Page 21 of Killer Secrets (Tempting SEALs 5)

And her momma had been taken away from them both. Her momma, her daddy, and the woman her uncle had been engaged to. A terrorist's bomb had killed them while they were on vacation in Greece, though it had been speculated that the bomb had been meant for them. Her father had been as immersed in the covert life as she and Jason were.

"She would have been proud of us," she finally whispered, surprising herself with her introspection.

She had been doing that a lot these past months. Reflecting, thinking, considering the choices she had made, and her life in general.

She was thirty years old. She had a failed marriage behind her and no children. Her marriage to Kane Austin had been the first casualty of her secret life and covert activities.

She had no family but Jason, and so few true friends that at times the loneliness bore down on her.

And lovers? They didn't last long even when she did find time to get involved with a man. She was too intent on partying and playing. They didn't really know her, so they had no idea why the parties, the trips, and the shopping were so damned important.

No one really knew her. Except Jason. And Ian. That part of her that she hadn't even known herself, had only begun learning in the past year, ached with loneliness. Ached for the man who held himself just out of reach.

Ian knew her. Ian had done what no one else had, he had made it a point to learn about her. He knew about her parents, about Jason, but more importantly, he knew who and what she was. He had informed her, his voice filled with amusement the night he slipped into her condo, that he knew her as no one else ever would. And he was right. He knew how to touch her, how to make her heart and her body come alive. And he knew the woman she hid from the world.

Which could be a liability if she thought there were so much as a chance of his turning against the friend who lay so helpless in that damned clinic.

"Where do you go from here?" Jason kissed the top of her head before moving slowly away.

"For now, I wait a bit." She shrugged, turning back to him. "He'll show up."

"You seem certain." His gaze was piercing in the dark.

Kira hid her smile. "I am certain." He was growing as desperate for her as she was for him. She dreamed of nothing else, and sometimes, she thought of nothing else.

"I have a few contacts here," he told her. "Let me know if you need invitations."

"Dozens have already poured into the hotel," she reported. "The flies are converging like a plague."

Jason grimaced. "I was hoping to eat dinner tonight."

Kira widened her eyes innocently. "What did I say?"

"Trouble," he muttered. "That's all you are."

Kira rolled her eyes. She was growing tired of that accusation.

* * *

Six

IAN STOOD AT HIS BEDROOM window, the technologically advanced night-vision goggles sitting securely over his eyes as he stared at the bedroom window in the villa across from him.

He should have been ashamed of himself. Hell, he was using a set of military hardware that even soldiers in the field didn't have yet, to spy on a woman. He watched as Kira leaned her head back against Jason McClane's chest and lifted her hands to clasp the ones at her shoulders. The pose was entirely too intimate, too close. He felt anger twitch the muscle in his cheek as McClane kissed the top of her head and rubbed his cheek against her hair. He knew he wasn't the least impartial when it came to Kira, and possessive instincts he didn't know lived within him were now tightening at his gut.

He wanted to kill McClane for touching her, and that was a bad thing. As the two moved back from the balcony doors, Ian pulled the goggles free of his face and tucked them once again into the wall safe.

The villa the Eventeses had leased for the season had every amenity, right down to personal safes in each bedroom.

Pushing his fingers through his hair, he paced his darkened bedroom, feeling lust edging into desperation as he thought of her, possibly allowing another man to touch her.

He shook his head. He'd watched Kira and her uncle together before, and though there was a surfeit of affection, there seemed to be no sexual tension. But that assurance wasn't easing the tightening in his gut, or in his cock. He knew it wasn't even possible that she would do something like sleep with the bastard. He knew that in his head, but logic could never apply to how he reacted over Kira, especially when another man was around, no matter who that man might be. He wanted to be the only one who touched her.

/> He didn't even bother to jack off again. Masturbation wasn't helping. He knew this mood, or at least a weak facsimile of it. The tension invading him wouldn't ease until he fucked her. Until he fucked her until neither of them could breathe for the pleasure tearing through them.

So why was he waiting? She was over there, accessible to him, and it was more than apparent that she wasn't going anywhere.

But she was a woman.

---