Worth Fighting For: A Warrior Fight Club/Big Sky Novella (Kristen Proby Crossover Collection Book 4)

by Laura Kaye

  “Christ, I’m coming,” Jesse groaned as his dick jerked inside her, hands tight on both of her hips, his whole body shuddering when his weight fell against her back.

  Harsh panting breaths were the only sounds in the room.

  Jesse exhaled heavily, and the rush of it ghosted across her neck. His hand went to where he was softening inside her, and Tara was already regretting what she knew was going to be the torturous emptiness that his withdrawal was going to leave behind.

  “Let me get rid of this,” he whispered, pressing a kiss against the scarred side of her throat.

  “If you let go of me, I’m going to fall,” she said, half teasing but also pretty sure it was true.

  “Fuck if my motor skills are much better right now,” he said, humor plain in his voice. He did withdraw then, though he kept one hand around her waist. “You okay?”

  Still leaning against the wall, Tara smiled despite the shocking emptiness. “You mean except for the fact that you made my bones melt?”

  He turned her, making her realize that her jeans still hung around her thighs—and so did his. “Please, go on.”

  Chuckling, Tara smacked the back of her hand against the deliciously hard plane of his abs. “Shut up.”

  Grinning, he kissed her. The sexy jerk. Then he tugged up his Levi’s and crossed the room, giving her a chance to really admire the way all that ink moved over his shoulder and arm before he disappeared into what she guessed was the bathroom.

  Tara fixed her own jeans and hugged her sweater to her chest as she wandered deeper into the suite. A small kitchenette and sitting room occupied the space right next to the door, with the bed taking up the far side of the room. In the wake of the mind-numbingly good sex, her thinking brain was starting to come back online now, which made her wonder what was next. If anything. They’d teased about that only being the first round, but that was when lust had hijacked both of their bodies.

  “There are some drinks in the fridge. Help yourself,” Jesse called out from the other room.

  “Thanks,” she said, pulling the sweater back over her head. She grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and took a long sip.

  Strong arms wrapped around her waist from behind, and Jesse settled his chin on her head. Surprise at the affectionate embrace whipped through her belly, which was maybe silly given everything else they’d shared tonight. “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey.” She held her water bottle up to him. Why did it feel intimate when he accepted? A gut check told her why—because she didn’t have this with anyone else in her life. She had friends, sure. Guy friends, too. But this kind of quiet intimacy? Or the intense physical intimacy from minutes before? No. Not in a long time. Hell, maybe never.

  And since she’d only been in DC for the last year, none of those friends had yet become the kinds of BFFs with whom you shared absolutely everything.

  So this felt different. Special. Kinda scary, but that was the thing about nearly dying—it made you willing to try, to reach, to take a chance. Well, at least outside of her work. Given what it’d taken her to get back in the water, that was one place where she played things safe. But this wasn’t that.

  When he gave her the nearly empty bottle, she turned in his arms, needing to see the cast of his eyes and the expression on his face. She didn’t know Jesse well enough to read his quiet, so she needed these other cues. There was still an intensity in the way his dark gaze took her in, but his expression was all sated ease. She didn’t think she was overstaying her welcome, but what was the point in wondering? “So, should I…go?”

  He frowned. “Only if you want to, but I’m perfectly happy with you right where you are.”

  Smiling, Tara nodded. “Okay.”

  “There’s something I’m not happy about though.”

  “Uh, and that is?” She finished the last of the water.

  “You put your shirt on.”

  Tara smirked. “I figured if it was going to get awkward, it would be better if I was prepared to make a fast exit.”

  Jesse arched a brow. “Did it get awkward?”

  She chuckled. “Not yet.”

  He slipped the bottle from her hand and tossed it into the recycling can, and the next thing she knew he’d bent and put her over his shoulder.

  Tara burst out in an incredulous laugh, her hands grasping the hard, flexing muscles down his sides. “What are you doing?”

  “Making it clear I want you to stay.” He tossed her on the bed, making her laugh again as she bounced on the mattress and he climbed in until he was on hands and knees above her.

  Whose life was she even living right now? A hot man had flirted with her, called her pretty, expressed interest in spending time with her, kissed her, fucked her senseless, and wanted to make sure she knew he was in no hurry for her to go. “Now I’m peeved,” she said, forcing her lips into a playful pout.

  His eyes narrowed. “Why’s that?”

  Having him above her was all kinds of distracting. And hot. How could she be hot again after the orgasm he’d just wrung out of her? “Because I didn’t have time to grab your butt before you threw me on the bed.”

  Snickering, he grabbed her hand and put it on his ass. “That’s a problem I can solve.”

  Grinning, Tara squeezed. “Mmm. Very nice.”

  He chuckled. “Literally grab any part of me you want. Consider it a standing invitation.”

  “I’ll remember that.”

  Jesse lowered his weight on top of her, his big body settling into the cradle of her thighs, and geez it felt good. And then his expression went more serious. “I don’t know what’s happening here, Tara. I just know I like it.”

  “I feel all of that, too,” she said, glad she wasn’t in this…whatever it was…alone. And man did she appreciate him saying what he felt. If she had to guess, he was a few years older than her almost thirty-two. So maybe he’d reached a point in his life where he didn’t see the sense in beating around the bush, either. Whatever explained his forthrightness, she liked it.

  He lowered his face to hers and kissed her. Once, twice. Slow and lingering. Taking his time. Which made her remember what he’d said earlier.

  “Fuck, I’m torn between hot and fast or spreading you out and taking my damn time.”

  A thrill whipped through her belly.

  This time when he kissed her, his tongue swept into her mouth, exploring her, stroking her, tasting her. His hands went to her hair, but it was pinned under her back. “Hold on,” she said, chuckling as she tugged the long length of it out and twisted it so it lay in a soft rope to her side. Belatedly, she realized that she’d pulled it to the unmarred side of her throat, leaving him a clear, close view of both of her scars.

  She thought he was going to ask what’d happened, but then his gaze lifted to hers. And there was something there, some emotion that she didn’t know him well enough to name. “Jesus, what if I’d never walked into Murphy’s?”

  The soft exclamation reached inside her chest and played with things that hadn’t been played with in so, so long. “What if you’d thought I was crazy when I’d offered to share my nachos?”

  He nodded. “What if you hadn’t agreed to take a walk with me?”

  “It would’ve been a tragedy,” she said, injecting humor into the affection wrapping around her. Because affection for a man wasn’t something she was used to feeling. Not in a long time.

  He tugged at the side of her sweater. “You covered up again is a tragedy.”

  That had her grinning again. She arched her back and worked it over her head with his help. “There. That’s a problem I can solve.”

  “Much better,” he said, dipping his head to kiss and lick one of her nipples. Against her thigh, his erection grew.

  Tara arched into his mouth and surrendered to him exploring her. “Is this Option B?”

  He lifted his gaze to look up her body, and if she’d thought him gorgeous before, it was nothing to seeing him with arousal darkening his gaze and highl
ighting the harsh angles of his face. “Option B?”

  Her hand went to his face, her fingers tracing his high cheek bone. Jesse turned his mouth into her touch, surprising her by licking her fingers and sucking two into his mouth. She gasped. “Yeah, um, spreading me out and taking your time.”

  The dark brown of his gaze absolutely blazed. “This is exactly fucking that.” He flicked at her nipple with his tongue. “Any objections?”

  The way he kept checking in with her made it even easier to agree. Tara shook her head, silent this time because she really had no words for what he was doing to her, for how he was overwhelming her. In all the best ways.

  “Good. Get comfortable. Because I’m going to be a while.”

  Chapter 4

  Jesse moved down Tara’s body, intent on finally being able to put his mouth on her everywhere he’d been wanting. So after he took off her jeans and panties for the second time tonight, he got himself good and comfortable between her legs, forcing her with his shoulders to open wider. Then he kissed her thigh. And again. Then higher. Until he was licking her clit and sucking it into his mouth.

  Tara’s hands fisted in the comforter. The moan that spilled out of her went directly to his dick and had him licking her harder, sucking at her repeatedly, plunging his tongue deep. She tasted sweet and smelled like the two of them, and it was a heady fucking combination.

  Peering up her body, he caught her staring down at him with hooded eyes, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip. “Fuck, you’re gorgeous,” he said.

  Her eyes flared as if he’d caught her off guard. It made him wonder if he should back off of giving voice to the shit that popped into his head, except that she seemed to be all about cutting to the chase, too. And then she wiped his concern away. “You are, too.”

  Jesse slid his hand between her legs, stroking her with his fingers as she thrust into his touch.

  “Please,” she pleaded, the wet evidence of her need driving him wild.

  But he wasn’t hurrying this. “Taking my time, Tara. Remember?”

  “Oh, God,” she whimpered as he stroked through her arousal and sank one finger deep into her heat. And then he put his mouth back on her, because little had made him feel better in years than the way her body was shaking under his touch.

  She’d said earlier that she feared she’d think this was all a dream come tomorrow, and Jesse was determined to make sure that didn’t happen. He wanted to leave her muscles weak, her skin marked, her body absolutely spent from the pleasure she received at his hands. With his mouth. From his cock.

  After this night, he wanted Tara to want to come back for more. Because he already knew, as fantastic as all this was, one taste, one time wasn’t going to be enough. Not for him. Not when she looked at him with eyes so full of possibility, with none of the usual disappointment he was used to reading when people looked his way. Not when her moans and her screams and, hell, even her laughter told him that tonight at least, he was good enough.

  For once in his damn life.

  At thirty-seven, he’d had his share of women. But nothing serious. Never anything serious. For twenty years—from the second he’d graduated high school, left small-town Montana, and never looked back—he’d prioritized the military. After all, the career had cost him his family, so it sure as hell seemed like he should make it his priority. And then there was his work as a navy diver and EOD tech. Nothing had ever demanded Jesse’s 24/7 focus like keeping his people safe in a job in which they were all one hand tremor away from dying in an explosion of pink mist. Which so many of them had.

  So damn many.

  Tara’s hands went to Jesse’s hair, forcing him out of his head, away from thoughts he didn’t want to be having.

  He went at her more hungrily, liking that she’d been able to chase the shit of his memories away. Liking being distracted. Being desired. Being touched. It drove him on. Made him flick and circle and suck her clit until she was squeezing his shoulders with her thighs and scratching his scalp with blunt fingernails. He added a second finger and fucked her as he sucked, his cock demanding friction he wasn’t going to give it yet.

  “God, Jesse, don’t stop.”

  He spoke against where she was hot and wet. “Never. Not when I wanted you from the second you looked at me.” The moment his mouth returned to her clit, her core went tight around his fingers.

  “Oh, fu—” Her breath cut off as her whole body arched and her muscles pulsed where he was inside her. He licked her through the orgasm, his mouth moving on her clit until she cried out and grasped his face in her hands, forcing him to let up. “G-gonna kill me.”

  He grinned at her, then slowly crawled up her body, loving the way she looked at him—the way her eyes on his body made him feel. Strong and worthy. He settled in along the side of her, his hand lazily stroking over her belly.

  Tara pushed up and kissed him full on the mouth. How something could feel grateful and possessive all at once, Jesse didn’t know. But fuck if that wasn’t exactly how it felt as her hand cupped his jaw, her mouth opened wide over his, and her tongue licked at his again and again. “You taste like me,” she whispered.

  Jesse groaned and pushed his hips into her thigh, an instinctive movement full of need that reminded him how fucking hard he still was. And then her hand grasped him through his jeans. She squeezed and stroked until he couldn’t help but grind into her touch.

  “My turn.” She gave his shoulder a good shove, forcing him onto his back. Then she was undoing his jeans and stripping him bare. On her knees between his legs, she swept her hair all to one side then took his cock in hand.

  Jesse wanted to watch, but the tightness of her grip moving over him had his head falling back against the bed and just giving in to the pure fucking decadence of it. Her hair spilling against his hip was all the warning he had before her mouth closed around his head and her tongue bathed over his length.

  “Jesus, Tara,” he rasped, bracing one arm under his head so he could watch. “Feels so good.”

  Those blue eyes flashed up at him at the same time that she sucked him deep, deeper. Her eyelids fell shut as she took him into her throat and held him there.

  Jesse’s hands flew to her hair, and he nearly hollered at the gut punch of pleasure. It was all he could do not to thrust his hips, especially when she began to move in a way that made his cock fuck even deeper into her throat. Just small, quick ups and downs that shoved him so hard toward orgasm that he wasn’t sure how he held back.

  “Christ, baby, I don’t want to come yet,” he said, his voice a raw scrape.

  Slowly, she withdrew until her tongue just flicked at his tip. “I don’t see a problem with that.”

  “C’mere.” He looked his fill of her body moving over his, and then he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. “I want to be in you first.”

  She nodded, her face soft with arousal and something sweet that looked like affection. Or maybe that was him projecting his own messed-up state of mind. But then she looked away as she reached over to where his jeans were discarded on the edge of the bed. “Do you have another condom?”

  “Fuck. No,” he said. “Fuck.”

  She smiled and kissed his jaw, once, twice. “I’m happy to finish you with my mouth.”

  He tucked a long wave of hair behind her ear, and then rolled them until they lay side by side, one of his arms under her head, their legs tangled. “I want to hold you right here,” he said, taking himself in hand. “So I can feel you against me when I get off.”

  Tara’s gaze cut to where he was stroking himself between them, his fist bumping against her belly on the upstroke. Her bottom lip caught on her teeth before her tongue stroked over her lip, leaving a glossy streak. “God, that looks hot.”

  “Yeah?”

  She squeezed her legs together, and the idea that he was arousing her again lanced white heat through his blood. “I could help.” Her fingertips stroked at his balls, then she cupped him in a gentle squeeze.
r />   “Can’t make this last,” he rasped.

  “Don’t try to,” she said, tugging at his sack until he was clenching his teeth at the goodness of it all.

  He tightened his grip and stroked himself faster. “Tara.” Her name came out as a plea.

  “Want to feel you on my skin.” With that invitation on her tongue, she kissed him until he couldn’t breathe and couldn’t care.

  And couldn’t hold back. He groaned into the kiss as his cock jerked in his hand, and his cum lashed heat across his fingers and her belly. His heart a fucking freight train in his chest, he lay there completely obliterated.

  “We should…probably clean up,” he finally managed.

  Tara curled into his side, and he hauled her in tighter with an arm around her shoulders. “I don’t think I could move right now if I tried.”

  “Can barely talk,” he said.

  She chuckled, and her breath puffed against his chest. “Okay if I stay for a while?”

  Stay as long as you want.

  That was his gut-check of an internal reaction. Not that he voiced it. “O’course.”

  “Good.” She heaved a deep breath and slid her knee up across his thighs.

  It made him feel claimed. Like he belonged to her. Dangerous fucking feelings when neither thing was true. When he was claimed by no one and belonged nowhere. Not anymore.

  All of which probably should’ve had him ushering her out of his bed. But no one had ever accused Jesse Anderson of making good choices. So he pulled Tara in tighter. And promised himself he wasn’t going to fuck up or let anyone down.

  Not this time.

  * * * *

  Tara had no idea where she was.

  Or who she was with.

  She lifted her head and looked up the hard masculine body on which she lay. Jesse. His hotel room. The single best night of sex of her life.

  Oh. Oh, right.

  She eased off the bed, but Jesse didn’t move a muscle. And God he was gorgeous. Between his cock lying soft against his belly, the ink all down his arm, and the miles of lean muscle, his nudity was downright decadent. She could stand here all freaking night and never get bored taking in each new detail.