rigid discipline that had always served him so well - a discipline that seemed intent on eluding him when he met the look of wounded confusion that swam in Corinne Bishop's lovely eyes.
"The sun will be setting soon," he told her. "We'll leave as soon as it does."
She flinched, worry edging her expression now.
"Where to?"
"A safe house has been arranged. You'll stay there while I resume my mission for the Order."
He turned, and left her standing behind him in the room alone.
"Mr. Masters, I certainly do appreciate the generosity you've shown my campaign in recent months. This check - " The senator arched a well-groomed brow as he glanced once more at the sizable corporate donation. "Well, sir, quite frankly, a contribution of this magnitude is humbling. It's unprecedented, really."
Dragos steepled his fingers under his chin and smiled from his plush guest chair on the other side of the upwardly mobile politician's desk. "God bless democracy, and the United States Supreme Court."
"Indeed." The senator chuckled somewhat uncomfortably, his Adam's apple straining against the starched white collar of his tuxedo shirt and crisp black bowtie. His flawlessly styled golden blond hair was combed back loosely from his handsome face, the dusting of gray on either side of his temples giving the thirty-something senator an air of wisdom and distinction. Dragos wondered if he'd earned those distinguished-looking stripes at a pricey salon, then decided he didn't care. It was the senator's politics - and his elite Ivy League connections - that interested Dragos the most.
"I'm honored that you and TerraGlobal have demonstrated such faith in my campaign's objectives," he said, adopting an earnest look that probably scored Boston's charming, mosteligible bachelor everything he'd ever asked for in his privileged young life. "You have my personal assurance that all the money you've contributed will be put to prudent, good use."
"I have no doubt, Senator Clarence."
"Please," he said, sliding the check into the top drawer of his desk and locking it. "You must call me Robert. Ah, hell, call me Bobby - all my friends do."
Dragos returned the polished smile. "Bobby it is."
