Forbidden Territory & Forbidden Temptation: Forbidden Territory / Forbidden Temptation

His gaze dipped to her parted lips, his breath quickening. She could see the struggle on his face, the need to resist. The sharp edges of her own doubts nicked her conscience even as she lifted her chin and met his mouth halfway.

Fire raced through her veins, surprising her with its wild intensity. McBride’s arm tightened around her back, pulling her closer. His other hand tangled in her wet hair, curling into a fist until she was ensnared in his grasp.

He took his time with the kiss, giving and demanding in equal parts, stoking the flames in her belly. His tongue brushed over her lower lip, tasting her. Teasing her.

A low moan of pleasure rumbled up her throat. He tightened his arms around her in response, lifting her off her feet. One hand slid down her back, settling low, pressing her hips firmly against the hard ridge of his erection. Heat flooded her, settling at her center, warming her from the inside out.

He lifted his mouth away only long enough to blaze a trail across her jawline and down the side of her throat, nipping and kissing a path across her collarbone. She melted against him, a shimmering onslaught of need flooding her veins.

At the first faint sound of sirens in the distance, she tightened her hold on his shoulders, not ready to let him go. But he broke the contact, gently setting her back on her feet and taking a step away, breathing hard and fast. His gaze locked with hers, wary and oddly vulnerable, as the sound of sirens grew, piercing the drum-beat of rain.

After an endless moment, he held out his hand. “Think you can make it back to the road if I help you?”

Nodding, she grasped it, wondering if he could feel the tremors still fluttering through her from the kiss.

His big palm enclosed hers. “Need anything from the car?”

“My purse.”

He let go long enough to retrieve the bag, and handed it to her. Then he took her hand again and helped her up the steep incline.

As they reached the road, a police car and an EMT unit were pulling up behind McBride’s idling car. The two medics immediately took charge, separating her from McBride and helping her onto a stretcher in the back of the truck while they looked her over for any possible injuries. She leaned forward to peer around them, not ready to let McBride out of her sight.

He stood a few feet away, bathed in a wide shaft of golden light pouring from the EMT vehicle. He met her gaze with a reassuring smile before moving away to talk to the uniformed officers waiting by his car.

She sank back on the stretcher and closed her eyes, her mouth still tingling from McBride’s kiss.

* * *

MCBRIDE’S WATCH READ four-fifteen when he woke in the predawn gloom of Lily Browning’s living room. Her sofa was built for a woman, sturdy enough but small. Cozy. Definitely not the ideal bed for a man of his size.

The EMTs had reassured him that the purple marks from the seat belt were superficial. Lily had been a little shocky, but a hot shower, dry clothes and extra blankets on her bed had fixed that.

She’d fallen asleep in his car on the way home and had roused only long enough to shower and crawl into bed. When he’d checked on her a little after nine, she’d been fast asleep.

Rubbing the ache in his neck, McBride let his eyes adjust to the pale glow of light from a streetlamp seeping through the thin curtains on Lily’s front windows. He stretched his legs out in front of him, trying to find a more comfortable position.

He shouldn’t have stayed. A police car was parked outside, manned by two perfectly capable officers. Hanging around all night was overkill.

Not to mention dangerous.

He’d kissed her. Not a gentle, comforting peck on the cheek to reassure her that she was safe, either. No, he’d gone for long, wet and greedy.

Worse still, she’d tasted just as he’d expected—sweet with a tangy edge, like wild honey. The curves and planes of her body had fit perfectly against his, soft and hot despite the cold rain drenching them both.

How had he let this happen? Even now he felt the tug of her calling to him, just beyond the closed door at the end of the hall. If he went to her bed, would she turn him away?

He rubbed the heels of his palms against his bleary eyes. He was insane. She was a suspect, for God’s sake! The attack on her tonight didn’t change the fact that she had information only the kidnappers and cops should have. How did she know what Abby had been wearing the day she disappeared?

Maybe she really did see Abby in her mind, a treacherous voice inside him whispered.

No. He knew better than that. He’d learned that lesson the hard way. But could the trembling woman who’d returned his kiss with a sweet passion that made his head spin really be involved with murder and kidnapping?

He sat forward, burying his head in his hands. The idea seemed almost as insane as the alternative.

But those didn’t have to be the only choices, did they?

Maybe the truth lay somewhere in between.

* * *

LILY CURLED UP in bed with her cats, somewhere between sleep and wakefulness. Though sleep had done wonders for her, she felt sore all over from her nerve-wracking ordeal. And below the twinges and aches lay a relentless hum of awareness, a disturbing reminder of how her world had tilted upside down again with one shattering kiss.

Why in the world had she let herself lose control that way? She couldn’t trust McBride; he still thought she was involved in Abby Walters’s kidnapping. Lily had seen it in his eyes the day before in Andrew’s hotel suite. And even if his doubts hadn’t built an impenetrable wall between them, the man himself posed a grave danger to her heart.

The more she learned about the detective, the less she knew. He was a man steeped in secrets. Terrible ones, if the darkness she’d felt from him that night in her kitchen meant anything. What if being around him opened her mind to whatever horrors lurked within him? Could she bear it?

She shivered, cold despite the blankets piled atop her. Delilah nestled closer, a hot little knot against her side, but the shivers grew stronger. The darkness of the bedroom had already begun changing color and texture before Lily realized that she was having another vision.

She opened the door in her mind, both eager and afraid to see what lay beyond. As she pushed forward through the thick fog, she felt a warning pain behind her eyes and forced herself to let the vision flow around her, carrying her at its own pace.

Eventually the mists cleared to reveal Abby Walters lying on the lumpy bed where Lily had found her in her last vision. The child slept fitfully, her pale eyelids twitching with a dream. She looked cleaner than before. Lily took a deep breath through her nose and smelled soap.

Somebody had given Abby a bath, she thought with faint relief. Maybe that meant they were trying to take care of her.

Unless…

A darker thought forced her mind to a horrible place. Abby, naked and vulnerable in the hands of the man—men?—who had brutally killed her mother. Nausea rose in Lily’s throat, making her eyes sting with acrid tears.

“What did they do to you, baby?” She stroked Abby’s cheek, her fingers tracing damp tear tracks.

“It’s okay,” a child’s voice whispered, very close.

Lily whirled around.

The dark-haired girl from her earlier vision stood behind her, clad in yellow-striped pajamas a size too small for her. She clutched a ragged stuffed toy against her chest, something round and tattered, its furry green body worn and thin.

She smiled tentatively at Lily. “I watched her for you.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

LILY FELT AS if she’d gone mad. “You watched her?”

The little girl nodded. “I know you can’t always be here, so I check on her sometimes to make sure she’s okay.”

Lily’s mind reeled, threatening to suck her back to reality. She forced herself to stay calm, let the vision hold her in its gossamer web. “Who are you?”

“Mama calls me Gina, but I don’t think that’s my name. She’s not really my mama, you know. My real mama’s dead.”