Cooper Security 06 - Secret Intentions by Paula Graves

Author:Paula Graves
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2012-10-01T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

The first kiss with Jesse had been something of a revelation, betraying a tenderness behind the ramrod-straight backbone of a born Marine. The second kiss, however, served as a shattering reminder that for all his moments of gentleness, he possessed a core of hard, polished steel, powerful and unyielding.

She had no conscious memory of moving, but suddenly the rough brick of the building behind her was digging into her back, the tactile sensation registering only faintly, swamped by desire so primal, so elemental, that even the rasp of brick against her flesh felt like raw pleasure.

She had promised herself, after their first kiss, that she wouldn’t let herself fall for the fantasy again. But her good intentions crumbled like a sand castle under the onslaught of Jesse Cooper’s seduction.

He had big, strong hands, slightly rough in texture despite his recent months behind an office desk. As she melted into him, boneless with surrender, he moved his hands slowly over the curves of her shoulders and down her arms, tracing a trail of fire across her flesh.

The small, sane part of her brain that still functioned sounded warning bells when he dropped his hands to her waist and pulled her lower body flush with his. A growl of frustration rumbled in his throat, and she echoed the sound with a soft moan of need.

Jesse pulled back suddenly, letting her go so quickly that she had to plant her feet and press her back against the wall to keep from sliding to the ground.

“Katrina,” he murmured, his brow furrowing.

She stared at him a moment, not understanding. Then she remembered the sound of the dying man’s words, the rattle of blood in his throat and the look of desperation in his fading eyes.

Katrina, he’d moaned. She felt a sudden wave of nausea and bent forward, resting her hands on her knees.

Jesse laid his hand on her back. “Are you okay?”

She took a couple of deep breaths, her head clearing. The nausea settled down to a faint queasiness she thought she could bear. “Yeah. You had a thought about what that man meant?”

“I thought at first maybe it had something to do with the Gulf Coast hurricane by the same name, but that made no sense,” he said, starting to pace a little as if he was still forming the thought in his head. “Anyway, it’s kind of crazy, but something’s been niggling at me since we figured out where Gamble was going, and it finally connected just a second ago. St. Elizabeth’s.”

Evie scraped her hair away from her flushed face, not following. “St. Elizabeth’s?”

“This morning, before we left the apartment, I bought a newspaper from the stand downstairs. I thought maybe there’d be a story about the Espera Group or Gamble or something that could give us a little insight. There wasn’t anything like that, but there was a profile of the president’s chief of staff and her personal crusade to raise more funds for St. Elizabeth’s Hospital. Seems she grew up in the Congress Heights neighborhood and her aunt, a nurse at St.

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