“Did you finish your business?” Claire asked him.
He put his hand on her cheek. Like touching silk. “Not yet,” he told her. “But I will, soon.”
Her breath caught as she stared up at him. “Noah?”
“I need you.” So badly that his whole body seemed to be burning. He hadn’t been able to get back to her fast enough. She’d been the only thing he could think about on the flight home.
She wore a dark robe. Her hands lifted. Unbelted that robe. It fell at her feet.
Claire took his hand. She led him back to the bedroom. The woman had no idea just how close to pouncing on her he truly was.
He should be careful with her. After their last time together, she was probably sore.
“I want you.” Her voice was pure sin, like a stroke right over his aroused cock.
His control was shredding. Every second with her ripped it a bit more.
“I want to give you pleasure,” Claire told him as she stared up into his eyes. “Teach me how?”
Right then, he couldn’t. He could only push her back onto the bed. Part her thighs. See the perfect pink flesh that waited. “This gives me pleasure.” He put his mouth on her and feasted.
She bucked beneath him. Arched. Her taste drove him insane.
Get her ready. Take her.
When her nails raked down his back, Noah rose. He positioned his c**k right at the entrance to her body. He’d put on a condom, pausing just those few seconds—one day I’ll have all of her—and he drove deep into her.
Only then, only then, the frantic tension left his body. The fear. The fury. The lethal combination that seeing Ethan Harrison had roused within him.
Claire will tease and she will flirt, but she won’t sleep with you…She can’t. Claire knows she belongs to me.
Ethan was so wrong.
Noah thrust harder into Claire. She whispered his name. Her sex squeezed around him. So hot and tight and wet. Perfect for him.
She climaxed, crying out and her sex clenched him even tighter.
Noah’s thrusts became faster then. Deeper. The bed shook beneath them. The headboard thudded into the wall. He didn’t care.
Nothing could have stopped him at that moment.
He plunged into her. Lost sight of everything but Claire.
And when he came, he roared her name.
Mine. Always.
Noah would do anything necessary in order to protect what was his.
***
They’d taken Claire away.
Ethan Harrison paced the length of his cell, rage pouring through his veins. All of his pictures were gone. The pictures that let him see Claire. That let him feel her.
Those pictures were important.
He needed them.
I need Claire.
That bastard Noah York didn’t scare him. After what he’d survived in prison, nothing scared him.
His father had thought that he kept Ethan safe from the other inmates. But when the lights went out, when the guards turned their backs…you had to protect yourself. He’d gotten very good at protecting himself.
And now…his father was dead.
The funeral would be in a few days. That gave him so little time.
It was a good thing he’d been plotting his escape for nine years. All of the plans were already in place. Soon…very soon…
I’ll see you again, Claire.
And it wouldn’t just be a thin photograph that he touched. He’d have the real deal in his arms once again.
No one will take you from me.
Chapter Six
“They’re burying the senator today.”
When Noah made that announcement, Claire’s fingers stilled over the computer keyboard. She’d been staying with him at York Towers for the last few days. Sleeping in his bed at night, working by his side during the day.
Drake had vanished.
The reporters had stayed close.
But not as close as Noah.
Noah cleared his throat and said, “And they’re letting Ethan go to the funeral.”
She looked up. They weren’t in the suite now. Instead, they were working in one of the offices downstairs. They’d spent the morning going over blueprints for the Washington restaurant addition. Talking marketing. PR. Noah wanted to open the roof-top restaurant with a bang on New Year’s Eve. Throw a huge party and—
“Claire.”
She swallowed and focused on him. She’d already known that Ethan was being allowed to attend the funeral.
“You’re wearing a mask, Claire. Talk to me.” He caught her hands. Pulled Claire to her feet.
“What do you want me to say?” There wasn’t anything to say. She wasn’t going to pretend some sort of grief for the senator’s death. It was wrong, but she felt relief now that he was being buried.
He can’t hurt me anymore.
“I want you to talk to me.” The words were hard, but his hands were light on her. “Claire, it’s me. I won’t judge anything you say. Just…talk to me.”
“I’m scared.” There. She’d said it.
His hold tightened on her.
“I saw on the news that the Alabama governor was granting some sort of special release for Ethan.” A temporary hardship release or some other kind of bull. “I don’t like knowing that he’s out there, free, not even for a second.” She wanted him locked away behind as many bars as possible.
“He won’t touch you.”
His gruff words sounded like a vow, but Noah didn’t understand. “That’s what my parents told me, too.” She pulled away from him. Headed to the nearby window. Stared out at the city. “They told me I’d be safe. That Ethan wouldn’t hurt me again. That I could just walk away from him.”
Behind her, Noah swore.
“I wasn’t safe. Even with a restraining order on him, he came after me. He killed them, and he found me.”
He’d told her that when he first found her on the dock. Been so proud.
“He watched me in that courtroom. Watched me like he owned me.” She’d been sixteen. So terrified. “And when I left the courthouse each day, there’d be people outside, yelling at me. Calling me so many names. There’d be spray paint on my house. People were believing his story. I thought…” This was the part that twisted her insides, but saying it out loud…I have to do it. “I thought Ethan was going to get away with what he’d done.”
Noah’s hands wrapped around her shoulders. He turned her around and forced Claire to face him. “He didn’t.”