Just the Messenger Read Free Page A

every nerve-ending in her body humming for more, begging her to tilt her face, to look at the Adonis who’d captured her in his grip. If she did, their lips would be but an inch apart. She kept her stance.
    “I’m going to need you to dispose of him,” Gene murmured into her ear.
    His breath spiked arrows of pleasure over her skin. Until she realized what he’d just said.
    “Dispose of him?” She straightened, trying to pull herself away from her boss, who apparently had nothing to do with photography.
    “Yes,” Gene said, matter-of-factly, before tightening his grip and pulling her so that her breasts touched his burgundy tie. “Consider it a test of sorts. If you can do this, if you can fix the error you made, you’re in, and we’ll set you up for life. If you fail…well, now you know how we work.”
    Grace shuddered out of fear and out of desire. Gene’s sweet cologne was distracting her thoughts, his embrace taking the edge off his sinister words.
    “Do you mean for me to kill him?”
    Gene shook his head slightly. “If you must. The point is to make sure he keeps the government out of our business. If you can do that without death, using…other means,” Gene shifted her down against the erection straining his slacks for emphasis, “then that’s okay, too. Do what you have to do.”
    The burning length against her abdomen made her woozy with need. She gazed upon him with heavily lidded eyes, trying to formulate a reply, when he bent down, slipped his strong arm behind her neck and kissed her.
    Hard and fast, Gene conquered her lips, slanting his mouth over them and teasing them open with his tongue. He drank of her then, for a few precious seconds, before breaking contact and gently pushing her away, leaving her breathless and disheveled.
    He straightened his tie and cleared his throat.
    “You’ve got one week from today,” he said as he walked to the door and opened it. “Marco Valencia is now working at the CableNette Building on Sixth Avenue.” He turned to give her one last, searing glance. “Good luck, Gracie. I hope you make it.”
    The door shut with a foreboding crack behind him.
    * * * *
    The air had a sinister weight to it. Everything Marco saw took on an eerie tone, which blatantly opposed the sun-drenched trees and bright blue skies as he walked the perimeter of the park on his lunch break from his new job. The squirrels seemed to stare at him, ready to attack. Even the bums sleeping on the benches appeared to be enemies lying in wait. What had Graciela Merced done to him? He’d never complete his mission if his nerves remained fraught like this.
    When he’d seen the brunette again, on his first day at the new job, he hadn’t thought much of it. He’d only caught a fleeting glance of curls, a tight blue dress and white heels walking around the corner to Times Square. It could have been any woman, on a lunchtime date in the city or going to a business meeting. The next day, he saw her on one of the benches in the park, a pink wool skirt to guard against the cold, her long legs, tapering down to the soft grass, covered by the lightest sheen of nylon stockings. They’d locked eyes then, and the stormy gray irises had looked fearful for just a moment before the contact was broken and she’d gotten up, walked away, her conservative black heels clicking over the pavement. By the third day, Grace had wised up. Clad in jeans and a white sweater, her curls pushed pack into a ponytail, Grace moved quickly after him on her sneakered feet . She followed his entire lunch-hour route.
    Marco’s smile was tight. He hadn’t seen her yet today. Either she was finally getting the hang of following someone without them noticing, or she hadn’t shown up. Whichever the case, it made him nervous. The woman clearly wasn’t cut out for espionage. Marco had planned on cornering her today and making her tell him what she was doing there, but Warren Bell had forced other plans on him. Marco stayed