“Tired already?” a deep voice said from beside her. Khaki turned to see Xander claiming the chair across from her, a bottle of beer in his hand. “I thought you’d be out there dancing all night.”
“It’s been a long day. I’m beat,” she said. “How about you? Why aren’t you out there entertaining the ladies?”
Xander set his beer down on the table. “None of them really interest me.”
Something about the way he said those words, or maybe it was the smolder in his eyes when he said them, made her body hum in a way that had nothing to do with the music. Khaki found it scary that such an offhanded comment could provoke such a powerful response in her.
She tucked her hair behind her ear and took a long swallow of her beer, hoping it would cool her off. It didn’t.
Khaki cursed whatever part of her body was responsible for the visceral reaction she had whenever she was around him. She also cursed the fact that Xander was so hard to read. One second he acted like she was nothing but a pain in the ass, the next he was heaping praise on her for a job well done. Other times, like now, her werewolf intuition told her he was feeling the same things for her that she felt for him.
She licked her lips and tilted her head to look at him. “Who does interest you then?”
Xander’s gaze never wavered from hers. “That’s a good question.”
Khaki stifled a growl of frustration at the blatant nonanswer. But it was her own fault for asking such a stupid question. What the hell did she expect him to say, that hot werewolf chicks in SWAT tactical gear did it for him? While that was a nice thought, she knew it wasn’t going to happen.
She should have dropped the whole issue and changed the subject, but Xander was still gazing at her with those molten eyes of his, making her insides do slow rolls and flips.
Khaki reached for her beer again, just to have something to distract her. But the intensity of Xander’s gaze only increased as he watched her lift the bottle to her lips and take a sip. She probably should have felt self-conscious, considering his eyes were locked on her every move. But she kind of liked him looking at her so intently.
At least he was paying attention to her now.
She took a long, satisfying swallow of beer, then gently placed the bottle back on the table, locking eyes with Xander. He didn’t look away, and neither did she.
The eye contact made the quiver in her stomach move south. She was so wrapped up in his soulful, dark eyes that she almost forgot she had a keen sense of smell until a sweetly masculine scent hit her.
She didn’t know what the scent was, but it was the same one she’d smelled at his apartment the other night. Why was it so mouthwateringly delicious? And if it was coming from him—which it was—why didn’t she smell it all the time?
Khaki squirmed slightly in her chair, trying to ease the sudden ache between her thighs. If she hadn’t been sitting in a crowded bar right now, she would have slid her hand down for a caress or two.
But since she couldn’t touch herself like she wanted to, she’d have to be satisfied with a little thigh-on-thigh action and some covert wiggling. Even that slight movement caused the most blatantly sexual scent to waft up from her aroused pussy. She might have had jeans on, but her sensitive nose picked up the uniquely feminine scent with no problem at all.
Xander’s eyes momentarily flashed yellow-gold, then darkened again. That had been a partial shift. She’d seen him and the other guys do it dozens of time at the compound. Then he lifted his head a bit, mirroring something she did herself frequently when she was trying to get a better grip on a particularly interesting scent.
That was when it hit her. Xander could smell her arousal too. And it was having an effect on him.
She realized something else. The masculine scent she’d smelled before—the one that was growing stronger by the second—was coming from below Xander’s belt. He was just as turned on as she was, and it was because of her.
Before she jumped across the table at him, Khaki slowed for a second to ask herself how sure she was of that last part. What if his body was responding to the pheromones she was putting off? Mac had said the guys would pick up on it if she kept lusting.
That didn’t quite fit. Yes, she’d gotten tingly gazing into those seriously sexy eyes of his, but those scent-laced fireworks of his had started before hers, she was certain of it. Which meant he’d gotten aroused from simply gazing into her eyes. She’d smelled the same thing at his place when he’d been teaching her to see in the dark, then again this morning during the PT session. She just hadn’t realized what it was.
The lightbulb that came on was so bright it almost hurt her eyes. Xander had been telling the truth back at her apartment. He didn’t have a problem with her being on his squad. And he definitely didn’t dislike her. Maybe he’d kept his distance because he was dealing with the same level of primitive attraction she’d been fighting. Like her, he’d been trying to put a wall between them.
Her boss was hot for her, and she was hot for him. What the hell was she going to do about it?
Thoughts of professional behavior, team chemistry, and the greater long-term good all floated through her head. And every one of those perfectly reasonable thoughts disappeared just as fast.
He wanted her as badly as she wanted him. That was all that mattered. And right then, the urge to have sex with Xander Riggs was seriously overwhelming.
* * *
Xander wanted Khaki so badly it physically hurt. Whereas before he’d hoped he could come up with a way to get her to leave the club with him, right at that moment he wanted nothing more than to tangle his fingers in that long, dark hair of hers, drag her across the table, and make love to her right there in front of everyone. Judging from the pheromones coming off her, he suspected she might just let him. But considering the rest of the team was out on the dance floor and would probably notice if he and Khaki started having sex, going somewhere more private would definitely be a better idea.
He’d started the day sure he was doomed to the painful existence of watching Khaki from afar, never getting to tell her how he felt. He was her squad leader and he couldn’t see how he could ever be anything else.
But what had happened down in those tunnels had changed all that. When the booby trap had exploded—when he’d thought he was going to lose Khaki—he stopped caring about all the reasons they couldn’t, or shouldn’t, be together. He’d known deep in his soul that his life would stop having meaning if he couldn’t be with Khaki. He normally wasn’t prone to dramatics, but he was sure he’d die if they couldn’t be together.
