There were the walls. The sarcasm. It all made sense.
“She hurt you?” he asked but knew it didn’t matter what her response was. Someone hurt her, someone who should have to pay in gigantic proportions.
“Oh, no. She never hurt me. She just focused on laundry, or she’d watch television. Though sometimes, on the days I thought she couldn’t love me any less, she’d go for a walk. Come to think of it, that hurt more than any stupid cut.”
How could a mother hurt her baby? He’d never understand it. He’d spent his life fixing wrongs others couldn’t handle themselves. Mia was trying to keep it together in front of him. It shouldn’t have been this way. She shouldn’t have these memories and scars.
“She hurt you in my book.”
“There’s always that.”
“Your father? He’s the one who hurt you?”
She coughed out an arctic chuckle, more theatrical than comical. “You mean The Colonel? Yes, he was the one. He liked to inflict pain with whatever he could find. With whatever might entertain him, distract him, or pass the time in his miserable existence.”
Winters would love to kill the bastard. But not before he ensured the man relived each old wound he gave Mia. Winters channeled all his rage into his fists and tried to hide them in the pockets of his pants. Ripping shit off walls wasn’t going to help Mia now. Napalming an area a mile wide wouldn’t help either.
He had to listen. Had to figure out what might help. A rampage would only be self-serving. He’d do it later and rain fire from the sky.
“Honey—” His chest felt tight.
“Don’t honey me. Or baby. Or doll. I don’t need it, and I don’t want it.”
He tugged at his collar. “They alive?”
“Nope.”
“Good.”
She nodded. “Agreed.”
“All of your walls make sense.” He hugged her. Not with the intention of crushing her breasts against him, or wrapping her body onto his, but with the sole desire to console her, wipe away all the hurt and pain.
Mia laughed again, this time, into his chest. She was still very much pressed into his embrace. “My walls are nothing. I became a psychologist to figure out how to fix me. Helping everyone else is just a bonus.”
“We’re the sum of our parts. One thing doesn’t define us.”
“For you, okay. But I don’t know about me.”
How could she think such a thing? He pulled her from his chest, holding her in outstretched arms. “No, Mia. That’s where you’re wrong. That’s where all your schooling and studying left you hanging. You are perfect. You are strong.”
“I’m not—”
“Everything about you is all shock and awe. You know what that means? Overwhelming power and spectacular displays of force. Tell me how you made it out of your childhood home to a military base? Tell me how you’ve made it through the last days with me, enemy crosshairs searching for your gorgeous smile?”
“But—”
“You wouldn’t have made it if you didn’t house a hell of a fight deep within your gut. And to top it off, you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever set eyes on. Ever.”
Tears slid down the perfect slope of her cheeks. Her lips trembled, and she grew prettier with each passing second.
“I wasn’t asking for a pep talk.”
“That wasn’t one. It was the God’s honest truth.”
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”
“We don’t have to.” Where did he go from there? “Forget it all, and tell me anything you want to. Tell me a joke, or your favorite food, or if you have a pet.”
“A reporter asked a sniper what he felt after he took a kill shot.”
“What are you talking about?”
A slip of a smile crossed her face. “Well, it’s not a joke. But it’ll get a reaction. A reporter asked a sniper what he felt after he took a kill shot. The sniper looked at the reporter and said?”
“I don’t know. He said… I don’t know.”
“Recoil. He felt recoil.” She laughed.
Thank God. She was laughing. “My, my, Mia. A little gun humor. I like it.”
“Blueberries. Watermelon. Sushi.”
“What?”
“Is it your turn to lose your mind? You asked what my favorite foods are. Blueberries. Watermelon. Sushi. Spicy tuna rolls. Extra spicy, cucumber, and avocado. And I want a dog. After this hair-raising experience, I think I’ll get one. I earned it.”
“Indeed you have. What else you got?”
“After Judith took Clara for the afternoon, I was dying for you to come home and kiss me.”
“Dying? That’s a bit dramatic. How about mildly interested? Possibly aroused?”
She laughed. The sound danced in his ears. “You’re awful.”
“You like it,” he whispered into her ear before he kissed her. Mia pushed up on her tiptoes to nuzzle against him.
“Yeah, I do. Right now, I want more than a kiss.”
Her heat pulsed through him as she murmured against his skin. “If that’s the case, I’m about five seconds away from dragging you into my bedroom.”
She dropped down from her toes. “That long? I’m disappointed in you.”
Hell. After that smartass remark, he lifted her into his arms and bounded the stairs. Winters kicked the door closed behind them and fell onto the bed, bracing over her with a forearm on each side of her head. That was less than five seconds, wasn’t it?
“That mouth of yours might get you into trouble.”
Her eyes danced. “You can’t even begin to imagine what my mouth might do.”
Oh, his imagination worked just fine, thank you. Every dream he ever stored in memory, queued up and flashed at the ready. All of his blood rushed straight to his cock, and every muscle tightened in a restrained effort. He throbbed with the thought of her mouth taking him. It was almost too much to bear. Almost.
“You can’t do much pinned under me.” He was as obvious and pointless as directions on a rocket launcher, reading Aim toward the enemy.
“Let me see what I can do about that.” She licked her top lip in one slow, wet lash.
Before he knew how to wrangle that thought, her hands planted on his chest and pushed against him like he wasn’t two hundred plus pounds of lean muscle. She could have used her pinky and had him flat on his back, powerless to her will. That was just fine with him.
Mia straddled his waist like a dominatrix ready to work. She drew his black shirt up, working it over his head with the efficiency of a woman on a sexual mission. Her fingers spread wide and ran though his chest hair. Her chilly palms left a trail of fire. She rocked her hips and arched her back.
“Open your eyes, Colby.” Her soft order contradicted the inferno hidden in her words, and he all but said yes, ma’am. If she wanted to call the plays, he was more than game to give her this round.
Silken hair teased his chest as she leaned over to kiss him. Hard, wanting, greedy. Her fingernails traced an old battle scar, high and right on his chest, then threaded into the coarse hairs and tugged with a temptress’s touch.
He flexed against her center, radiating heat. She met his drive, rubbing a slow rhythm, an exacting pace, demanding what she wanted of him. Wet kisses danced across his chest. In a move of perfect torture, she shimmied down his legs. Her face and lips hung above his skin, a glowing sun ready to set. She kissed one side of his stomach, then the other, leaving red-hot tracks of smoldering embers.
She unfastened his utilitarian belt. So practical, except for when it wasn’t. But the leather bent to her will and loosened at her sultry command. Next, the top button popped open and the zipper released. If one could suffer in paradise, then he was there.
Mia looked pleased. Proud. In charge. With her on top, she might as well strap a block of C4 to his chest. It wasn’t going to take much of an ignition to make him dissolve into a million fragments.
“I’ve been dying to kiss you,” she paused, as he helped
her shuck down his pants and boxer briefs, “just like this.”
Her tongue traced to the top of his shaft. Smooth, soft, and supple. Her mouth encircled him. A snug, deep heat overtook him, and a groan ripped from the depths of his gut. Profound, harsh, more and more familiar.
“Are you okay?”
“Hell, yes. Do. Not. Stop.”
Like a desperate man, he was ready to beg for her torment, borrow sweet nothings, and steal her mind, her soul, her anything that would bring another caress.
Hotness enveloped him again. Sweet Jesus. He buried his hands in her hair and watched as his length disappeared into her mouth, her eyes trained on him.
Damn her snug mouth and whipping tongue. Damn the springs of electricity that raced through him. Mia hummed, and he vibrated like piano strings struck by a virtuoso. She massaged him, fondled him, and straight drove him to the edge of a vicious cliff. He teetered on the threshold but would swan dive face first if it meant his climax.
“Mia, doll.” He panted. He pleaded. He needed her on so many levels. What was left of his control was seconds away from dissipating.
He should pull away. An old drill instructor barked in his head: five second fuses only last three seconds.
Words wouldn’t come out. Reluctant, he tried his best to slide from her. But she wouldn’t let him, her intentions clear, and he didn’t fight her. Winters fisted a pillow and crushed it onto his face, choking on her name as flames ripped through him.
“Good fucking God, Mia,” he shouted, as he pulsed. She didn’t loosen, forcing him to stay with her until he was done.
Unbelievable. She knew some tricks, and then some.
Mia pulled the pillow from him. And, oh, was she a foxy knockout. Lips slightly swelled. Cheeks very flushed. Her smile captivated his heart. How did he get so lucky?
“I can’t compete with—”
She cut him off with a blistering kiss. Her tongue delved into his mouth, and he pulled her into a possessive hold, sparking him hot and bothered for an encore performance. He craved her. Bad.
The spicy aroma of sex filled the room. He savored Mia, then made quick work of losing her clothes. With her naked body lying beside him, their skin clinging together, Winters ached. In a perfect way. In an “every nerve tingled, screaming for him to do something about it” way.
“Mia. Mia. Mia.”
His throat constricted. An invisible hand crushed the air from his lungs. He needed to make love until he was devoid of those desires, those affections and afflictions that clouded his mind and made his heart pound like he’d been eight-ballin’ lines of coke.
Wait a hot minute.
Make love. Make love?
Mia’s fingers ran into his short chest hair, exploring his pecs and stomach. Her damp sex rubbed his erection. He leaned forward, catching the tip of her perked breast in his mouth, cupping and sucking her, then watched the chain reaction. Her head dipped back, her back arched, driving her luscious breast into his kisses.
Mine. Definitely, absolutely, all mine.
He leaned over to the nightstand, removed a condom from the drawer, and slipped it on. Winters ran a hand into her silky hair as Mia angled herself over the tip and hovered, only allowing a moment of entry into her tight body. Such a tease. He smiled and closed his eyes.
She engulfed him, every sense infiltrated. Sight. Sound. Mind. And left her permanent mark.
“I’ve needed you my whole life, Mia. And I had no idea,” he whispered, eyes still closed.
Was that aloud? She danced her fingertips across him. Did she hear him?
His eyes opened, staring deep into the dark, trusting eyes of Mia Kensington. Yeah, she heard.
Mia rode him slow and deep, rocking back and forth. Her breath hitched, her tempo amplified, and he felt larger and harder and more of a man than ever before. His day job was nothing compared to earning her honeyed cries of rapture.
Good God, he wouldn’t—couldn’t—dare let this end.
She rose on him, nailing the Aphrodite act. Her fingers snaked into her hair, her pussy tightened on his shaft, and she swayed to a rhythm and music he could almost hear. He palmed her hips. His cock screamed for speed. His mind prayed to bring her to the brink.
“Mia, I—”
She shut him down. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
What the fuck was going to come out of his mouth? I need you? I want you?
“Promise me.”
As if he uttered a magic phrase of Kama Sutra, her face went stormy, and her vagina clenched. He held her tight, as she came undone in his arms like a Tasmanian devil, climaxing in a dervish.
She collapsed on him. Cheek to cheek. Perfect. He wanted to feel her float back to him in bed, all ambrosial and glittering. All things he was unaware of, until Mia landed in his life, a superb bombardment.
With gentle precision, he rolled off his back, still deep inside her. Angelic hair splayed on the mattress, framed by pillows. Legs wrapped his torso. Fingers threaded his hair. Trying for the softest of strokes and failing, Winters took his entire length from her drenched sweetness, then shafted her full again.
He brushed the hair from her face and concentrated on the flawless symmetry of her cheekbones. Sweat beaded on the nape of his neck, on his temples. He skipped fingers over her clit. Together, they soared in cadence to his thrusts. Mia trembled, vibrated, pushing them both to the verge of orgasm.
She purred in his ear. The wonderful, incoherent mumbles filled his heart.
Did she understand how he felt? If she did, at least one of them understood.
He wasn’t ready for it to end, intent to declare some sort of message, but yet, he was dying to finish.
“Please, Colby, come with me. I need you with me.”
Against his control, a deep breath loosened. She turned his key, unlocking an unprotected passageway. He drove with her, trying to fulfill her wishes.
Mia released again, ramming a shudder from his core to the tips of his ears. Absolute and sweeping completeness. They came in unison. His moan and her cry intermixed. Panting. Struggling. Battling.
With nothing left to give, he collapsed next to her, gathered Mia into his arms, and prayed she wouldn’t pull from him right now. He just needed a few more intimate minutes with her. A few more minutes of consummate fulfillment.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Even as Mia drowned in comfortable exhaustion, her anxious mind sat ready to taunt her. Lazy seconds lounged into hushed minutes in the twilight-lit room. Purple shadows cascaded from the picture window. Deep oranges tempered in the setting sky. The knowing air loomed in the bedroom, a million times heavier than the emotional weight of his words.
I’ve needed you my whole life. His words danced in her head and seared into her memory. What would he have said if she hadn’t cut him off? What did she want him to say? Something. Nothing. Everything. Who knew? Guessing made her heart and her head pound, one right after the other, seesawing in a brutal clash.
She hurt for wanting something so fleeting and so dangerous. The moments when she tried to reason away her feelings for Colby were absurd.
Absurdity was ignoring the jump in her stomach when he gave a languid smile or the warm rush when he stepped close. Absurdity was avoiding the glimmer of optimism. She wasn’t destined to be alone and didn’t have to feign imaginary interest in the boring and untrustworthy.
If she knew there were men like Colby Winters running around, she wouldn’t have given up in a shrug of disinterest. Now, every slow kiss and every sweeping glance was loaded with potential.
Gathered into his possessive hold, his sated breaths airily contradicted every one of his unyielding mannerisms. Mia just existed in the moment. No worries. No fears. No future. No past. Just now. Him and her. She burrowed against his chest.
“I thought you were asleep,” he whispered.
Scorching shivers washed across her warm skin. She could lie and say she just awoke, but there wasn’t a reason. He brushed her hair with
the tips of his fingers, slow and soft, like she was his to cherish.
“I feel safe.” That wasn’t a lie.
“Good. You should.”
“I don’t mean from the hell that’s been chasing us. I mean from the hell that I’ve ignored for the better part of my life.”
“Good.”
“Very short and sweet, Colby.”
“Baby, if you want to talk about what happened, go for it. I’m listening. But you know, I’m no angel, and I’m not finished dancing with the devil. If anyone ever hurts you like that again, there’s nothing I won’t do to protect you. To make sure you’re never hurt again.”
She nodded. He was an angel to her, no matter who he danced with.
He traced the scar under her chin. “This mark is a call to arms. This made me angry, hateful, and full of a vicious need for vengeance.” He kissed her bare shoulder. “But I didn’t need to see scars to know the day I met you, my world changed.”
She had fought the urge to cry like she avoided his closeness. Again, tears begged for release. Her eyes burned. Her throat was raw. But, in his arms, with his words, it was finally okay to cry.
Mia didn’t move. She didn’t sniff or sob. But cleansing tears escaped.
“Are you crying?”
Again, no point in lying. She smiled. “Yes.”
Colby leaned over, pressing her into the bed. His jaw flexed, and he locked his eyes with hers. Such intensity. Her stomach flipped, sending a rush from her head to her toes.
“Sweet Jesus, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“No. No, this is… welcome.” She snorted a laugh. Very attractive.
He laughed at her oh-so feminine laugh. “If you say so, Dr. Freud. Smiling and crying don’t mix.”
“They do right now.”
“And why is that?”
“Because my world changed, too.”
That was an understatement if there ever was one. Was there a handsome man and even a dog in her future? Years of studying psychology went out the door. None of this made sense. Nothing was practical. But here she was, a veteran gunfight spectator and kidnapping survivor. Liberated with simple words from a warrior.
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