Free Raven (Kindred #1) by Scarlett Finn

explore every facet of him. Questions outweighed answers, but all she cared about was pressing her body up to his.
    He kissed her deep then sucked her lower lip as he withdrew and cast his eyes down. The tension in him made her stroke the width of his shoulders in solace and encouragement because she wasn’t finished, she wanted more, but her bubble was burst when he spoke.
    “I wasn’t supposed to do that,” he exhaled.
    Catching her breath, she barely recognized her raspy tone. “Not in your timetable?” she asked.
    “You’ve been through a trauma and you’re still in danger.”
    Scooping her hands up over his jaw, she made him look at her while she confessed. “The last man who kissed me ended up with a bullet in his head. I think you’re the one in danger.”
    Because he had returned to examining her mouth, Zara wondered and hoped that he might kiss her again. It seemed somehow right in this night of madness that she should embrace her desire to be reckless.
    “He didn’t die because he kissed you.”
    She smiled and loosened. “One day you’ll tell me what you mean by all these cryptic half statements you make.”
    “One day, I might,” he said, though she didn’t assume it was probable. A man who wouldn’t even give out his real name was unlikely to hand out his secrets without imminent cause.
    Clutching the open edges of his jacket, she inhaled the scent of this man and this moment. She wanted it to be real because she hadn’t felt an attraction this strong in her life. But she had to ask, “Is this your way of gaining my trust? Like you said Tim was trying to do?”
    “You don’t trust the men you sleep with, not in the way I need you to trust me.”
    Again, he revealed how well he knew her, though she couldn’t imagine how he knew something so personal. Especially being that she hadn’t had a long-term boyfriend for a couple of years. Zara was accustomed to holding herself back in relationships. It was what came with being disappointed by men one too many times.
    “Then kissing me was probably not a good idea.”
    “No, it wasn’t,” he said. Sweeping his arm around behind him, he trailed his fingertips down the length of her leg and elevated her foot onto the cushions stacked at the end of the couch. “Tell me what happened upstairs at CI.”
    He didn’t kiss her again, although she got the sense that he wanted to by the way his interest flicked to her mouth and over her body. Flattered by his attention, Zara’s arousal didn’t cool, but it was obvious he had returned to business, insinuating that they probably weren’t going to explore their attraction further, at least for tonight.
    “Nothing,” she said. “They didn’t see me. I listened for a while and then I left.”
    “Grant didn’t see you?”
    Now that they’d acknowledged the want of their bodies, it was easier to maintain her senses. “No.”
    “And you overheard their conversation?”
    Measuring his gaze, she anticipated his next question with suspicion. She wanted answers and didn’t want to reveal too much because despite his odd behavior this week, Grant had never given her cause to betray him.
    “Some of it,” she said.
    “What did they say? Give me specifics.”
    Releasing all of her weight onto the scroll arm of her couch, she told the truth. “Grant has been good to me. I’m not going to sell him out just because you kissed me.”
    When he sat upright, their trance of familiarity was broken. “How about because I saved your life tonight? Or because I’ve been looking out for you for weeks?”
    Wondering about what he might have protected her from without her knowledge, she asked, “Have you seen any danger?”
    He propped a hand on the back of the couch. “Danger like your boyfriend being shot dead in the street? Or thugs jumping you in an underground parking garage?”
    His point was valid. She didn’t need to know about unseen danger when the seen danger was scary enough. “I don’t want harm