Savage Revenge (7 page)

She touched her wet hair and her eyes widened. Hairspray! Wait. She didn’t have hairspray. She had curly hair. She had hair mousse. And instead of aerosol spray cleaners, she used those stupid wipes.

Dammit she was striking out on every count here.

“Sage? You almost done in there?”

Crap
.

“Yeah. Almost.” She pulled on the dress and underwear she’d grabbed before coming in, and then picked up the first weapon she could find.

With the sink running to drown out the sound, she loaded her palm up with hair mousse and took a deep breath.
Now or never, Sage
.

She opened the door and when Nate took a step toward her, she raised her palm straight toward his eyes.

Unfortunately he was a little too tall, and her fingers just brushed his cheek before he caught her wrist and jerked it to the side.

“What the hell?” Genuine dismay laced his words. “What is that? Is that…?”

“Mousse.” Oh no. She’d screwed up and good. Her heart thudded quicker and she stumbled back to try and escape, but his grip on her wrist didn’t loosen.

“You were trying to shove mousse in my mouth?”

“No. Your eyes.” A whimper escaped and she flinched away from him. “Please, don’t kill me.”

“Kill you?” he repeated, running a hand down his jawline to wipe off the glob of moose. The way his eyes glittered made her throat tighten with panic.

His sudden laugh made her blink in dismay. “I’m not going to kill you.” He paused. “But I’m torn between tying your cute little ass up or spanking it, Curls.”

Cute little ass? She wouldn’t focus on that part.

“Look, you can’t blame me for trying,” she reasoned quickly. “What am I supposed to do?”

“Escape is logical. I understand and expected you to try.” He tugged her wrist and led her back toward the bedroom. “You’re just terrible at it. You almost make this too easy for me.”

Now he was just being insulting. “You’re a jerk.”

“Absolutely.” With a grunt, he glanced over his shoulder at her. “Though you seemed to like me well enough last night. I swear I woke up once and we were cuddling.”

He did
not
just say that. Her head began to pound from how hard her jaw was clenched. “Here’s a reminder: you
forced
me to sleep like that.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t force you to like it.”

“I didn’t like it!”

“You sure?”

There was a teasing note in his low rasp, and it seemed at odds with who he was. The impression he gave off of himself. Big, scary, took-no-shit-from-anyone alpha who was obviously in deep trouble. And yet the teasing—as strange as it seemed—diffused some of her fear. Some of the tension that had taken up residence in her muscles.

Maybe that was his motivation? To put her more at ease. To gain her trust? Well, like hell she’d give it to him.

Once in the bedroom, the tension came rushing right back when he grabbed the rope.

“I need a shower,” he said quietly as he took a step toward her. “But I promise I’ll be quick.”

She didn’t argue, but cooperated as he again began to tie her up. Fortunately he couldn’t read her mind and had no idea of what her next plan of action was going to be.

Nathan was true to his word and took a quick shower. For a minute, while soaping up under the water, he’d stared at her pink razor and considered using it on his incoming beard.

But in the end he knew his face would probably end up looking like a cutting board, and besides the fact, a beard might help disguise him a little bit more.

After the shower he made a quick stop in the linen closet and grabbed what he needed. When he opened the door to her bedroom a moment later, he froze, not immediately seeing her.

There weren’t many places to hide in here—just the bed, an antique looking dresser, and a chair in the corner.

A growl built in his throat. Son of a bitch, if she’d escaped—

“Down here.”

Frowning, he followed the sound of her voice and discovered her on the floor on the opposite side of the bed.

“What happened?”

“I tried to roll over and fell off the bed.”

“No shit.” And for a moment he’d actually considered she might have succeeded in escaping? Not a chance.

“Should’ve stayed put, Curls.” He strode over to her and lifted her into his arms.

“Nice toga,” she quipped. “That’s my favorite sheet, I’ll have you know.”

“I was accommodating your request to hide my
thing
.” He tried not to focus on how curvy the body was that he held in his arms, but his body reacted instinctively.

“Thanks. I appreciate it.” Her words were husky and not quite even.

Need flared to life inside him, small but there. Damn. Not good. She was a female, a shifter, and definitely not bad on the eyes. With her in his arms, their roles in the shifter society came into focus.

Unmated shifter men always sought to find their mates. The need to conquer and claim was always dormant inside them, so it could be easily roused.

The conquer part they eagerly indulged in. Shifter men were sexual by nature. It wasn’t hard to rouse a response from them—especially when the female was an attractive shifter.

The claiming part, though, was a once in a lifetime deal. That didn’t just happen with anyone. Each shifter had one true mate. Sometimes, when you were the alpha, you didn’t get to choose. Duty overrode instinct and you could mate with someone you might not necessarily be driven to.

Sometimes it all boiled down to politics and what matches were advantageous to the packs.

“Umm, you can put me down now.”

His gaze met hers and he saw the flicker of awareness in them before she lowered her lashes.

Almost reluctant to do as she requested, he forced himself to lower her onto the mattress.

Christ, he needed to get laid. He’d come down on his own agents for thinking with their dicks too much, and yet here he was thinking of what it would be like to get Sage out of those clothes.

If things had been different he might’ve been tempted to seduce her. To discover what kind of heat simmered beneath the skittish, almost adorably clumsy persona.

Because she was aware of the chemistry, just as much as he was. Whether she would admit it to herself or not, and it was damn inconvenient for both of them.

Things weren’t different. The woman he should’ve mated with was still being mourned as a victim after her savage death, and Sage—a stranger and victim in this all—was essentially his hostage. Things were just about as fucked up as fucked up could go.

So yeah, screwing his hostage would be an epically bad idea.

“I know I said I’d untie you,” he murmured, averting his eyes from her tempting curves, “but there’s a couple more things I need to do.”

“Shocking.” The one, sulky word was all she said before she went silent again.

“I’m going to run downstairs, but I’ll be back in like ten minutes.”

“Fine.”

She wasn’t happy and he couldn’t blame her. After adjusting the sheet tied around his waist, he turned and left her alone again.

Ten minutes later he’d successfully placed a much-needed Amazon order and was currently taking a moment to read a major online news source.

Again, no major red flags, until he visited a small northwest online paper and an article gave him pause. The picture of a woman in the article was striking a note of familiarity with him.

He read the headline and his blood chilled. A woman’s body had been found outside of Cannon Beach. The cause of death was unknown and it wasn’t clear if foul play was suspected yet.

There wasn’t much information about the crime, which wasn’t generally a cause for alarm, but the lack of details this time made something within him uneasy.

Sometimes the vagueness of a media-covered death ended up being because shifters were involved.

Nathan stilled, but it wasn’t the article that made him suddenly alert. No, it was the slight creak he’d heard on the stairs.

He just barely saw the reflection on the monitor before Sage raced past him and toward the front door.

Chapter Seven

Sage had the door open, with one foot out, before he reached her and snagged her around the waist.

“Son of a bitch,” he roared. “How in the hell did you get free?”

He lifted her back into the house and slammed the door.

She was apparently done being complacent, though. She squirmed, kicked and hit before he finally had to drop her to try and get a better grip.

But it wasn’t that easy, because in an instant she had scurried away and grabbed any kind of makeshift weapon she could get her hands on.

He ducked from the remote control that flew at his head and lunged toward her. He missed.

“How did you get yourself untied?” he roared.

“You seriously underestimate me.” She darted past him, throwing a small lamp at him in the process.

It clipped his shoulder before crashing to the floor. “Clearly.”

A growl of fury erupted past his lips as he threw himself at her full speed.

He took her down linebacker style, rolling them both on the hardwood floors.

“Get off me.”

She slapped at his shoulders, trying to free herself, and he caught her wrists in one hand to get her under control.

Her expression morphed from frustration to pain, and her sharp cry had his anger vanishing. Had he hurt her? He hadn’t realized his grasp was that tight.

A quick scan of her body, though, and he dropped her wrists from his grasp after seeing the raw, red cuts there.

“Jesus, woman, what the hell did you do to yourself?”

She winced and gently cradled one wrist. “I cut them while freeing myself.”

He leaned down and slid an arm around her waist, helping her to her feet. “You mind filling me in on how you even got free?”

“I rolled myself off the bed and cut the rope on the metal frame. There’s a sharp corner that I’ve cut my foot on more than once while climbing into bed.”

Smart girl. “So when I found you on the floor and scooped you back up, you were probably already halfway through your ropes?”

“Pretty much.”

He grunted and steered her toward the kitchen. “You’re bleeding.”

“I’m a shifter—it’ll stop fast.”

“Still, it wouldn’t hurt you to wash the cuts. That frame might be rusty and why risk any slowed healing?”

“Does it matter? I have a feeling you wouldn’t mind seeing me suffer.”

Christ. This again. “It’s not my intent to hurt you, Sage. I can’t stress that enough.”

“Then what
is
your intent?”

“I just need a place to lay low. To figure out a few things.” He turned on the sink and gently pulled her wrists under the water. “And you’re going to help me with that.”

She winced as he added soap over her raw but already healing wrists. “Not exactly willing here.”

Their heads were close and he was suddenly all too aware of her as a female. The wrist he held was delicate and soft, and the scent of her shampoo mixed with the citrus soap he was using to wash her wounds.

“It would be a little weird if you were,” he finally agreed.

Her gaze lifted to meet his. Searching. “Are you really a P.I.A. agent?”

“Yes. And not just an agent. I’m also the commander of my unit.”

She shook her head, her breathing not quite as steady now. Was it from the information he’d just divulged, or their proximity?

“You sound as if you should be one of the
good
guys. What did you do?”

He was a good guy. Or so he’d used to think. He shrugged, not quite ready to answer that. Not quite sure he could.

So he changed the subject instead.

“This could’ve been so much easier on both of us, Sage. At the bar last night I was trying to make you fall for me. Trying to gain your trust so you’d willingly take me home.”

“I’m sorry I was so uncooperative.” Her sarcasm ran rampant. “And I don’t take men home.”

When he glanced up at her, her gaze had slid to his mouth.

Interesting
. Maybe she was a more aware of him than she cared to admit. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips and everything primal inside him responded.

He turned off the sink and maneuvered her against it, straddling her legs with his own.

“Well I guarantee you if I’d been the one kissing you outside instead of your pretty musician, you would’ve taken me home.”

She swallowed hard and met his gaze once more. The amount of defiance there was outweighed by excitement.

“For a criminal, you’re awfully full of yourself. It would take more than a kiss for me to have brought you home.”

“Careful, Sage,” he warned softly and leaned in closer. His breath mingled with hers. “Because that almost sounds like a challenge.”

He heard it then. The slow thud of her heart that had become a pounding thunder. She didn’t reply to his statement, and the wolf within him rose to the surface in an instant.

Was he right? Was she as physically drawn to him right now as he was to her?

Maybe he was going about this wrong. Maybe if he tried to seduce her mind—her heart—he’d have her cooperation. She’d stop trying to escape and break his skull in.

Or maybe, you just want to charter the inside of her mouth with your tongue.

Whatever it was, the primitive side of him was far too close to the surface to be denied now.

He lowered his head and lightly touched his lips to hers—waited for her to pull away. She was so soft. Wonderfully sweet.

She didn’t move, though her shoulders tensed. A moment later she gave a stiff shrug. “See? That did noth—”

He didn’t let her finish that thought before he’d crushed his mouth on hers again. Not gentle this time, but with the sole intent to explore that amazing mouth deeper. To conquer and take.

She whimpered in shock before he effortlessly pierced her compressed lips with his tongue, determined to taste the soft warmth inside.

For a moment, she tried to push him away, her hands shoving against his bare shoulders, but as he gentled his kiss—switched his intent from conquer to seduce—she grew pliant in his arms.