or he was angling around to get a better look at her derriere. Though she could feel the heat creep into her face, she bit her tongue to stifle the crisp retort she had in mind for his blatant voyeurism.
Whitney pulled up her panties when she was finished, but with her hands bound, her jeans proved to be more of a challenge. She could pull them up over one hip, but when she’d reach for the other side, the weight of her belt would make them slip. She tried twice, and ended up with the denim pooled around her knees.
Swallowing what bit of pride she had left, she turned back to Rashid. She blinked twice, and looked again.
Not Rashid.
Though this one, too, was dressed in black from head to foot, the man who stood guard over her now held a different gun. Something sleek and compact that fit into his fist. So Chilton had called in another thug. In the dawning light of the moon she could see his black eyes, the shadow of black stubble on his jaw, the short, shiny crop of inky-black hair that molded to his head.
The thing that frightened her most about this man was his size. He stood bigger and brawnier than any of the others. Well over six feet tall, the breadth of his shoulders strained against the leather jacket he wore. He fit the dimensions of the mountain itself. Even his legs, encased in black denim, looked as solid as the pine trunks that towered around the cabin clearing.
She definitely didn’t want to cross this one. Whitney raised her hands in surrender. “I’m not trying to escape this time, I promise. I just…” She didn’t want to say the wrong thing. She’d been warned not to speak at all. But necessity dictated taking this risk. “I need some help with my pants.”
“Ms. MacNair?”
His deep, raspy voice held no trace of the accent the other men shared. He buried his gun inside his jacket and closed the distance between them. She was too stunned by what she’d just heard to make any protest when he reached down and pulled up her jeans.
With swift, spare movements, he zipped and snapped, and buckled her belt. With him standing so close, she had nowhere else to look but at the controlled flex and give of his broad chest beneath the jacket and a wool turtleneck. He smelled different than the other men. Clean. Leathery. She tipped her chin and looked him in the eye. “Who are you?”
From somewhere behind him he pulled out a switchblade knife and punched it open. She recoiled from the razor-sharp point. But he grabbed both her hands within one of his and pulled her to him. He slipped the knife between her wrists and slit the tape. He’d freed her. Whitney’s confusion must have reflected in her face. He closed the knife right before her eyes so she could see he didn’t plan to slit her throat as well.
“Relax, ma’am. I’m here to rescue you.”
“RIGHT. And I’m the tooth fairy.” Vincent narrowed his gaze and watched the changing emotions play across Whitney MacNair’s upturned face. Her creamy skin reflected the moonlight, revealing fear, distrust, anger. But not once did the classic contours of her oval face soften into anything resembling joy or relief. “I’m tired of playing these games. Just take me back. I won’t run away. I promise.”
He knew an uncharacteristic moment of indecision when she walked around him and headed for the open ground of the clearing. Few things surprised him, yet her straight-backed refusal to accept his help did.
But he wasn’t a man to let anything rattle him for long. Before she reached the end of the rocks and the sight line from the cabin, he snatched her by the belt and pulled her up against his chest. He backed them both into the shadows. “Where are you going?”
“Back to the cabin.” The crown of her hair barely reached his chin, but she squiggled in his grasp as if she had a chance of escape.
His grip held firm. “You can’t.”
“I can and I will.” She reached back and swatted at his hand. “I won’t have your boss take away what privileges I have left. Now let me go.”
Vincent knew of hostages who became attached to their kidnappers, who became loyal to the keepers who terrorized them if they stayed together long enough. But Whitney MacNair had been held for fewer than forty-eight hours.
Maybe she hadn’t understood him. She might be injured or brainwashed or just too frightened to listen. He spun her around and clasped her by the shoulders. “I’m Agent Vincent Romeo. I’m here to take you home.” He scrunched down to her level and looked her straight in the eye. “Do you understand?”
In a shadowy trick of the moonlight her eyes appeared colorless. Gray, her file had said. But much paler than he’d imagined, as airy and light as quicksilver.
The expression in those eyes was unmistakable, though. Simmering anger. Pure rebellion.
Her wide mouth tilted into a sarcastic line. “Romeo, hmm? Romeo, ‘Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?”’
Shakespeare? Like he’d never heard that joke before. All right. So he’d never heard it while he was in the middle of an incisive, undetected strike into enemy territory to retrieve a spoiled society dame who had fluff for brains.
“Come with me now, or I will take you by force.”
Though he never raised his voice above a whisper, he snapped the directions with a clear-cut authority that was rarely challenged.
“I said I’d go back.” She twisted her slim shoulders within his grasp. “Just don’t touch me anymore.”
Giving her the benefit of the doubt, he released her. She stumbled back a step in her haste to get away from him. Her heel caught and she staggered backward. Her arms flew out like twin windmills, but her left foot hit on the same impediment and her balance was lost. She landed with a soft thump on her backside.
On top of the man he’d taken out two minutes ago.
Dazed by the proof of his mission, she touched her fingers to the dead man’s face. His skin would still be warm, but his lack of a response to the woman sitting on his chest should clue in even her stubborn brain to the truth.
Vincent checked his watch while she studied the man. He scanned the clearing for signs of the other guards when she looked up at him. He unholstered his gun when she looked back at the corpse and met her questioning gaze when she looked up at him again.
“Is he…?”
“Dead.”
She scrambled to her feet with reflexes rivaling his own. In an instant she was behind him, her fists gripping handfuls of his jacket.
He had her full attention now.
She poked her head around his shoulder. “Did you do that?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“You don’t need to know.”
He could feel her chest expand and press into his back as she dealt with the shock. The pictures he’d seen of Whitney MacNair had given him the initial impression of a woman of above-average height who needed to put some meat on her bones.
His introduction to her tonight, though, had provided an unexpected glimpse of a nicely rounded bottom. And the stretch of
