Tempting The Beast(11)

we’ll head out.”

They knew where the soldiers camped, though the men were unaware of it. Like the others before them,

they thought their training and their precautions would hide them from the instincts ingrained in Callan’s

DNA. They would find out otherwise.





CHAPTER FIVE



Merinus woke up aching the next morning. Not the flu or summer cold kind of ache. The utterly female

ache of needing a man. How a virgin was supposed to know what that ache meant, she wasn’t certain.

But there was no doubt that was the cause of it. Her cunt was slick and creamy, her panties damp, too

damned damp to suit her. Her breasts were swollen, her nipples distended and hard, and she could have

swore she tasted cinnamon on her lips.

Her lips were sensitive. She ran her tongue over them. They weren’t swollen, just sensitive enough for

her to be very aware of them. Then she remembered the night before. She frowned, her brows snapping

together in instant ire. Damn him. He hadn’t even stuck around long enough to wake her up?

She jerked to an upright position, then groaned roughly as her sore muscles protested the effort. Oh hell,

now that just hurt. There was no cause for those bastards to act that way. She groaned roughly as she

reached for her cell phone. Kane was supposed to take care of this.

She keyed his number in swiftly as she stood to her feet. Waiting on Kane to answer, she shed her

clothes and pulled on a big, soft cotton T-shirt until she could get to a hot shower.

“Where the hell were you last night?” His voice came over the line with a stern, cranky tone.

“Watching soldiers,” she informed him tensely, knowing better than to tell him the truth. “There are two

on the ridge above the Lyons’ house. I thought you had that taken care of.”

His contacts in the private and government sector put him in a place where he would have, or should

have known those men were being sent out there. There was silence across the line.

“Damn,” he finally cursed quietly. “Pull out, Merinus. Someone’s gone to the trouble to hide these

bastards from me. I’ll bring Dad and we’ll come in—”

“And I’ll head for another paper at the first offer,” she cut in. “You aren’t pulling me off this, Kane.”

“Dammit, Merinus, it’s not safe anymore.”

“So find out who they are and give them a call. Tell them you’ll rip their balls off and feed ‘em to your

favorite dog or something,” she suggested. “Make them pull back until I can finish this. Don’t start

making excuses, either. I know you can do it.”

Kane was slick, and he could be mean when he had to. Merinus knew that. No one messed with him,

and most people in his little world owed him enough favors that he rarely had to ask for anything twice.

“Geez, Merrie, why don’t you just pounce on them yourself if you have all the fucking answers?” Kane

bit out.

Merinus bit her lip, painfully aware of the bruise across the left side of her face now. Yeah, that one

worked really well.

“Okay, I can do that,” she mused thoughtfully. “They looked kinda big, but hey, maybe if I throw your

name around a little—” She should have thought of that one yesterday.

“Dammit,” he cursed. “You would, too. Okay. Okay. Just hang on a few hours and let me see what I

can find out here. Stay out of trouble, dammit, until I can find something out.”

“I always stay out of trouble,” she lied smoothly. If Kane knew the trouble she was getting into he would

come down, tie her hand and foot and haul her back to New York so damned fast it would make her

head spin.

“Yeah. Right.” He grunted absently.

“I’ll be waiting on you.” Evidently he was already hard at work on his trusty little computer.

“You do that,” he mumbled, then disconnected.

Merinus sighed roughly as she flipped the phone off then tossed it on the bed. Dammit. Like she was

going to sit around and play dead while he hunted around the Internet for a source of information. Bruise

or no bruise, she was hardly finished. And she was growing tired of this game she was playing with

Callan.

Glancing at the clock, she winced at the time. Late morning. She had definitely overslept. A shower and

lunch first though, then she was tracking Callan Lyons down and that was that. If she had to stake out

that damned gas station until hell froze over. Her phone rang, interrupting that furious thought.

“Well, that was fast enough,” she said as she brought it to her ear. “Did you threaten their balls or

what?”

There was silence over the line. Merinus frowned.

“Kane?”