Free Twice as Hot by Gena Showalter

cared about consequences.
    But
then, panting as I was, the black plumes still wafting from the mat enveloped
me, soaked into me and filled me up, and I started coughing again. My steps
slowed, then stopped altogether. As the seconds dragged by, those coughs became
gut racking, shaking my entire body. Damn it! Not now. Any time but now.
    While
I gasped for breath, someone tackled me, tossing me to the ground and pinning
me. What the—three male bodies weighed me down. I struggled and kicked and
screamed.
    Lexis,
who was being patted on the back and asked if she were harmed, sprang for me.
Through wide eyes I watched as she closed the distance, fist drawn back. One of
the men dove for her, knocking her down just before she reached me. She
scrambled to her knees just as I worked my way free of my own captors.
Determination like ours couldn’t be contained.
    Even
as I coughed, a raging fireball formed in my hand. Attack me while I was unable
to defend myself, would she? Try and steal my man, would she? Hurt my friend,
would she? Not without paying a very dear price. I pulled my elbow back, wrist
relaxing…preparing…
    “Stop!”
a masculine voice shouted.
    Rome.
    I
twisted, my heart pounding, nearly cracking my ribs. He was clearly angry but
all the more magnificent for it. Too bad I didn’t have time to drink him in.
Lexis’s foot connected with my back and sent me flying forward. Forever I
seemed to trip, the fireball falling from my hand and catching a corner of the
mat in a blazing inferno.
    As
I righted myself, someone rushed over and saturated the flames with liquid
nitrogen.
    With
a quick glance, I rasped, “Low blow, Lexis.” I wouldn’t be foolish enough to
give her my back again. But damn it. Well played, Miss Know-It-All. Well
played. I should have been smart enough to do something similar to her.
    She
was standing, shoulders squared, expression once again smug. “There’s more
where that came from.”
    How
could I ever have trusted this woman? Even a little?
    At
least I’d gotten in a few good blows. Her lips were cracked and bleeding, and a
bruise had already begun to form under one of her eyes. No telling what I
looked like, though. Without the rush of adrenaline, without the glacial blast
of fear and the conflagration of rage, my knuckles throbbed and my facial
muscles ached.
    “What
the hell is going on?” Rome demanded.
    I
strode to Lexis’s side, though I remained out of striking distance, and
returned my focus to him. This time, I was able to drink him in—but oh,
I was sorry for it. Quite simply, he scrambled my brain. He was tall, dark,
dangerous. Exotic, sensual. Mine. He was the fantasy I’d always craved, the
reality I thought I’d never achieve, but had. Only to lose it.
    This
isn’t over.
    His
eyes strayed from Lexis to me, from me to Lexis. I wasn’t sure which one of us
caused his pupils to dilate, his nostrils to flare. Sure signs of arousal. At
one time, I would have known who that arousal was for. It would have been me,
no question. He would have stalked to me, grabbed my hand and jerked me into
the hallway—coworkers be damned—where he would have pinned me against the wall,
unable to exist a second more without my taste in his mouth. One of his hands
would have cupped my breast, and the other would have worked at my jeans.
    “Out,”
he snapped.
    Both
Lexis and I jolted in response, though neither of us obeyed. We knew he wasn’t
speaking to us.
    “Out!”
he repeated, harsher this time.
    There
were scampering footsteps behind us as our fellow agents fled.
    When
there was silence, Rome crossed his arms over his chest. “There will be no more
fighting between the two of you. Understand?”
    “Yes,”
Lexis said, clearly wanting to please him. “But I was only defending myself.
She attacked me.”
    Perhaps
I should have followed her lead, should have tried to placate him. That had
never been my style, though, and I wouldn’t change now. “Fuck you,” I told