His to Take (Wicked Lovers #9)(33)
Author: Shayla Black

In the face of her furious hurt, remorse smacked him again. He probably could have handled her more gently. What could be kinder than barking questions, digging through her memories, and shoving pictures at her until you ripped apart her identity, dumbass?

Joaquin dragged in a deep breath. “I wasn’t able to get a lot of information about your identity before I took you. Since then, I’ve been trying to fill in the blanks. Some of the info is coming faster than other bits, so I don’t have a complete picture yet. I’ve got a few people working on it.”

“But you think they were FBI agents?”

“That’s my best guess.”

“Tell me what you know,” she demanded through clenched teeth.

He understood the anger. It was bolstering her, and without it she feared falling apart. “They obviously raised you and kept you safe. I’m sure that was their number one job. Any memories of your past or hints that you remembered a life before them would need to be squelched. Not because they wanted to hurt you. Tatiana Aslanov disappearing kept you safe and gave you an opportunity to grow up normally. You probably resent the hell out of them right now, but most likely, those two agents accepted a thirteen-year assignment, knowing they might never see field action again. They had to shed their previous lives, abandon their own family. They had to become mom and dad to a stranger until you turned legal. They might not have been perfect, but they did their job. It was a shitload better than you growing up in some government detention facility.”

“I-I . . .” She gasped in an agitated breath, fighting her temper. “You’re probably right about them making sacrifices to bring me up in a safe environment. They did that well. On the other hand, they made me believe we were a family, then they allowed themselves to ‘die’ shortly after I turned eighteen. They abandoned me. And you’re defending that?”

“No.” Crap. “They may not have had a choice. I was just trying to make you see the other side of the coin. I doubt it was easy for them, either.”

“Obviously, they haven’t missed me much, since neither of them has attempted to make contact with me in about three years.”

“I’m sure they would have been prohibited from doing that.”

“Which tells me they value their jobs more than the girl they raised as their daughter. And what about you? You’re with another government agency, so you’re here to . . . what? Be my lover? Does Uncle Sam think you need to crawl between my legs in order to watch over me?”

Joaquin ground his jaw. She was hitting low, and the logical part of him understood that she was hurt, so she was lashing out at the messenger because she didn’t have anyone else. But that didn’t stop his temper from getting swept up in her cyclone of emotion. “I’m not here on anyone’s orders. In fact, I’ll probably be fired for pursuing this case because Tatiana Aslanov isn’t on my boss’s radar. When it became obvious the agency intended to do nothing, I couldn’t leave you to that horrific death. So here we are. But let me clue you in, baby girl. Uncle Sam doesn’t tell me who to fuck. I can’t fake an erection, even for the sake of God and country. That kiss we almost shared? That was me wanting you because just being in the same room with you makes me want to strip off everything you’re wearing and impale you with every inch I’ve got.”

When he eased closer to Bailey, she squared her shoulders and raised her chin. “Don’t come near me.”

That defiance made him wish again that he were a spanking kind of guy. He’d really like to melt that starch in her spine. If she wasn’t going to let him comfort her, he’d be more than happy to adjust her attitude with a good smack or ten on her ass, then follow it up with a thorough fucking. A nice handful of orgasms would do them both a world of good.

“I am so done with people lying to me,” she ground out.

That pissed him off. “You think I’m lying to you? About which part? Your parents being agents? That I’m sorry? Or that my cock is aching to fill your little pussy until you dig your nails into my back and wail out in pleasure?”

Her face turned pink. “You’re not sorry about any of this. I’m also not buying your sudden desire bullshit.”

“I will be more than happy to prove you wrong right now.” He reached for the button of his jeans. “I’m ready if you are.”

In some distant corner of his brain, Joaquin realized that combating her hurt with challenge wasn’t going over well. On the other hand, something about arguing with her while he’d been imagining her underneath him hadn’t gotten his blood just flowing, but boiling. If fucking her would, in any way, prove to her that he wasn’t lying, he was beyond down with getting busy. If she let him, he’d give it to her hard and wicked—repeatedly.