“Keep your eyes closed and take a step back,” she said.

“You’re naked and wet. My eyes aren’t staying closed for long.”

“Trust me. You’ll like this.”

He couldn’t resist such a promise. Cade stepped back and inhaled sharply when one of the jets hit his sore shoulder. Then he relaxed as the hot water slowly began to work its magic. He tipped his head back, giving in. “That feels great.” He felt Brooke move around, then she stepped onto the marble bench behind him.

Her soft hands rested lightly on his shoulders. “Tell me if I do anything that hurts.”

She slid her hands down his chest, her fingertips like silk against his skin as the water beat over him. His erection swelled as her hands began to caress him in a sensual massage, soothing the muscles of his chest, arms, and back.

It felt like . . . heaven.

For several minutes, Cade did nothing except enjoy the sensation of Brooke’s hands and the pulsing water running over his body. He leaned back, his head resting against the lush curves of her br**sts. She was careful around his sore shoulder, avoiding those muscles and letting the water, steam, and ibuprofen loosen him up. But then she lowered her mouth and kissed his neck, and by then he was so sensitized from the heat, the jets, and from her massage that he groaned.

She pulled back. “Does that hurt?”

“No.” Needing more than just her hands, or a teasing kiss, he turned around and snaked his good arm around her waist. He lifted her off the marble ledge, crushing his mouth to hers. As they kissed, he slid her down his body, skin to skin, until her feet touched the ground.

She pulled back from the kiss. “I’m supposed to be doing all the work,” she reminded him breathlessly.

Cade pressed her against the shower wall, the jets pulsing against his back as his c**k pulsed against her. Unable to resist, he rubbed the tip of his shaft between her soft folds, fighting for control. “I need to be in you, Brooke.”

She looked up into his eyes, and whatever she saw made her meld her mouth to his while fumbling to turn off the water. He pushed open the shower door with his good arm, and in a tangle of towels, hands, legs, and mouths, they landed on the plush oversized rug in front of the bathtub.

Brooke reached over, opened one of the drawers in her vanity, and pulled out a condom. She ripped it open and slid it over him, then she straddled his hips and slowly eased onto him, inch by sweet, heavenly inch.

Her eyes opened and met his just at the moment when he was fully buried inside. Cade’s chest pulled tight at the intimacy of the moment, and he was filled with a sudden need for more.

He pushed up on his elbows, not giving a shit about the pain in his shoulder, and pulled her in for a kiss. He eased back to the ground, bringing her with him and holding tight, wanting to be as close as he could get as she began moving over him.

Twenty-three

ON MONDAY, CADE sat at the head of the table in a trial-prep room—a “war room” as they were called around the office—directing his team as they worked through the massive evidence database they’d put together in the Sanderson case.

The war room served a dual function: a place where the trial team could meet, since no AUSA had an office large enough to comfortably accommodate ten people; and it also served as the storage room where they would maintain the many boxes of evidence in the case.

Discovery would begin soon, and Cade wanted to make sure that they had everything in order and that all the evidence was accounted for. As such, he’d gathered the team he and Cameron had assembled: Rylann, who would cochair the case along with him; two midlevel AUSAs from the special prosecutions group; and two paralegals. Along with them were Huxley and Vaughn, as well as two other FBI agents who’d assisted them in monitoring the various recorded conversations throughout the investigation. They all sat around the table, everyone armed with either an open laptop or iPad as they worked their way through the database.

“And we’ve got all the records for wire transfers and deposits into Diamond Strategic Development’s accounts?” Cade asked Vaughn and Huxley, referring to the shell company Senator Sanderson had created to hide the funds he’d collected as bribes.

Huxley nodded. “Boxes twenty-three through twenty-eight.”

As the paralegals made notes to the database, Cade moved on to the next item. “I know we have the call index . . . speaking of which, what’s the status on the audio recordings?”

“You have all of them,” Vaughn said. “The only thing you don’t have is the video of Sanderson and Torino’s meeting at Sogna. The forensic lab has the original footage we took from the restaurant on a hard drive; they just haven’t had a chance to transfer it to a DVD. I’ll follow up with them next week if we still don’t have it.”

“They’ve had the video for four weeks. Tell them I want my copy by Friday or I’ll drive over to the FBI lab and burn it onto a DVD myself.”

“I’m pretty sure that would violate the chain of custody,” Vaughn said, never missing a chance to be a smart-ass.

“You guys worry about chain of custody?” Rylann joked. “Wow. Such sticklers.”

They continued that way for the rest of the afternoon, with everyone good-natured despite the fact that double-checking evidence logs was undoubtedly one of the most tedious parts of an AUSA’s and special agent’s job. They made it until six o’clock and finally called it a day.

Huxley pressed his forehead against the table. “That was mind-numbing.”