Her mouth formed an O and released a little puff of air. “I thought we were talking about my abductor.”
“We are, we will, just wondering about the transformation.” The warmth from his chest began creeping up his neck.
Even discussing a violent incident and a mystery, Quinn couldn’t tamp down his attraction to Rikki. He could take her right now, across that kitchen counter, bent over that stool, and not give another thought to her mysterious meeting or the man he’d beaten down in the alley.
What did any of it matter with this woman back in his life, sitting right in front of him, inches away?
She tossed her head, and the dark hair flowed over one shoulder. “It’s not a wig. I had my hair straightened when I had it colored. It’ll last for several weeks—as long as I need.”
Quinn ran both hands over his face as if waking from a long, drugged sleep. “As long as you need to do what, Rikki? What are you doing in New Orleans? What was that meeting all about?”
“The man I was supposed to meet had something for me, something that might help me clear my name. I need that. I need something before I can go to the CIA and reveal that I’m still alive—and no traitor.” She blinked and rubbed her nose with the back of her hand.
The Rikki he knew, the woman who’d dumped him in Dubai, never cried. But that woman had been a trusted CIA operative at the top of her game and still on the rise.
When she’d succumbed to him, knowing her superiors would frown on her conduct, knowing she could be reprimanded, she’d spun out of control. Their desire for each other had been so great they’d both thrown caution to the wind. They’d made love in glass elevators high above the glittering city, coupled in the warm waters of the Persian Gulf in a place that frowned upon spouses holding hands in public.
And during all of it, the kick-ass CIA operative who could disarm a man without breaking a sweat and interrogate a suspected terrorist for twenty-four hours straight had relinquished control to him in every way. She’d waited for his commands, done his bidding, which was really her own. She could pretend to herself that he’d mastered her mind and body, but in reality he’d been the captive. She’d enthralled him. Still did.
Quinn launched forward and crouched beside her. His thumb swept her bottom lashes where a single teardrop trembled, although she’d willed it not to fall.
“You deserve that life back, and I’m going to help you reclaim it. What did your contact have for you?”
“A-a flash drive containing some information. I don’t think he even knew what the info meant, but he was going to pass it along to me.”
“On whose authority? Who’s your contact at the agency? Who sent him?”
Rikki swept her tongue along her bottom lip. “Maybe it was all a setup. Maybe the goal of the plan all along included my capture. The flash drive a ruse to lure me out.”
“Who sent him? Not some anonymous source? You didn’t trust some anonymous CIA drone, did you?”
“It was Ariel.” She hunched forward, her nose almost touching his. “You know Ariel, don’t you?”
“The head of the Vlad task force. Several of my SEAL team members have been on assignments controlled by Ariel—and they trust her, or him.”
“Her. Ariel is definitely female.”
“How do you know that? I think one of my team members actually spoke to her, but we’re not even sure it was the real Ariel.” Quinn’s eyes narrowed. “You know her?”
“Ariel was my mentor at the CIA when I started. You know, one female spy to another in a department dominated by men.”
Quinn sat back on his heels. “You mean, you know the real Ariel? The actual woman behind the clever pseudonym? From what I understand, the Vlad task force is controlled by Prospero, Jack Coburn’s black ops organization. Ariel, Prospero—from the Shakespeare play.”
“Yeah, I remember my Shakespeare and yeah, Ariel is with Prospero now, recruited from the CIA several years ago.”
“Her real name?”
Rikki ran her fingertip along the seam of her lips. “Ariel.”
Quinn jumped to his feet and paced in front of the window. “You don’t owe her anything if she set you up.”
“I can’t be sure she did. She’s the one who discovered I was in the labor camp and not dead. She’s the one who helped me escape, get back to...get out.”
“Maybe she did all that so she could dial in the CIA and have them recapture you. Maybe she didn’t want you hobnobbing with the North Koreans, possibly passing them intel.”
“I don’t believe that, not...Ariel. If that’s what she wanted, my contact at the bar would’ve followed through with our assignment without alarming me, and then she could’ve sent the FBI to pick me up and arrest me.” Rikki slid from the stool and edged around the counter into the kitchen. “That’s not how this went down.”
“Maybe the contact himself went rogue. Maybe he recognized you.”
She made a half turn from the fridge, a bottle of water in her hand. She raised it. “In this getup? Just because you had me figured out immediately doesn’t mean some CIA agent is going to recognize me from a photo in a briefing on spies within the Agency. Dark hair, dark eyes...” She patted her hip. “A few extra pounds. This is a damned good disguise.”
When she touched her body, Quinn’s gaze followed her hand. Rikki had always been long and lean. He tracked up the curve of her hip to the loose blouse draped over her form, brushing the ample swell of her breasts.
He swallowed hard. He’d always enjoyed Rikki’s slim, athletic build—especially given their marathon lovemaking sessions in...unusual places and circumstances. But for the first time this crazy evening, he noticed the new softness of her body—the way her jeans hugged her derriere and thighs, the seductive sway of her hips when she walked, the way her blouse pulled tight across her breasts when she spread her arms or gestured. His erection pulsed again.
Then he blinked. Rikki hadn’t just escaped from a North Korean labor camp. She’d been recuperating somewhere.
Quinn cleared his throat. “God, it’s late. You’re bunking here tonight, and I don’t want to hear any arguments.”
She snapped her mouth closed and chugged some water from the bottle. “Okay, but just so we’re clear you’re sleeping in the bed and I’m taking the couch.”
Quinn’s erection ached for relief, and he tugged on the hem of his cargo shorts. “Yeah, of course, but I have a sofa bed in my office and you can have that.” He opened his mouth in a pretend yawn. “We can try to figure out what happened to your contact tomorrow. If you still trust her, get in touch with Ariel.”
Rikki sloshed some water in her mouth before swallowing. “Do you happen to have an extra toothbrush?”
“I’m on leave, and you’re in luck because I just went to my dentist two weeks ago. I think he’s under some misconception that the navy supplies me with one toothbrush every two years, because he loaded me up. They’re in the second drawer on the right. This place has two bathrooms, so you’re welcome to the other one.”
“I’ll take the water with me to bed.” She swept her small purse from the counter. “This is good. I’ll get a good night’s sleep and regroup in the morning. I’m sure Ariel will have an explanation for me.”
“If you think you can trust her.”
“I do.” She turned at the entrance to the hallway. “Thanks for your assistance tonight, Quinn. Maybe I did want you to see that text after all.”
“You can always ask me, Rikki. You can ask me for anything.”
A