And Hawk Monroe had saved her life.
Hawk.
God.
She still couldn’t believe it, couldn’t stop shaking, even though he’d turned the heater in the car on full blast. She’d sat there, numb and clutching his sport coat around her body, listening to him explain the situation while trying not to draw the achingly familiar scent of incense and musk deep inside of her. She didn’t want him there with her. She didn’t want his warmth.
And dear God, she didn’t want to remember the way she’d kissed him. Because she had. Kissed him. Kissed Hawk. His mouth had been hot and hard and more than a little seeking, covering hers, coercing, urging, rough, a seductive drug she’d never quite gotten out of her system. Adrenaline.
A mistake.
“You need to get out of those clothes,” he said, coming up beside her.
The heat of his body washed over her like a tempting embrace, forcing her to wonder how he could generate so much heat when his clothes were as drenched as hers. “I don’t have anything else to wear.”
Too late she realized her mistake. For a man like Hawk Monroe, nudity wouldn’t be a problem. She braced herself, waiting for him to cockily tell her he didn’t mind one bit if she walked around naked.
“I do.”
Holding his sport coat around her, Elizabeth followed the sweep of his arm to the bed closest the window, where clothes spilled from an open gym bag and onto a ratty floral comforter.
Twin thoughts hit her simultaneously. There were two beds, and Hawk had known they’d be spending the night in this rinky-dink hotel a few miles from the airport.
“You planned this?” she asked, pivoting toward him. She didn’t understand why the thought bothered her.
He shoved dark blond hair, still damp, back from his face. “Sorry, sweetness, but I couldn’t let you sleep in that hotel tonight, not with Zhukov unaccounted for.”
“I guess it never occurred to you to let me know what was going on?”
“Not before the awards ceremony,” he said with infuriating dismissal. “No. What occurred to me, as you put it, is that my time was better spent mapping out the hotel and beefing up security.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “A lot of good that did us.”
He was across the room before she could so much as breathe. The angles of his face hardened. She took an automatic step back, but he took one forward. “You’re damn straight it did a lot of good. You’re alive, aren’t you? You’re here, with me and not out in the woods with one of Zhukov’s men.” His voice was hard, angry. “Do you know what they would do to you?”
Elizabeth bit down on her lower lip. Surprise flickered through her, followed by an unexpected sliver of regret. Yes. She knew what Zhukov would do to her.
“I thought you were one of them,” she admitted, and the flash of horror streaked back, the insidious vulnerability she despised. “I thought you were dragging me off to do God only knows what.”
His eyes flashed. “Don’t tempt me.”
The dark words whispered through her, as unsettling as they were familiar. The pieces, the memory, fell into place. “It was you,” she muttered. No wonder her heart had taken a long freefall through her chest. “It was you.”
He tucked a finger under her chin and turned her to face him. “What was me?”
The masculine scent of incense and musk in the elevator lobby. The one that had prompted her to spin around, expecting to see him standing behind her, thumbs hooked into the waistband of faded, low-riding jeans, smiling that insolent smile of his.
She forced herself to look at him, refused to give the satisfaction of thinking he rattled her. Because he didn’t. “All day I felt like I was being watched, followed. It was you, wasn’t it? You were there.”
The planes of Hawk’s face tightened, emphasizing wide, flat cheekbones. “I didn’t get to the hotel until midafternoon.”
She stepped back, swallowed hard. The thought of Hawk Monroe following her unsettled her in ways she didn’t want to analyze too closely, but it also brought a modicum of comfort. He was one of her father’s men. His best man, if she were honest. He’d been sent to keep an eye on her, escort her home, keep her safe.
The threat he posed had nothing to do with her life.
“If not you,” she asked, keeping her voice steady, “who?”
Hawk swore roughly, then strode to the air conditioning unit and fiddled with the controls. “Zhukov.”
Reality drilled deep. Jorak Zhukov. The man who’d sworn to make the Carringtons pay for his father’s death. Make them suffer. He’d been in the hotel, watching her. Waiting. Planning. If Hawk hadn’t been there…
“I’ve got the heat going,” he said, turning his attention to his gym bag. He pulled out a well-worn shirt, then crossed to her and put the flannel into her hands. “Go take a hot shower. Get warm. We can talk more when your teeth aren’t chattering.”
She looked at the familiar green-and-black tartan balled in her hands and tried not to remember the way the fabric looked stretched across Hawk’s shoulders, with those top three buttons open and exposing the silver chain nestled against the dark gold hair of his chest.
She did not want to put that shirt on. She didn’t want to crawl into bed with the soft, well-worn flannel whispering against her body.
But she wanted to walk around naked or in a towel even less.
“I won’t be long.”
Thank you, Hawk. Thank you for saving my life. Thank you for giving me your jacket, for turning up the heater in the car so hot that you broke out in a sweat. Thank you for thinking ahead, making sure we had a safe place to spend the night. Thank you for offering me your shirt, so I don’t have to walk around naked.
Thank you for being such a sap.
Hawk watched Elizabeth walk regally away from him, head high, damp hair sleekly twisted from her face, his sport coat hanging from her stiff shoulders and extending below the hem of her little black dress. Her panty hose were muddied and torn. Her feet were bare.
Rarely did he remember her looking more provocative.
She stepped into the brightly lit bathroom and closed the door, fiddled with the lock on the doorknob.
Biting back a few not-very-nice words, Hawk could do nothing about other impulses. He swept his arm across the dresser and sent the stupid little ice bucket and room-service guide crashing to the matted carpet.
Nothing had changed. Elizabeth Carrington may have kissed him like there was no tomorrow, but when it came to anything beyond pure physical responses, she made it brutally clear she hadn’t forgotten yesterday.
Or rather, two years before.
Once,
