Night Rescuer

How long she sat there in the dark, gazing out at the lights of Lima and the distant, unearthly glow of the moon preparing to rise over the mountains, she didn’t know. It was peaceful. It had been a long time since she’d been truly alone like this. She spent almost every waking hour at the lab, surrounded by government officials and guards and the pharmaceutical firm’s eager executives, all of them hovering over her work while they waited for her to invent the next designer drug to replace methamphetamine, and in so doing, win a huge government contract to create its antidote.

She started violently when the hotel room door opened behind her. She felt the dark shadow of John Hollister glide into the room on high alert.

“Everything’s all right. I was just enjoying the moonrise,” she murmured.

A shadow on the far side of the bed straightened into the outline of a man and detached itself from the wall. He moved over behind her chair to look out the window. A golden, glowing ball broke free of the Andes mountains and lifted majestically into the night sky, rapidly growing smaller and whiter as it went.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” she said.

“Yes. It is.”

“You sound surprised.”

He replied contemplatively, “I don’t remember the last time I watched a moonrise.”

“Too busy chasing the girls, huh?”

A snort came from behind her. “Something like that.”

“Did you get what you need?”

“Yes. We’re good to go. When are you supposed to collect the final directions as to where we’re heading?”

“As soon as I call to let…my family…know I’m here.”

“And why do we need to get these coordinates, again?” he asked lightly.

She answered in an equally light, but wholly false, tone, “They move around frequently in their work. Once they know when I’m arriving, then they can tell me where they’ll be.”

“And who, exactly, are we meeting?”

She sighed. “Mr. Hollister—”

“I know. Don’t ask.” A pause. “Call me John.”

Silence fell between them. The moonlight took on a cold, metallic hue that sent a chill across her skin. She rubbed her arms to chase away the sudden goose bumps.

“Hungry?” he finally asked.

“As a matter of fact, I am.”

“You’re in luck. People eat late in this part of the world. When I came in, it looked like they were still serving in the restaurant downstairs.”

He held a hand down to her to help her out of her seat, and she reached up to take it. Their palms touched, and the skies opened around them. Infinite possibility soared overhead, wide open and free, inviting her to come fly. Startled, she looked up at him. His eyes blazed out of the shadows, compelling and full of dark magic. It washed over her, drawing her in and seducing her. She threw herself into the promise of his gaze, succumbing without a whimper. He gave an easy tug on her hand, and she floated to her feet before him.

He sucked in a sharp breath. “Nice dress.”

A genuine smile started in her toes and spread upward until it blossomed on her face. “Thanks. Thanks for noticing.”

He cleared his throat. “Kinda hard not to. You look…dynamite.”

She was going to kiss him if he kept that up. Kiss. Now there was a thought. A totally inappropriate one, but my, how tempting. She followed him to the door, feeling wobbly, and not because of the heels.

As the elevator whisked them downward he murmured, “Don’t forget we’re a couple. You’re my woman and I’m your man. Got it?” The door slid open and his hand landed possessively on the back of her neck, his thumb caressing the tender flesh under her hair. The promise of raw, unadulterated sex roared through his fingertips.

She glanced up at him, shock in her eyes.

He nodded, his smile sizzling her all the way to her toes. “Better. That’s how a woman about to be made love to until she can’t stand up should look.”

Her jaw dropped. He led her across the lobby, his hand never leaving her neck, his thumb never stopping that light, possessive caress. Waves of tingling shivered through her, starting at her neck and racing outward in expanding spirals of delight. All the loneliness of the past few years slammed into her full force. How long had it been since a man touched her like that? If only it were real. Intense longing nearly brought her to her knees.

As they approached the French doors into the restaurant, she threw him a sidelong glance. “You know, it’s not nice to tease. If you’re going to say something like that to a lady, you really should mean it.”

His retort stole away what little breath she had left. “Who says I don’t?”

Chapter 3

John was startled at the effect his words had on her. A shiver raced across her skin, and her eyes went so big and dark he could see all the way to her soul. Distracted, he guided her behind the maître d’ to a candlelit table in a dark, secluded corner. John took one look at the table their host had selected for them and a reluctant smile tugged at his mouth. Apparently, the steamy lovers act must be working.

He stepped smoothly in front of the host and held Melina’s seat for her, his hand brushing across her bare shoulders as he moved to her right and took the seat that put his back to the wall.

He leaned back, amused, as Melina made a production out of studying the menu as if she were going to have to take a test over its contents. The line of her cheek captivated him. DaVinci couldn’t have drawn it more beautifully than Mother Nature had. She really was a stunning woman. Polished as brightly as a fine diamond. If she didn’t come from money, and a lot of it, she faked it very well. She seriously didn’t strike him as the type to want to run around in the rugged mountains of South America.

She glanced up. “Do you know what you’re ordering?”

He nodded. “I’m still deciding how I want my dessert, though.”

Her cheeks blossomed twin spots of pink and her chest lifted on a quick breath. Give the lady high marks for catching the subtleties of double entendre.

When the waiter came, Melina exchanged pleasantries with the guy in perfect Spanish before ordering effortlessly in the same tongue. Where did she learn to speak that tongue so well? John wished there’d been time to run a background check on her before they left Pirate Pete’s. But Brady Hathaway had been in such an all-fired hurry to hustle him out of there and away from that noose that he’d barely had time to collect his own gear, let alone outfit Melina.

John ordered a steak—rare—salad with vinaigrette, roasted local vegetables, no mushrooms, and a bottle of wine, lightly chilled. The waiter left, and John turned his attention back to his dinner companion. Time to do his own background check. In the guise of polite dinner conversation, of course.

“For an American, you speak Spanish exceptionally well.”

“I live in Mexico City.”

“What do you do there?”

Her eyes clouded over. “I work for a pharmaceutical company.”

She didn’t look particularly happy about it, though. They sipped their wine in silence while he considered her. He couldn’t come up with a single reason why a cosmopolitan woman like her needed to go on a trek in the Andes that was so obviously not for pleasure. What was she up to?

“Tell me about yourself,” he said casually as he refilled her wine glass.

She swirled the maroon liquid, staring down into it pensively. She looked up abruptly, her reverie broken. “Why don’t you tell me about me? You dodged my question earlier. Let’s see how your instincts stack up to mine.”

Fine. Maybe he could shake loose some information out of her by playing along. He sipped his wine, studying her until she began to fidget beneath his intent gaze.