Naked In His Arms

Naked In His Arms
Sandra Marton

Alexander Knight: An ex-Special Forces agent called to undertake one final dangerous mission…Cara Prescott: The beautiful, spirited young woman Alex has been hired to protect. Alex's only choice is to kidnap her and hide her on his private exotic island, where holding her captive leads to hot and steamy days, and intense, passionate nights. But can Alex keep Cara from harm, when he has no idea how dangerous the truth really is?

Naked in His Arms

Sandra Marton

UNCUT

Contents

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

COMING NEXT MONTH

PROLOGUE

HE WAS a hard-bodied, six foot four inches of angry male.

His hair was midnight-black, his eyes deep-sea green. He had the high cheekbones of his half-Comanche mother; the firm jaw of his Texas father.

Tonight, the elegant savagery of his mother’s people ran hot in his blood.

He stood in a room where darkness was broken by ivory swaths of moonlight. Shadows lurked in the corners, lending an ominous chill to the air. The sighing of the wind through the trees outside the house added to the sense of disquiet.

The restless stirrings of the woman asleep in the big four-poster bed were a manifestation of it.

She was alone, this woman he’d thought he loved. This woman he knew. Knew, intimately.

The delicacy of her scent, a whisper of spring lilacs. The silky glide of her gold-streaked chestnut hair against his skin. The taste of her nipples, warm and sweet on his tongue.

His jaw tightened. Oh, yes. He knew her. At least, that was what he’d thought.

Long moments passed. The woman murmured in her sleep and tossed her head uneasily. Was she dreaming of him? Of what a fool she’d made of him?

All the more reason to have come here tonight.

Closure. The glib catchall of overpaid twenty-first-century shrinks who didn’t have the damnedest idea of what it really meant.

Alex did. And closure was what he’d have as he took the woman in this bed, one final time.

Took her, knowing what she was. Knowing that she had used him. That everything they’d shared had been a lie.

He would wake her from her dream. Strip her naked. Pin her hands high over her head and make sure she looked into his eyes as he took her so that she could see it meant nothing to him, that having sex with her was a physical release and nothing more.

There’d been dozens of women before her and there’d be dozens after her. Nothing about her, or what they’d done in each other’s arms, was memorable.

He understood that.

Now, he needed to be sure she did, too.

Alex bent over the bed. Grasped the edge of the duvet that covered her and drew it aside.

She was wearing a nightgown. Silk, probably. She liked silk. So did he. He liked the feel of it under his fingers, the way it had slid over her skin all those times he’d made love to her with his body, his hands, his mouth.

He looked down at her. She was beautiful; there was no denying that. She had a magnificent body. Long. Ripe. Made for sex.

He could see the shape of her breasts through the thin silk. Rounded like apples, tipped with pale pink nipples so responsive that he knew he had only to bend his head to her, let the tip of his tongue drift across the delicate flesh, breathe against it to draw a guttural moan of pleasure from her throat.

His gaze moved lower, to the shadow of her mons, a dark umbra visible through the silk gown. He remembered the softness of the curls there. The dark, honey-gold color. The little cries she’d made when he stroked her, parted her labia with the tips of his fingers, put his mouth against her, sought out the hidden bud that awaited him and licked it, drew it into his mouth as she arched toward him and sobbed his name.

Lies, all of it. No surprise. She was a woman who loved books and the fantasy world in them.

But he was a warrior, his very survival grounded in reality. How come he’d forgotten that?

How come his body was turning hard, just watching her? That he still wanted her enraged him.

He told himself it was normal. That it was simple biology. Part A fit into part B, and part A had a mind all its own.

Maybe. And maybe that was why he had to do this. One last encounter, especially in this bed. One last time to taste her. To bury himself deep between her silken thighs. Surely, that would burn the rage out of him.

Now, he thought, and he feathered his fingers lightly across her nipples.

“Cara.”