She knew, without a doubt, that she would regret it for the rest of her life if she didn’t explore this sexual connection between them. Tonight might be the last chance she’d have for that exploration.
Benji was safe and so was Brendan, so she’d take this night for herself and pray that her demons didn’t rise up and ruin everything . . . again.
The streets and corridors were quiet around her. The gray walls were a soothing, indistinct blur. It felt good to get out of the clinic and stretch her legs, work her heart and lungs. Not enough to tire her out but enough to limber her up. One of the tips from the articles she’d read was to get plenty of exercise. She needed to make that a priority as soon as the boys were back on track.
She ran through the other tips aimed at preventing flashbacks: methodical breathing, anchoring in the here and now, anticipating triggers, paying attention to her body’s danger signals, and the steps to self-soothing.
These were all methods she could use to derail the flashback before it had a chance to strike—before it could ruin the moment.
Because she intended to make love to Jace Mackenzie tonight.
For this night to progress the way she wanted, the way she needed, she required his help.
One of the things she’d absolutely hated following her kidnapping was how public everything was. Everyone knew about John’s murder, her kidnapping, and the rape. The media had fed on the tragedy of her life for weeks. Her parents and friends had been supportive, but they’d treated her like she was fragile, breakable, as though the kidnapping and rape defined her or had broken something inside her. The knowledge of what she’d gone through had constantly lurked in the back of their eyes or shuffled across their faces.
She couldn’t look at them, interact with them, without being reminded of what those bastards had done to her.
Mac wasn’t like that. He knew what had happened in that crappy track house. He’d seen the video. He’d seen the bruises—so she should have felt uncomfortable around him. Yet there had never been any awkwardness between them. Not even in the beginning. Maybe because he’d never treated her as though the experience defined her. He’d simply acknowledged it and moved on.
He’d never treated her like a victim either, or like she was fragile. He’d been more likely to snap at her or yell at her than treat her like she was breakable. She counted on that from him. Needed it.
She couldn’t bear the thought of the rape coming between them now, of Mac treating her differently. But to move past the nightmares she was going to need his help.
For the first time, when she reached his door she didn’t hesitate. She knew why she was there and what she was doing. There was no sense in pretending otherwise—a sentiment that echoed in the firm rap she gave his door.
When the door swung open, she found no surprise on his face. No questions. She found hunger instead, anticipation mixed with relief. He wordlessly pushed the door wider. She turned to face him as the door closed behind her but stepped back out of reach. Before things went any further, she had to explain what she needed tonight.
“I’ve been reading up on”—she hesitated—“post-traumatic stress and flashbacks.”
He cocked his head, his gaze sharpening. “Anything useful?”
“Yes, actually.” She tried for nonchalance. “You were right about the trigger. About how the flashback is prompted by your arms closing around me. Apparently it’s quite common. They even have a name for it—trauma triggers.”
Mac scanned her face and nodded slightly. “So we avoid that trigger. What else?”
He didn’t sound unnerved or worried. Rather, he sounded matter-of-fact. In control. Like it was no big deal. She relaxed, a tickle of nervous excitement racing through her.
She reached out to run her hands up his chest. His T-shirt was soft and warm on her palms. “I’m supposed to ground myself in the moment by doing a lot of . . . touching.”
“I can get behind that.” He bent his head. His voice was thick and raspy against her lips.
She shivered as he brushed a kiss across her mouth. “And you’re supposed to do a lot of touching too. Like my arms and my shoulders, my back. Lots of light touches without any holding.”
“Now that I can really get behind,” he whispered, angling his head to nibble at the soft skin behind her ears.
She quivered as his teeth scraped the sensitive flesh, lost her breath as he slowly, sensually trailed his fingers from her wrist to her shoulders.
“Like this?” he whispered, his breath moist and hot against her ear.
She burrowed in closer, until his hard chest was pressed against her tight, throbbing breasts.
“Just like that. Except . . .” She eased back from him and ran her hands down to the bottom of his shirt. She caught the hem in the curve between her thumbs and forefingers and oh so slowly pushed it up. “All the articles claim bare skin works best for grounding.”
Okay, so maybe the articles hadn’t actually said that, but bare skin certainly worked best for her grounding. Her fingernails lightly scraped his abdomen as the shirt rose. His skin twitched at her touch, and a soft hiss of need broke from him.
Quivers attacked her spine as his muscles bunched beneath her hands. She pushed his shirt up until his patience gave out and he wrenched it over his head. To have so much power over his reaction was rather exhilarating. Heat flared inside her, humming through her veins.
“Who are we to argue with the experts?” His voice sounded raspier than ever, close to hoarse. His fingers traced a casual, light-as-a-feather path down to the bottom of her shirt. “I assume the bare skin mandate is for you as well as me?”
“Absolutely.” She swallowed a groan as his hands drifted lightly up her back, taking the shirt with them.
As the sensation registered of his arms sliding up her waist and the sides of her breasts, some of the heat dampened and tension rose. He pushed her shirt up over her head, and darkness fell. The quivers stilled. Her heart began racing.
A section from one of the articles flashed through her mind.
Pay attention to your body’s danger signals.
The sudden tightening of previously fluid muscles was a danger sign; so was the diminishing heat and the panicked beat of her heart.
Ground yourself in the present.
Once her shirt was off, her sight returned. She zeroed in on Mac’s bare bronze chest. On the puckered scar from the bullet wound he’d taken in the woods after he’d rescued her from the monsters. Before the flashback had a chance to kindle, she pressed her hands against Mac’s chest, against his heart, and focused on the hard, steady thump under her palms.
Remind yourself where you are, who you are with.
“I’m with Mac. This is Mac.” Her voice was thin, shaky, the nightmare just a breath away.
“That’s it, babe. You’re with me. Mac. You’re safe. Nothing to fear here.”
Thud . . . thud . . . thud.
She concentrated furiously on the steady beat of his heart. The feel of it pumping beneath her fingers. On his heat and strength. On his hard, hot muscles. The calm, raspy rumble of his voice sank into her ears, and then her mind held the flashback at bay.
It took her a moment to realize that his hands had fallen from her sides. They were standing torso to torso, her hands on his chest, his arms loose by his hips.
“You okay?” he asked.
She looked up, afraid of what she might see on his face. In his eyes. But his face was still, his black gaze sheathed in tranquility. It was so odd how this man who’d reacted so explosively more times than she could count could face her with such absolute calm when she needed it most.
“You with me, babe?” he asked, his voice as quiet as his eyes.
Her tense muscles softened. She brushed her palms over his nipples, smiling as the muscles of his chest rippled. That earlier current of excitement sparked again, inched through her. “I really need to focus on touching. That appears to ground me the best.”
�
��By all means, touch me.” His hot breath steamed the side of her neck, kicking up a flurry of tingles and quivers. He nibbled a path to her collarbone. “I’m a big believer in going with what works.”
“Oh, this certainly works.” She was vaguely surprised by the sensual purr in her words. By the way her body was softening and heating and liquefying in all the right places. By how easily she’d turned away from the nightmare.
There was obviously something to all that grounding advice.
She ran her hands down his chest and tucked them into the waistband of his jeans. His belly twitched at the move. His crotch swelled. The heat creeping through her mushroomed, expanded, until her skin felt tight and swollen and increasingly sensitive.
“But according to the articles, you’re wearing too many clothes.” Her fingers drifted to the fastening of his jeans, to unbutton and unzip.
“Can’t have that.” His voice deepened to guttural, thickened with hunger. “How about we move this discussion to the bedroom?”
He took a step forward, the movement trapping her hands between their bodies. His fingers skimmed down her sides to lightly rest on her hips.
Another step.
His chest rubbed against her breasts. Her nipples peaked. Her breasts swelled and throbbed in time to the beat of her heart. A flash fire swept through her, pooling in a hot rush between her legs.
Another step.
His pelvis brushed her belly, a carnal dance of advance and retreat. The quicksilver tingles spread through every inch of her. Another purr broke from her, a sigh of contentment as the sexual attraction shifted to erotic need.
This was exactly what she needed. The heat. The hunger. The brush of his body against her. Each step a sensual shimmy of hard, hot muscles against her overheating skin.
Raising her head, she focused on his hungry face, on the urgent glitter in his dark eyes. Then his lips took hers, and his tongue surged into her mouth, and the heat inside her turned volcanic. By the time they reached the foot of his bed, every inch of her felt incandescent, lit from the heat boiling within.
“Babe.” His voice rasped against her lips. “Unhook your bra for me.”
It took a second for the realization to hit.
He can’t do it himself . . . not without wrapping his arms around me. He remembered my trigger, remembered what sets off the flashback. Even driven by arousal, he remembered.
Her heart swelled at the realization. He was putting her first. Her needs above his own. It couldn’t be easy to keep his hands to himself, to remember not to reach for her. But he was doing it. For her.
Her heart cracked wide open at that knowledge.
She made quick work of unhooking her bra, then shrugged her shoulders until it slid down her arms and fell to the floor. Instantly his hands moved up and filled his palms with her breasts. He leaned back slightly to give himself more room to work. She gasped and then groaned at the caress of his calloused hands on her breasts. Heat surged in places she didn’t even know existed.
When his thumbs brushed over her nipples, she shook, her knees going weak and wobbly. The throbbing in her pulse points shifted, intensified, zeroing in at the junction between her thighs.
“How’s this for grounding?” he whispered in that gruff, hoarse voice before catching the fleshy bottom of her ear and gently tugging.
“I think . . .” Her words emerged thick and sultry with a hint of a pant. “That I need to do some more grounding myself.”
As her hands dropped to the open fly of his jeans, she was vaguely aware that he was turning them, using his big body and a hand on her hip to shuffle them around.
His mouth dropped back to hers, and his tongue darted into her mouth as she slid her hand inside his jeans, into his underwear, and took his penis in hand.
“Jesus.” Tearing his mouth from hers, he arched into her hand.
“I see . . .” She tried for a sultry, teasing tone. “You like phase two of grounding.”
“Fuck.” He pressed his penis into her hand again and groaned. “If this is phase two, phase three might just kill me.”
If that wasn’t close to the sexiest thing she’d ever heard . . .
She slid her hand down the thick, smooth flesh and wrenched another groan from him.
“Babe—” He broke off to hiss. “It’s been a while for me . . . much more of this and we won’t make it to phase three.”
His voice shook beneath the slow, steady glide of her hand. She smiled against his lips, giving the rigid flesh between her fingers another firm pump.
“Ah . . . fuck,” he groaned, arching into her hand.
“I’d love to.” She punctuated her acceptance by tugging on his nipple with her teeth and simultaneously pumping the straining flesh in her hand.
He said something that was far too garbled to make out. She felt hands on the waistband of her slacks, and then the tension around her waist gave. Since she was all for getting naked as quickly as possible, she toed off her shoes and shimmied her hips and legs until the fabric pooled around her ankles and she could step out of them. Of course, getting naked didn’t just pertain to her.
Mac had way too many clothes on.
She let go of his penis in favor of grabbing his waistband and dragging his jeans and underwear down. Once the material had reached his knees, he dropped to the mattress and raised his legs, allowing her to pull off his shoes and from there his pants and underwear. Naked, he pushed himself farther back on the mattress and stretched out, his fists knotted in the blanket above his head.
“Babe,” he said thickly, wings of red climbing his cheeks. His eyes were locked on her face and glittered with black fire. “We may need to tie my wrists to the headboard. I’m having a hell of a time keeping my hands off you.”
Something whispered through her at his suggestion, a subtle return of the raw, ugly tension that heralded the arrival of the flashbacks. An image flashed through her mind . . . wrists cuffed to a headboard, only they weren’t his . . .
No.
Damn it.
No.
She focused furiously on the man below her. On his damp, close-cropped black hair, his tense face, the black fire burning in his eyes, the urgent straining of his penis. The burnished copper of his skin. He was so beautiful stretched out before her. Perfect.
Mac. This is Mac.
He was all hers. If she could find the courage to take him.
Without looking away, imprinting his image in her mind, she crawled onto the bed and over him.
This is Mac’s room. I’m safe here. Safe with Mac.
“Mac,” she said. The feel of his bare legs rubbing against hers sparked a new flurry of tingles and stoked the waning flames.
“I’ve got you, babe.” His hands left the blanket to skim up her body in a feathery caress. He cupped her breasts and squeezed them gently, then slid his right hand down her abdomen in another of those light, barely there touches. When it reached her panties, it slipped beneath the fabric and between her thighs. She spread her legs wider, giving him deeper access, encouraging him to explore.
The last traces of the flashback dissolved under his touch, at the slide of his finger as he stroked her clit. She froze above him and breathed deeply, drawing his musky, male scent deep inside her, where it drowned the ghosts of her nightmares in escalating pleasure.
So close . . . so close to flying.
That talented finger pushed up inside her, pulled out, and thrust in again. His thumb rubbed her clit, and that delicious, familiar tautness cinched tighter and tighter, drew her deeper and deeper.
“That’s it, babe. That’s it. Let go.” His voice was gritty. Raw.
Let go . . . fly . . . Yes, she needed to fly. But not like this. Not alone. She wanted to fly with him. Together.
She pushed herself up with her knees and shoved her panties down her thighs, vaguely hearing the fabric rip at her urgency. Then she was guiding his rigid length in place and taking him inside.
They both froze as he
filled her, dual groans breaking from them at the exact same time. As his hips lifted, driving his thick, hard length deeper into her, filling her completely, his hands rose above his head and fisted the sheet.
To keep from grabbing her.
Even now, claimed by passion, he was still thinking of her.
The knowledge seeded something inside her. Something fragile and new. Something close to the first delicate unfurling of love.
Then the dance was on. The lift and fall of hips. The pounding of hearts, the raw, breathless cries. The tension wound tighter. The sunburst drew closer and closer. They were on their way—flying—together.
Chapter Twenty-Six
TEN HOURS AFTER he’d snuck out of his bedroom like a man on the run, Mac banged his head against the helicopter’s padded wall. Unfortunately it didn’t pound any sense into his head.
You’re a moron.
A fucking cowardly moron.
Mac shifted against the Eagle’s wall, and the vibrations from the engine numbed his back.
You should have woken her—asshole.
You should have told her how you feel instead of sneaking out the door like a fucking loser escaping a drive-by fuck.
Mac grimaced, more disgusted with himself than he’d ever been in his life.
They’d yanked the seats out of the Eagle to scale back on weight and give the extra team of six men room to sit. But even camped out on the floor, this bird was a hell of a lot easier on the spine than the Black Hawk.
Yeah, things could have been worse . . . much worse.
It had been a stroke of luck that David Coulson had stepped in to host this quarterly meeting after the previously scheduled one had gone bye-bye. Coulson, the selfish bastard, had apparently opted for his own convenience rather than his compatriots’—who’d had to fly in from around the world. Good news for Mac and Shadow Command, since the jackass had scheduled the meeting on his wife’s family’s yacht, which was currently cruising the Gulf of California, a distance of five thousand klicks from Denali or ten hours by Shadow Mountain’s experimental Eagle—eleven plus change if you included the two pit stops to refuel. Even with the bulk of their intel coming in just twenty-four hours premeeting, the boat’s location had made the mission a possibility.
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