Yup. Way too long since I’ve been laid…

“That’s not true, Delilah. You’re gonna see him again,” he told her, his blue eyes flashing fiercely, as if the sheer force of his will alone could make her believe his words. And honestly, looking at him stoically sitting there while Steady shoved a two-inch needle filled with some sort of numbing solution into his other side, she had to admit, it kind of, sort of, maybe worked. Because if anyone could find her uncle, it was Mac. The former all-star FBI agent with a backbone of iron and a mind like a steel trap.

Then, of course, there were all the rest of the Knights…

Sucking in a deep, bracing breath, she glanced around the conference room. Ozzie, Becky, and Zoelner were seated at the computer bank, typing furiously, scouring phone records and military archives for any clue that might lead them to her uncle and this Charlie guy. They were also combing through city surveillance footage for a glimpse of Mr. Timberlands. And, Jesus, how in the world was she ever going to pay them back for this?

How in the world was she ever going to pay Mac back for this?

He’d been the one to set the others on their tasks, and he’d done it all with the calm authority of a man who’d been down this road countless times before, a man who had the situation well in hand.

She wasn’t used to having to depend on anyone for anything. But she was glad she could depend on the Knights and, more precisely, Mac, for this. And since she didn’t know how she was ever going to pay him back, she reached beneath the table to squeeze his knee and gave him the one thing she could…

Leaning forward, she went to place a soft kiss of thanks, a friendly kiss of thanks, on his whiskered cheek—holy hormones he smelled good—but at the last second, he turned his head and her lips landed directly atop his.

Sweet sonofa—This was a mistake. Not what she’d planned at all. But even so, she didn’t want to pull back. Mostly because she’d been waiting years to find an excuse to get her lips on Mac, and now that she had one, she wanted to milk the moment for all it was worth. And also because, right then, his mouth softened. Just a little. Just enough to allow his hot breath to whisper across her lips.

And that fire he’d started low in her belly? It exploded into an inferno. And that ache between her legs? It shot up into her center, making her womb pulse. For a split second, she considered opening her mouth to him. But before she could work through all the ramifications of that action, he gently pulled back. And the look on his face when she opened her eyes? It wasn’t…well, to put it quite honestly, it wasn’t what she expected.

When it came to her, Mac’s expressions usually fell into three categories. One was simple dismissal. His patented I don’t have the desire or inclination to give you the time of day look. Another was flat-out disapproval. The one that said why do you have to be so loud, so bossy, so brash? And his last go-to expression was what she liked to call his Mask of Inscrutability. The facial equivalent of a blank page.

But to her utter astonishment, he wore none of those tried-and-true looks. Huh-uh. In fact, if memory served—and that was taking a giant leap, since it’d been four long years since she’d allowed a man to seduce her—that particular gleam in his eye was the guy equivalent of twenty minutes of foreplay. Instantly her nipples furled, her womb contracted for the second time, and her heart raced until her blood we all fizzy, like a lime dropped in tonic water.

But then it was gone. Just like that—finger-snap—and she was left to wonder if she’d really seen anything unusual at all. Perhaps the fear and fatigue, not to mention the crack to the cranium she’d received, were causing her to imagine things.

“I just—” Her voice sounded like she’d been swallowing broken beer bottles. “I just wanted to th-thank you for…everything.”

He shook his head, causing a dark lock to fall over his brow, his expression now firmly entrenched in the Mask of Inscrutability category. “Darlin’,” he said in that deep, smoky voice of his, “no thanks are needed. Helpin’ out in times of trouble is what friends are for.”

What friends are for…

“A-are we friends, Mac?” she ventured, her mouth so dry she was almost tempted to take another sip of the goop that passed as coffee.

“Of course we’re friends, darlin’,” he drawled again.

“Lovin’! Touchin’! Squeeezin’!” Ozzie belted out in a surprisingly clear tenor, instantly breaking whatever spell she’d been under, severing the tie that had held their gazes locked together.

“Goddamnit, Ozzie!” Zoelner yelled. “If you don’t turn off that Journey shit in two seconds I’m going to lose my mind.”

“No way, man,” Ozzie retorted, never taking his eyes from his computer screen and never breaking the rhythm of his fingers dancing across the keyboard at lightning speed. “Steve Perry sings from the heart and the hair. You’d do well to appreciate that.”

“I’ll give you something to appreciate,” Zoelner shot back. “How about my boot up your ass? I can’t think straight with that crap on and you wailing like a goat being groomed with a cheese grater.”

“First of all,” Ozzie said, “I’ve been told I have a lovely singing voice.”

“You can’t believe the compliments your mother gives you,” Zoelner countered.

“And secondly,” Ozzie continued as if Zoelner hadn’t spoken, “you need to think straight to run a simple scan of military archives? Pssht! And they try to make us believe that all you government spooks are the cream of the crop. What a crock of—”

“Okay, boys,” Becky interjected, yanking a purple Dum Dum from her mouth. “Put away the rulers and button up your flies, because I’m finding jack shit on the city surveillance cams. We’ve run into a brick wall with the mystery man in Timberlands. The scoreboard says we’re down by one, so we don’t have time to sit around while you two figure out whose giggle-stick is the biggest.”

Giggle-stick? Delilah felt her lips twitch.

Then, “Sweet lord of the rings!” Ozzie whooped, shooting a fist in the air. “Un-bunch those panties, Becky my dear, because now we’re cooking with gas!” He shoved a finger at his computer screen.

Becky slid her rolling chair next to his—one loose wheel clattered against the hard concrete floor—and leaned in close to his monitor. Turning, Becky pinned Delilah with an excited stare. “Does the name Charles Sander ring a bell?”

* * *

Delilah trembled at Becky’s question, and Mac instinctively squeezed her tighter to his side. Then he was reminded that, sure as shit, touching her was like taking a hit of crack—and let’s not even get into what the feel of her soft, warm lips or her hot, moist breath was like. Because holy shit fire! That innocent little kiss? He didn’t know it was possible to get so hard so fast. And all of this, all the touching and the friendly kissing was getting out of hand, making him forget himself.

Get it together, asshole.

And, yessir. That was a sage bit of advice if ever there was some. Time to take it. Like, now.

He jerked his arm out from around her back so quickly that Steady whacked him upside the head. “Be still, chorra. Or else it’ll look Dr. Frankenstein himself took a needle and thread to you.”

Okay, so that was one seriously unsmooth move, you stupid, horny dillhole, Mac chided himself while simultaneously rubbing his sore head and lifting a warning brow at Steady who, like always, chose to ignore the killing gleam in his eye.

Luckily, when he turned back, it was to find Delilah hadn’t noticed his total douche-canoe maneuver. Her gorgeous green eyes were glued to Becky like the blonde was made of cane molasses.

“Charlie Sander. I—I don’t remember if that’s him or not,” she said, her breathy voice unusually hoarse, as if she’d swallowed all the gravel on the old ranch road that led to his boyhood home.

Christ…that sound just…well, it just got to him. He was tempted once more to place a comforting arm around her shoulders. After all, she was so incredibly soft. So amazingly warm. So…so much woman—and, yeah, sick, twisted, shitheel that he was, he was referring to her boobs. Her lush, delicious, overly abundant boobs. And having her in his arms just now, and earlier, out in the courtyard, had felt…something. Something a far cry closer to right than he in any way, shape, or form wanted to admit.

Are you really stupid enough to let history repeat itself?

The question was either posed by the universe or his own subconscious. Of course, where the query originated didn’t amount to a hill of beans, because either way, the answer was the same.

No. No, he was not stupid enough to let history repeat itself. Because the truth was, no matter how good or how right she felt in his arms, That Woman was nothing but walking trouble and heartache.

He’d learned that the hard way…

Boy, howdy, had he ever. Barely a week went by when he wasn’t reminded of the pain Jolene’s leaving had caused. Barely a month passed when he wasn’t wrenched from his sleep by the nightmare of her betrayal and what it had cost him. And sometimes, when he was all alone, he could still hear the sound of a strangled voice calling her name in the darkness.

“We haven’t been able to access your uncle’s text messages,” Becky said. “But we have been able to access his call log and Sander’s number is the only one with a southern Illinois prefix. Plus Charlie is a nickname for Charles, and—”

“Well, that’s—” Delilah shook her head a little frantically. Her slim, pale throat—a throat Mac didn’t want to touch and kiss and lick; liar, liar, pants all the freakin’ way on fire!—worked over a hard swallow. “That’s got to be him, right?”

Her excited tone hit Mac in his soft, gooey center. And, yes, he had a soft, gooey center. Because even though he may be determined not to let history repeat itself, not to let himself get caught up in her sticky web of seduction, that didn’t mean he wanted to see her enthusiasm ground to dust either. Fortunately—thank you sweet baby Jesus—Zoelner saved him from the unenviable task of having to be the one to douse that spark in her eye. “Don’t get too excited,” the ex-spook said. “This could be the guy we’re searching for, or it could just be coincidence. We still need to run his name through military records to see if he was a Marine.”

“Yeah.” Delilah nodded again. “Okay.” Mac could tell she was trying hard, and failing miserably, to temper her enthusiasm.

“Then, if he was a Marine, we can start looking for his last known address,” Zoelner added.

“Sounds good.” Delilah licked her lips. The dart of her pink tongue made Mac’s—

“Ow! Goddamnit!” he hissed. “Lord have mercy, Steady,” he groused, frowning up at the man. “Are you usin’ a seven-gauge needle to stitch me up, or what?”

“Oh, pipe down, you big baby,” Steady replied. “I gave you a local. And besides, this is just a little stab wound. People get stab wounds all the time.”

Mac turned to Delilah, one corner of his mouth quirked, his expression all about the I told you so. But he was thwarted from speaking the words aloud when Zoelner yelled, “Bingo!”

“What’ve you got?” Boss strolled into the conference area from his office, then immediately ordered, “Good God, Ozzie! Turn that shit off!”

“What?” Ozzie lifted his hands, blinking innocently. “I’m kicking mad flava in your ears. I’d think you would all thank me for it.”

“I’ll thank you by way of a boot up your ass,” Boss growled, throwing an arm around Becky’s shoulders when she came to stand beside him, bending to smack a quick kiss beside the lollipop stick protruding from her lips.

“What is with everybody wanting to put their boots up my ass?” Ozzie asked the room. “I know it’s a particularly cute ass, but—”

“Ozzie!” a chorus of voices, including Mac’s, yelled at once.

“Sheesh!” The guy held up his hands and Mac noticed his T-shirt was printed with the Starfleet logo and the words: Are you out of your Vulcan mind? “Tough crowd tonight,” he grumbled, twisting to switch off the music. Boss shook his head before pinning Zoelner with a no-nonsense stare. “What’ve you got, Z?”