Operation: Midnight Guardian

“Get off me!” she shouted.

She caught a glimpse of dark eyes. She felt the tremendous force of his strength, and her only thought was that these were the last moments of her life.

“If you want to live you’ll be quiet.”

Mattie barely heard the rough whisper over the wild pounding of her heart. She tried to twist away, but he was heavy and strong, pinning her with ease.

“What do you—”

A hand slapped over her mouth, cutting her words short. “Shh.”

Mattie stilled, and for an instant the only sound came from their labored breaths and the tinkle of sleet against dry leaves. Blinking hair from her eyes, she looked up, found herself staring into icy, blue eyes.

“There are four heavily armed men less than two hundred yards away,” he said in a low voice. “Make another sound and they’ll kill us both. Do you understand?”

For an instant the sense of helplessness and terror nearly overwhelmed her. But Mattie could tell by the look in his eyes that if he wanted her dead, he would have already done it.

She jerked her head. Never taking his eyes from hers, he removed his hand from her mouth and put his finger to his lips. His eyes scanned the surrounding darkness. Reaching out, he grasped the base of a long-dead bush and dragged it over them. The bush was large and full and in the semidarkness would cover them completely.

He turned to her and looked into her eyes, his expression tense. He was lying squarely on top of her with some of his weight on his elbows. “Don’t move,” he whispered. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

His body was rock hard, his muscles taut. At some point during the struggle her legs had opened, and he was lying between her knees, pressed intimately against her. He was no longer breathing hard, but she was.

“The tracks end here!” A heavily accented voice cut through the night like a blade.

“She’s using the stream to hide her tracks.” Another voice. Frighteningly near.

“We should have had her by now. We’re running out of time.”

Mattie listened, praying they wouldn’t be discovered when she saw a pair of boots and the butt of a semiautomatic rifle a few yards to her right. He was standing so close she could smell the stench of his sweat. Her breaths grew rapid and shallow.

“We’re safe,” the man lying on top of her whispered. “Just calm down.”

In the last hours she’d seen too much violence to keep a handle on the fear barreling through her. She could feel her entire body vibrating as a fresh wave of panic engulfed her. She began to hyperventilate. Her face and hands were tingling. If she didn’t get a grip, she was going to give away their hiding place and get them both killed.

Dry grass crunched as one of the killers drew closer. For a terrible instant Mattie thought he’d heard her panicked breathing. She imagined him raising the rifle and shooting them the same way he’d gunned down the three marshals. The urge to jump to her feet and run was strong. She could feel her muscles twitching as the flight instinct kicked in.

“Easy,” the man lying on top of her whispered. “Slow, deep breaths.”

But Mattie was beyond hearing, beyond logic. She tried breathing through her nose, but she could no more slow her breathing than a marathon runner who’d just run ten miles.

Grass and leaves rustled nearby and she knew one of the men was approaching. This is it, she thought. I’ve given away our hiding place and now they’re going to kill us.

The man on top of her shifted, and suddenly she was aware of the way his body fit against hers. Surprising her, he set his hands on either side of her face. His palms were warm and amazingly gentle as he brushed back the hair from her face. Mattie looked into the startling blue of his eyes. And even though the threat of death was so close she could feel the cold scrape of it against her spine, her only thought was that no man had ever looked at her the way this man did.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Saving our lives,” he said and lowered his mouth to hers.

CUTTER CONSIDERED HIMSELF a master of improvisation. He possessed an uncanny talent for making the best of a bad situation and the ability to adapt to current conditions. They were traits that made him the best of the best. At the moment, kissing this woman seemed like the most expedient way to keep her from getting both of them killed.

He hadn’t expected to get caught up in the softness of her mouth. Sean Cutter didn’t get caught up in anything, especially when it came to his job. But that was exactly what happened when his mouth made contact with hers.

She tried to turn her head, but he caught her cheek with his palm and deepened the kiss. She opened her mouth—to protest no doubt—and he seized the opportunity to take the kiss deeper. Another mistake, he thought dazedly, but by then he’d stopped counting.

Her mouth was warm and wet against his. Her body was curvy and soft and fit perfectly beneath him. He could feel the warmth of her quickened breaths against his cheek. And despite the fact that they were seconds away from being discovered by four men who would not hesitate to execute them, he found his body responding to hers.

He struggled to control the hot rush of blood to his groin, reminding himself of all the terrible things that could happen next. But her mouth was incredibly soft, her body a promise of all the things he’d denied himself for what felt like a lifetime. And while Cutter was a whiz at improvisation, he hadn’t a clue how to stanch good-old-fashioned sexual arousal—no matter how dangerous.

But the kiss was working. Slowly her body relaxed against his, and her breathing slowed. Cutter broke the kiss and for several agonizing minutes neither of them moved while the four killers smoked cigarettes and spoke in a language he was all too familiar with. If the woman could feel his erection against her, she gave no indication. She was probably too terrified to notice. He should be, too, considering they were inches away from getting shot. But Cutter had already faced the worst thing a man could face. He didn’t have a death wish, but not much truly scared him anymore.

After what seemed like an eternity, the men moved on. Cutter lay on top of his prisoner for several more minutes, listening to the men’s retreat. Once he deemed it safe, he tossed the bush aside and rose.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Glaring at him, the woman sat up and with cuffed hands brushed at the leaves and dust on her clothes.

“Saving your life.”

A twig was sticking out of her hair. She was still wearing the slacks and jacket she’d worn to court. Both knees of her slacks were torn. The top button of her blouse had popped off at some point and he could see the lacy outline of her bra. Damn.

“You had no right to…to—”

“You were hyperventilating. If I hadn’t done something, you would have gotten both of us killed.”

Even in the semidarkness, he saw her pale. “Who are you?”

“I’m the man who’s going to take you back. For now, that’s all you need to know.”

“I don’t want to go back.”

He jabbed a thumb in the direction of where the four men had disappeared. “Maybe you’d rather take your chances with those cutthroats.”

“I’m innocent.”

Cutter couldn’t help it. He laughed. “Yeah, so am I.” Bending, he grasped her bicep to help her up.

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” she said as she got to her feet.

“Here’s a newsflash for you, blondie. You don’t have a say in the matter.”

Of their own accord, his eyes did a quick sweep down the front of her. Even though her suit was rumpled and torn, he could see that she was slender and willowy and built just the way he liked. Her hands were cuffed, accentuating curves he had no right noticing at a time like this.

He removed the master key from his belt. “Give me your wrists.”

She blinked. “You’re uncuffing me?”

“We need to move quickly before those bozos realize they fell for the oldest trick in the book.” He glanced up at the sky. Storm clouds were billowing to the northwest. The weather had been an issue during his briefing in the Lear jet that had taken him from Chicago to a small airport in Kalispell, Montana. A cold front chock-full of nasty precipitation was barreling down from the Canadian border. Cutter figured they had another hour before the skies opened up. Hopefully, enough time to make it to the rendezvous point where the agency had a chopper waiting.

She offered her wrists. “Who were those men?”