LITMIR.BIZ

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out of her daze. Then she slipped back into seductress mode, curling her lips into a practiced smile. But her hand trembled, sending wine slopping onto the bed, proving she wasn’t as unaffected as she tried to pretend.

      Good. She deserved to sweat after the callous way she’d dumped him.

      Leaning forward, she handed the diplomat the glass of wine. He gulped it down, then reached out to put it on the bedside table. “Lesh get that dress off,” he slurred.

      “Right.” Her voice came out breathy. She stepped away from the bed. Reaching for the straps on her ballgown, she sliced her gaze back to Rafe’s.

      He didn’t move. Stark tension arced in the air. He raised a brow in challenge, wondering just how far she’d take this game. Not that he cared. Gabrielle had meant nothing to him for years. And if she wanted to perform an impromptu strip tease, who was he to complain?

      Unless this was some sort of trap …

      The muscles of his belly tightened, more doubts piling inside. Had she expected him to show up here? Had she been sent here to waylay him? But that made no sense. She couldn’t have known his plans. And while she might be an expert seductress, she hadn’t faked her surprise.

      But then why not sound the alarm? Why not tell the diplomat he was here? What game was she trying to play?

      She moistened her lush lower lip with her tongue. The gown’s thin straps slithered down. Rafe’s gaze dropped to the scraps of fabric clinging precariously to her breasts, just as he knew she’d planned. But if she thought she could manipulate him through his hormones, she was wrong.

      She paused, as if to heighten the anticipation.

      Damned if it didn’t work.

      Scowling, he cursed his weakness around this woman. He knew better than to let her suck him in. She’d led him on for years, slumming it with him while she waited for a more respectable man to come along.

      A sudden snore cut through the air.

      Gabrielle abruptly straightened. Rafe spared a glance at the diplomat now passed out cold on the sheets. Still scowling, he jerked apart the drapes and strode across the room, determined to get answers fast. As he neared, Gabrielle’s perfume flooded his senses, that unique blend of jasmine and vanilla taunting his nerves.

      He stopped and braced his hands on his hips. She tilted her head back to meet his eyes. “Well, hello, Rafe.” Her husky voice rumbled inside him, making him angrier yet.

      “Gabrielle.” He bared his teeth in a feral smile.

      She swayed back, her own smile wavering, the pulse speeding at the base of her throat betraying her unease.

      It was about time she started to worry.

      Because the real game was about to begin.

       Chapter 2

      Gabrielle gaped at Rafe in dismay, watching everything she’d worked for crumble apart. Bad enough she’d had to return to País Vell. Worse that she’d had to drug the American diplomat, who’d have one heck of a headache when he finally came to. But now the moment she’d dreaded for three torturous years had arrived—she’d come face to face with Rafael Navarro, the man she’d once desperately loved.

      And at the worst possible time. She wasn’t prepared. She needed time to erect her defenses. And she couldn’t afford to mess up this mission. This was her one opportunity for vengeance, to finally bring down the killer who’d murdered her father, the man she’d worked tirelessly to incriminate for the past three years.

      Rafe’s gaze skewered hers, making her pulse sprint. She pressed her clammy palms to her thighs, determined not to let him see how thoroughly he disrupted her nerves. It didn’t help that he was still outrageously gorgeous with his darkly chiseled face, a sorcerer’s black eyes, that thick shock of straight black hair.

      Unabashed masculinity radiating from every pore.

      He leaned his tall, sinewed body even closer, his furious eyes boring into hers. Stark grooves bracketed his sensual mouth, slashing through the razor stubble covering his jaw, and she battled the urge to step back.

      He was still sexy, still potent. Still dangerous. And he still had that aura of menace that had always kept her enthralled. He’d called to the wildness latent inside her, luring her to forbidden pleasures, tempting her to shed society’s prohibitions, and live.

      She inhaled, willing away the memories. She couldn’t think about the past. And she couldn’t worry about Rafe—not with everything she’d worked for at stake. Feigning a poise she didn’t feel, she pasted on the knowing, jaded expression she now used to keep men safely at bay.

      “Imagine meeting you here,” she drawled, injecting a note of bored amusement into her voice. “I thought you’d given up the life of crime.”

      His black eyes flashed. A muscle twitched in his iron jaw, and another whisper of unease slithered down her spine. Rafe wasn’t a man to toy with. He never obeyed the rules, never caved to another’s will. And he was impossible to control.

      “Once a thief, always a thief, right, Gabrielle?”

      Her face burned at the memory. She’d used that excuse to break off their engagement, aiming at his most vulnerable spot. But she couldn’t tell him the truth—that she’d had to drive him away. It was the only way she could make sure he survived.

      “So why are you here?” he countered.

      She hitched her shoulder toward the diplomat snoring on the bed. “Isn’t it obvious?”

      “Yeah.” He shot her a scathing look. “But stripping for middle-aged drunks is a new low, even for you.”

      Hurt razored through her. She struggled not to let Rafe see it, her jaw aching from the effort it took to hold her smile in place. But she couldn’t miss the irony—since the last time she’d made love was with him.

      “He’s not so bad,” she gritted out.

      “Right. He looks like a real ball of fire in bed.”

      Her smile frozen, she angled up her chin. “That’s none of your business.”

      “The hell it isn’t. You made it my business when you waltzed in on my case.”

      “Your case?” She managed to scoff. “I’ve got more right to be here than you do. At least I was invited in.”

      His onyx eyes turned deadly. He shifted closer, his wide shoulders caging her in. She moved back and bumped the nightstand, her heart tripping through her chest.

      “Cut the crap, Gabrielle. Why are you really here?”

      She tried again to inch backward. Her breath dammed up in her lungs. Rafe was too big, too close. Too threatening. Warnings skittered inside her, igniting the urgent need to flee.

      But he didn’t budge. He towered over her, his broad chest filling her vision, sharp intelligence blazing in his eyes.

      She frantically shuffled through options, desperate to make him back off. She couldn’t tell him the truth, but he’d see through any lies. Maybe the partial truth would satisfy his curiosity, enough to persuade him to leave.

      “Fine. If you must know, I’m looking for information.”

      “What kind of information?”

      “Business. Something that affects FerrCom, my corporation. It has nothing to do with you.”

      At least not directly. She’d recently intercepted a message using her company’s secret backdoor access to the billing software they ran. The message revealed that the American diplomat would deliver some highly sensitive intelligence to the king at the G-6 summit, exposing the identity of a traitor in the king’s inner circle.

      The trouble was, the police chief—the

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