She made a soft sound of pleasure, and then challenged him. “I’m ready, Blake. The question is, are you?”

His c**k thickened with her response, and he pressed against her, inside the tightness of her sex, his hand flattening on her stomach, angling her body as he buried himself deep inside her. “Do I feel ready?”

“Just know this,” she whispered, arching into him. “Wherever you’re trying to escape to, Blake, I’m here. I’m with you.”

He stilled with her words, their content shaking him to the core. Blake buried his head in her neck. She was with him. He wanted her with him. He shouldn’t. He couldn’t. He did. He was falling for this woman, and he could almost feel her carving away at his anger and pain, could almost feel the raw, aching parts of himself being exposed. Could almost imagine Alvarez using those weaknesses to slaughter him, and everyone he cared about, including Kara. “You’re going to get us both killed.”

“I’m going to keep you alive.”

This wasn’t working. He had to get away from this woman before he couldn’t. Blake pulled out of her and turned her to face him. She instantly pressed her mouth to his, her soft, tempting tongue teasing its way past his lips, to caress and seduce. To hell with it. He stopped fighting what he was feeling, stopped denying this was more than sex with Kara, and with a low growl, he pulled her close again, sinking into the kiss, and guiding his shaft back between her legs, pushing back into the tight, warm center of her sex. He was falling in love with this woman and she was right. Denver had been the beginning of what was inescapable today.

For the first time in years, he didn’t think about who was in control. He thought about who he was with, and he saw Kara as more than a body, more than a way to suppress the flashbacks. He was lost, but not in the sensations of edgy need and pleasure. In this woman.

Blake savored Kara. He kissed her, touched her, tasted her, made love to her. Every touch of her hand was waking up a new part of him. Every brush of her hair on his skin like an electric charge. Every collision of their eyes a touch of his soul to hers. When they melted into satisfaction together, sated and exhausted, and he pulled her to his side, her head resting on his chest, he was alive again and he wasn’t sure what to do about it. How did a man, on what he knew was most likely a suicide mission, embrace life? How did he not, with Kara in that life and in his arms?

Blake stared at the ceiling, listening to Kara’s breathing slow, feeling her body relax against his into slumber, his mind racing. Kara had been hurt by Alvarez as well, and as much as he wanted to bring her sister back to her, he knew, and he knew she knew, that it was a long shot. That bitter truth only made his mission more important. This wasn’t just about vengeance, though he didn’t deny he wanted it. Too many people had died directly and indirectly because of Alvarez. It had to end. Blake had to kill him no matter what the consequence.

***

Kara woke with a gasp as the hotel door burst open, instinctively clutching the blanket to her naked body as she sat up. Heart in her throat, she blinked a new day’s sunlight—and the huge man with long dark hair now standing at the foot of the bed—into view.

“What the hell were you thinking, Blake?” the man demanded.

Beside her, Blake, undaunted by his nakedness, threw off the covers and stood up to grab his pants. “In case you didn’t notice, Royce,” he said irritably to the bigger, crankier version of himself, “I’m not alone.”

Royce, Kara thought, processing the name with relief. Blake’s brother.

Royce snorted. “When are you ever alone?”

Irritation and embarrassment prickled at Kara, and she scanned desperately for her missing clothes. “Kara,” Blake said. “He’s an ass. Ignore him. Way to be a gentleman, Royce. Thanks a f**king lot.”

“I suppose ‘thanks a f**king lot’ makes you a gentleman?”

“This wasn’t the way to announce our arrival, Royce,” another man grumbled, appearing in the doorway and clearly of the same genetics but with his hair cut to his nape. The Navy SEAL, she assumed.

Blake glowered at the newcomer, tugging his pants, sans underwear, over his hips. “How about some warning, Luke?”

The instant Blake glanced at Luke, like a predator waiting for an opening, Royce stalked forward, heading straight for Blake—and good gosh, the man really was huge. He stopped in Blake’s face, but Blake was seemingly unfazed, clearly used to Royce’s attempts at intimidation, standing toe to toe with him. “Back off, Royce,” he warned in a low, tight voice.

“Killing Alvarez isn’t going to do anything but put you behind bars or in a grave.”

Kara watched the muscles in Blake’s body bunch, his fingers curling into his palms as he leaned forward, right in his brother’s face. “And if Lauren had been killed? Would you sit back and let her murderer live the high life?”

Luke stepped beside them and shoved them apart. “Enough. This isn’t solving anything.”

If Lauren had been killed. Lauren must be Royce’s woman. Kara’s stomach knotted with realization. Blake’s woman had been killed by Alvarez.

“Enough, I said,” Luke barked again. “Not now. Not here.”

Tension curled in the air, the two men glaring at each other, and Kara knew, despite Royce’s gruff approach—perhaps because of it—that he was terrified of losing Blake. Her chest burned and her soul ached. Royce was afraid of losing his brother, like she was her sister.