Skin Game

CHAPTER 9

Kyra peered past Rey’s shoulder, stunned speechless by what she saw.

Through the gap between cheap curtains, she’d been able to tell the lights were out—and she’d thought that meant he was gone. But she’d knocked anyway, digging up a tiny bit of faith. Maybe he’s asleep, she’d told herself. But he wasn’t. She’d heard him stirring inside; in a motel like this one, the walls were tissue thin.

First, relief surged through her. Then he swung the door wide, and she glimpsed a sea of flickering candles. Ah, crap. Maybe he’d picked up a woman somewhere between Lefty’s Tavern and Motel 5, which sadly wasn’t up to the rigorous standards set by the Motel 6 up the road. But at least he’d come back.

If it had been anyone else, she would have just assumed he’d split and gone to bed herself. Kyra wouldn’t even have bothered knocking. In fact, she’d never taken such a leap of faith before. If it had been her father, she wouldn’t have hesitated to run that particular con, but without him, it hadn’t been possible in years.

As she’d driven back from the bar, she’d wondered whether he had skipped out with their night’s take. She could afford the loss, which was why she’d taken the risk, but joy ricocheted right through her at finding him waiting for her, just like he’d promised. Maybe she’d really found a new partner.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she muttered. “I didn’t realize—”

“That I was making dinner?” Rey cut in smoothly.

He stepped back to reveal the rest of his room. Nothing could disguise the cheap furniture, but the candlelight helped. From somewhere he’d found a red-and-white-checkered tablecloth, which he’d spread over the cheap café table beside the window. He’d laid the table with Chinette, plastic silverware, and wineglasses. The man even had a wicker basket for the food.

“I don’t understand.” Kyra took a step back, puzzled.

In answer, Rey reached out and snagged her hand, tugging her into the room. “Come in already.”

There was a little sizzle, but nothing like the usual reaction. Though it meant she might get sick later, she didn’t jerk away. She felt completely ambushed—in a good way. Kyra let him seat her, and then he laid out her choices, mostly sandwich makings and fresh veggies. He sat down opposite her, smiling. His teeth gleamed white in the dark. Mechanically, she started assembling an enormous sandwich with turkey, Swiss cheese, sliced tomatoes, lettuce, some Colby, and roast beef. The thing was six inches thick by the time she finished.

“What are you doing?” She gestured at her sandwich.

“Feeding you.”

Her new partner was particular about what he put on his sandwich, she noted. Rey took his time selecting the bread, and he went with whole grain. He chose lean turkey, and the trimmings, lettuce and pickle. It reinforced what she’d already noticed about him—he was careful and he took his time with things, great attention to detail.

“Yeah, I figured that out. But why?”

“You’re starving by the time we finish for the night. I wanted you to have something more than ramen noodles or vending-machine junk. You have a high metabolism.”

So he’d noticed. That rocked her a little. Nobody had paid that much attention to her in years. Even her dad hadn’t. Since she was sixteen and she’d told him they needed to keep moving on, he had trusted her to make her own decisions.

“I do,” she acknowledged. Kyra took an enormous bite to cover her confusion. She chewed while contemplating his acuity. “How’d you transport all this stuff?”

“Carried it.” He dismissed her concern with a loft of one broad shoulder. “It’s only a mile and a half to the market from here. Don’t worry,” he added, “I took the food out of my part of the cut. Here’s yours.” He handed her a wad of bills across the table.

Kyra stuffed those in her bag, now on the floor at her feet. She didn’t bother to count the cash. If he’d wanted to cheat her, he would have done it by disappearing, not skimming five bucks off the top.

Her sandwich went down quickly, as he’d doubtless known it would. She felt less enthusiasm about the raw vegetables he lined up on her plate, but when he poured the wine, she decided it was a worthwhile compromise. Kyra nibbled on a stalk of celery, none too enthusiastic about its healthful benefits.

He’ll have me taking multivitamins before long.

“So after you left Lefty’s, you were just overcome with the desire to feed me?” Somehow she just couldn’t wrap her head around it.

“Altruism doesn’t ring your bell, huh?”

She quirked her mouth up in a half smile. “Not so much.”

“Brutal honesty it is, then. Remember how you said if we ever had sex again, I’d have to work for it?” Rey grinned and swept his hand toward the candles. “Consider this my first day on the job.”

Now there was a motive she could understand. He wanted something from her, and he’d hit on this as a possible way to get it. Kyra smiled back.

“It’s beautiful,” she said softly. “Who’d have thought a few votive candles could be put to such good use?” She felt compelled to warn him, though. “But you should know . . . I don’t really do romance. I mean, I’m not susceptible to it.”

For a long moment, Rey studied her in the flickering light. She felt as if his onyx eyes stripped away layers of skin, flesh, and bone to see into the parts of her she didn’t even examine too long. When he finally spoke, she shivered a little, freed from a spell that stole her secrets.

“How would you know?” he asked.

Another shudder worked through her. It was as if he could see down the years, and he knew she’d never lived anywhere long enough to have someone come to the door with flowers, not when it was real. Serrano didn’t count. Rey knew she’d never been taken to a fine restaurant by a man she esteemed and respected. And she’d never regretted her life, never regretted her choices.

But here in the vanilla-scented dark, she wondered for the first time what might have been. She didn’t like him for making her speculate. Her stomach cramped tight around the sandwich she’d inhaled.

“I just do.” She dismissed the strange, otherworldly moment when she’d felt like he knew her to her bones. “But you get points for trying. I’m weirdly flattered you’d go to the trouble since you’ve had me once already.”

“Three times,” he corrected in a soft, savage voice. “And it wasn’t enough.”

Her nerves fired to life, remembering that night. She’d never been with anyone who could be as rough as she wanted without actually hurting her, but Rey had carnal brutality down to a fine art, knowing where to press, how to hold, when to restrain. He used fingers and teeth with expert precision. Kyra squirmed in her seat, squeezing her thighs together.

She tried for a dismissive tone, not wanting him to see how badly he’d shaken her. “Sex is sex.”

“No.” He shook his head. “We had something else entirely, and you know it, too.”

“Something more than sex?” Kyra went caustic in self-defense. “With a guy I picked up—unwillingly, I might add—outside a cheap beer hut filled with yokels. I don’t think so.”

Leaning in, he asked, “Then how did I know to bite your inner thigh? How did I know you like to be subdued and taken from behind?”

Those memories sparked awareness between them. If she were honest, their night together had fueled her solitary fantasies more than once. But she wasn’t going to let herself be suckered into a two-person fantasy that ended in him getting what he wanted from her so easily. She’d said he would have to work for her, and she’d meant it.

Kyra shrugged. “Sometimes people share the same kinks. It’s pure serendipity when they meet.”

“I can see you’re going to be a challenge.”

“That makes it more fun, doesn’t it? You wouldn’t want me to just strip naked and lay down for you.”

His dark gaze slid to the bed as if imagining her there, spread out for him, and he gave a little groan that turned her on. “Wouldn’t I?”

“I think you’re a man who enjoys the chase.”

“More often than not,” he admitted. “I intended to seduce you in traditional ways, candlelight and flowers. I had a feeling you hadn’t seen much of that, but now I’m not sure what’ll get me what I want.”

“I’m certainly not going to tell you. That would take all the fun out of letting you figure it out yourself.”

“Will you give me a hint?” Rey smiled.

Kyra found herself staring at his mouth. The rest of his face was sharp, reflecting some lovely, arcane union of Hispanic and Native American features, but he had a lush, gorgeous mouth. In response, near smiling, she wanted to kiss him so badly that she had to curl her fingers around the armrest of the chair.

“I’d better not. You know too much about me already.” That was, without a doubt, the truest thing either of them had said since she got back. “I’m going to bed. Thanks for dinner. And . . . see you in the morning.”

Reyes reached for her before she could scamper to her room like a frightened rabbit. His grip wouldn’t hurt her, but neither would he permit her to escape. Not yet. He ran his thumb against the delicate skin on the inside of her wrist. She trembled.

There was a little surge, like that electricity from the first time, but it was faint and thready, almost nonexistent. He didn’t feel drained, just a little dizzy. That could almost come from her softness. Reyes hadn’t known until this moment how much he loved the scent of coconut.

His hard cock surged against his zipper. Painful, but tolerable. When she’d teased him with the mental image of her naked on the bed, he’d turned to stone from the waist down, just as she intended. Well, he didn’t intend to suffer alone.

“I think a good night kiss is in order, don’t you? It seems to fit the mood . . . and it’s in keeping with dinner.”

Her eyes looked huge in the candlelight. “Just one?”

“Absolutely.” He etched a cross over his heart, which would’ve been laughable if she knew anything about him.

Kyra tilted her face up, and her trust struck him in the solar plexus. Something was screwy. She didn’t act like the hard-edged, treacherous bitch depicted in Foster’s file. Maybe he should do a little more checking.

For now, though, he would take the lips she’d offered him. Reyes curled his fingers around the nape of her neck and leaned in with his whole body, bringing her up against the door. Kyra wound her arms around his neck, startling him with the sense of rightness that accompanied the motion. Reyes kissed like he fucked, all possession. In her case, it was more furious than usual; he didn’t want to leave her a spare brain cell for anything else.

Her mouth opened on a gasp, and he took more, nuzzling deep with each sweep of his tongue. She tasted faintly of celery and spicy mustard, clean flavors that made him want to lick away everything that didn’t come from Kyra. He slid his hands down her body, relearning her curves, and then cupped her ass in his hands, lifting her up against him. He tasted her from lips to jaw and then downward, biting tenderly at the sweet column of her throat. Then he nibbled his way back to her luscious mouth.

Her nails dug into his shoulders, tiny little bursts of pain that insisted they should be naked. Kyra’s tongue lashed against his, slick and hot. He swore he could feel her heartbeat in the heat of her lips, an echo to his own thundering in his ears. Then he lost his mind as she tried to climb him. His hands came up to drag her hips against his and he couldn’t help but thrust. She pushed back, undulating her hips. Her breath came in sharp little pants; he recognized the sound of her escalating arousal. If he touched her inside her panties, she’d come in a fury of clenched teeth and fierce cries.

God, she felt good. Reyes remembered that she’d fit him like a glove. With her long legs curled around his hips, he should be canonized for not unzipping them both and sinking into her. For a long moment, it was touch and go.

Then he opened his hands and stepped back, letting her drop. Kyra swayed for a moment, eyes opening. She pressed two fingers to her bee-stung mouth, seeming to try to figure out what had happened—or what hadn’t.

“That was more than one kiss,” she accused, breathless.

Reyes made himself smile. “My bad.”

He was pleased to see her knees weren’t altogether steady when she tried to open the door. Kyra supported herself on the door frame for a few seconds, still looking dazed. “Well then.” Her gaze slid to his bed. Lingered there, as if awaiting an invitation. “Good night, I guess.”

You made the rules, sweetheart. No changing them now. Keeping her off-balance would work better than any tactic he’d yet devised.

“G’night, Kyra.”

He shut the door in her sweet, sun-kissed face. Reyes stood listening for the click of her door, making sure she’d gotten in safely. Only then did he push away from the wall and allow a muffled groan. As he went, he stripped off his clothes.

Straight into the shower. Another man might take the high road, but he wasn’t big on self-denial. More importantly, it would undermine his purpose if he couldn’t control himself around her, and there was only one way to make sure of his discipline. He had to be practical about such things, so he stepped into the shower and turned it on.

The hot water felt tepid against the heat of his flesh, as if it could evaporate to steam just from touching him. Reyes wanted to be businesslike as he wrapped his fingers around his dick, but he couldn’t force Kyra out of his mind’s eye. As he began to stroke, water pouring down on him, he saw her sinking to her knees in the tub, face upturned as it had been for his kiss. To his disgust, he lost it in less than two minutes, as soon as he imagined her lips touching his cock. A shuddering orgasm ripped a cry from his throat, and he slumped against the tile wall, heart still racing. A woman hadn’t gotten to him like this since he was a kid.

A few minutes later, he staggered out of the bathroom, steam slipping through behind him to coil in the air. After pulling back the covers to reveal thin off-white sheets, Reyes sank onto the bed, slightly dizzy. The worst part—he wasn’t anything like satisfied. He still had a need for her twined like barbwire in his belly. Nothing would do but for him to have her again.

And he was starting to get chills when he pictured ending her. He didn’t want to be close to her when he did it; that was beyond even his considerable professional acumen. And that ruled out knives and strangulation.

He told himself to focus. Keep your mind on the job, asshole. And don’t worry about the details. Just get the information. By the time you have it, she’ll show her true colors. They always do.

Still, he couldn’t help but want to double-check what he’d been told. Maybe he needed to dig deeper. His attention to detail was what made him one of the best—and most princi pled—assassins in the country. Sometimes people were desperate enough to have the job done right that they tried to put one over on him.

Reyes prided himself on taking on jobs where the target needed killing anyway. The fact that someone’s just deserts and his skill intersected? Serendipity, as Kyra claimed regarding their sexual compatibility. Privately, he considered himself a vigilante for hire, though not for such an altruistic reason as righting a wrong. Nobody he knew wore a white hat, too hard to keep it clean.

Without further deliberation, he plucked his cell phone from the hidden zipper inside his jacket. He also had a pocket-sized quick charger since his cover didn’t permit for plugging in the phone in his room. Speed dial number four connected him to someone he did business with frequently. Favors begat favors in his line of work. He didn’t like owing people, but he’d done a good turn for this guy recently.

“Monroe,” he said, when the call completed.

A rough, disgruntled male voice asked, “Do you know what fucking time it is here?”

Since he had the man’s cell number, he had no idea where Monroe might be. It was better that way. “No. And I don’t care, either. Can you check someone out for me?”

A stream of colorful invective followed—seasoned by curses in Chinese, Turkish, and Russian. Reyes waited, listening to the rustling of papers. Finally Monroe said, “Shoot. I’m ready.”

“Get me everything you can find on Kyra Marie Beckwith. I have three socials here for her, but I’m not sure which is the real one.” He listed the numbers.

“Ah,” said Monroe. “One of those.”

“Yep. How soon can you get it?”

“That depends.”

A prickle of irritation pierced his calm. “On what?”

“On whether she’s lived on or off the grid.”

“Okay,” he acknowledged. “Just do the best you can and get it to me fast. You do this for me, and we’ll call it square over Prague.”

“Appreciate it,” Monroe said, and Reyes heard the smile in his voice. “I’ll be in touch, patron.”

They had history, Monroe and him. He never asked anyone else for help.

Shortly thereafter, he disconnected and lay back in the dark, staring at the ceiling. Outside, he could hear the hum of the fluorescent light in the hallway. Reyes wondered what Kyra was doing on the other side of the wall. Was she a cold-shower sort of woman?

And then he didn’t have to wonder; he knew.

Listening to her muffled thumps and moans, he discovered she was a self-sufficient type. It sounded like she was tearing up the bed without him. With her, his plans never seemed to work as anticipated.

Ah, Jesus.

He recognized the throaty cry she made as she came, but her movements didn’t show any signs of slowing. Reyes would give a kidney to kick a hole in the wall and have her, and say to hell with his job, to hell with his reputation. He burned with wanting her.

It was going to be a long night.