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“So, I hate to be the one to incur the wrath of Deck here, but…” Cabot tried to hide the grin on his face. “Anyone else notice Lake eye fucking the boss man into oblivion?”
Fitz bit his bottom lip and stared hard at the table top in an effort to keep from smiling and the rhythmic tapping of keys by Kasey and the men around stopped. All eyes, except Fitz’s, were on me now, making me feel like I was trapped under a microscope.
Our group had been far more than a team since our time overseas. We were brothers in every way but blood, and had seen many women come and go over the years. Cabot always had a tendency to make inappropriate comments, and I had never been one to kiss and tell but had never cared about the ribbing and jokes and inquiries posed to me by my brothers. I’d never cared about it enough to react. Until that very moment.
Looking into Cabot’s amused eyes, I poured every violent intention into my glare until the smile slipped and finally fell from my friend’s face. The room was still wrapped in silence, tension of a different kind growing. I’d had the urge to hit Aiden Cabot before, hell, we’d all thrown punches at each other over the years, but the dark desire to smash his face in for the simple fact that it would have humiliated Lake to even hear him talk like that, it was a heady feeling that made me not trust myself. Luckily, Fitz was the one to cut through the tense silence.
“Aiden, I suggest you keep your comments to yourself in regards to Lake.” His attention turned to me and the disappointment and reprimand in his eyes had me shrinking back slightly. “And you need to calm the fuck down, boss.” When neither of us blinked, it was Kasey who cleared the room and ended his own video feed, leaving Fitz and I alone at the table.
“I never thought I’d see the day when someone got so far under your skin that I couldn’t even recognize you, man.” The words were a stab to my chest. A blow to my pride for sure.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Fitz.”
“I think you’re the only one here who doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about, Decker.” The make-shift shrink closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “You didn’t come back from that meeting with Harrington and Lake the same as when you’d left. You want her and you can’t stand that. You can’t handle anything that doesn’t fit into the rigid world you’ve built for yourself since Iraq, man, and it’s breaking you apart to not have that control.”
“I don’t want anything,” I bit out, trying to keep the anger brewing in my gut under control.
“Jesus, you are so stubborn,” Fitz ground out through clenched teeth causing me to pause. Fitz was the peacekeeper among us, the mediator and sound of reason. He usually had his professional mask on for these situations but he was losing his cool now too. “You are attracted to Lake Harrington, you bullheaded shit. You hate that it goes against all your rules and codes of conduct because you cling to those fucking rules like they’re gospel. She’s pushed you into a spot that is miles from your comfort zone and now you can’t stop lashing out at the rest of us for it.”
I couldn’t keep his gaze and looked down as each word hit me like shrapnel. I could feel a beast of an emotion behind my walls, rattling the cage I’d locked it in, trying desperately to be let free. I’d refused to label the emotion when I locked it down, but it was clearly desire. Unwanted and unwelcome, I ignored and denied it until I’d only been able to tap into rage the previous week. “Okay,” I answered finally. Maybe admitting the attraction for Lake would be enough to ease the pressure on my chest, even if it was only to Fitz. “I’m attracted to her. I thought she was some spoiled daddy’s girl, and she’s knocked me on my ass every day since that meeting.” I looked back up at Fitz who wasn’t smiling or glaring. He just held compassion in his eyes. “So I admitted it, can we move on now?”
“No,” his clipped tone was in contrast to the compassion in his eyes. “You have two choices here, man. Do something about the obvious mutual attraction or go home.”
I had been ready to scoff at Fitz's first words, but it was the latter of his ultimatum that had me on my feet and in front of him, ready to haul him up by his shirt in rage. Rage, that ever present demon scratching at me from the inside. The only beast free inside me to run over the others. Fitz was standing too, no trace of emotion on his face. Professional and ready to take whatever was thrown at him. Conviction in his spine as he came toe to toe with me.
“You think I’m going anywhere with anassassinafter her?” I laughed a harsh bark that most men would have cowered at. “So according to you my only options are to cross a professional line that could cost this company’s reputation and future business or let her get killed and cost this company’s reputation and future business.”
“Where were you when Lake was by the pool being watched? Were you working on figuring out who was sending those letters? Or were you watching her, fighting with her, obsessing over her?” Fitz sounded more venomous than I had ever heard before. Damn, Lake Harrington was bringing out the worst in all of us. When I didn’t answer, Fitz chuckled darkly. “Yeah, Deck, I already know. You’re so fucked up with all this internal right and wrong bullshit and fighting with yourself and her, that you’re sleeping on the job you put so much pride into. This company has been everything to you, and now someone else shows up that distracts from that and instead of making room for her, you’ve fucked everything seven ways from Sunday and we’re all done with it.”
“What does that mean?” An icy finger of dread dragged down my spine. I may have been called boss, but I was an equal partner and could be out voted by the three other men. They could have me removed from the team or put me in charge of Robert Harrington’s team. They could put the distance between me and Lake that I thought I’d wanted. Now with the idea a very possible reality, my heart was slamming into my ribcage, making me feel like a man on trial, waiting to hear his judgment.
“Make peace with your feelings for Lake or Kasey is taking your place in the field. You haven’t even discussed moving her to a new location after this shit with The Wraith, Decker. You aren’t thinking five steps ahead like you should be. You’re putting us all in danger.” With that, Fitz turned and left the room, leaving me feeling like I’d taken a baseball bat to the sternum.
I fell back into my chair and absently rubbed my chest with one hand in an attempt to lighten the pain caused by Fitz’s brutal honesty. I had been screwing everything up since I’d reacted to her in the elevator at The Plaza. Every reaction had been an attempt to push back the desire I had for this woman who was a walking contradiction. I couldn’t gamble with her life or the lives of my men anymore. Because Fitz had been right, I’d gotten so distracted that now I was putting my men in danger too with The Wraith. He’d take out anyone to get his mark and anything less than absolute vigilance was going to invite a bloodbath.
Unsure of when I had actually moved from the control room, I found myself standing at the entrance to the library, just in time to hear Kasey comment on fart jokes, causing Lake to open up with laughter, the sound traveling straight to my cock. When the odd sound of harp music played on the camera’s speaker, Lake seemed to lose it further and I couldn’t stop myself from smiling too. Until she face planted into her laptop and the laughter was cut off abruptly by a pained curse as she raised her hand to her forehead, rubbing at the area that had made contact with the hard surface.
I crossed the room and knelt in front of Lake, causing her to tense at my sudden appearance and proximity. Gently brushing her hand away, I looked at the faint red spot on her forehead, most likely from her rubbing at it more than the actual bang to the laptop. Still, with Fitz’s words drilling into my skull, I gave a small amount of control to the beast called desire that had been clawing me from the inside out. My fingers traced from her forehead, around her temple and down her cheek, caressing her jaw before I let my hand fall away from her.
Her breath caught and a deep flush darkened her sun kissed cheeks as Lake kept her eyes locked with mine. It surprised me how easy it felt to be close and touch her, as if I’d been swimming against a strong current this entire time and now, I was moving with pull, my body having an easier time of it. It felt right, the way I touched her, the way her body responded, and the air tingling with sexual tension. I’d do what I was told and admit to the desire, then I could get back to my life’s work.
“You didn’t doze off,” I said, my accusation so gentle that it felt more like an encouragement as it left my lips.
“I-” she frowned in obvious confusion and tried to pick up the thread I’d dropped, unsuccessfully. “What?”
“In that room. You didn’t doze off.” Again, it wasn’t a question.
Lake’s flush darkened as she looked around the room to focus on anything but me. “I did, actually. With Jack waking me up after barely sleeping as it was, I could hardly be blamed for nodding off when Aiden and Fitz go into mind numbing details.” She gave a one shoulder shrug and focused her attention on picking at her manicured nails.
Gently grabbing her chin between my index finger and thumb, I pulled her attention back from everywhere but me and struggled with opening that cage locked tight within me. If I didn’t let it go now, I’d be worse for it when I lost men to The Wraith or worse, lost Lake to him. “You were thinking about me,” my thumb moved from her chin to stroke along her bottom lip as she opened her mouth to deny my words. My ministrations left her struck speechless as her tongue darted out to nervously lick her lips, the tip connecting with the pad of my thumb making me growl with the need to dip my thumb between her lips and command her to suck.
“You were thinking about me,” I repeated, my voice heavy with the desire I’d released only to cling to it on a leash. “Your breath was just as ragged as it is now, you clung to that chair” my eyes broke from hers to look down at her hands white knuckling the arms of the chair before I looked back at her, smirk fixed in place. “Just like you’re doing now, and the way you fidgeted in your seat, clenching your thighs together for relief… Fuck if I don’t want to crawl inside your mind and see every filthy thing you imagine, so I can make every dirty dream come true.”
Her mouth dropped open further at my words and I fought back a groan at the sight of her lips parting for me. “Why,” she started but her voice caught and she had to clear her throat and try again. “Why are you telling me this? You’ve been nothing but pissy with me since you met me.” Her words held an accusation but there was no conviction in her tone.
I let my hand fall from her face to her knee, sliding up to the same spot on her outer thigh I’d gripped as I held her the afternoon before. I was giving myself this moment to commit as much of her to memory as possible. Take this moment before it ended and could never be built on. Not if I wanted to keep my world intact and Lake safe. The leash holding back my need pulled with urgency as I let the truth slip free.
“I’m telling you because I think about you too. I imagine the way you taste, the way you feel.” My fingers dug into her thigh with just enough pressure to have her breath catching and her eyes widening. “The way you sound when you moan with pleasure.” The tiny whimper that escaped into the space between them had me instantly hard.
