Excerpt: Games of Acclaim

Io watched out of the corner of her eye as he tucked her arm in his and drew her into the crowd. He commanded her attention somehow, made her want to look at him. Sinfully, wickedly, addictive to look at. The brown hair that was cut just above his collar gleamed in the light and made her fingers itch to know if it was as soft and supple as it looked. She’d bet if she ran her fingers through his hair it would cling to them, almost like a caress before it let go.

He was tall enough that she had to look up at him but not so much that she’d get a crick in her neck. Lean, defined muscle showed in the fit of his uniform.

He looked down at her, a smile in his eyes and she blushed at being caught looking. Actually blushed like a teenager. When he saw it the smile spread to his lips and grinned back. She couldn’t help it, despite the warning bells in her head telling her he was her target, not a potential lover. Looking was free, fantasies harmless. Besides, he was her target. She was too smart to get involved on any level, in any way with someone she was contracted to kill. Especially this kill, because this kill was her ticket to freedom from the guild’s ownership.

So why did that thought make her chest ache and a protest lodge in her throat?

“Is everything alright?” he asked suddenly, his attention sharpening, locking in on her.

She blinked, wrinkling her brows closer together. “What? Yes. Yes of course it is.” She produced a bright smile. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

He didn’t believe her. She could see it in the faint lift of his eyebrow.

“You had this lost look all of a sudden.”

He considered her, studying her face in a way that left her feeling exposed. He saw too much, she was suddenly sure of it. She needed to be very careful around him. “I did? I apologize. I was just thinking of my father.”

Logan frowned and stopped. Then he looked around at the people around them. His mouth firmed and he directed her over to the side of the room with the hand at the small of her back. There was a small alcove, shielded by potted palms and he backed her into it before she could protest. He stood in front of her, blocking the sight of anyone passing by and stopping her from leaving. He had her caged. Her heart slammed once against her chest. She took a deep breath, not caring if the fury gathering in her belly showed on her face or not.

He leaned in close, forcing her to lock eyes with him, leaving no way to look at anything or anyone else. “I’m an empath, Io. I don’t like lies for a lot of reasons but one is that to an empath’s senses the feel and substance of them taint the air like a pollutant. Tell me to mind my own business, tell me you aren’t going to answer. But do not lie to me.”
The last five words were spaced, separated by his intensity and her pounding heart. But his intensity made no sense. Why should he care about a little polite fiction?

“Oooh kay,” she said slowly. She put her hand on his chest and pushed, not as hard as she could but hard enough to make her point. Heat streaked up her arm like she’d touched a laser. Without any permission from her, her fingers flexed, pressed into the muscle band under his uniform and she almost groaned with the need to step closer, to press the rest of her against him and see if it was just as hot, just as hard and resilient as his chest.

She closed her eyes for just a second and opened them again. He was still watching her with that amused look in his eyes, like he knew what she was thinking. Well, hell, if he was an empath he didn’t need to know what she was thinking. What she was feeling said it all. She narrowed her eyes, biting back a snarl. “Step back.” She said it flat, infusing it with ice and command. “Now.”

He did. Which was a good thing because if he hadn’t she’d no idea what she would have done, but it would have been even more out of character than her demand he move. Trouble was her hand followed him like it was stuck to his chest with epoxy. She grit her teeth together and forced her hand to drop. Time to distract him.

“I apologize for the lie. It seemed a small, polite, social fiction since I can’t imagine my worries are all that interesting.” She didn’t add the ‘to you,’ but it hung there between them and his frown returned. She didn’t like him frowning at her, she realized. She liked even less the notion she’d caused the frown somehow.

“I don’t play very many social games,” Logan said. “I certainly am not playing any tonight.”

This time it was his ‘with you,’ that hung between them, all the louder for being unsaid. “Well that is certainly good to know. So what are you playing at?”

“The good host?”

She laughed, she couldn’t help it. He looked so innocent, all little boy caught in mischief. When he laughed too she relaxed. “Then as a good host you should be circulating, mingling with the guests, not hidden away here in the corner with me.”

He laughed again and gestured towards the room behind him. “Then shall we?”

She nodded, and stepped past him, her arm brushing against him with the same sensation of forked lightening exploding under her skin. She looked back, over her shoulder. He didn’t seem to have noticed but he was an empath. He couldn’t have missed it. Anymore than he could miss the low pooling warmth of arousal that he elicited. This man was dangerous, infinitely so. No other man had ever affected her like this, aroused her with no more than an accidental brush against his clothed body. She wasn’t sure she liked it. Well, her body liked it fine and wanted more, no questions asked. It was the part of her that never lost sight of what it took to survive that was quivering in her thong.