Bound By Temptation by Trish McCallan Page B

knew what he did for a living. As far as they were concerned, he and Tag were Naval Intelligence officers assigned with tracking down departmental theft. So far the alias had served him well.
    The only neighbor he’d gotten close to was Emma, but hell—he’d been lying to her, too, for years. She had no clue what his life was like or why a relationship with him would be so damned difficult.
    Which meant there was no reason for her to trust him to keep her safe.
    “Look, if you’re worried I can’t protect you—” A full confession hovered on his tongue, anything to blast those shadows from her face, regardless of the repercussions.
    “It’s not that.” She stirred slightly, hissed in pain, and froze again. “I’m just really sore.”
    He leaned back. Of course she was in pain. She’d barely been able to walk from the car to the condo, and that had been a good two hours earlier. Stiffness, along with muscle and joint pain, would have set in by now. He should have given her a pain killer eons ago. What the fuck had happened to his common sense?
    “Ibuprofen will help with that.” He stood up.
    “A hot bath will work even better.” She rolled her head on the couch to stare up at him.
    “Hot water will counter the effects of the ice.” He forced himself to ignore the plea on her face.
    “I don’t care.” The look of entreaty gave way to determination. “I’m not a child. I know what works for me, and I want a hot bath.”
    “You’re knees and hands are pretty skinned up,” he reminded her quietly. “Hot water is going to sting like hell and you’ll need to change the bandages.”
    Pure stubbornness flattened her gaze. “I won’t use soap, so the pain will be minimal and I don’t need bandages. They’re scrapes, not cuts. They’ll heal better with the air flow reaching them.”
    Taking a bath was a mistake. He was certain of it. After dealing with hundreds of traumatized muscles and joints, he knew the treatment protocol to reduce pain and increase mobility.
    But she wasn’t a child. And it wasn’t his call.
    “I’ll get the water going.”
    Her face relaxed and she smiled up at him. “Thank you. Steaming hot, okay?”
    She’d managed to attain a sitting position by the time he returned from drawing the bath, but from the look of frustrated pain on her face, that was as far as she’d been able to get on her own. He handed her a glass of water and two ibuprofen tablets. After she’d downed the two pills, he took the glass back, set it on the coffee table, and leaned down, slipping his hands beneath her armpits. Straightening, he carefully lifted her.
    The flowery scent that had sucker punched him in the motel bathroom, and then teased his cock to painful urgency during that slow, erotic shuffle up the walkway, drifted from her hair, attacking his lungs and brain with its aphrodisiac properties.
    His head spun. His scalp prickled. His hands started to sweat. His cock went from stand down to full salute in a nanosecond. Christ, much more of this and he’d be stiffer than her—at least in one hard to hide spot.
    Once she was steady on her feet, he eased back, keen to step away. Jesus, he needed to put some space between them. A buffer of air to curb his base instincts. He stood a better chance of keeping his impulses in check if he wasn’t rubbing against her with every step. But when he dropped his hands she swayed and shot him a panicked look.
    Son of a bitch.
    Grimly he moved back in, sliding his arm around her waist. The feminine sway to her hips hypnotized him as he led her—one waddling step at a time—around the coffee table and down the hall to his bedroom. With each brush of their thighs, heat flared, prickling up his spine and infusing it with goosebumps. When they finally made it to his bedroom, he steadfastly ignored his bed and the erotic images it conjured, as he guided her, Cuddles trailing behind them, toward the bathroom.
    The bathroom was hot, and steamy, and brimming