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“Put the knife down, Marin,” Griffin commanded once Ben and the dog had left the kitchen.
Marin’s hand holding the knife shook, but she couldn’t seem to get the rest of her body to move.
“Please,” he urged softly.
The knife landed on the counter with a clank. Her eyes stung and her face burned with humiliation. This man had too much power over her. And stupid woman that she was, Marin was about to give him more.
“You kissed me,” she choked out. “Why did you do that? It wasn’t fair.”
He stepped in closer so their bodies were only separated by a distance the same width as the blade of the knife she’d just tossed on the counter. Marin breathed him in. Despite being exhausted and bedraggled, Griffin still smelled crisp and clean, like a freshly showered man. The guy was a menace to women everywhere.
“I kissed you, Marin, because I couldn’tnotkiss you.” His soft voice was like a caress to her skin. “I’d be lying if I said I tried to avoid kissing you. Because I really didn’t. Yeah, it was wrong, but I’m not going to apologize. From the moment I saw you standing in the pastry kitchen looking like an Amazon goddess, I knew I had to touch you. To kiss you. And when I finally did, it felt anything but wrong.” He brushed a fingertip along her jawline making Marin’s breath hitch in her lungs. “You enthralled me from the very beginning. Kissing you”—he leaned in closer so that his lips were hovering over hers—“kissing you, Marin Chevalier, was inevitable.”
The rasp of his breath scorched the tender skin on her cheek. But Marin didn’t care because seconds later he was opening her mouth with his. He kissed her slowly, reverently, as though he was reacquainting himself with her mouth. Marin wasn’t as patient. Fisting her hands in his T-shirt, she tugged him closer. He made a rough sound in the back of his throat when their tongues collided. His lips on her mouth suddenly became more urgent.
Marin felt the cold hard door of the refrigerator at her back. Griffin cupped her face as he delved into her hungrily, now just as impatient as she was. She slid her fingers beneath his shirt, spreading them out over his warm skin. He shuddered when she traced the muscles on his stomach. Feeling empowered, Marin rubbed her pelvis against his. Griffin nipped at her lips before moving to her neck. He swore roughly against her skin. She arched her back to give him greater access, smacking her head against the steel door when she did so.
“I didn’t want to stop the other night, Marin,” he whispered near her ear. “You have to know that.”
“But you did and now you owe me,” she insisted.
She didn’t want to think about that night. All she wanted was the here and now with this beautiful man before she woke up from what was certainly a dream. Marin wrapped her fingers around his skull pulling his mouth down to hers.
“And you can start by shutting up and kissing me.”
Griffin’s grin was merciless, his eyes wicked. Using his hard body to press hers more fully against the fridge, he gently pulled her hands from his face and placed her palms against the cool door. He unstrapped his holster and carefully lifted it over his head, placing the gun on top of the refrigerator. Taking her hand, he maneuvered her onto the padded bench of the banquette in the corner of the room, his own body following her down.
“I think you need to be more specific, Chef.” One of his hands slid between their bodies as his lips nuzzled her jaw. “I need to knowwhereyou want me to kiss you.”
A low moan escaped from the back of her mouth when Griffin’s talented fingers slipped inside her shorts.
“Am I getting warmer?” He teased the corner of her mouth with the tip of his tongue.
Marin squirmed when his finger found her wet seam. His other hand left her chin to gently knead her breast. She tilted her face toward his and sank her teeth into his full bottom lip. Lifting her hands from the refrigerator door, she slipped them into the back pockets of his jeans where she dug her fingers into his ass.
“Kiss me, Griffin,” she pleaded. “Kiss me everywhere.”
He didn’t disappoint. Griffin took her mouth in a demanding kiss while his hands simultaneously pleasured other parts of her body. Marin’s stomach quivered at the full sensual assault. Griffin’s tongue slid over hers while his finger mimicked the same motion down below. She gasped for air, her body on the verge of shattering.
The kitchen window shattered instead.
CHAPTER13
Griffin instinctively jumped to his feet and turned to shield Marin with his body. When he reached for his service weapon at his waist, it wasn’t there. He swore violently as he spied it eight feet across the room just as two big men jumped through the broken window blocking his path to his weapon. Neither of them was the Ukrainian special forces jerk with the vendetta against Marin. But both seemed bent on doing the same kind of harm.
Adam and Ben—and even the damn dog—were out of the safe house. A fact these morons probably already knew. Two against one wasn’t the best odds, especially without a gun. Griffin would have to improvise.
Grabbing one of the wooden chairs from the table, he smashed it on the floor, startling the two intruders and giving him a jagged post of wood to use as a weapon at the same time. The one with a spare tire for a neck dodged out of the way of the splintered wood while the bald guy with the bulging eyes made a beeline for Griffin.
Making sure to keep Marin behind him, Griffin lunged at the bald guy, jabbing him hard in the face with the fractured tip of the stool. Caught by surprise, bald guy howled as he staggered backward. The other guy wasted no time pulling a Glock out of his jacket and aiming it at Griffin’s chest. In one quick move, perfected during his hockey days, Griffin shoved Marin to the floor just as the bullet flew past his ear and landed in the oven door with a loud ping.
Marin grabbed his hand and shoved a fire extinguisher into it. Griffin could have kissed her right then and there. Instead, he pulled the pin, turned and fired a stream of pressurized nitrogen and CO2into the gunman’s face. The second gunshot went wild as the big man screamed in agony.
Griffin jumped to his feet, using the fire extinguisher as a weapon to crack the gunman over the head. The hit knocked the guy out cold. When Griffin turned around, however, he was staring down the barrel of a Glock the bald guy had trained on him. The thug sneered.
In that instant, Griffin’s heart shattered painfully. He had failed Marin. God knew what these brutes had in store for her. He met her wide eyes behind the intruder as the guy began to squeeze the trigger. “I’m sorry,” Griffin mouthed to Marin while he waited for the shot that would end his life.
It never came.
