Page 14 of Fast Kill

He smiled at her, those sharp blue-green eyes and neat, reddish-brown beard making him every bit as ruggedly sexy as she remembered. Her heart did an annoying fluttery thing against her ribcage.

When she’d first met him, being near him had unsettled her because of his size and sheer masculinity. Now he put her on edge for a different reason. One that stirred a swirl of hot tingles low in her belly. That was annoying too. She had no time or patience for tingling when it never led anywhere.

“Hey, you made it,” he said to her.

“I did. How’s the knee?”

He made a face. “It’s okay. Just supposed to stay off it mostly for a little while.”

“What happened?”

“Little christening gift from a teammate, to commemorate his first mission,” Jamie said, grinning as he raised his beer bottle to his mouth.

Taylor looked back at Logan in surprise. “Your teammate did that to you?”

“Was an accident,” he said with a shrug. “So, how’ve you been?”

“Good.” She had to admit, it was far less awkward talking to him with the others around. Although the room did seem tiny all of a sudden with three men that size in it.

Since there was nowhere else for her to sit than the chair beside Logan, she took that one. Thankfully that old, ingrained and instinctive fear of big men never surfaced, but this close to him a different sort of nervousness took hold, every one of her senses heightened with female awareness.

“Taylor brought us cake,” Charlie announced, carrying in a pile of plates and forks. “I say we dig in.”

While everyone sat around talking, joking and eating cake, Taylor mostly observed. The camaraderie between the men was comfortable and obvious, and Piper and Charlie gave as good as they got in the teasing department.

As always, Taylor was the odd man out, staying quiet and pretty much only speaking when spoken to. She was far better at one-on-one than she was with a group, though that wasn’t saying much.

She made herself stay for an hour, sneaking glances at Logan when she thought no one else would notice, before finally making her excuses to go. Long day, had to be up early, lots of new data and intel for her to sift through, blah blah.

When she got up, Logan surprised her by reaching for his crutches as he started to rise. “I’ll walk you down to your car.”

That was ridiculous. She was a trained agent able to defend herself against any would-be muggers, and he was on freaking crutches. “I think I should be walking you to yours.”

He cracked a laugh. She liked that about him, that he could dish it out as well as take it. “Okay, then I’ll leave too, and we’ll walk each other out. How’s that?”

“Sure.” She put on her coat and waited while he hobbled behind her to the door, trying not to stare at the way the muscles in his arms flexed every time he moved the crutches. The T-shirt’s sleeves gave her a great view of his biceps, triceps and forearms muscles.

Mmm, yeah. Sexy lumberjack and then some. Not that she should be thinking about him that way, but come on, she’d have to be dead for her endocrine system not to react around him. Or for her brain to conjure up erotic images of him when she was in bed.

Holding the elevator doors open for him a minute later, she stepped aside to give him room to enter, unprepared for the effect of being trapped inside an enclosed space with him. He was over six feet tall and powerfully built, but his presence was even larger, all male confidence and charisma.

With him standing so close it was impossible not to notice his spicy, masculine scent, or feel the warmth radiating from his big body. It heated something low in her abdomen that she hadn’t felt in a long damn time, and sent tingles racing over her skin.

Realizing she’d been staring a second too long, she jerked her head around to face front, kept her eyes locked on the display at the front of the elevator as they rode down to the lobby.

“So, Taylor.” His deep voice seemed to reverberate in the enclosed space, wrapping around her like an invisible embrace.

Invisible embrace? Are you drunk?

“Yeah?” she said.

“What do you like to do for fun?”

Taken off guard, she glanced over at him. “What do you mean?”

His eyes twinkled at her answer. “You know, fun? Stuff you do that makes you happy.”

Staying home with Sudoku puzzles and a cup of tea in front of a crackling fire.Peace and quiet with which to recharge.

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