“Every one of those scars is a badge of honor. The only reason it will bother me to see them is to think if we’d only gotten there sooner we could have saved you the torture.”
“No! You can’t think that way.” Lydia cupped his face, and placed a tender kiss on his lips. “You saved me. The beating is on them.”
Brown eyes met hazel. “If I can begin to forgive myself, can you believe me when I tell you I see only beauty?” She finally nodded, and his eyes lightened, and laugh lines fanned from the edges.
“Ever since you bought those three bras, I’ve been dying to know which one you decided to wear tonight.” He pulled the top over her head.
“Ah Ha. You wore the silver one.” She laughed at his silliness. But then his expression turned carnal.
“Look at your nipples. I can see them through the lace. You’re gorgeous. You’re going to kill me tonight.” He tangled the fingers of one hand in the curls of her hair as he took her mouth in a voracious kiss. His tongue plundered, as his other hand found the latch on the back of her bra and released the bounty. He lowered her slowly against the pillows, barely able to think as she met his passion. The prick of her fingernails in his scalp only added to the spice of the kiss.
Their bodies were in perfect accord. She spread her legs in welcome, and he was now resting against her, while she rocked upwards.
“This feels so perfect, please. Please now.”
“Soon. I promise, soon. But first I want to explore you. I want to cherish every moment of our time tonight.”
Clint slid her bra totally off her body, and then swept downwards so her slacks and panties followed. He lowered his head toward her breast and she shoved against him. Hard.
“What?”
“We did this before and I don’t want a repeat.”
“Huh?”
“I missed out.” He was totally confused. All he understood was she was looking at him with a really serious look, and he better get his head in the game if he wanted to get close to Lydia. Then she stroked her hands downwards to the button at the top of his jeans.
“I didn’t get equal playing time last time,” she said as she started to unbutton the top button of his jeans. Feeling her hand as it brushed against his lower abdomen made him lose all focus. He got up off the bed.
“Clint,” she whined.
“If you help me out of my jeans, this will be over too fucking fast. Your hands that close to my cock will drive me out of my mind.”
“That’s the idea.” She rubbed her legs together, and her hands moved upwards towards her breasts and cupped them. Holy hell!
“You stop that right now Lydia Hidalgo. We’re taking this slow. You just got out of the hospital five days ago.”
“Exactly. I deserve my treat now. Fast first. Slow second.” She moved one of her hands towards her face, and brought her forefinger to her lips and sucked it. He shoved his jeans down. Where the fuck was the condom?
****
Clint destroyed her three nights ago. She had never been loved so thoroughly before. It never even occurred to her a man would give and not expect something in return. She wanted to give him the same kind of pleasure tonight. She wanted to be the type of woman men fantasized about, something she never managed to be for others, but a woman she knew she could be for Clint. She wanted to make all of his dreams come true.
Lydia pulled her wet finger out of her mouth, and trailed it down her neck to the upper part of her breast, loving how Clint’s eyes narrowed and followed her every move. Slowly she swirled it around her areola. As his eyes focused on her breasts, she glanced downwards and saw how hard and erect he was. Her thighs clenched together as warmth pooled. The idea of having that much power inside of her was arousing and… intimidating. She sucked in a deep breath.
Clint’s gaze cut upwards, and he was on the bed beside her before she could exhale.
“Talk to me, Baby.”
She lifted her breasts in offering, wanting to focus his attention back towards her body, not her nervous reactions.
He stroked the tops of her breasts with his calloused fingertips, dragging them across her sensitive flesh. Her hands fell to her sides, as the world narrowed to the shards of pleasure his touch evoked.
“Talk to me, what were you thinking a minute ago?” She came out of her pleasure induced trance, and rolled to her side. Tonight was about Clint. Looking at him and his body she had to touch.
“Want this. Need this.” She stroked down his rock hard abdomen and grasped his cock. So hot, so hard. “I need you, Clint.”
“We’ll get there.” He placed a soft kiss against her temple.
She grazed her thumb over the silky head of his penis and gloried when she felt him shudder. She raised her knee. “Now.”
“You’re amazing. But you’re not going to make me lose my head.” He kissed the corner of her mouth, and she felt his strained smile. “You, lady, need to be with me every step of the way.”
“But I want what you want.” She finally had to look away from Clint’s steady gray gaze.
“This is about both of us, love, which means you’re going to talk to me.” She gave him another stroke and he arched into her hand. He put his hand over hers and looked her in the eye.
“Lydia?”
“I’m not sure I’m ready for you.” She gave him a squeeze and looked up at him, praying he would understand. He searched her eyes and seemed to find an answer to his question.
“It’s my job to make sure you are. Do you trust me?”
“More than anybody else in my life. You would never let me down.”
He nodded, then he stroked down her body, and pushed out her raised knee, so that he could touch the intimate flesh of her core.
“You feel like wet silk.” He pushed a finger inside and she sighed in pleasure. Two, and she moaned as he made her feel so good. But when he tried to increase his presence even more, she winced.
His eyes narrowed. “We’re going to slow down, Baby.”
“No. I want more now.” She didn’t care it was uncomfortable. She needed to give to him this time.
He chuckled at her petulant tone. “This is too important. You’re too important.” He pulled her hand away from his flesh, and brought it to his mouth for a kiss. “Your touch is potent, Lady.”
Lydia smiled, and stroked the muscles of his back as he pressed teasing kisses down her body. She might have wanted to make this all about Clint tonight, but her greedy body took the choice away from her.
“Ahhh. Clint.”
His tongue swirled down her tummy, and then he was exactly where she wanted him. He parted her folds and when she tried to rise to his tongue’s forays, his grip held her down, which rocketed her arousal upwards. He delved deep as his thumb raised the hood of her clit, and then he sucked as he plunged his fingers deep finding just the right spot. She moaned her release.
****
As she crested he found heaven. This woman meant the world to him and no matter his needs hers would always come first. He continued to plumb her depths, swirling his tongue over her engorged flesh.
“No more, I can’t.” And then she did. This time she cried out.
He sheathed himself and slowly entered her hot depths.
“So good, you feel so good, Clint.” Her nails bit into his back. Resting one arm over her head, he smoothed her hair from her mouth, and kissed her lips, as he eased in further. He read only pleasure on her face as she canted upwards, and then he felt her body give a pulse of wet welcome. He started a gentle tempo she matched, but soon she shoved against him in eager awkward thrusts.
His hand slid down her hip and guided her. Soon they were meeting one another in a rhythm that launched them ever upwards.
“Please.” She shuddered.
He hit the spot, the one he touched before with his fingers, in and out. She clamped down on him and they came together in a shower of ecstasy.
Lydia looked at him with a dreamy expression, and he knew he was wearin
g a silly grin on his face.
“Don’t move a muscle.” He went to the bathroom. He got back in time to see her stretch her body and he groaned.
She curled around one of the pillows and looked at him.
“I’ve never felt better in my life.”
He walked around the bed and got in behind her. She stiffened, but stayed where she was. He laid a kiss on her shoulder and started tracing the ridges of her scars.
“Do they hurt?”
“Sometimes they do,” she said quietly, “not recently.” His breath shuddered in. He’d known what to expect. He’d asked Darius. But knowing and seeing were two different things. She rolled over, exposing the entire expanse of her back to him.
“Baby, you should have told me, you should never have been lying on your back when we made love.”
“Clint, I only felt your touch.” He brushed kisses and traced the network of marks that marred her skin. He wasn’t surprised when he tasted the salt of his tears.
Lydia fell asleep and he pulled her close covering them up with the comforter.
“I love you, baby. You’re mine.”
Chapter Eight
They made it to the safe house a couple of hours ago. Finn arranged for a three bedroom, two story house a mile from the beach. Clint thought it was perfect because it was at the end of a cul-de-sac.
Lydia pressed end on the phone and turned to Clint.
“Beth learned how to ride a horse!”
Clint looked at Lydia’s beaming face, momentarily diverted from his computer screen. Score one for Jack Preston.
“So Mama Bear is feeling a little bit better?” Clint teased.
“Yes I am.”
Lydia got up from the dining room table as the buzzer rang in the kitchen. She took out the casserole she put in for dinner.
“So that takes care of Beth, but you didn’t tell me how your conversation with your parents went.”
Clint closed his laptop. He wanted to show Lydia what he found on Guzman, but he could tell she needed to talk.
“I honestly don’t know what to think.” She looked at him, and then touched the glass dish without using the oven mitt.
“Ow.”
In seconds he had her hand under the faucet, running cold water on the burn.
“It’s no big deal. Really.” He kissed the top of her head.
“Let me take care of you. I like doing it, okay?”
She leaned into him. “Don’t tell anyone, but I kind of like it when you take care of me too.” Now didn’t that deserve another kiss? He continued to keep her hand under the water, but he used his other to tangle in her mass of black curls and tip her head for a fierce kiss that left them both breathless.
Reluctantly he let her go.
“Is there anything you want to talk about?”
“Not really. They’re just them. In five more weeks, this will all be over.”
She straightened. “Help me find where the plates are.”
They scrounged in the cupboards and found the dishes they needed to set the table. “This is a really nice house. Do you know who it belongs to?” Lydia asked as they sat down.
“Nope. Finn arranged it. The man is amazing. He has contacts everywhere. You mention you need something, and voila, it just shows up.”
“Does he use computers too?”
“I’m sure he does but it’s not like we do. It’s more just e-mailing a bunch of friends and calling in favors.” Clint laughed.
He waited for her to pick up her fork. Then he did the same, anxious to try the food that had been tantalizing him for the last half hour while it cooked. He took a bite of the succulent corn and chicken dish and sighed with delight.
“I love this.”
“I’m glad you like it.”
“How’s your hand?” She seemed to be holding her fork okay.
“Fine. So what did you find out while I was talking to Beth?” she asked as she took another delicate bite of her food. Damn, she was sexy when she ate. Okay, he admitted to himself, she was sexy when she did anything as far as he was concerned.
“I’ve been accessing the dark web.”
“Makes sense. That’s where most of the information about drug trafficking goes on.”
“Something weird is going on. I wanted you to take a look at it. Guzman seems to be dumping his product at a fast rate. Almost like he is having a fire sale. It doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“Hmmm.” Lydia put down her fork after only a few small bites.
“Nope, you have to finish a hell of a lot more before you get to play with my computer.” She gave him a dark look.
“I have my own damn computer.”
“Yeah, but it would take you an hour to get to the site I found. If you’re a good girl and eat all your food, you could be looking at the fun stuff in under twenty minutes.” She stuck out her tongue at him.
He choked out a laugh and her eyes twinkled.
“You’re perfect for me, you know that, don’t you?” She blushed and picked up her fork.
“I’m serious. When we get done with this shit, I want to take you to Colorado to meet my family.”
She took a slow bite of her food and swallowed. “Tell me about them. Your family I mean.”
“It’s pretty normal. Mom, Dad, my sister Jenny and my brother Robert. They all still live in Denver.”
He watched as she started to push food around on her plate.
“Baby, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” God, he hated that answer.
“Lydia, please talk to me.”
“Normal sounds so good. You’re lucky.” She set down her fork and took her plate to the sink. Dammit, she had barely eaten. She started cleaning up the kitchen while he finished the rest of his meal. She looked so sad. How had they gone from her joking with him, to this?
He went into the kitchen with his dishes and put them in the dishwasher. She avoided looking at him. He couldn’t stand it a second longer. He trapped her against the edge of the counter.
“Clint, what are you doing?”
“Trying to determine what made you sad.”
“Nothing.” That damn word again.
He put his hand on her forehead.
“No fever.”
She knocked his hand away. “You’re being silly.”
“You’re not being honest with me.” She looked up at him with confused brown eyes.
“I’m not trying to be dishonest.” He saw only truth.
“Baby, tell me what you’re feeling. I hate when you shut me out.” He did. He hated it a lot.
“Normal. You called your family normal.” She almost spit out the word. Now he was wearing a confused expression.
“The Hidalgos are never going to be normal again. You need to run away from me Clint. I’m trouble.” He pressed her against the cupboards.
“There isn’t a chance in hell I’m going to run. And, there is no way I’m going to let you run. I have no idea where this is leading, but we are going to find out.” She twisted, trying to get away from him, but he was more than happy to use his strength to keep her in his arms.
“Are you listening to me?”
“Are you listening to me, Clint? We’re on the run from one of the most notorious drug cartels in the world. My father worked for that drug cartel. We will all have to go into the Witness Protection Program. We left normal three Twilight Zone episodes ago.” She shoved at his shoulders. “Let me go.”
“No.”
“Are you threatening me?” If he had seen the slightest bit of fear on her beloved features he would have let her go, but he saw only anger and frustration.
“I’m not threatening you, I’m telling you that you don’t get to leave this discussion until you bring up some sort of rational argument.”
“You are a horse’s ass! You need to get the hell away from me. You have a normal happy family. You are one of your country’s heroes. The last thing you need is someone like me in your life.”
Her breath caressed his lips as he dipped in to taste. He could feel her conflict, and he wasn’t going to allow it. He thrust his tongue deep and she gasped, arching into him. He moved, one arm tilting her up, the other lifting her up, so she was seated on the granite countertop. She pushed him away with one arm, and pulled him closer with the other. This was not going to be how they would spend their time together.
He pulled her right leg around his waist, so even through their layers of clothes they could feel each other’s heat. She relaxed and stopped trying to push him away.
Clint drifted kisses down the side of her neck, loving how she always smelled of honeysuckle.
“This won’t change anything. We’re still wrong for one another.” Her fingers dug deeply into his scalp. He loved it.
“Nobody else will put up with Nerd King.” She gripped his hair and pulled him away. Tears were swimming in her big brown eyes.
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. I’m the furthest thing away from normal you could imagine. I need you. Please just keep yourself open to the possibility.” She gave him a look so filled with hope and fear he had to trace her lips with kisses.
“And another thing.” He tipped up her chin so she was looking him in the eye.
“What?”
“When I ask you what’s wrong, I’m begging you. I’ll get down on my knees if I have to. Please don’t say ‘nothing’. That answer just scares the piss out of me.”
She giggle snorted. “Hand me a paper towel you fool.” Lydia blew her nose. “So now do we get to play on the computers?”
****
“How old were you when you started playing with computers?” Lydia asked. They were sitting cross legged on the floor in front of the coffee table in the den. Each of them were in front of their respective laptops. They spent a half hour arguing over the better operating systems, the better hardware, and game controllers. Now they were settling into the business of investigation. Clint liked to call it spying.
Her Loyal Seal Page 10