Page 74 of License to Kill

“Does that mean we can skip straight to the sex marathon? If we’re going to be stuck together in this tiny room, we may as well make the most of it.”

“Basically, you’re saying I can choose between picking a fight with you or sex?”

“That didn’t take you long to figure out.”

Would indulging make anything worse? I could definitely see how it could make a lot of things better temporarily—and fill a great deal of time. “Can we fight while having sex?”

“If you can fight with me while we’re having sex, neither one of us is doing either right.”

The man had a point. I scowled. “We’d have to have the fight before the sex.”

“Yes, but I’d rather not fight.”

Whatever. The bastard would just take off his shirt and flex his muscles and win the war anyway. Surrendering would conserve energy, and I’d need it if Jake decided he had something to prove.

“Can I at least put up a fight first?” I had more than my fair share of issues, but I didn’t mind adding rough foreplay to the endless list of them. I could live with it if anyone thought I was a little bit twisted for liking the way Jake balanced putting his Fenerec strength to good use catching me while I worked to make him earn the rest of our time together.

He chuckled, a deep, sensuous sound. “You just want me to get rough, don’t you? I think I can come up with something.”

When I didn’t think things through, I inevitably got myself in trouble. Months of separation had given Jake a hefty dose of enthusiasm, and despite my best efforts, I couldn’t keep up with him. At least failure ended with a great deal of mutual satisfaction and a nap.

If I had gotten my way, I would have slept for a week without budging, but the Fenerec had other ideas, ideas which involved me having to get dressed and move so Jake’s parents wouldn’t rain on our parade. Snapping and snarling at them didn’t help. Gary and the other wolves teamed up and coerced Jake into cooperating under the threat of helping me dress if I refused to do what they wanted.

“My parents caught wind we’re here?” Jake herded me into the back of Gary’s SUV while I cursed over having my nap interrupted.

“They’re just running out of places to check when they aren’t busy working. They want you to do your job, and Mason’s been having far too much fun toying with them. Last I heard, he had suggested you had lost your mind and were considering a job in prostitution.”

I glared at Gary. “No.”

With a smirk, Jake reached out, snagged a lock of my hair, and gave a tug. “She’s the one with the hobby of dressing up as an underage prostitute.”

As always, everything returned right back to the beginning, when our partnership in the FBI had turned into something more—and something less. CARD had broken me in more ways than one. At first, I had thought I had everything I ever needed in Jake, but I had changed.

He hadn’t.

If I’d been wise, I would have noticed his dependency regarding his parents. Maybe I would have been able to find a different—better—way of handling what had torn us apart. Then again, I’d never know. He hadn’t changed until after I had walked away, and I didn’t know what that would mean for us.

‘Us’ remained a dangerous proposition, and everything circled back to the reason I had chosen him in the first place. My trust in him had been broken, but he meant to wait out the storm again. It had taken me four years to accept he could become more to me than just a partner, the rare one who I trusted in the field to watch my back.

He’d waited four years once, and I had no doubt he’d wait that long again.

Jake cleared his throat, and I jumped at the sound. “What?”

“Do you want to go on a hunt?”

“On a hunt?”

“With part of the pack.”

“I want to go back to bed, Jake.”

Arching a brow at me, he leaned back in his seat. “Again?”

“I’m too tired to rip your intestines out through your big toe today, so I’m going to take a rain check.”

Gary grinned at me before directing his attention to Jake. “There’s no reason you can’t tag along after the pack and make us do most of the work. You both need to exercise, and you both could use a good meal or two. A hunt’s perfect.”

Jake huffed. “And it gets us out of the house so when my parents come poking around, all they pick up are old traces of our scent?”