He sat back in the love seat and lifted his boots on the table, crossing his legs at the ankles.
Tired as she was, a flood of disquieting heat rushed through Annabelle. He looked as he had the first time she’d laid eyes on him – in that bar on her twenty-first birthday. Ten years ago this Sunday. If he looked good in Armani, he looked like an angel in black leather. An angel straight from Hell, sent to take her spinning end over end into an Abyss of untold proportions.
At that very moment, Annabelle desperately wanted to touch Jack Thane. To run her hands along the back of his neck and feel his soft curls against her skin. To kiss lips that she’d always imagined as cool and soft. To trace her fingers across the perfect muscles of his chest that were so plainly visible beneath the tight black t-shirt he wore under his jacket.
“So?” Sam asked casually, ripping Annabelle out of her lust-filled stupor.
What the hell is wrong with me? She asked herself. Sleep. I need sleep! It’s like those hypnotic thingies where people are extra susceptible to crap because they’ve gone too long without sleep. That’s all! You’re susceptible to Jack because you’re tired. And he’s fucking hot. That too.
“So, after we rest for a few hours, we’ll check out the dean’s office,” Jack told him, apparently not having noticed Annabelle’s rather indiscreet ogling.
“Did he talk?” Sam asked, coming to lean against the wall that lead to the kitchen.
“Yes, but he may as well have remained silent,” Jack said. Though the sound of it almost made her shiver, Annabelle realized that Jack must have been very tired indeed, because his accent always got deeper when he was tired and, right now, it was the strongest that she had ever heard it.
“Beckman covered up a lie, thinking it was the truth.” He sighed and ran a hand over his face. “He gave me bugger-all I can use.” He stared at the keys on the table. “Except those.”
Annabelle looked at the keys, desperate to get her mind out of the uncomfortably sexy gutter it had been swimming in. Surprising herself with her ability to focus, she asked, “He just gave them to you, huh?” She already knew that Jack had taken the keys. The question was rhetorical. She was being a smart ass.
“He was too drunk to drive. I did him a favor.” Jack said, flatly. He shot her a pointed look.
She ignored his tone, and the look, and asked another question, this one not as rhetorical. “If the dean doesn’t actually know anything useful, then what can we hope to find in his office?”
“His address, at the very least,” Jack replied, taking a deep breath and letting it out with a sigh. “His class list and schedule… It’s a start.”
Annabelle watched him for a moment, noticing the shadows under his eyes. He’d removed the make-up, probably in the simple act of splashing water on his face to wake himself up. But, somehow, the darkness beneath his eyes bothered her more than any of his bruises. “You need sleep.” Again, she surprised herself, this time by the vast amount of tenderness in her tone.
“Aye,” he agreed, pulling his eyes from the keys to gaze up at her.
By the gods, his eyes are blue.
He stood then and swiped the keys off of the coffee table, re-pocketing them. Then, without warning, he took one long stride toward Annabelle, closing the distance between them. She didn’t have the time or the will power to move back away from him. He grabbed her wrist in his black gloved hand and tugged her toward the door.
“I take it you’re exploring the dean’s office alone, then?” Sam called as Jack opened the door and stepped through.
“Indeed,” was all Jack said as he pulled Annabelle out into the hall and closed the door behind them.
“Jack, where are we going?” she asked as he continued to lead her down several flights of stairs. Her heart was racing.
“Sam’s flat is too bloody small for the seven of us,” Jack answered, not slowing and not easing his grip on her arm.
She could agree to that much. She’d been wondering where she was going to sleep. She could have shared Sam’s bed with Cassie, she supposed, but there was only one couch and she knew that Jack and Sam weren’t going to share that.
“Okay…” she stammered.
“So, we’re going elsewhere.” Jack told her, matter-of-factly. His tone had deepened, his voice lower, nearly a growl.
Wow, someone gets crabby when he’s sleepy, she thought as they made it to the ground floor and he punched through the double doors that led out into the adjoining alley. Annabelle stumbled after him, a little off balance because of his hold on her wrist.
But when they were past the doors, Jack stopped and Annabelle came to an unsteady halt beside him.
The hum of a street lamp reverberated off of the walls of the alley around them. Its distant light sent long shadows stretching across the ground and climbing up the bricks. The heights of the buildings around them stopped most of what wind there was from entering the alley, but an occasional breeze rustled the garbage on the ground. A Lay’s chip bag went skirting past their feet.
Annabelle barely noticed it. Her eyes were adjusting to the darkness and they’d found something much more interesting to focus on.
“We going for a ride, Jack?” The question, again, was rhetorical. She guessed she was just in that kind of mood.
Jack had stopped in the alley so that she could gain her bearings, but once he knew she’d figured things out, he continued to pull her toward the shining black bike that awaited them.
Its chrome looked like starlight in the beams from the distant lamp. Its spotless black paint looked like night. Like shadow.
Jack mounted the Harley Fat Boy as if his body were made to mount a bike. Long, lean, hard legs straddled the bike with a kind of practiced, confident ease that lit Annabelle’s blood on fire.
She waited for him to straighten it and start it up. When he did, the resounding roar was like a salve on her tired, raw nerves, almost instantly beginning to chase away her weariness. It was her favorite sound in the world. Closely followed by the sound of Jack’s voice, and then by the sound of thunder. In fact, it was a lot like thunder. And she loved a good storm.
She just stood there for a moment, letting the sound seep into her body and massage her soul, even going so far as to close her eyes. When she opened them again at last, it was to find Jack gazing steadily at her. There was a secret smile on his lips, but something dark was dancing in his eyes.
Without a word, he offered her his gloved hand. She looked at it for a moment, wondering if it was the hand of the devil. Then, not really caring, she took it and mounted up behind him.
Chapter Nineteen
Annabelle held tightly to Jack’s waist, out and out relishing the opportunity to hold herself close to him while having a very legitimate excuse for doing so. After all, a woman needed real justification for being this close to a married man. She had it right now and she was going to use it unabashedly.
Jack sped around a corner, carving the road as he did so, and she hugged closer to him, closing her eyes. The wind whipped through her hair, tangling it into helpless knots and she didn’t even care. She loved the way the air hit her so hard that it bit her skin; she loved the blur of the pavement beneath them. She loved the speed, the roar of the V-twin, the barely concealed sexual energy of riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle. It was only slightly less powerful when you were on the back of the bike rather than in the saddle. And when you were seated behind someone like Jack, well…