"You think not?" he taunted softly, his smile mocking her attempt to distract him. He lifted his hips slightly, then plunged into her deep velvet heat again, all the way. Her quick exhalation puffed gently against his face-warm and moist, like the rest of her. All his. He felt like a conquering barbarian. He felt like the wild animal that had won his mate after a fight. He smiled down and adjusted his hold slightly, pulling both her hands to each side of her face. "Honey, this is standard position for me. A Navy SEAL can easily do a hundred push-ups."

"A hundred?" She breathed out faintly. Could she take a hundred strokes?

"Or more," he murmured, and started demonstrating.

His breathing fell into a rhythm while he moved in and out of her as if he did s.e.xual push-ups every day. His eyes were half closed as he gyrated against her s.e.xually every time he impaled her, each slide keeping contact with that part of her that seemed to belong only to him.

For once in a long time, Marlena lost all sense of control, letting the man above her take over. This wasn't s.e.x. This was claim staking, and she recognized it even as she wanted him to continue. He was male to her female, claiming her with his body, stamping her with his scent, searing her with his kiss. And she had never felt more wanted.

"I think I'll do this all night," he muttered to himself. "Keep you wet. Keep you wanting. Keep you coming for me. Yeah, like that."

Her spasms started with a slow shudder, responding to the s.e.xual promises he whispered in her ear. Oh G.o.d, she couldn't possibly do it again. What he was telling her shouldn't excite her, shouldn't make her feel like this. She shook her head, trying to clear it.

"Come again, sweetheart." That velvet voice seduced her, even as her body started obeying. She heard her own deep-throated whimpers as she did as she was told.

"Again," he commanded, his tongue exploring her ear, stealing the last vestiges of rational thought. "Once more. Yeah."

She climaxed again. And again. And then he, too, began to shudder as he gave in to his own need. A deep groan rumbled from his chest as his hips moved faster and faster. She was vaguely aware of the pa.s.sionate kiss he gave her, plundering her mouth. The muscles on his arms corded thickly as his body tensed in mid-plunge.

"Lena..."

"Stash..."

There wasn't any breath left for words. His hands were still holding her down when he collapsed on top of her. Their bodies were slick against each other. Dazed by the whole experience, Marlena could barely move. He finally rolled onto his back, breathing hard. She curled up on her side and tried to remember the last time she'd fallen asleep on the floor of a hotel room.

She didn't have the luxury to recall anything. An arm scooped under her and she was pulled onto her knees, then onto her feet. "Oh no," Steve whispered in her ear, as he swung her into his arms. "That was war. Now we get in bed and we make love." He looked around. "Where is the bedroom in this place, anyway?"

Marlena opened one eye. The bedroom light was still on, but from her vantage, she couldn't see much. There was an obstacle in her way. On top of her, actually. Approximately one hundred and eighty pounds. Six feet of musculature and testosterone. A s.e.x machine whose switch had been on most of the night.

She didn't dare move. Mr. Happy Down There might still be awake, and she was much too sore to even contemplate going another round.

She should be d.a.m.n mad. And uncomfortable to have a man sleeping on top of her. Yet, she wasn't. She felt...satiated. Happy. Wonderfully at ease. When he'd taken her to bed last night, Stash had made good on his promise. He had made love to her all night. Slow and satisfying. The kind that made a woman feel...She jerked her head up the few inches allowed her, shock reverberating through her body. Oh no. She had almost said in love...oh no...

"Don't move," Steve ordered sleepily. His chest rumbled in her ear, and his masculine scent wafted through her senses as his chest hair tickled her nose.

In love...oh no...Her denial was automatic, conditioned from years of training herself to keep an emotional distance. Especially from men like Stash McMillan. She shook her head, or tried to, and instead tortured herself with his scent again.

"Don't you ever listen, woman?"

"I can't breathe," she lied.

"Not true. You have a healthy pair of lungs. Your screams last night prove that."

He was the only man who had ever made her lose control like that. Pleasure without preliminaries, without thought. Just mindless s.e.xual satiation. It scared her, and she didn't like it. She opened her mouth against his chest and bit him.

He yelped and turned over, pulling her on top of him as he did so. His eyes were sleepy and slightly red. His dark stubble somehow made him even s.e.xier. She wanted to kiss the dimple in his chin.

"My back hurts," he complained. "I think you took chunks of my flesh with your teeth."

She wrinkled her nose. "I can't move my right leg," she told him. She must have wrenched a muscle while tussling with him on the carpet.

His eyes started to twinkle. "That's because you opened your thighs too wide last night."

His raunchiness had her flushing. She couldn't believe it. She felt her face heating at the things he did. He had had her every way he wanted. Just as he told her in the car last night, he had shown her exactly what he wanted to do.

"You're beautiful when you're blushing," Steve said softly.

He caressed her bare back, a sweeping up and down sensual motion that had her body squirming against him. Oh no. She wasn't losing control so soon again. She needed time. Needed s.p.a.ce. "All my men tell me that," she quipped, trying to be flippant.

It worked. His smile turned into a scowl. "I don't want to know about your other men."

"Good, I wasn't going to tell," she said. She could take anger. Anger she could control and shape. "Maybe you can go ask around, start another file."

"Maybe I'll ask Tess," he came back.

That wasn't the answer she wanted to hear. She forgot that was what started it all. Tess and her meddling. Stash working with Tess. She tapped him on the chin with a finger.

"I don't share," she said.

He c.o.c.ked a dark brow at her. There was a strange light in his eyes. "That makes two of us. But where does that leave us?"

Marlena didn't have an answer. At least not an answer that wouldn't leave her vulnerable. No man wanted a woman without an ident.i.ty, who couldn't give him the care a normal woman would. She had learned the hard way. It was much easier to be the first to walk away.

She bent forward and kissed him, shutting out the questions and the doubts. He didn't protest, gathering her closer, hands splaying on the cheeks of her behind. She glided against his maleness, catching her breath at how quickly he responded to her touch. Just like that, he was ready for her again. His desire was mirrored in his sleepy eyes, a torrid l.u.s.t in them as he savored her fondling. His lips parted when she took him in her hand and guided him into her.

He had taken her all night. This time she would take him. She knew how he liked it, too. Long and hard and slow, pulling his pleasure at a slow pace. And he loved it when she paused just a fraction of a second before taking him again. His hands on her b.u.t.tocks tightened, trying to hurry her. He sighed when she complied. He seemed to grow even larger the longer she prolonged his pleasure. She smiled down as she rode him. They didn't need any words for this.

This was more like it. Back in control. For now she would make believe that this was her territory. Her man.

Chapter Sixteen.

S teve muttered a soft curse. Jacka.s.s. Instead of talking it out, he had gone after Marlena with his d.i.c.k. Now there was a gulf between them. He knew her body but not her mind, and she was determined to keep him at arm's length. He understood why. She had lost control last night and hadn't liked it.

Now there wasn't time. Hands in her jacket pockets, Tess studied them, amus.e.m.e.nt gleaming in her gray eyes. He knew she was checking out the scratch on his cheek. She would probably have a good laugh if she knew about the big purple bruise in the middle of his back. Or the scratches there. In fact he had marks all over him. His mermaid hadn't started the night very submissively. His lips quirked as he recalled her declaration. Marking her territory, she had said. Ruefully he had to admit that she had done that very well.

He glanced over at Marlena. She was walking a little gingerly. She wore a white angora top over white leather pants. Pale pink pearl necklace with matching earrings. Very cool, very sophisticated. But she still looked well kissed, he couldn't help noting smugly. And she very well better admit she had been marked, too. To his frustration, she wouldn't meet his eyes.

"I said to talk, not walk all over each other," Tess commented, as she surveyed the living room and them. Other than picking up the leftover material that had been their clothes, they hadn't had time to straighten up the place. She picked up half of a leather belt and wagged it around. "Remind me not to take a suite here. The room service leaves much to be desired."

Actually, room service was amazing. A call to the hotel butler had produced a shirt and a pair of pants within half an hour. No questions asked.

"I've already used the intranet component," Marlena told Tess. "Everything should have been transmitted."

"Good. By the time we finish with Steve's admiral, I should have verification from Command, and the rest of the codes. I suppose Steve did get to fill you in with some details since last night?" Tess's smile echoed the mockery in her voice. She kicked one boot aside as she walked toward the dining table.

"All I need to know is when I can get back to my job. Alone."

Steve curbed the urge to say something sarcastic. Last night was still on his mind, and there was no way to get around the fact that he had fallen in love with Marlena Maxwell. He realized that his attempts to get her to talk to him seriously had been a belly flop, and that if he really wanted to get serious about winning this woman, he had better learn more of her ways and the way her world worked. Right now she wanted her comfort zone back. He would give it to her for a few hours while he sorted things out at his end.

"Too many cooks involved in this soup, darling," Tess said, shaking her head. She pulled out a chair. "We have to straighten out who the players are."

"By exposing me?" Marlena asked, picking up her cup of coffee.

"Putting you in danger was the last thing I wanted to do," Steve said quietly. How could she still think that after last night? "I didn't know then what I know now."

"Obviously there are a lot of layers at work here," Tess chimed in. "I wouldn't be here if it were an easy knot to unravel, M. You know I've stuff to do in New York."

"Oh, I know why you're here. I just don't know why he's here." Marlena finished her coffee, hiding her expression behind the cup.

If she wanted to squash him like a bug under her pretty white boots, she was doing a good job of it. Steve shoved his hands into his pants, fisting them. He caught Tess's warning glance and pursed his lips grimly.

Tess noisily stirred her coffee, then studied the pattern on the little silver spoon, rolling it between her fingers. "Anger is such a powerful emotion. Did you know that was how I drove away Alex?" she asked conversationally. She got off the sofa, her sideways glance steady on Marlena. Steve noted her stilted shoulders as both women exchanged challenging stares.

"Don't mess with my mind," Marlena warned.

"Darling, you're already a mess." Unperturbed, Tess indicated their surroundings.

"You got what you wanted, didn't you? Your Alex did exactly what you wanted."

Steve wasn't sure what was happening or who this Alex was, but the subject was obviously meant to push Tess away. He was beginning to understand what Tess told him. Marlena had been goading him on purpose. To drive him away. She'd been using NOPAIN on him.

"Yes, he did do exactly what I wanted," Tess agreed, then turned toward the door. "But I didn't get what I wanted. It's time to go or we'll be late."

Thankfully, the trip to the Office of Naval Research in Arlington was more businesslike in tone. Marlena didn't ask many questions, but Steve could tell she wanted to know more about why they were involving the navy. Tess wore a brooding far-off expression, even though she answered the questions without any appearance of being distracted. Steve had the feeling that she was thinking of something-or someone-else.

He had things on his mind too, and more questions than he would like. When he was first told all those months ago that he was being transferred to TIARA on an interim basis, he had known that there were reasons for his being suddenly sent to D.C., that the admiral didn't just pick one of his field operatives to go behind a desk. His covert training in STAR Force prepared him to enter into something unfamiliar on a need-to-know basis. Perhaps he was a little uneasy and just a tad disappointed with the way TIARA's Task Force Two worked, compared to his own SEAL team, but he had been willing to learn and integrate, had tried to get along with the others, some of whom didn't seem to appreciate his transfer into their department.

At first Steve had thought it was just the natural compet.i.tiveness between different covert fields. He was a soldier, and TIARA members considered the military their footservants, so to speak, doing the dirty work for them while they gathered the necessary intel. However, as the months went by, he became aware of an underlying suspicion of him, of the group split into two, some of whom-like Cam-accepted him, and some-like Harden-who distanced themselves from him. It was exasperating, because he knew he couldn't do a good job without total team trust.

He glanced at Marlena, physically sitting so close, yet mentally miles away. She had started it all. Besides wreaking havoc on his emotional life, she had been the pivotal point that had forced out some of the information being kept from him.

The admiral obviously had another agenda when he had sent Steve to TIARA. It wasn't just a temporary fill-in, as he had told him, and an opportunity to learn how the covert food chain worked. Harden had accused him of being the admiral's eyes and ears. The main question was, what did the admiral want him to see and hear?

It couldn't be mere coincidence that they were meeting at the Office of Naval Research, especially after learning last night that Cunningham worked at the NRL. There had to be a connection because the ONR was the parent organization to maritime labs around the world.

Steve mentally connected the dots. Industrial research led to Project X-S-BOT. The missing laptop led to the meeting at the Naval Research Lab in D.C. Maritime research led to the navy, which led to the admiral. Where did GEM fit in? He looked at Marlena again.

She chose to slant her gaze in his direction at that very instant, and their eyes met. He could drown in those blue depths so easily, so full of secrets and promises. He couldn't forget how dreamy she looked when they made love, how those eyes lost the defensive shields that hid what she thought and felt. In bed she responded without suspicion or fear. She didn't draw away as she was doing now.

He wouldn't let her gaze go, and they continued staring at each other silently. He wanted to know what she was planning. Experience had taught him that it was always better to be one step ahead of Marlena Maxwell.

"Looks like we are expected," announced Tess as they reached their destination. They went through security without any difficulty and followed the officer.

Marlena smiled at the smartly dressed young man holding out the door for her. "Thank you," she said, knowing that Steve was watching.

"What would you like to drink, ma'am?" asked the young man, smiling back appreciatively.

"Something hot," Marlena answered. She turned to Tess with an arching smile. "Men in uniform...something about them."

"And for you, ma'am? Sir?" The officer didn't know that Steve was navy, too, since he was in civvies.

"The same thing Marlena is having, please," Tess murmured, amus.e.m.e.nt in her eyes.

Steve repressed the urge to bark at the young officer. These two women were lethal weapons. Didn't they ever stop playing their games? "Something cold," he said.

As the officer left the room, Tess turned to Marlena, "Stash's on to your little fun."

Marlena chose one of the chairs around the conference table in the s.p.a.cious office. "Stop teaching him things he isn't supposed to know, then," she said lightly, and gave a playful whirl in her seat.

"Well now, that's my fun," Tess teased.

"Seems like there is a lot of fun at my expense lately," Steve remarked, and sat down next to Marlena. "Well, you're in luck. You get fun sitting between the both of you."

Marlena frowned, hearing Tess's soft laughter. Why was she feeling so possessive? She remembered what she'd nearly admitted to that morning and firmly pushed the thought away in some corner of her mind. Love was out of the question. Besides, he didn't look like someone who would fall in love with her anyhow.

The connecting door opened. The admiral came in first. Marlena recognized him immediately, not just from the rows and rows of medals on his uniform, but from the photos of him. Admiral Jack Madison was famous. And very handsome for a man in his fifties. Even her heart fluttered a little in the presence of such authority and magnetism.

"Tess, how are you?" he greeted warmly. Marlena sighed inwardly as she witnessed the friendly buss he gave Tess's cheek. Trust T. to have friends like that.

"Jack, marriage suits you well," Tess observed. "Sorry I couldn't make it to the wedding."

"You have to meet my wife sometime," Admiral Madison said, then turned to Steve, returning his salute. "McMillan."

"Good morning, sir."

Marlena could see Steve's respect for the admiral. She supposed it would be pretty hard not to admire a renowned and decorated Vietnam War hero such as Jack Madison, one of the first SEAL commanders known for his saves as well as his kills. She wondered for the first time about working in a team such as a SEAL unit, as opposed to covert self-reliance.

"This is Marlena Maxwell," Tess introduced her.

His handshake was firm and confident. "Admiral," Marlena acknowledged, skipping the usual niceties. She really didn't want to be there, so what was the point of pretending?

Admiral Jack Madison, in turn, introduced the other two men who came in with him. "This is the commanding officer of NRL, Captain Hector Douglas, and this is the civilian director, Dr. Thomas Cafferty. Please sit down. This is just an informal meeting, but I trust all of you understand that nothing discussed here goes beyond this room."

After they spent a few minutes setting up and getting comfortable, the round conference table looked decidedly smaller with six people occupying it with various folders, laptops, and accessories. Marlena couldn't remember the last time she'd attended a real conference that had to do with her job. Most of her debriefing was quietly done, on a one-on-one basis. She was an outside contractor, an ent.i.ty that usually meant the fullest possible secrecy. Her role as any agency's shadow a.s.set was too useful to allow group conferences. T. must trust the admiral's outfit a great deal more than she had realized.

"We've been working at cross purposes," Admiral Madison began, looking each of them in the eye. "That's why I thought it necessary to call a meeting between us to clear things up. Tess, I didn't know you were involved or I would have contacted you right at the beginning. Then we would have fewer complications."

Tess shook her head. "You know how government agencies are, Jack. Different agendas and no communication. In a way that's good because of our CIA problem right now, but it can become challenging trying to figure out who is doing what, especially in the rare instances such as this one, when we b.u.mp into each other."

"Well, this is a rather big b.u.mp, isn't it?"