It caused Castle actual physical pain to pull away from Kit’s embrace, and that was the problem. He’d tried chalking up his affection for her to a little bit of pity and a whole lot of lust. Most times, he wondered if he simply reveled in being a savior. They were contributing factors to the hold she had on him, but now he knew this growing attachment was something much stronger.
“What I feel for you will make my job harder, the mission messy.”
Being with her had shifted his perspective, but game changers were always bad news.
“Do you regret it?” she asked. “Sleeping with me?”
“It wasn’t smart. I gave in to weakness.”
“That’s not a no.” She winced, the look cutting right through him, and bowed her head. “It was just sex, Castle.” Her voice broke. “Let’s not make it a big deal by talking about it anymore. Okay?”
“No, it’s not okay.” It was a big deal, and he wasn’t going to dismiss it and pretend. That wasn’t him. “Because it wasn’t just sex and I don’t regret it. What happened was inevitable.”
After the navy, sex had become a ritual of riding the buzz from a Gray Box mission. He’d been more connected to the thrill of beating death than to the woman. He’d convinced himself he was better suited alone and never opened up, never shared, never got close.
Everything before Kit had been superficial. She roused him on a soul-deep level, awakening something in him that he’d thought had grown cold forever. Touching her was like being drenched in sunlight. He was a sponge that needed to soak up every damn drop of warmth.
But with Kit, so much was at risk.
“I have a lot to lose by handing over a copy instead of the original hard drives. By protecting you, trusting you, sleeping with you,” he said.
She looked up at him, her liquid brown eyes filled with sadness. “I’m a full handbasket of trouble for you. Aren’t I?”
Unable to deny it, he blew out a heavy breath. If the only way he could have Kit, even for a little while, meant headaches and pain-in-the-ass trouble, then he’d take it.
“Did you tell your boss how many hard drives there are?” she asked.
“No.” Castle was straddling a dangerous line.
“What if you handed over two of the three? The only thing I need to protect is Ever Shield. I can copy everything else from the third drive onto one of the others.”
“The files are time-stamped. Willow will know they’re copies as soon as she sees them.”
“I may lack the talent of most hackers I know, but I’m not totally useless. I can alter time stamps. You can turn over original hard drives containing all the pertinent information.”
She flashed a little smile as she slid her hand along his thigh. His cock jumped in response, but seeing the desire rekindling in her eyes made his heart flip over.
Castle caressed her cheek, drawing her close. The memory of being buried deep inside her rolled through him. Hot, hungry sex that had ended explosively.
Holding Kit afterward had been the best part. It was the first time that, instead of being lonely with a woman, eager to get away from her, he’d felt right at home.
“This is ethically murky territory,” he said and that was putting it mildly.
“This is a compromise. You give Sanborn original hard drives and the information your team needs to stop Bravo. I keep Ever Shield.”
“Why would you give up the hard drives?”
“What can I say?” She shrugged. “You entice me to yield. You’re doing this for me. To protect me. I don’t want you to lose anything because of it. And the thought of you not touching me again because you resent me hurts too much.”
The sincerity in her voice caught him by the jugular and that beautiful, unguarded look on her face made him ache. He was torn.
He had spent half his life blocking out his emotions for his job, only to have the job rob him of his humanity. Now he’d found Kit. She was a storm tearing through him, a white squall drowning him in feelings, but he hadn’t completely lost his mind.
“One more thing,” he said. She stiffened in his arms and he stroked her back, not wanting her to get defensive. “Ever Shield. It’s dangerous. A serious risk to national security.”
“If I give the government Ever Shield, can you guarantee it won’t be used as a weapon against other countries?”
On the contrary, he’d bet his left nut that it would. “No.”
“Ever Shield is the Outliers’ legacy, the greatest thing Marty, Tim, Jeff, and Lincoln created. The point was for citizens to be able to protect themselves. Like the right to bear arms but for privacy and from a virtual perspective. Granted, it became bigger and more powerful than I imagined, but they’d never want it weaponized by the government. You told me to honor their memory with my actions.” She pressed a palm to his cheek and her forehead to his. “This is how I honor them.”
She was twisting the meaning of his words into something he hadn’t intended.
“Kit—”
“Your boss will use it as evidence to send me to prison.”
Taken aback, he gathered his thoughts. “I don’t think he’d do that.”
“Think? I admitted to being Steve Jobs. The only reason Ever Shield exists is because I came up with the idea, and I brought together the talent capable of making it possible. I’m supposed to hand over proof it exists. Can you assure me your boss won’t think I’m an even bigger threat once he sees it?”
Sanborn already considered her a menace to national security. Giving him Ever Shield, seeing it tested for its destructive potential, might only amplify his boss’s concerns rather than allay them.
Misguided talent could be rehabilitated and redirected. Persuaded into putting their skills to work for the NSA, CIA, the Gray Box. Masterminds whose sole motivation was to thwart the government in the name of privacy and civil liberties only pissed people like Sanborn off. Incarceration would be an easier, preferable fix. Otherwise, what was to stop Kit from becoming a Snowden if she worked for them or forming a new band of hacker rebels to produce something worse if they let her go?
Turning Ever Shield over to his boss wasn’t an option if it meant Kit might see the inside of a supermax cell. Castle wasn’t going to let that happen.
“I won’t give the government Ever Shield,” she said.
He couldn’t resist that gutsy determination packed in a lovely stick of dynamite.
Except something was bound to be blown to smithereens.
“That doesn’t change the threat it poses,” he said, holding her gaze, needing her to understand. “Help me make sure it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.”
She took a deep breath. “How?”
“I don’t know what the long-term answer is, but for now, we can open a safety deposit box in both our names that requires two keys and dual authorization for access. Store it until we find a better solution. I’m with you until the end, no matter what. But I need you to agree to this compromise.” His voice was unyielding because on this, he wouldn’t bend. “For me.”
Kit mulled it over a moment and nodded. “For you.”
She brushed her lips against his and took his hand, guiding it to her breast, and then lower between her thighs, where he instinctively slid two fingers into her wet heat.
He bit back a groan as she rocked on his hand. “I only had one condom in my wallet.”
A naughty smile graced her face, setting him alight. “I guess that’s the perfect excuse to make you come with my mouth.”
Ditto. He wanted to drop to his knees, throw her legs over his shoulders and make her cry his name as she came against his tongue.
Kit brushed her lips against his, their breath mingling. He couldn’t stop kissing her, couldn’t stop enjoying the slick softness between her thighs. His blood churned with need.
Castle always followed the rules. He relied on protocol and orders. Now, for her, again, he was violating all that he’d once held as sacrosanct. It was starting to become a habit.
He could do his duty to the Gray Box, protect Kit, and have her as well. Couldn’t he?
She lowered her head. Licked his stomach as she squeezed his erection, her silky hair brushing his thighs. She stroked his aching shaft from root to tip, rubbing her soft breasts against his thigh, then took him into her hot mouth and hummed. Stars burst behind his eyes and he was certain.
This wasn’t a zero-sum game.
No one had to lose to win.