His Personal Mission Read online

  “How did you know that, Courtney?”

  “He told me. That’s why I had to do what he said.” She gulped in a deep breath.

  “Courtney?” Sasha prodded, very gently, after a moment.

  “He said he’d kill me if I didn’t.”

  Another deep breath before she added the words Sasha had feared.

  “Just like he killed her.”

  Chapter 18

  It was quiet here in the woods, Sasha thought as they sat on the front porch swing of Rand’s house, especially when you were used to the constant background hum of densely populated suburbia: traffic, voices, your neighbor’s television, the thumping sound system of a passing car full of teenagers. So quiet, all you could do was think. And she was certain Ryan was doing more than his share of that.

  She didn’t try to tell him not to, she knew it would be useless. How could he not after what he’d heard?

  They’d spent hours being debriefed, hours during which she was certain he was raw with the now even more urgent need to find Trish. And the sheriff’s investigators, being who they were, spent a couple of hours milking them for every bit of information they had, then ousted them from the proceedings as no longer part of this investigation.

  Sasha was used to the way they worked. Ryan wasn’t, and he did not go quietly. Only Rand’s calm intervention soothed the situation; one of the deputies who’d responded had worked with Rand before, and Sasha guessed from Rand’s nod at her that he would have whatever information might help them before it was over.

  That it was now late afternoon and Rand was still gone told them how complicated this was getting.

  “We don’t know it was Trish. We don’t even know that it’s true.” She’d said it before, but she hoped he’d actually hear her this time.

  He closed his eyes. And in that moment, looking at his expression, she ached for him in a way she’d never known before. For all the pain she’d witnessed in her work, for all the agonies she’d seen people go through, she’d never hurt for anyone the way she was hurting for him now.

  “You were right,” he whispered, not opening his eyes.

  “Right?”

  “I did take them for granted. I assumed they’d always be there. My folks. Dad telling me what I should do, Mom worrying about what I did do. And Trish, teasing me, laughing at me…”

  His voice got so rough she knew his throat had tightened on him. She searched for something to say, for the things she seemed to come up with that helped the others she’d had to get through similar situations. But nothing seemed good enough, not now. Nothing sounded like anything other than pointless platitudes, or reassurances he wouldn’t believe. So she did the only thing she could think of. She put her arms around him.

  It felt right. So right, it would have made her skittish had she allowed herself to think about all the reasons it shouldn’t happen. The timing, if nothing else; Ryan was vulnerable, hurting.

  She’d meant to comfort, and for a few moments it seemed she was succeeding. When it changed, she couldn’t bring herself to pull away, not when he’d responded so instantly and fiercely to her embrace. His arms had come around her in turn, pulling her hard against him. The old fire flashed, flaring up as if it had been only banked all that time ago, not extinguished.

  She knew he was probably desperate for distraction, knew he couldn’t be thinking straight. But she also knew this had been brewing between them from the moment she’d answered his call…had it been just yesterday?

  And she was honest enough with herself to admit she wanted this, wanted to know if her changed view of him would affect this as well; it had always been hot between them, but her irritation at what she’d seen as his faults had overridden the fiery attraction. She’d been, as always, practical and logical.

  Right now, practicality and logic had never been so remote.

  She tilted her head back to look up at him.

  “Sasha,” he whispered.

  “Yes,” she said, to her name and everything else he hadn’t asked.

  She knew in the instant before he moved that he was going to kiss her. And instead of pulling away—that logic was indeed far removed—she lifted to meet him. This was no stolen, unexpected kiss to test the waters. This was done with full intent, and the knowledge of someone striking a match over gasoline.

  The fire leapt, racing along her nerves with a heat that left her breathless. Not that she could breathe anyway. His mouth wasn’t gentle or coaxing or tentative this time, it was demanding. He was consuming her, devouring her, and she suddenly didn’t need to breathe, or do anything else earthly, because she was in some crazy, new place she’d never been before.

  More, she wanted more, and flicked her tongue over his lips in invitation. He read it instantly, and she felt his hands come up to cup her face, to brace her for the renewed fierceness of his kiss. He probed, tasted, and she did so in return, barely aware of moving, aware only that she wanted closer.

  She slid a hand under his shirt, nearly gasping at the glorious shock of the heat of his sleek skin. He’d always been fit—no junk-food flab for this computer geek—and that hadn’t changed; she could feel the tautness of lean muscle.

  She could hear her heart hammering—or was it his? It didn’t matter. And when she felt his fingers sliding over her own skin, the heat flashed to the surface there as well. Then he was cupping her breast, and she felt an ache she’d known only once before in her life, the ache to have this man completely. A tiny moan broke from her, and she arched toward him.

  He moved, pressing her back, and she welcomed the weight of him as he shifted over her. She felt the solid ridge of aroused male flesh pressed against her, and wanted nothing more but to touch, caress. She did, and savored the low, rough sound that he made. He was—

  The sound of a car coming up the gravel driveway stopped her short. Ryan sat up abruptly, as if they were kids caught making out. With a rueful glance at each other, they quickly put their clothes to rights just as an unfamiliar white sedan came into view and stopped. Kate Singleton got out and waved at the driver who had given her a lift home, since Rand still had her car.

  Gravel, Sasha thought, remembering the yard at the house where they had rescued Courtney. The sound was distinctive, obvious. That slime had probably done his driveway and walk with it for just that purpose.

  Kate spotted them on the porch as soon as she turned around. She came to them, a warm, concerned expression on her face. She laid a gentle hand on Ryan’s shoulder.

  “Have you eaten?”

  Ryan let out a compressed breath. “Not hungry.”

  “I would think not,” Kate said. “Doesn’t mean you don’t have to eat.”

  “I’m not in the mood,” Ryan said. Then, apparently realizing how he’d sounded, he added more gently. “Sorry. I’m not very sociable right now.”

  “I wasn’t going to invite friends old and new,” Kate said. “Just offer some comfort food. They call it that because it works, you know. Come on in.”

  Whether out of custom or simple courtesy, Ryan gave in. He hesitated when Sasha didn’t immediately follow. She got up slowly, barely aware of what she was doing, because her mind was racing.

  …friends old and new, Kate had said.

  When they went inside, instead of heading for the kitchen, Sasha headed for her room, and that capacious black and yellow bag.

  “You didn’t eat.”

  “Wasn’t hungry,” Sasha said.

  “How come that didn’t work for me?”

  “Because,” she said as she gathered up the papers she had spread over the bed, “it gave Kate a chance to mother you. I think she’s practicing.”

  Ryan sat down on the edge of the bed as Sasha patted the pages into a neat pile and slid them back into the portfolio she’d had them clipped in. She’d had a memory tickling her brain, from those lists they’d made from the various social pages, but she hadn’t found what she was looking for yet.

  “They went to bed?”
<
br />   Ryan nodded. “Kate said she was tired.”

  “Building a baby is hard work.”

  Ryan’s brow lifted. “Never thought of it quite like that.”

  “That’s why we women are such amazing creatures.”

  “And here I thought you were just—”

  He stopped, clearly having thought better of what he had been going to say.

  “What?” Sasha asked. “Come on, give me the list.”

  “I don’t think that would—”

  “Too late now. Give. What are we?”

  “Different.”

  She nearly laughed; if not for the hovering shadow of what might have happened to Trish, she would have.

  “That’s a given. Shall I help? We’re sweet and bitchy, fun and moody, generous and demanding, kind and cruel, and the cost of being able to build that baby are hormones that occasionally run amok.”

  Ryan had started to smile, but when she finished, he was looking merely thoughtful. “I never thought of it like that, either. The baby part.”

  She looked at him for a long moment, wondering if she should ask the question that had popped into her head. She’d asked a form of it, once before, and his fierce negative had been yet another straw on the pile that had eventually broken the relationship, in her mind.

  “I didn’t think you thought about babies at all.”

  “I don’t really. Kids, well, yeah. I mean, when they’re old enough to talk to you, that’s different. Then they’re fun.”

  Well, that was a change, she thought. Before the answer had been a near-hysterical laugh and a definite “No way!”

  “They’re the best and hardest parts of life,” Sasha said.

  “You want them, don’t you.”

  It wasn’t a question, but she answered anyway. “I do.”

  “How can you?”

  She blinked. “What?”

  “How can you want them, when you see all the time the horrible things that can happen to them?”

  She looked at him, surprised by the depth of the question. “Perhaps,” she said slowly, “it’s because I see what can happen that I want them. Because my kids, at least, will have a parent who’s wise to the evil things out there, and who will take extra steps to keep them safe.”

  “Lucky kids,” he said softly.

  She moved suddenly, to sit beside him. “Don’t give up, Ryan. We don’t know anything for sure yet.”

  “I know. At least, my head does.”

  He sounded so beaten down she couldn’t help herself; she slipped an arm around him. She hugged him tightly.

  “Sasha,” he whispered. “I need—”

  He cut himself off. It didn’t matter, when he turned to her, she knew it was again for distraction. And in a very uncharacteristic fashion, she wasn’t sure she cared. She wanted to ease his pain, more than anything else.

  This time it was slow, gentle, the build from warmth to fire more gradual. He started with a trail of quick, soft kisses from her lips over her cheek and down the side of her throat. Then, as if realizing he’d missed something, he reversed course and kissed his way back up to her ear. She shivered as his warm breath both tickled and aroused her. When the hot, wet tip of his tongue traced the curve of her ear with a feather-light touch, she let out a low moan she couldn’t stop.

  She felt a shudder go through him, as if in response to the sound she made. For all the things that had broken them apart, this had never been one of them. And she was at the point now where she realized that if she didn’t pursue this now, when she had the chance, she was going to wonder about it for the rest of her life.

  She dived in, kissing him back fiercely, her mouth taking his and asking to be taken in turn. She didn’t even realize until she felt the corner of the portfolio digging into her back that they were lying on the bed now, her sense of balance was seemingly on hold as her body dealt—or tried to—with the new onslaught of incredible sensations his mouth and hands were creating.

  His hands. God, those hands, hands that could make a computer dance, apparently had the same effect on her. She would have sworn every nerve in her body was rippling under his touch.

  Those hands that were apparently also quite adept at other things; she was down to her yellow bra and panties and not even sure how. Had he done it? Or had she, herself, in a frenzy to feel skin against skin? No, she thought foggily, he had. Because she had been busy with his clothes, yanking off his cotton sweater and tugging at the zipper of his jeans.

  She could feel the hot, hard length of him pressed against her belly. It had been a long time for her, a very long time, and she felt a qualm.

  “Ryan,” she whispered.

  He murmured something she didn’t catch, and then his hand cupped her breast and his thumb rubbed over her nipple, eliciting a cry of shocked pleasure that made her forget whatever she’d been worried about.

  Another moan broke from her when he pulled away for a moment. “Speaking of kids,” he said roughly. “I don’t have anything. A condom, I mean.”

  She groaned. “Neither do I.”

  “And you’re not…on the pill or anything?”

  “No. This is hardly my MO,” she pointed out.

  “I know that.”

  “I haven’t been this close with anyone since…The last time it was you.”

  An odd expression crossed his face. She thought she saw one corner of his mouth lift as if he were almost going to smile.

  “So we either stop, or find another way.”

  At least he wasn’t trying to convince her it was safe, or just once would be okay, or worth the risk. Sasha wasn’t sure her aching body was going to accept the sudden halt.

  “Other way?”

  To her surprise, by the time she said it, he was sitting up and pulling his jeans back on.

  “Ryan?”

  “We’re not teenagers, Sasha. I don’t want this to be some silly fumbling around in the heat of the moment.”

  She stared at him. When he had his sweater back on, he turned to look at her. Only then was she aware of her own state of undress by comparison.

  “I want it all this time, Sasha. And I don’t want to start with halfway.”

  Sasha continued to stare at him for a moment before she finally grabbed her yellow nightshirt and pulled it on, since it was closest. And all the while she was confronting the reality staring her in the face.

  The Ryan Barton she’d known would have gone for the “other way.” They would have ended up using hands, mouth, whatever was necessary to ease the fiery ache.

  This Ryan Barton would not.

  I want it all this time, Sasha.

  And heaven help me, I want to give him all this time, she thought. He had changed, she couldn’t deny it any longer. Not only had he changed, he’d become exactly what she’d wished he was two years ago.

  Or he had been, and she’d misjudged. Or some combination of the two. That, she thought, was the most likely.

  But whatever the cause, she knew that this Ryan was what she’d thought and hoped she’d found two years ago.

  The thought scared her more than a little.

  Chapter 19

  It had been a long, restless night for both of them. They had the house to themselves this morning, as Kate went to work and Rand had gone back to the sheriff’s office to see what he could pick up about the victim they’d recovered, and her abductor.

  Ryan came into the kitchen, looking more tired than she had ever seen him. And as if he felt more than a bit guilty. It didn’t take even Sasha’s good imagination to explain that; how could he have even thought about sex, even sex with Sasha, when his sister was out there, or worse, possibly dead, murdered.

  He looked as if there was an ache in him that was almost unbearable. She’d have been surprised if there wasn’t; this Ryan felt, and felt deeply. And this was the price to pay for that. She wondered if he mightn’t have been onto something, with his old, more carefree attitude.

  Sasha looked back at the papers
she had spread out on the eating bar. The were dog-eared in places now; they’d been through them so many times since they’d printed them out before they’d left California.

  “What are you doing?” Ryan asked, his voice husky. “Going over it all again?”

  She glanced up at him, knew he could probably see her eyes looked nearly as tired as his own. The old Ryan might have missed that, the new one wouldn’t. But it seemed clear sleep hadn’t been on the agenda for either of them.

  “Sort of. I was looking for something, something I vaguely remembered seeing.”

  “What?”

  “Another screen name Trish had some exchanges with.”

  He frowned. “She had a lot of kids posting on her page. None of them stood out like this SadBreeze clown.”

  “I know. But something got me thinking…”

  She glanced at him, curious if he was as ready to go back to business as he seemed. But in truth, it wasn’t as if the heat between them last night had never happened; instead, it was as if it were right there, simmering, ready to flash into an inferno at the slightest encouragement.

  He read her look perfectly. Another indication of a new Ryan. “I know, last night was a mistake,” he said roughly.

  “No, it wasn’t,” she countered. “Going ahead without protection would have been a mistake.”

  He blinked. She gave him a rueful smile. “I spent some time last night wondering how embarrassed I’d be to buy condoms for the first time at my age.”

  He smiled, as if he couldn’t help it. “Better than trying to buy them at sixteen.”

  “Or younger,” she said. “It never ceases to amaze me, how shocked parents are when we find their sweet, innocent child had a stash of latex they never knew about.”

  “Do you lecture them about not paying attention?”

  She winced. “Not at that moment, when their child is missing.”

  He didn’t miss her reaction. “That wasn’t aimed at you. Really. It’s just…I’m beginning to see your point. I used to think you were just extreme, because of your job. But now…I think I get it. Having kids is one place where sticking your head in the sand doesn’t cut it.”