“Fine. Bath.” What could it hurt? She would put him in the tub, wash his back for him and make sure she was there when he was ready to get out. No big deal. She knew Doc’s drugs. They would make him a little dazed, kind of woozy, but he could stand up on his own. She couldn’t anticipate what was to come.

He couldn’t unbutton the snug jeans. His arm was useless. Swallowing tightly, she unbuttoned them with trembling fingers, more than aware of the thick bulge beneath them. Keeping her eyes carefully averted, she eased them and his snug briefs down his powerful legs before he sat on the small chair beside the tub and let her unlace his boots.

Finally, gloriously naked and heavily aroused, he was able to step into the wide tub and lean back against it wearily. His head rested on the back, his eyes closing.

“You can’t go to sleep, Kane.” She was shaking as she watched the head of his cock bob along the tanned flesh of his abdomen. Only Kane would have a hard-on while he was half dead. It was just her luck.

“I’m awake,” he muttered. “Just give me a minute.”

He lifted his good arm, his fingers scratching lazily at his scarred chest. She followed the action, her eyes held captive by the thin scars, her heart aching at the pain they must have caused.

“He caught me outside the lab grounds,” Kane said softly, causing her head to raise, her gaze to meet his.

His eyes were dilated and drowsy now.

“I’m sorry.” She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t know what to feel.

“Bastard thought he could bury me and just walk away,” he said softly, though his voice throbbed with anger and pain. “I managed to dig myself out and crawl through the brush. Some hikers finally found me. Half dead, fevered. They got me to a hospital, but I was pretty out of it by then. It was weeks before they were able to find out who I was. Months before I was coherent. By the time I was able to get help to you…” he swallowed tightly, “the labs were gone. They said everyone had died. Nothing was left.”

He closed his eyes again.

She thought he had just walked away. She covered her face with her hands. Even after Callan and Merinus had told her what Dayan said, she still hadn’t believed it. Not completely. Not clear to her heart. She didn’t until now.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered again.

He shook his head slowly. “Fuck it. Help me wash this grime from my body, Sherra, so I can at least sleep a while. I’ll figure the rest of it out tomorrow.”

Sherra felt her heart slam into her chest. Her pussy was screaming out in victory. Her hands were almost vibrating in pleasure at the thought of stroking his flesh, even with the barrier of a washrag against it. Slowly, she knelt beside the tub and lifted the clean cloth from the small basket hanging on the edge. Dipping it into the water she lifted the bar of soap.

“Hair,” he mumbled, sitting up slowly and lowering his head. “Just use the soap. I do.”

She washed his hair carefully, then after laying a towel over the bandage, rinsed the short strands with a dripping cloth. Removing it, she began to wash him quickly, desperate to get it over with and get him into the bed and hopefully sleeping. There was temptation and then there was desperation. She was passing desperation fast.

Her face flamed as he took the cloth from her and washed his hard, engorged cock and the sac beneath. His face twisted into a grimace of pleasure, the hard flesh jerking rapturously beneath his strokes.

“Enough.” Her voice was strangled as she took the cloth from him and wrung the water out of it. She held out a towel. “You’re squeaky clean and I’m tired of playing nursemaid.”

A slumberous, sensual smile crossed his lips as he watched her through lowered lids.

“And you do it so well,” he whispered, but forced himself to stand up. Water sluiced over his tanned flesh as he rose before her, staring down at her, daring her as his engorged cock filled her vision. It was wet, water running in streams along the mushroom-shaped head and heavily veined shaft.

Sherra licked her lips, remembering much too well how good he tasted, how his groans of pleasure stroked her senses as her mouth had enveloped him. She swallowed tightly and quickly pulled the plug on the drain before rising to help him from the tub and towel him dry.

She thought she was strong enough to do it. She thought she could control the hunger and the need long enough to get him dry and in bed. But when she was once again faced with the thick length of his erection, she could only whimper in defeat.

His hands tangled in her hair as she knelt before him. He held her still, though there was no reason to. Her lips parted as the velvety head of his cock nudged against them, opened and allowed him to take her mouth with one smooth, shallow stroke.

“God. Sherra.” His voice sent shivers cascading over her flesh as the thick, throbbing flesh filled her, stroking her swollen tongue as he moved his hips, caressing it as he thrust in and out with a strangled groan.

She whimpered, closing her eyes as her hands gripped his thighs and she began to suck at the engorged shaft. Just as he taught her a lifetime ago, her mouth closed on him, tongue stroking him, milking the sensitive head slowly.

His hands tightened in her hair, his body tensing as a ragged groan filled her ears and she felt his warm pre-come dripping to her tongue. It was salty, rich, making her realize how desperate she had been for his taste. She wanted it all, wanted to feel the hard hot spurts of his semen filling her mouth, coating her tormented tongue as he found his release in her.

“Sherra, baby.” His voice was hoarse as he fucked her lips slow and easy. “Baby, this is so fucking good I could die, but I’m going to fall to the floor any minute.”

To prove his words he nearly stumbled, a rough, tortured chuckle filling the air as she slowly released him. Looking up at him slowly, her breath caught at the stark male hunger in his gaze.

“Son of a bitch, I finally get my cock in that sweet mouth again and I can’t even stand up long enough to enjoy it.”

Sherra was shaking as she jerked back roughly, clamping her lips firmly shut as she stared at the moist length of male flesh. Dear God, what was she doing? She had lost her mind completely.

“Well, hell,” he said roughly as he braced himself against the wall to stand upright. “Guess I can forget the release, huh? Can I at least get some help into bed?”

She shook her head slowly. He was watching her with heated intensity and a sexual hunger that made her body flame in awareness. This was madness, she told herself fiercely. She knew better than to think that this could ease her hunger for him. It would do no more than make it worse.

“Damn.” She came to her feet, easing her arm around him and leading him from the bathroom to his bed.

“Yeah, curse for both of us,” he growled as she jerked the blankets back on the bed and he sat down slowly. “Son of a bitch, no way I’m sleeping on my stomach with this hard-on, Sherra.”

“You had it before I touched you.” She frowned as he watched her with mild accusation.

“For you,” he growled. “It’s been hard since the night you stepped out of the shadows in Sandy Hook. Dammit, I can’t even jack off enough.”

She almost lost her balance at the roughly voiced protest. Then she did lose it as he lay down before pulling her to the bed beside him. Leaning over him, she stared down at him, alarm streaking through her system. Too close. He was too close now for her to maintain any sense of control.

“You need to go to sleep.” Please go to sleep , she thought, oh God make him go to sleep . But she couldn’t resist touching the light stubble of beard along his cheek, her fingers glancing over it, the sensitive tips tingling in pleasure at the rough feel. He watched her, relaxed for a change. She had never seen him so laid-back, smiling at her easily, his eyes dark, filled with heat.

“You need to fuck me.” He grinned suggestively, his dilated eyes nearly black now as he watched her.

“Come on, just once. I promise I won’t fall asleep on you,” he wheedled in a dark velvet voice that sent electric flares of sensation tearing through her body.

How was she supposed to fight this new, suddenly gentle Kane?

Chapter Five

Sherra stared down at him in shock. He was teasing her? He never teased her. He either snapped at her or had something impossibly arrogant to say that was sure to infuriate her. He snarled at her, mocked her, called her cute little pet names and generally did his best to make her life hell. But he had never teased her so gently. So sweetly.

The time they had been together at the labs hadn’t exactly given anyone an opportunity for laughter or for teasing. Life and death were a struggle, day by day. Each minute of their lives had been a lesson in death. How to accomplish it, either quick and silent, or with maximum pain. Sherra guessed she knew more ways to kill a man than most assassins walking around now. But she didn’t know how to tease.

“Sherra.” He reminded her of his request with a gentle, chiding voice. Gentleness. He could be so gentle, so tender, that the thought of the single night he had given her brought tears to her eyes. She didn’t want to remember, she needed desperately to forget. Remembering made her weak, made her ache for all the things she denied herself.

“You know I can’t,” she whispered, flinching as he caught her hand, watching her closely. His calloused fingers smoothed over the back of her softer ones, creating a warming friction that had her breath hitching softly. She loved his touch. The heat and strength of his flesh always amazed her, as did the licking flames of hunger that grew in her womb.

“You always jerk like that when I touch you,” he said, staring up at her somberly. “As though afraid I’ll hurt you.” His gaze was so dark, regretful. “Did I hurt you, Sherra, when I made love to you that first time?”

Sherra drew in a hard breath as he lifted her fingers to his lips. Hurt her? He had broken her heart, but physically he had given her more pleasure than she had ever known in her life. She shook her head slowly, her eyes widening as his lips parted and he rubbed the pad of her forefinger against it. The sensation speared straight to her clit and from there to her aching pussy. His lips were firm

and hot, full with sexual promise.

“Are you wet?” he asked her as his lips quirked in a smile. “I hope you’re at least as wet as I am hard, baby. It wouldn’t be fair otherwise.”

His tongue swiped over her finger, causing her to jerk at the sensation. Wet, moist, she could well remember him stroking her clit with it as he held her thighs wide and sucked the little pearl to release. That hard knot of flesh swelled and throbbed at the thought as she fought back a groan. Breathing roughly, she licked her dry lips, fighting to hold her eyes open, to make certain she watched every move he made. She wouldn’t be able to bear it much longer. Having him touch her was a torment. An agonizing pleasure that she knew she would soon be helpless against.

“We have to stop.” Talking was damned near impossible. She could barely breathe. Hunger assailed her, filling her with the bittersweet pain of a lust she knew would never be fulfilled. She had made the mistake, albeit unknowingly, of condemning her body to bleak non-fulfillment. She wouldn’t do the same to Kane. He had suffered more than enough already for daring to attempt to save her.

“Stay here with me, Sherra,” he said, his voice low, vibrating with need. “Let me hold you. I’m too damned weak to force anything else on you right now.”

He wouldn’t have to. Her gaze trailed down his muscular chest, his tight abdomen and the rigid length of his cock rising up. She licked her lips nervously. She was so weak. As long as he was angry, sniping at her and appearing to hate her for her denial of him, then she could stay far enough away to keep her resolve. But this softer, kinder Kane made her hunger that much deeper. Kane groaned. “Hell, baby. I want that tongue licking all over me, not your lips. Let me lick your lips.”