Ghostwalker 02 - Mind Game

didn’t dare take his eyes off his downed target, or even Martin, until Kaden signaled him an all clear. Kaden knelt beside her and put both hands on her shoulders, trying to absorb the energy consuming her. He glanced at Martin who knelt weeping beside his brother. “Are you an anchor?”

    Martin hesitated, and then nodded.

    “Get the hell over here. Put your hands on her,” Kaden ordered.

    Martin complied, somewhat in shock as the other GhostWalkers joined them. Gator made the call to Lily to inform the director of the NCIS that the data was recovered and the traitor found. Nicolas rushed to Dahlia’s side and gathered her into his arms.

    “This is the last time. I swear, never again, Dahlia,” he whispered as the convulsion eased and left her staring up at him with wide, dark eyes. “You scare me to death. The only way I’m going to breathe properly again is if you come home with me where I can keep my eye on you around the clock.”

    “Just get me to some place where the data will be safe until I can give it to the admiral,”
    she whispered.

    He brushed a kiss across her forehead. “I’m on it.”

CHAPTER TWENTY
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    “When I asked you to bring me somewhere safe,” Dahlia said, “this wasn’t what I had in mind.” She swam to the edge of the pool and shaded her eyes to look up at him. “And I can’t believe you made the director fly out here himself to collect the data. Research, which, by the way, is probably not even going to yield a weapon for them.”

    “I didn’t force him,” Nicolas pointed out. “And he could have sent someone else. He wanted to see you.”

    Dahlia scowled, or pretended to. She was feeling too relaxed and happy to conjure up much of a protest. “He just wanted to meet you and talk about the GhostWalkers. His poor men are struggling through so many problems. Do you really think Lily can help them?”

    “She helped us. I told the admiral all they had to do was call her, identify themselves, and she’d bring them into the program. It isn’t like it’s a deep dark secret that they exist.
    Lily suspected some time ago that her father had performed the experiment on the girls first, on us, and then on another set of men privately in his laboratories. We haven’t uncovered the research on them, but it was only a matter of time. Dr. Whitney was thorough in his research data. He recorded everything. It’s in the lab, and Lily will find it.
    They may as well come in and let her help them.”

    “I still say you forced the admiral to come here on purpose.” She studied his face for a long moment, her gaze moving lovingly over him. “You wanted him to see the contrast in how I was living before, and what I’m doing now, with you,” she guessed shrewdly.
    “You wanted to throw it in his face.”

    He shrugged easily and shook his head. “I’m going to maintain I didn’t force him.” He gave her his most expressionless stone face, but it didn’t last, turning almost immediately into a smirk. He had made the point in a quiet way, but he knew the admiral had gotten it.

    Nicolas stood near his fascinating waterfall, almost hidden among the lush greenery, looking primitive without a stitch on his hard, muscular body. Dahlia sent up a plume of water and pushed off, floating backward away from the edge. She knew he liked watching her, his black gaze drifting over her body, dwelling on every curve and secret hollow. There was always hunger in his gaze, an intense desire he never hid from her. It shook her up inside and she was certain it always would. “Yes you did,” she replied.
    “You told him I couldn’t travel and he needed to get the data to a safe place. Basically, you left him no choice.”

    Nicolas shrugged, in no way perturbed. “We had a good visit.” He crouched down beside the edge of the pool and offered her a glass of strawberry lemonade. It was an enticement, pure and simple. Dahlia loved the drink, and he knew she’d eventually swim to the side of the pool and he would be able to devour the sight of her body gliding through the water, her breasts floating free and the occasional inviting temptation of her feminine channel flashing at him as she swam around first. She loved the water and spent a great deal of time swimming naked in the pool.

    Sometimes he enjoyed just sitting in a chair watching her swim, his body reacting with a hard, painful ache he knew he could assuage at any time.

    “Is this a trap?” she asked