by Zoe Dawson
“Strip me down,” she murmured. “Down to the bare bones. Rebuilding requires us to shed everything.”
She could feel him shaking, moved by her words. “I’m scared as hell,” he whispered. “I haven’t been with a woman since the torture, except for the base way I took you in your bathroom. I’m—”
“Don’t be sorry,” she said, covering his mouth, then kissing his lips. “We both wanted it that way. It was honest and intense. It’s the only way I want you to be with me. We both needed to start out showing how much we wanted each other. You gave me hope that we could heal each other.”
“I’ve never met anyone like you, Charlie, so strong and grounded.”
“You do make the earth a little more unsteady under my feet,” she said.
He chuckled softly. “I hope that’s in a good way.”
“Oh, yes,” she whispered. “Really good.”
He back-walked her toward the bed, his hands skimming off her T-shirt, going to the clasp of her bra and dropping it to the floor.
She wanted to keep her mind focused on how he was reacting, but even though this was supposed to be therapeutic, she couldn’t seem to get her mind off how intensely erotic he was.
He wanted her and flipped all her switches. He kissed her passionately, his tongue halfway down her throat, his hands all over her, his breathing ragged. No rules and no one in control of anything.
That added a dark thrill to the whole heart-stopping thing with Blue making love to her mouth, clueless to know what else to call it. It was as intimate as joining with him, a kiss to die for.
When he sucked her tongue, giving her heated thoughts about what he wanted to do to her, she was shameless in her response. The feel of him in her mouth, the taste of him, was intoxicating, dizzying.
He set her on fire with his kiss, made her gasp, and every inch of her wanted more. It was crazy. Crazy and hot and utterly sexual in a way she hadn’t ever experienced before. The reality of being with Blue was so intense—the silkiness of his hair, the rough edge of his jaw beneath her palm, the strength of his arms wrapped around her.
Everything had been so damn safe. She’d cocooned herself in the navy’s embrace and told herself that love was for others. She had the navy and didn’t need anything more. Until she did. The pure physical energy of him was a force to be reckoned with. He was powerful, dangerous and unpredictably seductive.
Her identity was all wrapped in the gold and blue, the uniform, the duty, the pride and the determination to do a good job. In that moment, when he was so warm and hard beneath her hands, she realized that if she couldn’t move beyond that thought, she would be nothing but an empty shell. Where was the pride in that? How could she serve true without taking the chance, having the courage to become who she was instead of burying that beneath layers of armor, hiding herself from herself?
Hiding was a coward’s way out.
There was no more hiding.
Not for her, and she was determined, not for him.
“Let me see you,” she whispered. “All of you, beautiful baby Blue.”
The kiss came to a sudden, heart-catching stop, leaving both of them standing so very still, breathing into each other’s mouths, hardly daring to move.
“Charlie,” he said, his voice showing the utter turmoil warring inside him. “I was so humiliated. She cut me. I thought…” He shuddered, and her heart seized with her compassion for him. That damn bitch! Charlie could kill Natasha with her bare hands.
She ran her hands over his chest, down to the waistband of his pants, his hands automatically going to her wrists.
“Let me,” she murmured softly against his mouth. “I won’t hurt you ever. I want to give you mind-bending pleasure.”
His grip loosened, his chest expanding with his ragged groan. “Charlie, I need you. I have to find a way to get past this. I want to make love to you. Show you the other side of me.”
“I want that, too. But you have to trust me. Let me.”
“No light,” he said.
Charlie stared at him, wanting to push, but this was beyond his capacity right now. He didn’t want to acknowledge his body—except here in the dark, where he could drop his barriers. Any step toward healing was the right method in this moment.
“Okay, no light, but everything else.” The whole truth would come out, even the debilitating truth that was affecting him the most.
“Yes,” he said like a man on the edge of release, his breathing uneven.
She undid her pants and stepped out of them, and before she could even think about taking off his, his hand was there, cupping her, the state of her underwear driving home to him how much she wanted him.
She was too aroused to think straight, especially when his fingers slowly slid beneath her thong and began moving over her so very, very gently. Their mouths sought out each other, and he was devouring her, top to bottom.
He was the kind of man women fall for, she thought through the haze of her arousal. They fall in love with a person who can give them so much pleasure. She was entranced by it, by the sheer eroticism of Blue’s touch and her own raw response.
“God, you are so soft,” he murmured against her lips. “So beautiful.”
His words worked like a desire poured over her senses, and the touch of his hand wouldn’t be enough. She wanted him the way she had him in her fantasies. She wanted him filling her up, driving her up and over the edge of release. She wanted him to make her feel more like a woman than she ever had, and if he couldn’t give her everything, she still wanted him.
He was wild. He was practically a stranger. He was a SEAL, lived with death every day. His work was vital, patriotic, gritty, admirable, and dangerous just like his lethal good looks and his bold personality.
But this connection between them, the seduction—for all its raw power and reckless abandonment of powerful rules and deep-seated fears—it felt like a gift, like the most precious of gifts, the rules be damned. She was his haven in the storm, and he was her catalyst. With their hearts interlocked, they would find the way—for both of them.
She pushed into his fingers, her hips rocking with each stroke. She dragged his mouth back to hers when he slipped two fingers inside her, wanting his mouth on her, the hard length of him between her legs, buried deep inside her. She was all but coming apart at the seams as he continued to drive her wild. There was power and movement, and she was pinned against the wall. Groaning in deep satisfaction, he slipped his hands down her sides, over her hips, pulling at her thighs, urging her to wrap her legs around him as he once again took her mouth with his in a soul-deep kiss.
The instant she lifted one leg up over his hip, so he could take full advantage of her opening to him, she peaked—hard. The strength of it stunned her, robbing her of breath, but he kept up just the right amount of sweet pressure, so she could wring every last pulsing bit of pleasure from the contact. She met his eyes in the semi-darkness, and they glittered hot and primal with satisfaction.
She dropped her leg, her core still throbbing with aftershocks. Pressing her whole body against him, she murmured, “Let me.” Using her nails to score his lower abdomen, she kissed his chest, running her tongue over his nipples, sucking him and making him thrust his hips toward hers. She pulled on the strings of his sweat pants, loosening the band, pushing the material off his hips before his reaction to her touching him receded.
As he stepped out of the pants, her hands slipped down, he caught them just before they reached his erection, and she was momentarily disappointed until he guided her to him, set her hands around his shaft. Then with a soft brushing retreat, he let go.
While the velvet night cocooned them, he let go, his courage overcoming his fear, his distrust dissolving. God, how she wanted to experience that herself. Tears gathered, and her chest filled. This was his transformation, and it was beautiful.
Then she felt what Natasha had done to him. The scars not only on his member, but his groin. Still healing, like his psyche was still
coming to terms with what had happened to him and how he was going to handle moving on, getting back to himself.
This step was so filled with his courage, she could barely take a breath without it making her want to cry. She put pressure on his chest to get him to back up, then guided him to the bed where she crowded him until he fell back against the mattress. She moved onto the bed, pushing his thighs open.
He was so hard, his erection jutting thick and rigid, proving his words about how much he wanted her. She rubbed her thumb over the tip, plump and full, moist from his pre-cum, and he swore softly under his breath as his head fell back and he arched his neck. She moved her hands up and down, gloving his erection in her firm but gentle grasp, getting used to the rough patches and the healing scars until there was nothing but Blue beneath her hands and not his trauma or what had been done to him.
She kissed his chest, working her way down his body until her mouth was on the first scar just below his right hip bone. “Charlie,” he said, his voice breathless like his chest was in a vise.
She used her tongue on the thin scar, then kissed each healed injury around his thick shaft. His groans and gasps fueled her desire to show him how sexy and whole he was to her.
She had to taste him.
She wrapped her fingers around the hard, velvet-textured length of him, and he pulsed in her tight grip. She slipped her wet mouth over him, his skin hot and salty against the stroke of her tongue, and he shuddered, his whole body straining. He tangled his hands in her hair as she sucked him, taking him as deep as she could. She worked him over with her mouth, teased him with her tongue, and aroused him to a fever pitch of need that made his entire body shake with the restraint of trying to hold back.
“Oh Christ,” he breathed. “I’m going to come.”
Wanting more with him, she heeded that warning, licking him one last time as she crawled onto his lap. She straddled his hips. She could see the uneasiness in him blossom as she settled on him, but this was necessary. Directing his shaft upward, she took him inch by inch into her body, until he filled her completely and her sex stretched tight around his width.
His breathing grew harsh, but it wasn’t all arousal. When she moved, his nostrils flared, and desire heated his eyes. He clutched her waist and rocked her tighter against his hard-muscled body, setting the kind of rhythm that would get him off.
She grasped his wrists, and he immediately bucked, his eyes popping open and his breathing changing from pleasure to fear.
She kept her eyes on his. “It’s okay, Blue.” She pulled his wrists over his head, her restraint loose and light. She just sat there on him until he got used to it.
“Ride me, Charlie.”
She held him down gently, in complete control of his pleasure, of his release, and she reveled in another courageous show of trust.
She moved on him, and he groaned, his eyes going to slits of intense blue. His chest rose and fell heavily, his expression fierce and hungry as he watched her face with each stroke. With a hot, spiraling sensation of her approaching orgasm, she rocked into Blue, just enough to increase the friction inside of her and against her clit. She pressed down on his erection, hard and deep, and came on a soft, shivery moan.
She bent her head down to his and whispered in his ear. “What do you want, Blue?”
“Make me come, Charlie.”
Her whole body responded to those words, feeling as if she’d scored another wonderful gift. Lowering her mouth to his, she sucked and nibbled his lower lip, and when he opened for her, she slipped her tongue inside in a smooth stroke that matched the roll and glide of her hips against his.
Then she let go of him, and when he grabbed her hips, she let him, but he gave her free rein to set the pace. She moved, enthusiastic and shamelessly uninhibited. She felt his thighs tense beneath hers, felt his stomach muscles ripple, and knew his orgasm was imminent.
Cupping his buzzed head, the short hair like velvet, she tipped his head back and dragged her damp, open mouth along his throat, then gently sank her teeth into the taut tendons where neck met shoulder and put her mark on him.
He bucked upward one last time, hard and strong, and his groan of surrender in her ear was the sexiest sound she’d ever heard.
Once his tremors subsided, he tipped her back against the mattress so that he was lying on top of her and stared down at her with awe on his face. Something broke inside her like a dam that had been built up for so many years and all her defenses seemed to crumble and wash away. There were no more barriers to hold on to and no place to hide. Charlie felt exposed for the first time since she’d been sixteen, lost and afloat on an open ocean, her parents and sister dead in the deep. But there was one difference that made her grasp onto that feeling like a life ring.
This time, she wasn’t alone.
9
The early-morning sunlight filtered through the bedroom curtains, placing patches of fire across her body…and…Blue’s.
He was sprawled facedown amidst the pillows and rumpled sheet. She kept her movements to a minimum. This was a warrior whose instincts were on alert whether he was sleeping or awake. At this moment, he was asleep, his breathing deep and measured. No doubt he was exhausted from last night. She had put him through his paces, working him over, trying to get him acclimated to her touching his wrists. Until he was desensitized, she couldn’t tie him. She had slept like the dead herself, once she could keep her hands off him. She went into freefall looking at him, her intense attraction to him to blame. God, her warrior was so sinfully gorgeous he ought to be outlawed. She bit her lip and suddenly remembered…he was illegal. What they had done was so against the fraternization policy, but she didn’t care. It was necessary.
Even asleep and completely out of it, he exuded an earthy, sexual magnetism, one she was finding dangerous on so many levels—physically, emotionally, and mentally. The fact that this man had the ability to affect her so completely was a scary prospect she hadn’t been prepared to face or deal with at first.
She caressed him with her eyes, his dark stubble, thick eyelashes, and face soft in sleep, the naked slope of his beautifully muscled back, all the way down to where the sheet barely concealed his hard contours. It was easy to discover how hot-blooded he was, the heat of him warmed her in the night when he’d reached for her and curled her tight into the curve of his body. That had been another startling revelation, how much she’d enjoyed his presence in her bed, casting away the loneliness she’d lived with so long. She was sure she would never forget this man when the time came for them to go their separate ways.
That was a given. SEAL and diver. Deployments and the dedication to the navy were their top priorities. But sadness stole over her, even as the sight of him buoyed her. She couldn’t fall for him. It would be too hard to let him go.
When his warm hand slipped up her thigh to her hip, she jumped, her gaze going to the movement under the sheet that came to her waist. When she looked back at him, his eyes were open, startling as jewels.
He chuckled, a low, rumbling sound that brushed up against her intimately. “Good morning,” he said, a fleeting smile on his lips. He turned to his back and stretched his long, lean body, and she looked her fill of all that bare skin and cut muscle. His hair in the sunlight was on fire with many shades of caramel. As he drew up his knee, the sheet slipped lower on his abdomen, revealing the edges of his red puckered scars.
He went to clutch the sheet to him, but she wrapped her hand around his. “Don’t. After what we shared last night, do you still think you have to hide from me?”
He swallowed hard. “I wasn’t even sure I could be with you,” he said, his voice husky from sleep. “So, it was very special to me. You gave me the space to be who I am right now without judgment. That’s…everything, Charlie. Being a man with you in a normal, natural way feels better than anything has in a long time.”
She nodded. His eyes were dark with pain as their gazes caught and held. The muscles along his jaw tensed, and his mout
h hardened, his grip on the sheet just as strong.
“Before we go any further, tell me why this is important to you. Why you need me as much as I need you.”
She bit her lip, her heart hammering. This was the moment of truth where she had to talk about her family. Last night, before they had been together, before he’d stripped away her barriers, she wasn’t sure she could speak about it. Everything was raw and sore as if it had happened yesterday, and she wasn’t sure she could.
But then she remembered how he’d given her the gift of trust. Couldn’t she extend herself just that much more to be the woman he needed right now? She wasn’t sure what he was reacting to, but he took one look at her face and dragged her against him, into his arms. He held her tightly. “What are you afraid of, Charlie?”
“Loss,” she whispered. “I’m afraid I’ll get swept away if I let myself remember.”
“You’re safe with me. I’ll anchor you, babe. I’ll hit bottom and grip on so tight, you won’t even feel the give.”
Her throat was so tight, memories flashing through her head like a movie reel, heart-wrenching, gut-ripping agony.
“You were an angel last night, Charlie. It was so hard to let go of my own humiliation. You helped with that. Let me help you.”
As she listened to his voice, an enormous need unfolded in Charlie. A need for comfort, for assurance, a need for him to simply hold her and tell her everything was going to be okay. He turned her face, his gaze connecting with hers, the muscles along his jaw tensing as he stared at her. His voice was quiet and a little gruff. “You can do it, babe,” he said softly. “I’m here for you.”
As if sensing how fragile she was, he didn’t say any more, and she shivered. He drew her against him, pulling up the sheet, his warmth settling into her like a roaring fire. He brushed his mouth against her hair. “Warmer?” he asked, his voice husky.
It was so silly that one softly spoken word made her throat close up solid. Turning her head against his shoulder, she slipped her arm across his waist, a huge ache of longing settling in her.