by Sybil Bartel
She turned.
Flushed, exactly how her face got when she was embarrassed, her ass bloomed with my markings. “So fucking sexy,” I muttered, dragging the backs of my fingers over each cheek.
She turned back around, and green eyes full of doubt stared up at me. “You spanked me,” she whispered.
My heartbeat faltered and I locked down my expression. “Yes, I did.” I wasn’t sorry. Not for one second, but I’d be a fool not to recognize she was the most innocent woman I’d ever touched. “You got a problem with that?”
She didn’t hesitate. “No.” Heat hit her cheeks. “I think I liked it.”
My dick throbbed, and I pulled back the covers as I stepped out of my boots. “Get in.”
She crawled across my bed with her ass in the air, the little vixen. “No comment?” She looked at me over her shoulder before sliding under the sheets.
I fought a smile. “Put your head on the pillow and close your eyes before I decide to fuck you again.”
She stared up at me. “What if I want that?”
My doorbell rang.
I winked at her. “Hold that thought.”
I fastened my jeans as I walked to the entryway. I checked the peephole then opened the door to Luna.
He waltzed in with a suitcase. “That was more than a few media, bro. You wanna tell me what’s up?” He set her shit down and glanced around my place. His gaze landed on her underwear, and he smiled as he tipped his chin. “Besides you?”
“Asshole.”
He grinned. “Still waiting.”
Fuck. “Her ex was at a restaurant we were at for lunch. He caused a scene, and I took him down.”
“Since I didn’t recognize her, it must be the ex. Who is he?”
I drew in a breath and let it out. “Dan Ahlstrom.”
Luna’s eyes went wide as fuck. “She dated Miami’s quarterback?”
“She didn’t date him.” I hated that fucking prick.
“But you took him down?”
“Him and the linebacker, Sunshine. That defensive end, TJ, was there too, but he stayed out of it.”
“Dios mios.” He exhaled. “You break anything?”
“Strom’s nose, the linebacker’s too.”
“Fuck, Brandt, you know that’s a felony.”
“Self-defense. I wasn’t charged.”
“You got a lawyer?”
“I said I wasn’t arrested.”
“I wasn’t talking about for when you get arrested, which by the way, you’re lucky you didn’t get booked. I was talking about when you get sued. If you took him out of the lineup, he’ll come after you.”
“Fucking pussy, let him. Twenty witnesses were filming the whole damn thing. And it’s preseason.”
“Doesn’t mean he won’t sue. Professional football teams have whole rooms full of lawyers with nothing else to do.”
Goddamn it. “There a point to this conversation?” Red was naked in my fucking bed.
“Yeah. You’re dumb as shit.”
“Fuck you.”
He glanced at Red’s underwear again and smiled like he always did, like a damn saint. “Looks like you got that covered.”
Christ. “Thanks for getting her stuff. I owe you.”
Luna sobered. “The media was on a warpath, my friend. They’re going to find you next. You step foot out of your place, you’re going to need a detail.”
I dragged my hand over my face and the sweet scent of Red filled my head. I knew he was right. I didn’t want someone on my ass, but this wasn’t about just me anymore. “Can you spare someone?”
“Yeah, but that’s not going to solve your bigger issue. You need a lawyer to get ahead of this.”
“I’m not hiring a lawyer.”
“Your funeral, amigo. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Shit. “Fine. You know someone?”
“I know a lot of lawyers, but someone dumb enough to take this on? No.” He thought a second. “Well, maybe.” He pulled his phone out and scrolled through the contacts. “His name’s Mathew Barrett. I just texted you his contact info. Call him.”
Fuck, I didn’t want to deal with this. “Thanks.”
He nodded as he messed with his phone. “I’ll post my guy Tyler out front and leave him on you for three days. Keep your head down until the media moves on.” He glanced back up at me. “How’s everything else?”
Out of all the brothers I served with, he was the only one who ever asked. Not that I saw Luna often, he was busy running his company, but he always asked how I was whenever I saw him. Not that I told him or anyone else a fucking thing. “I’m fine.” It didn’t escape my notice that the redhead in my bed had gotten more out of me in the past twenty-four hours than my buddies had in nine years.
Luna smiled and slapped my shoulder. “One day I’ll get it out of you.”
“There’s nothing to get.”
His smile disappeared. “Right. And I don’t lie awake at night counting kills.”
I drew my knees to my chest and pulled the sheet up to my chin. His friend’s words bounced around in my head like warning bells. Counting kills.
Shirtless and all muscles, Jared strode back into the bedroom. His intense brown-eyed gaze on me, he stripped off his jeans and crawled into the bed naked.
I tried to not stare at the size of him but it was impossible. His length, his width, he was huge. I still couldn’t believe he’d fit inside me, let alone what we’d done. What I’d let him do.
“Let it out,” he demanded, snaking an arm under my knees and another behind my back. He lay down and brought my back to his chest.
“Let what out?”
“What you need to say. You heard our conversation.”
It wasn’t a question, so I didn’t pretend to answer it. “Your friend’s right. Dan will sue you.” I didn’t work with the team lawyers much, except to pass correspondence between them and Coach, but I knew how things worked. They’d tell Dan to sue Jared to keep him from suing Dan.
“I’ll handle it. What else?”
“You can’t take on the league by yourself.”
“I’m not taking on the league. What else is bothering you?”
“I didn’t say anything was bothering me.”
“You didn’t have to. You were curled in a ball with the covers at your chin like a terrified kid.” He stroked my tender backside. “Are you sore?”
Desire swirled low in my belly. “I’m fine,” I whispered, not sure I was ready to talk about that or how it’d made me feel.
“Don’t lie to me, Red.”
I exhaled. “I didn’t want to like you hitting me, but I did. I shouldn’t have felt safe or even turned on, but you just touching me now….” I sucked in a breath as I trailed off. “Your friend said he counted kills.”
“He was a sniper in the Marines,” Jared answered matter-of-factly, as if this was a common occupation. Then he lowered his voice. “You’re always safe with me. You enjoyed it because you didn’t have to think. I took control and gave you a release your whole body would feel.”
“What did you get out of it?”
“Control and your trust.”
He said it reverently, but I didn’t know how to take any of it. I felt weak for enjoying the way he’d touched me. And I knew our military protected us and I knew I was living a free life because of the sacrifices so many like Jared had made. But I’d never been this close to it. This wasn’t a torn ligament or a bloodied face on football Sunday. This wasn’t about the millions of dollars that poured through an industry whose sole purpose was to entertain. This was real life, real death, real people sacrificing everything they had to protect what I took for granted.
“I’ve never been around someone who served before. This is… new to me.”
A hint of defensiveness crept into his tone. “I’m no different than anyone else.”
I looked up at him. “You’re very different.” Alpha, aggressive, guarded, protective, even the way he carried hims
elf. It wasn’t just confidence, it was the knowledge of capability behind that confidence. He didn’t posture or assert himself to prove a point or to make it look good for the cameras on Monday night. He did it because it was ingrained in who he was. “You’re a hero.” A true hero.
“I’m no fucking hero, Red.” He rolled to his back and rubbed his hand over his face. “You hungry?” He started to get up.
I grabbed his hand. “That bothers you?”
The angles to his face went sharp and he turned on me. “I’m not some saint who wanted to make a difference. I was an eighteen-year-old kid who wanted a stable job. I didn’t enlist to protect my country. I signed up to get a paycheck and shoot shit. Then I got blown up and the Marines dropped me faster than you can say wounded. So don’t glorify what you think I am. I’m a damaged ex-marine who likes to fuck hard.” He threw the covers off, grabbed his boxers and walked out. A few seconds later, I heard pots banging in the kitchen.
His anger should have scared me, but it didn’t. I should’ve been running, not walking out the door, but I wasn’t. I was pulling open dresser drawers full of perfectly folded clothes and borrowing a T-shirt that smelled better than any article of clothing I’d ever put on.
I walked into the open-plan living space and saw my suitcase by the front door.
Without turning around to look at me, Jared spoke. “You eat eggs?”
I stared at the scars on his back as I walked up behind him. Aching to touch them, I turned the burner down under the pan. “If you don’t burn them.”
He whisked a bowl of eggs to within an inch of their lives. “I wasn’t going to.”
I went to the fridge. “Do you have bread?”
“Yeah.” He dumped the eggs in the too-hot pan.
I pulled bread, butter and a package of cut-up cantaloupe from the fridge. “Toaster?” There wasn’t a thing on his pristine counters besides a coffee maker.
“No.”
I looked at him. “How do you make toast?”
He jabbed at the eggs, breaking them up into little bits. “I don’t.”
I took the spatula from him and gently folded over the cooked parts. “Like this.” He stood so close, I could smell his scent, strong and masculine and tinged with sex. My core ached for his touch.
His breath landed the side of my neck. “Nice shirt.”
“Nice boxers. You can turn the oven broiler on and we can make the toast that way.”
He didn’t move. “You telling me what to do?”
I hid a smile. “Yes.”
Quick and precise, he punched the buttons on the oven then grabbed my shoulders and spun me. His lips were on mine before I could gasp, and his tongue sank into my mouth. Pulling me against his hips, he devoured me. His hard cock pressed into my stomach and he thrust in rhythm with his tongue.
I didn’t melt into him, I fell apart at the seams.
His dominant hold on me, and the memory of him inside me, had me so turned on that if he touched me once between my legs, I would’ve come. But he didn’t.
He pulled back and spun me. “You’re burning the eggs.”
Breathless, I looked at the pan. “Right.” His strong body behind me, he slowly rubbed his hard length against my backside.
His lips touched my ear. “Stir.”
I shivered. Then I did exactly what he told me to do. The spatula still in my hand, I stirred.
His voice softened. “Good girl.” His hand traveled up my shirt and his thick fingers grasped my nipples through the material and pinched.
My back arched and I moaned.
He squeezed my nipples harder, then abruptly let go and his palm made contact with my ass.
The sting followed by the ache in my nipples made me gasp as his hand slid down my stomach and two of his fingers shoved into me. “Oh my God.” I dropped the spatula and blindly reached forward.
His arm came around my waist and he spun me so fast, my head swam. His fingers thrust inside me, touching a spot so deep and so personal as his palm ground against my clit that I stopped caring about anything else.
Overnight, he’d turned me into someone else. Someone who let a stranger spank her. Someone who left her home, not to avoid the media, but to be with a man she didn’t know. Someone who wanted a male escort to be hers.
“Stop,” I cried.
He froze, but then his fingers rotated deep inside me. “Tell me you don’t want to come and I will.”
I started to shake. “I don’t.”
“You’re lying. Tell me you don’t want me inside you.”
Oh God. I wanted him. I wanted him so badly I could taste him. “Why?”
“Because you want to come, you want me inside you, and you want to be exactly where you are. Stop thinking and let go.” His strokes slowed, but he increased the pressure as he pressed into my front wall. “Grab those hard nipples and come.”
The sound that crawled up my throat and spilled from my lips wasn’t as shocking as the sheer freedom of doing exactly what he said. My own fingers slid under my borrowed shirt. Pinching my tender nipples, my body aching for release, I cried out as the orgasm slammed into me. My muscles burning with exquisite tension, my core grasped at his fingers and I completely fell apart.
I came so hard tears slid down my cheeks.
His fingers still deep inside me, he pulled my head back to his chest and stared down at me. For three heartbeats, no words passed between us. We just stood, connected.
Then he leaned down and kissed my tear-stained cheek. “I own those.”
I swept my thumb across her cheek and shit fucked with my head. I didn’t want to pull my hand out of her body, I didn’t even want to let her go. This woman was better than me in every possible way. I needed to leave her the fuck alone, but I couldn’t bring myself to.
My dick pulsing, I eased my fingers out of her swollen pussy. “You burned my eggs,” I deadpanned.
Her chest heaving, she barely nodded. “Yeah.”
“Need a minute?” My arm still around her waist, I held her up, but the kitchen was starting to smell like burned shit.
“The burner,” she managed.
I reached over and turned it off. Her back still up against my body, she started to shake. “Hey, you okay?” I brushed her hair away from her face.
A smile curving her lips, she held back laughter. “My legs don’t work.”
The corner of my mouth twitched.
Eyes bright with laughter and tears, she looked up at me. “I’m not sure I care.”
I smiled.
Soft and feminine and so fucking beautiful, she laughed. “You do smile!”
My childhood, enlisting, getting hit, the hospitals, the women, everything in my life flashed and culminated into this one single moment. Red hair, green eyes and a smile so fucking beautiful, my heart hurt.
I cupped her face. “Yeah, Red, I smile.”
She turned serious. “You’re so very handsome.”
I was a demanding, scarred fuck. And the second she realized I couldn’t balance a checkbook, let alone read it, she’d leave. “You’re too good for me.”
She frowned.
I released her and changed the subject. “You gonna make me food?”
She cleared her throat. “I’m sure you worked up an appetite.”
Like she wouldn’t believe. “I’ll feed that after I eat.” I tossed the pan of burnt eggs in the sink and grabbed another pan, handing it to her.
She took it, smiling shyly. “Will you, now?”
My dick a fucking rocket, I stared at her until her cheeks flushed. “You have to ask?”
She pulled more eggs out of the fridge. “I have no doubt that your appetite is—”
“Insatiable?” I stared at her. I liked her in my kitchen.
“I was going to say voracious.” She turned on the burner and bent slightly to make sure it was on, giving me an eyeful.
My dick throbbed for release. “With you it is.” I realized the hole I’d dug myself into
the second the words left my mouth.
“Right.” Her tone went instantly formal as she cracked eggs into a bowl.
“I don’t bullshit, Red.” At least not with her I didn’t.
“Mm-hm.” She poured some milk from the fridge into the eggs. “Where are your spices?”
“You got something to say, say it.” I opened a cupboard and handed her salt and pepper.
She set the salt and pepper down. “I meant spices. Herbs? Seasonings?”
“I don’t have any. Why are you avoiding the subject?”
She whisked the eggs and her prim and proper voice returned. “I’m not avoiding it. I have nothing to say.”
“Bullshit.” I grabbed the bread and started to open the bag.
She snatched it from me. “Wash your hands.”
Slow, deliberate, I lifted my hand to my mouth and sucked the fingers that’d been buried deep in her pussy. My gaze on her, my dick got even harder.
“Stop it,” she squeaked.
I licked one finger then the other, loving the hell out of her shocked expression. “I’m just getting started.”
She turned the water on. “Wash!”
Half my mouth tipped with a smile. “You telling me what to do again?” I’d fuck her on the kitchen counter this time.
As if knowing my thoughts, she turned the water off and schooled her features. “Suit yourself.”
I chuckled. “Giving up so easily?”
“There’s nothing to give up, and even if there was, I’m not a quitter.”
I seized the opening. “You walked out on me last night.”
“That was… different.” She poured the eggs into the pan.
I wanted this cleared up, once and for all. “You told me to call a client, Red,” I reminded her. “That was you quitting.”
Her shoulders stiffened. “We hadn’t started anything to quit.”
“The second you showed up at my door, something started.” I wasn’t going to let her deny it.
“No, it didn’t. And I’d changed my mind is all.”
Right. “Was that before or after I kissed you? Or was it when I made you come for the first time?” I stepped closer to her and lowered my voice. “You felt it. I felt it. Why deny it?”