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“So we’ll set up Gundersen as a hotel employee and Aster as a guest,” Lucas said, rubbing his palm hard across the back of his hair, making it stand on end. “Berg and Pedersen should set up outside the hotel in twelve-hour shifts.”
He nodded several times, uttering a few nonsensical acronyms that must have made sense to the person on the other end of the line before hanging up and slipping the phone back into his pocket.
“So what happens now?” she asked, not sure she wanted to hear the answer.
“We call off the wedding and get you the hell off this island.”
She could disappear and start over. Jasper didn’t need her looking over his shoulder any more. He had the entire American government doing that. Having a permanent spy in the Macintosh organization was too valuable to let anything happen to him. Her mom had finally found her backbone, how much longer before she walked away from Fare Island? What if the only thing tying her here were her kids? If they left, would she too?
It seemed like Ruby’s world was full of breathless possibilities instead of well-loved burdens, but when she tried to imagine where she could go, the only thing that popped to mind was a garden of lavender, comfortable chairs perfect for reading in the sun, and a dark-haired, blue-eyed man coming out of the manor house, heading straight for her.
And that was never going to happen.
Her throat ached, but she forced the words out anyway with a bravado she didn’t feel. “So I guess this is good-bye.”
The muscles in his shoulders went tight, and his eyes darkened dangerously. “I don’t want it to be.”
“That makes two of us, but it doesn’t change facts.” She lifted her chin and dredged up any bit of self-control she had not to bound up from the bed and run straight into his arms. “I’m not the kind of girl who ends up with the good guy. I’m the crime boss’s daughter.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” He stalked over to her, every step an act of aggression no doubt meant to intimidate her and push his message home. “The Sparrow and your bother, they know the score. I did terrible things before I joined the Silver Knights. Luc Svendsen, and all his misdeeds, isn’t just a cover. It’s my real name. It’s who I really am. Every blackmail scheme, every extortion, all of the lives ruined, and dishonest schemes enabled, I did that. If Dominick Rasmussen hadn’t seen a use for me and recruited me into the resistance when Henriksen’s father was still riding high on the success of his coup to overthrow the Elskovian monarchy, given me a new last name and a purpose, I’d still be selling secrets to the highest bidder. I’m not a good guy.”
He loomed over her, a massive, uncompromising brick wall of wrong. If he expected her to back down, he was seriously mistaken.
“Bullshit.” She stood up from the bed, forcing him to take a step back to make room for her. “Who you used to be isn’t important, it’s who you are now that counts.”
Crossing his arms, he gave her a hard look. “Always such a tough chick with all the answers.”
“Coming from you…” She shot him a sassy smirk. “I take that as a compliment.”
“It is.” A grin tugged one corner of his mouth.
“We aren’t going to get all soft and mushy now, are we?”
“You always seem to have the opposite effect on me.”
Her gaze dropped to where his hard cock pushed against the confines of his pants. Her mouth went dry. If this was the last time she got to see Lucas, she sure as hell was going to see all of him.
“Do I make you horny?” she asked in her best silly British spy impersonation, needing to put some emotional distance between them before she just gave in and admitted what she already knew was true.
She wasn’t just falling for him—she already had.
He cupped the side of her face with his hand and dragged his thumb across her bottom lip, staring at her with a look of such focused intensity in his eyes that she was surprised she didn’t spontaneously combust on the spot.
“That’s not a good enough word to describe what you do to me,” he said, his voice a low rumble that was made of equal parts awe and frustration. “You distract me from the rest of the world. You make me lose my ability to think about anything else, but how good you feel in my arms. You tempt me just by breathing. Believe me, I love everything you can do to me with that mouth of yours, but it’s what comes out of it that lets me know I’ll never find anyone else like you.”
She gulped. “I thought you didn’t like my smart mouth.”
“I like it too much.” His hand dropped to the hem of her shirt, but he didn’t make a move to inch it up. Instead he teased her with the weight of his fingers against her.
“Stop talking.” It came out more like a desperate plea than demand.
Lucas dipped his head but stopped short of her lips. “But there’s more to say.”
No. She couldn’t take any more. Walking away from him was going to be hard enough without more words like those to replay on an endless loop in her head. “Shut up and kiss me.”
…
The desperate, needy edge in her voice tore away the last shreds of control Lucas had been holding onto because, despite what she’d argued, he wasn’t a good guy. A better man would have found a way to walk away. He may not be that man, but he could be her man tonight. So he did what she asked—what they both wanted—and kissed her.
