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  “I don’t want to be commanded.” There was a little pucker of worry between her eyebrows and he smoothed it away.

  “I don’t want to command you.” Oh man, no. “Why would I want to do that?”

  She shrugged, the light silk sliding off one shoulder. No, he didn’t want to command her, but he did want to do something else.

  It filled his head until he could think of nothing else. Max was forgotten, food was forgotten, the only thing filling his head was Paige, naked underneath a thin silk robe. It wouldn’t have made any difference if she’d been wearing chain mail.

  She looked down at him, blushed, then looked up. “I thought you were hungry?”

  “Mm.” Heat filled his head, his hands itched. The only thing that could make them stop itching was touching her. It took only a second to untie the robe and slip it off her shoulders and then she was in his arms, naked, soft breasts against his chest.

  She’d seen precisely what his body wanted. It was visible to all, sticking out from his groin. Men really had nowhere to hide.

  But—but she was affected, too. The signs were less visible, but there, if you knew where to look. Dilated pupils, a slight sheen on her face, her left breast trembling with the beat of her heart.

  And there, that sweet spot between her legs. He ran his hand down her back, between her buttocks, lower and . . . yes. Oh yeah. Soft and hot and wet. The female equivalent of a hard-on.

  Suddenly, his leg wouldn’t hold him anymore, and not just his leg. His entire spine had melted, gone liquid, flowed into his cock, and then solidified.

  Kissing her, he reached out with his foot, hooked a chair, dropped his briefs, sat down, and pulled her down on top of him. Just opened her up, pulled his cock away from his stomach and shoved it into her because if he didn’t, he’d die.

  They sat like that, a little sexy tableau, Woman on Man. Paige’s arms were around his back, face buried in his neck, his cock buried to the hilt in her.

  “Whoa,” he said and stopped, because what could he say? He hadn’t planned this at all. He thought they’d eat together and maybe he could coax her into another round in bed eventually. Or maybe tomorrow morning if she fell asleep immediately. This—this was unplanned and completely unstoppable. His body had reacted faster than his head.

  He looked down past her shoulder. Bright shiny hair, pale golden skin, strong sleek back, the indent of a small waist, buttocks sitting on his thighs.

  It was, hands down, the most erotic sight he’d ever seen.

  “Are, um, we okay here?” Because maybe she’d actually wanted to eat instead of being jumped.

  In answer, she lowered her mouth to his shoulder, took a little nip, then kissed him.

  His cock leaped inside her at the tiny bite. He lifted his hips while holding hers and slid in and out, once, testing.

  She remained lax against him, eyes closed, a faint smile on her face. She sighed.

  Okay.

  Oh, yeah.

  Another slide in, pulling out. And again. She lifted her face slightly and took his earlobe in her mouth, and took another little bite.

  He lost it.

  Holding her tightly, he slammed into her, establishing a hard rhythm, trying and failing to hold back. He couldn’t. It was as if his life depended on getting as deeply into her as he could and staying there as long as he could.

  Thank God she was with him, growing wetter by the minute—otherwise they’d catch on fire.

  Harder, faster . . . they were rocking in the chair now and a dim part of his brain hoped they wouldn’t topple over, because there was no way he could stop.

  Paige moved her head again and kissed him, her mouth as soft as her cunt, and it set him off. Rocket man.

  He held her hard against him while a hot wire sparked down his back and exploded through his cock, and he came in hot, fierce spurts that went on forever.

  Just as his spasms were dying down, she exhaled sharply in his ear—raising goose bumps all over his body—and clenched tightly around him, as if her cunt were trying to hold on to him.

  Oh man, he wasn’t going anywhere—he was staying right here, feeling her entire body shaking with her climax.

  When it was over, he was holding her tightly, panting. Maybe holding her too tightly. Was he hurting her? He slowly relaxed his grip, shifting to make her more comfortable.

  They were wet where they were joined and every move made a small noise. He rubbed a hand over her satiny back, exhausted, as content as he’d ever been in his life.

  “Uh oh.” Paige wriggled on him a little. He swelled inside her, as if he hadn’t just had the most explosive orgasm in his life. “Are we ever going to eat? Or are we just going to sit here until they find our dead bodies?”

  It was a thought. At some point in June his XO would arrive. Wouldn’t find him, would check with Paige, and there they’d be. Two corpses, still together, covered in cobwebs.

  He sighed. “We’ll eat. Sometime next week. Maybe.”

  Chapter Five

  April 5

  My gosh, good sex is better than Prozac as a mood lifter, Paige thought five days later as she walked back to her apartment after taking Maximilian for an afternoon walk. He was unusually frisky, leaping and barking and making her laugh. The kids on the beach made her laugh. The cool little wavelets frothing over her feet made her laugh.

  It was Friday, Maxwell was on his way home from a doctor’s appointment, and they’d spend the evening and the night together as they had every evening and every night for the past four days. And the weekend—she shivered. Two full days with him. Forty-eight hours. Non-stop.

  Oh yeah. Sex with Max was better than any mood-lifting drug known to mankind.

  Even the dark cloud of worry about Silvia was manageable. She hadn’t heard from Silvia since last Monday, B.M. Before Max. When she still had the capacity to fret and worry. It seemed to have left her body, together with all her sexual inhibitions. And all that empty space? Filled by her new lover.

  Maybe Silvia had pulled a Paige? Maybe she’d found herself a super lover and had disappeared for a week somewhere?

  After all, she was in Argentina, a country full of Latin lovers. Of course, there was no Latin lover on earth who could compete with Max, but still. Paige imagined having a laughing girl-fest with Silvia over a glass of wine at that swanky place on De Mott Street. I was worried about you, she’d say, and Silvia would smirk, her dark eyes dancing with amusement.

  “OK. Got it. Not to worry,” Paige said out loud to the imaginary Silvia, bending to ruffle the fur behind her dog’s ears. “I should take a leaf from your book, big boy, and be a little less anxious. Though I’d try not to have that goofy expression on my face.”

  He was panting and yipping, tongue lolling out of his mouth, in dog heaven. A long walk with his mistress and at the end of it food. What else was needed to be happy?

  “Indeed,” Paige said, not even annoyed with herself that she was talking out loud to her dog. “What else is needed? Besides fantabulous sex?”

  Max yipped in agreement, and she laughed as she opened the door and almost tripped over Max, who was scrambling to get inside, barking wildly because it was food time. Thank God the only neighbor was Max, who had a real soft spot for her Max.

  Though, come to think of it, it appeared that human Max was also her Max. Now wasn’t that delicious?

  She shook her head as she reached under the sink, doggy Max’s enthusiasm reaching frantic proportions. They’d definitely started something, but it was too early to say just what. It was enough that, so far, whatever it was, it was pretty wonderful.

  Max was bouncing off the walls. Though doggy Max was like a marine when human Max was around, obeying instantly, he reverted to the slacker teenager he really was in the presence of his mistress.

  Paige had one obedience trick in her arsenal. “Only good dogs get food.” She usually said that in tones that would have been used by an old-time school marm. Sometimes it actually worked, depending
on how hungry Max was.

  The jumping stopped but the barking didn’t, so she sighed and filled his food and water bowls.

  Max had said he wouldn’t be back before six, which gave her time to get some work done in her study, have a really nice, long, leisurely bath, and start cooking. Heat washed over her as she wondered whether they’d end up eating the food at midnight, as they often did.

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  After amazing sex.

  Oh, God. She sat down abruptly, her legs giving out.

  For a moment there, she’d had a sensory memory of being held tightly by him as he moved in her, hovering in a blaze of heat on the knife’s edge of an orgasm . . .

  She gave a shiver and simply sat for a moment, because her legs wouldn’t hold her, flushed red with the memory of this past week.

  Max watched her, head cocked, probably wondering what his insane mistress was up to.

  Reliving the most intense sexual experiences of her life, that’s what. But she couldn’t tell him that. He was only eight months old.

  Get a grip on yourself. It was so hard to reconcile what she knew of herself with the messages her body was sending her.

  Paige was cool and cerebral. A little detached. Always had been. She’d never been ruled by her hormones like her roommate in college had been. Moira had had a real good time in college. Real good. But she’d dropped out because Study of Gross Male Anatomy hadn’t been on the curriculum and nothing else had interested her half as much.

  Paige had been a straight-A student all the way.

  She’d always liked sex, it was one of life’s greatest pleasures. Somewhere above Spaghetti all’Amatriciana but definitely below that amazing massage she’d had at the Broken Tree Spa overlooking the Pacific. And it had always been a pleasure she could do without when there was no one suitable around.

  So that was her experience of sex, which was worlds away from this compulsion, like a dark creature living inside her that filled her head with heated images. Every time she moved, she was reminded of Max, particularly when she sat down.

  She, who was so very self-sufficient, couldn’t wait for Max to get back from San Francisco.

  Not just for the sex, either. She wanted to hear what the doctor said about his leg. She wanted to tell him what an incredible dickhead the project leader was being. Maybe she’d share her worries about Silvia. If he laughed them away, she’d feel better about it. If he took her worries seriStuworriesously, she might think of contacting someone.

  She trusted his judgement absolutely.

  That was something new, too. Paige never trusted anyone’s judgement as much as she trusted her own. But the few times Max disagreed with her opinion, he made her think. For such a macho man, he had the capacity to reason things out in a way that made sense to her.

  She missed him. She wanted him home right now.

  It was as if she had this tropism, like a plant to the sun.

  She wanted him home, now.

  Her vagina clenched.

  Whoa. She definitely needed to think of something else. Some work ought to do it. There was some data she needed to enter into a spreadsheet and some reports she had to catch up on. Work cooled her down, centered her.

  She dove in and was lost to the world when her cell phone rang.

  “Hello?”

  “Paige!”

  She sat up, electrified. “Silvia! Where are you? I’ve been trying to—”

  “Paige, I have to be quick! I’ve sent you info on Twitter. To Barbie, go check it now. Make sure you put it somewhere safe. Something terrible is happening, Paige. I think we’re going to have to go to the FDA. Maybe the FBI.”

  Paige’s eyes widened as she clutched her cell phone. “Where have you—”

  “No time, Paige! I’ve been running away from them all week. I think I’ve finally found a place where I can be safe. A friend is going to help me cross over into—” The connection was broken and Paige stared at the cell phone’s display. She checked the call register. It wasn’t Silvia’s cell phone number, which was memorized in her SIM card. Silvia was either using someone else’s cell or had bought a disposable one.

  Something terrible is happening.

  The urgency in Silvia’s voice spurred her. She accessed Twitter and scrolled. She and Silvia had set up a private communication system—@Barbie1 and @Barbie2—to complain about their bosses. Two years ago, Paige had had what they called a “seagull boss”—he flew in, he crapped all over everything, and then flew out—who was angry at the failed results coming from his pet project. In one notable incident, he threw the hard copy of the failed test—all two hundred pages—in the air, accusing her of not doing her job. Of being a Barbie doll hired for her looks.

  Instead of being kicked in the ass, he’d been kicked upstairs, but not before writing an epically negative report on her.

  Silvia had been there, and ever since then, they kept a close eye on all the assholes. Currently the biggest asshole in sight was the man overseeing the Argentina project out of Buenos Aires.

  Paige looked at the message Silvia had left for her @Barbie1. It was nonsense with a tinyurl in it. Clicking it brought her to a site dedicated to the restoration of Assyrian artifacts, and then to a specific section of the site. Smart girl.

  She isolated the section, which was huge—at least six hundred pages, over six hundred kilobytes. But the kicker was in the first ten pages. Paige skimmed the intro to the section, her heart starting to thump in panic.

  The test fields of HGHM-1 in Argentina had been planted five years ago, the minimum time the FDA required before applying for permission for human consumption of a new variety. Test results on animals had shown no anomalies. Human testing had not yet begun. But Silvia had gathered data from hospitals and clinics in the surrounding area. The data was preliminary, not all of it collation-ready, but serious enough to warrant an immediate halt to the test trials.

  Cancer rates in a radius of two hundred miles had increased by 400 percent over the past five years. Argentinian newspapers were calling it “The Cancer Epidemic.” Silvia was the first to connect it to the test fields, which had been kept confidential. Even on a hasty reading, Paige could see that there was a strong case to be made for the fact that her company’s new plant variety was massively carcinogenic.

  The project had to be terminated immediately, the plants uprooted and destroyed. A whole department of the company would have to shut down, a $30 million dollar investment wiped off the books, the legal department advised that probably a multi-million dollar lawsuit was in the offing. Heads would roll.

  Silvia had also sent her a personal message.

  On Monday, a car tried to drive me off the road. It was that twisty, winding road I sometimes take to get to Santa Maria. The car tried to run me off the road twice, but there were other cars on the road and it drove off. I was shaken. When I got home, my door was open. They’d trashed my apartment. They took my computer. I took one look and ran. I’ve kept my cell off so they couldn’t track me, and turned it on only to try to call you, but they must have some kind of homing device, because a few seconds into the call, I get static. By “they” I think it’s a little rogue operation inside the company’s security division. I don’t dare use any friends’ cell phones. These guys mean business.

  I’m in BA right now, staying with friends for a night or two, then moving on. I’m sending this to you from an internet café.

  I need to get home somehow. Can you help? I don’t think security at headquarters is involved, but you never know, so don’t contact them. Right now, I’m thinking FBI.

  I’ll be checking for a message from you a couple of times a day. Remember it’s GMT +3.

  God, Paige. Help me. I need to come home. I need to put this into someone’s hands.

  Her own hands were trembling. Her mind was racing as she eliminated the restoration of Assyrian artifacts section and downloaded only Silvia’s file onto her hard drive and then onto her thumb drive. She watched the bar filli
ng while trying to figure out who could be after Silvia.

  The most obvious choice for bad guy was the overall project’s team leader, Jonathan Finder. He had the psychological profile for it, too. Ambitious and greedy. This was his project and he was making his name with it. It was going to have to be scrapped and would probably cost the company huge amounts of money in reparations. It was the kind of blow that could destroy a career.

  Paige had always considered him a lightweight, but even wusses could be driven to violence by fear and greed.

  Paige didn’t even know where Finder was. He wasn’t at her lab, but that didn’t mean anything. GenPlant Laboratories ran facilities all over. Four research centers in the continental United States, including the high-security facility on Santo Domingo, and three outside the country. One in India, one in Thailand, and one in Argentina. Finder could be in any of these.

  Was he capable of running a rogue cover-up operation?

  If she only had something she could take to someone. Even an incriminating email, something. If she could go to the section head, Larry Pelton, with something other than wild conjecture, maybe she could stop Finder. Larry definitely had the authority to block Finder, especially if Finder were using GL resources to hunt Silvia down.

  It was true that she and Larry had an unfortunate sentimental history, but she was sure he would overlook that.

  She’d had no desire for a two-night stand. One night had been enough. She and Larry had avoided each other ever since that disastrous date when he’d tried and failed to stuff what felt like a marshmallow inside her, and they both ended up staring at the ceiling.

  That was nothing compared to what was at stake. Her main worry was how to help Silvia right now. How to get her to a safe place and then get her back to the States. She had no idea what to do, who to turn to.

  Then she thought of Max. Of course! He was a former SEAL. He’d know what to do, or at least who to contact. The legal implications were something she could think about later, but right now, the most important thing was to keep Silvia safe. Surely he’d know how to do that?