Free The Seraphina Donavan Collection: Contemporary by Seraphina Donavan Page B

and watched as he fiddled with the taps. Memories washed over her of the small shower in his tiny apartment, of soap slicked skin and intense heat.
    When the water was going full blast, he turned to her. “Speak softly,” he whispered.
    “What the hell have you gotten into?”
    He sighed. “You know that office I work in?” At her nod, he continued, “It’s an FBI field office. We don’t advertise it. The less people who know the better.”
    “You’re an IT guy,” she said.
    “I’m also the only person they could get who can sing, play guitar and has the ‘look , ” he said. “I wanted to tell you, Dixie, but it happened so fast. I didn’t even get to go back to my apartment. They dropped this bomb on me in the office and that night I was driving here.”
    Oh, she wanted to believe it. It was impossibly farfetched, but so far, she hadn’t seen anything that made it seem like he wasn’t telling the truth. Mahoney. The listening devices in the hotel room. The fact that he was dressed like Elvis, for the love of Pete! “So, what happens now?”
    “You’re stuck with me. We can keep up the pretense of me being your dead beat ex.”
    “That’s not a pretense… the ex part anyway,” she said.
    He shoved his fingers through his hair in a gesture of frustration. “I know you’re mad. You have every right to be, but as happy as I am to have a chance to explain things to you—Dixie, I wish you weren’t here. It’s dangerous.”
    “Nana and Frankie are here,” she said, worry eating through her anger. “Are they safe?”
    “I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “Mahoney is so damn paranoid, that since I got here, he’s been watching me like a hawk. I’ve got some stuff but not much, and I have no way of getting it to my handlers.”
    “So, what do you need to find on him?” If they could get the evidence and get out, then she wouldn’t have to look at him and she could get Irma and Frankie to safety.
    “These are some bad guys, Dixie. Bad, in ways you can’t imagine. You don’t need to do anything but lay low until I can figure out how the hell to get you out of here.”
    “Get out. I need a shower and I need to figure out what the hell to do about my grandmother and my aunt.” She also needed to not look at him. Those blue eyes and the dark hair, with the little bit of stubble that made him so damn sexy, not to mention his full lower lip and the fact that all she could think about was how she’d bite his lip while kissing him and his fingers would dig into her hips. Yeah. He needed to go. And she needed to get her head together.
     
    ~*~*~
     
    Nick got the anger. He really did. Things had been going so good between them. Dating had always been hard for him. He couldn’t talk about his work, and most of the time he just felt awkward talking about himself anyway. But with Dixie it had been different. From the moment he’d met her, he’d known she was the one. Then he’d walked away. No phone call, no word. He’d left her sitting at home waiting for him to show up.
    Looking at her, with her cheeks flushed and a worried frown creating that tiny little furrow between her brows, it hit him like a ton of bricks. He was in love with her. It wasn’t something he’d let himself think about before. They’d only been dating for a few weeks and he shied away from it, not wanting to spook himself or her.
    So, he’d played it cool. So cool that when he’d disappeared she just assumed he’d been playing her. It was probably a bad idea. Hell, he knew it was. But he wanted to show her it hadn’t been some kind of game, that everything that had passed between them was real.
    Sliding his hands into her dark hair, he watched her eyes go wide for a second, then her lips parted. It might have been surprise or she might have been on the verge of calling him a bastard again. He didn’t give her the chance. Tugging her close, he slanted his mouth over hers, her soft lips crushed beneath his.
    The