Shit! So Thomas was the one who’d ratted on Zane. Quinn gritted his teeth.

Thomas held up his hand. “I know what you’re thinking, but it wasn’t like that. Samson already had a suspicion. I only confirmed it. And I would do it again. What I regret is that we didn’t tell Zane to his face. If we’d done that maybe we would have realized what he was planning.”

Quinn kept his anger in check. It would do no good to pick a fight with Thomas, particularly since he still hadn’t come to what he was there to ask for.

“I doubt even that would have made a difference. Zane hides his emotions better than anybody,” Amaury added and gave Thomas a friendly slap on the shoulder.

“Hey, Thomas, given your sentiment about how things went down with Zane, maybe you wanna help me try to coax him back,” Quinn baited his colleague.

Thomas’ eyebrows went up. “Coax Zane? How?”

Quinn pulled the mangled cell phone from his pocket, drawing both Amaury’s and Thomas’ gaze onto it.

“There’s some information he’s after, and I’m pretty sure that if I can get it for him, he’ll come running back.”

Even though he’d promised Zane not to let Thomas know that this had anything to do with him, this was a promise he couldn’t keep. Thomas would work on this problem with much more speed and energy if he knew it could bring Zane back.

“Information in that piece of shit?” Amaury asked full of doubt.

“What kind of information?” Thomas added.

“Phone numbers, contact info, anything you can pry out of it.”

Quinn tossed the phone to Thomas who caught it in one hand. He turned it between his fingers and looked at it from all sides.

Then he raised his eyes. “Explosion?”

Quinn shrugged. “Can you salvage the chip?”

“Maybe.”

“I thought you were a genius,” Quinn needled him.

“And I thought you were loyal to Scanguards.”

“It’s nothing to do with Scanguards,” Quinn protested. “And that’s all I can tell you.”

“For now,” Thomas said calmly, “I’m going with it, but if something turns out to be fishy, I’ll demand the whole story.”

“Fair enough.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Portia traced her fingers over Zane’s arm, feeling an intimacy and connection that she’d thought impossible before. Being in Zane’s arms had exceeded all her wildest dreams. The pain of losing her virginity had been fleeting and had been instantly replaced by intense pleasure that had built and built until she’d thought she could take no more.

She purred like a content cat and snuggled closer to Zane’s lean body.

“My sentiments exactly,” he husked at her ear, and pulled her lobe between his lips, humming softly.

Her smile intensified as if wanting to permanently imprint itself on her face. “I liked it.”

“Just ‘liked’?” he growled while his hand on her stomach pressed her firmer into the curve of his body—his still very hard body. “You practically passed out.”

Her cheeks flamed. “I nodded off. Sorry.”

He lifted her chin with the tip of his fingers and turned her face to him. “Don’t be. I like holding you.”

“Just ‘like’?” she teased back.

His eyes sparkled in response. “What do you think?”

Portia turned in his arms and stroked her hand over the spot on his neck where she’d bitten him. The skin had instantly mended, repairing itself, but she could still visualize the tiny wound.

Zane’s eyes darkened, and a moan issued from his chest. “I can still feel your fangs there.” He pulled her closer.

She licked her lips, remembering his rich taste, suddenly hungry for more. “Can we do it again?”

“Just the biting?”

“No. Both.”

“Biting and making love?”

Portia felt warmth spread in her belly. “I want both.”

“Anytime, baby girl. You just tell me when you’re ready for me.”

Encouraged by his tender voice and the warmth she felt from him, she brushed her fingers over his forearm again, lingering over the tattoo on its inside. She dropped her gaze to it and felt him shift.

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to …”

“Portia …”

His muscles tensed.

“You must have gone through a horrible time.” She’d sensed earlier that whatever things he’d experienced in the death camps, had shaped his beliefs about himself. And now that she’d experienced the passion that was inside of Zane, she wanted more. She wanted to understand him, to find out what else was inside him. If he let her in.