beating. With the quick fingers she was known for, she had his mask halfway off his face and her lips against his in the span of a breath.
Whatever surprise he might have had at her move was quickly tamped down by the hard press of his lips and the quick heat of his tongue as it swept through her parted lips.
A streak of heat flooded her belly before racing to the end of her limbs, and Rowan had the very real sensation of feeling her knees go weak.
He lifted his head, his lips bright with wetness in the moonlight, but it was his eyes that truly captured her. The gaze that had teased mere moments before glinted with something else. Something elemental. Something that called to her and made all those empty places inside—the ones that clamored so loudly in their silence—still.
And for the first time in four years, Rowan Steele felt an emotion that was stronger than the emptiness.
Voice gentle, he nodded toward his still-laced fingers. “Come on, darling. Up you go.”
Rowan placed a booted foot in his hands, their eyes meeting once more. In the moonlight she saw what had only been an impression earlier when she’d thought him as gangly as her brother.
Likely because he was.
He was barely a man, no more than nineteen or twenty if she estimated correctly. The half of his face she could see—over his hard jaw and past the thin scruff of beard—held a softness. Even more than that, she had the distinct sensation that he wasn’t quite done filling out the body that would ultimately be his.
With a hard push and the determination to find out who he was when they reached safety, she launched off his laced fingers, grabbing the ivy. She worked her way up the side of the house, hand over hand. He did the same on several strands next to her, his grunts the only sounds breaking the silence.
She cleared the second floor and turned to see him still struggling on the first. “Hand over hand and use your feet on the wall.”
“Bloody vines are breaking under my weight.”
“Grab a thicker handful.”
“I’m try—”
The protest bubbling in his words never fully formed as the thug they’d left in the kitchen came into view beneath them. Rowan screamed as the pistol lifted, even as her body moved on, desperate with the urge to flee the threat.
They were so close.
And then they weren’t.
The boy who climbed next to her shook with the impact of a bullet. His fingers loosened against the ivy.
His body slid down the wall, his gloved hands barely hanging on to the vines, before collapsing in a heavy slump on the ground.
Tears burned her eyes but she climbed on, torn between going back to him and the all-consuming need to get away.
To leave the nightmare behind.
The last image she saw before she ran over the London rooftops was that slumped figure—clad in black—lifeless on the ground.
Chapter 2
Today—New York City
Rowan Steele fired round after round at the Lower West Side gun range that had been her main practice site for the past decade. The fear of guns she’d long carried had never faded, but Rowan refused to be ruled by it.
And she took some solace when the multitude of holes in the center of the paper target’s chest indicated she’d mastered a technical proficiency, if not an emotional one.
The distinct feeling of being watched washed over her and she laid the gun down on the platform in front of her before turning around.
Straight into the eyes of her brother Campbell.
“What are you doing here?”
He shrugged, his long frame on the lanky, slender side of muscular. “Same thing you are. Staying sharp.”
“You haven’t been back from Paris all that long. I’d have thought picking up a gun was the last thing you’d want to do for a few more weeks.”
The hollow laugh was as empty as his eyes. “Why the hell do you think I’m here?”
Rowan nodded, well aware the events he and his fiancée, Abby, had faced the previous month were still far too fresh for both of them. The half brother Abby didn’t know she’d had was gone, but his attempts at terrorizing her were going to take time to fade. Add on the fact that the man had died at Campbell’s hands and she knew he and his new love were both working hard to get past the pain and look forward to their future.
She was just so damned happy they’d found each other and had a future to get on with.
“Abby going to take lessons?” She kept the question casual as she pulled a fresh magazine from her pocket.
“She’s not interested. And I’m only here to keep Kensington off my back.” Campbell grimaced before adopting a high tone meant to mimic their sister. “All those who work for the House of Steele are trained with the highest degree of security and protection skills.”
“So we are.”
“I’m surprised to see you, actually. I thought you were headed to evaluate that Egyptian collection coming into the new museum in Seattle.”
“Kenzi’s got a different assignment she wants me to take on.”
Campbell’s eyebrows lifted over a speculative blue gaze. “I thought Seattle was a pretty lucrative gig.”
“Apparently whoever she’s got dangling is willing to triple the usual fees.”
“Which is code for run far, run fast.” Campbell’s mouth slid into a frown. “Kenzi knows better than that. You look at the file?”
“Not yet.”
“Whatever it is, there’s no way it’s worth it.”
Rowan didn’t completely agree with Campbell—they took on the hard jobs others weren’t capable of—but she wasn’t going to argue the point. Her brother had a right to be a bit raw after recent events. She heard the protective instincts that threaded through his words.
Campbell would bounce back, and in the meantime, she’d keep her own council on the new opportunity. The House of Steele stood out as a resource because they did take on the hard jobs. And they had very few peers because no one had their combination of connections, skills and bankroll to get it done.
It still didn’t mean triple their already-exorbitant fee didn’t ring a few bells.
“You get what you pay for.”
“You always do.” Campbell moved into the stall next to hers and removed his gun from a protective case. “Just remember you get what you take, too. You don’t have to take this job.”
“I know.”
Although
