by Angel Payne
Rayna sneaked her tongue out to rewet her lips. Beautiful? He was tossing that out to describe her when he looked at her like this, touched her like this? “Th-Thank you.”
She gulped deeply. To her shock, Z matched the action. He paused his hands and then rotated his head, face intense, as he glanced to her sweats and panties. He blinked as if realizing what he’d just done…and was silently admitting that this might not be a good idea after all.
She needed to listen to that instinct, too. This was her opportunity. She could roll away right now. He’d probably let her. They’d laugh awkwardly, and this moment would officially be in their past. They could go back to standing on opposite sides of the bridge that connected them, enjoying the view while safe on their respective shores and traveling across from time to time for visits…but never touching in the middle. Never throwing off the balance. Him, Dominant. Her, never going there. Yes, balance was good. Balance was necessary.
Zeke moved his hands again. Into the crevices where her thighs joined her torso.
Buh-bye, opportunity.
She twisted her hands into the sheets as her heartbeat set up camp in her throat. Zeke moved his hands down and pushed at the insides of her legs. She clenched in resistance.
“I’m only going to look, Rayna.” His voice was so intimate she doubted someone standing at the door would be able to hear it. “I promise…if it hurts, I’ll stop.”
She swept her stare up to his face. He waited with those banked embers in his eyes, with that perfect slant of his lips, with his wide shoulders set, waiting on her patiently. Everything about him said the only thing on his mind was her health and safety.
If he’d tethered his Dom for the night, she could damn well do the same with her whiny infant.
She relaxed her legs.
Zeke opened them.
Rayna gulped hard and looked up at the ceiling. She mentally filed it as a necessary chore, like a root canal or a pap smear. The gynecologist at the base had a round sticker on the ceiling over her stirrup table, a conversation bubble that said I Hate This. That sign had always pissed her off, but now she’d give anything for even that distraction from the strong, sure fingers that parted her pubic curls, softly wending his way toward the circle of steel embedded in the hood of her most intimate flesh.
She bit the inside of her lip when he found it. Nobody had touched her there since that awful night in Thailand. The only reason she went near it was to wash the area. She certainly hadn’t inspected the little ring like Zeke did now, softly twisting it, lifting it a couple of different ways to observe the insertion point in her skin…
And unleashing a wholly unexpected force in her body.
Force, as in an eight-plus on the Richter scale. Cracked cliffs of composure. Tsunami time.
Holy hell.
Thank God she already had a death grip on the sheets. Her increased torque wouldn’t appear odd. Z didn’t have to know that the reason she tortured her Mulberry four hundred threads was because of the jolt he’d just given her entire sex with his tender exam. The little flicks were like the switch on a stunning light display, flooding her pussy with new awareness, immersive heat…
Crap. How was this possible? She wavered between a wild need to know the answer and a screaming who-gives-a-shit. Her entire core was suddenly electric and alive, and she struggled not to cry out in pure wonder. She had no idea how she limited herself to the sharp breath she pulled in through her nose, which made Zeke stop his exam.
“You okay, honey?”
“Fine.” She sounded like a chipmunk and hated herself for it. What the hell was wrong with her? And how on earth could she gain a second of pleasure from that thing they’d forced into her flesh? She cleared her throat and said more forcefully, “Yeah, fine.”
Zeke still didn’t move a muscle or, for that matter, a finger. “You don’t look fine.”
“Can you just focus and finish?” she snapped.
He tilted his head as if preparing to fire a comeback but gave her thick silence through the rest of his inspection, instead. Damn it. This had been his stubborn-ass idea, and now her psyche was the pinball machine of arousal, guilt, irritation, and confusion. As the man himself enjoyed saying all the time, this was some messed-up shit.
Fortunately, he only subjected her to another thirty seconds of the wordless tension—and the strokes to her libido that recruited even her toes into sheet-twisting duty. When he finally lifted his head, he wore a look she couldn’t define. His mouth was still an unreadable line, though his gaze had changed hues again. His eyes, bright as emeralds, emphasized his ungodly long lashes and the tan he’d brought home from the mission. Great. Like she needed the reminders that the man’s face was as captivating as his fingers.
“Well, I’m shocked,” he said. “They got it right and did it clean.” His lips lifted a little. The smile extended up, crinkling the corners of his eyes. “You’re going to be fine, bird,” he assured her. “It looks good.”
Rayna admitted her own surprise. “Really?”
“Yep.” He nodded. “Genital piercings heal fast, if they heal right.”
The statement, along with the breath he let out after it, enabled Rayna to finally ID his previous expression. Relief. From what she could tell, a bunch of the stuff. Despite this wholly uncomfortable situation, she smiled, too. It seemed he’d been really worried about her, so it wasn’t just a chest-beating thing to get his testosterone card punched.
She was relieved too, though her mindset stemmed from a different purpose than Zeke’s. Much different. She debated revealing it but realized this might be her only chance of attaining it. She’d never be in this position with Zeke again. And she’d never have the guts to ask it of anyone else.
“So if it’s healed, you can take it out, right?”
She expected his smile to fall. It did. She expected his moment of contemplation after it, as well. But his shadowed scowl? That wasn’t on the checklist. Nor was the retort he gave back in a guttural murmur.
“Why do you want it out?”
She actually laughed. “You’re kidding, right?” She met his stare now, inch for unblinking inch. “You have to be kidding. You think I need a memento of that hell? A reminder of what happened?”
Zeke shifted his hands to the tops of her thighs. His grip was steady, matching his entire mien. “What they did to your body healed, but what they did to your soul hasn’t. And you’re not treating that wound, Rayna. Now it’s becoming infected, dysfunctional.” He jerked his head toward her bottles of meds on the desk. “And it’s why you still need all that shit.”
Hell. She should have kept her intention to herself. Just gone to a piercing parlor and let some stranger get the ring out of her. Now she had to deal with what Z’s words did to her heart, the rip they widened inside. “What’s your point?”
Zeke caught the hand she lifted to cover her eyes. “The remembering is what heals you, Ray-bird. It’s what makes you stronger. Better.”
She sniffed, unsuccessfully battling tears. The torment got worse when Z intensified her horror by guiding her hand down, until she touched the steel circle that felt like an alien implant to her body.
“Feel it,” he directed. “Do it. Feel your body. Love it again. You’re so fucking stunning, Rayna. You’re warm, you’re vibrant, and you’re alive. You did it. You survived.” He took her index finger and swirled its tip around the little jewel embedded into the clit ring. “This piercing isn’t your shame. It’s your medal of honor. Touch it.”
The tears came faster. He was a mush of colors across her vision, but in the mirrors of her soul, she’d never seen things more clearly. She could practically hear the storm canopies being thrown off her psyche, exposing the skies of her spirit, the heights of her strength. And ohhh yes…the pulsing needs of her body too. She set them free a little bit more, using her fingers to spread the wings of her sex, gasping as pulses of lust tore through her intimate tissues, now welcoming them. Rejoicing in them.
> It was all because of him. Her wisdom. Her hero. Her friend.
But damn it, right now, she didn’t need a friend. She needed more. If only for tonight, for this hour of liberation and light, she needed him as more.
“Zeke.” It left her on a desperate breath. His fingers still twined with hers, though she now realized he was following her lead, not the other way around. “Please…” The supplication made their breaths mingle, too. She smiled as she pulled on his middle finger, leading that beautifully long digit toward the opening into her deepest core. The motion brushed his thumb against her ring, moving the metal directly on her clit again. She throbbed with wet need. “Shit!”
He moved over her on an urgent surge. His breath, cool as rain yet warm as summer, blew across her neck and face.
“Ray-bird.” His voice was husky, his stare dark with his complete focus on her.
Rayna gazed back, trying to smile through her lingering tears. That effort went to hell when he caught a drop with his lips, wicking it from her with a little kiss. He did it to another. Another.
Forget crying now. Or breathing. She surrendered them both to wonderment. From the moment she’d met him, this man was gunning for a header of his own in Webster’s under the word ferocious. This tenderness illuminated a new facet of him. How many more of these surprises would he unveil tonight?
She yearned to get started on that answer, but the man himself didn’t seem to agree. Though his other still hand circled the sensitive membranes at her intimate entrance, driving her into the stratosphere from aching heat, he didn’t enter her.
“Zeke, please!”
A sigh fell off his lips. “Rayna.” It sounded damn near like an entreaty, too. A deep furrow invaded his brow. “Fuck…Rayna.”
She dug her fingers into the longer hairs along his nape. “You did this to me. Now you have to help me!”
A ragged sigh shook his whole frame. He dropped his forehead to hers. “Honey, I’d love nothing better than to bury my finger inside you right now. I’ve fantasized about it, okay? Lots of times. I’ve dreamed about what you’d feel like, taste like, be like. But—” He stopped himself with a huff.
Rayna grabbed his jaw. “But what?”
His eyes glimmered like hazel kaleidoscopes. The rest of his face tightened. “If I get my finger inside you, I won’t stop there.”
Hell. If his touch didn’t have her soaked already, the confession would’ve done the trick. Her tunnel sluiced with new arousal. Her nipples pushed at her sleep tee. Her inner thighs burned. She writhed, ready to detonate, hating the word stop in so many ways.
“I don’t want you to.” She ran her thumb along his jaw, savoring the bite of his scruff.
A dark laugh quirked his face. “You know I’ve spent the last eight weeks with a bunch of rancid guys, right? You know my only lover’s been my fist and that the only reason I even suggested getting you like this was because I got so damn worried about your piercing, and—” He dropped his head with a harsh grunt. “Shit. If this was an op, my approach would’ve had us both toes up with bullets in our brains.”
“No.” She dug her fingers beneath his beard, digging into his skin. “No talk of killing. No talk of death.” When his gaze lifted into hers, she didn’t hold back on letting him see everything inside her. The pure gratitude. The raw attraction. The scorching need. “We’ve danced at that edge before. Not now. Tonight, the dance is about living. About celebrating.” She let her hands travel back, scoring his scalp again. “I know this isn’t forever. I know you can’t give me that. It’s not what I want.”
When conflict still glittered in his gaze, she took a determined breath and shifted her other hand—from her crotch to his. She shoved back her insecurity. This point had to stick. When her fingers closed around his erection, she stroked it as if his clothes weren’t there and she held his bare, hard length in her hand.
“I only want you, Zeke. I need you. Here. Tonight. Inside me. Please.”
Chapter Three
It wasn’t the first time a woman grabbed him like this. It wouldn’t be the last. But holy hell, Z didn’t know if another’s touch would ever affect him this way. His thighs trembled. His heartbeat skidded. Christ, his toes were tingling.
He had to get a grip. She wasn’t some goddamn lust fairy. She was simply the first body he’d been near in two months that didn’t smell like a goat and fart like a cretin. So what if she’d been his go-to fantasy during those months, his escape from considering that the squad’s targets had enough plutonium to decimate half of South Asia? So what if her body was more sleek, sensual, lithe, and gorgeous than even his best dreams? So what if that diamond nestled in her lush curls turned the peach beneath it into his new fruit to crave?
Shit.
His intention had only been to make sure she was safe, comforted, and lulled back into a peaceful sleep. He was a man of control, including his own body. He’d been able to play Dom with totally naked women for hours and never experienced what he did from ten minutes of this woman with her tousled hair and faded Princess Leia T-shirt.
Wasn’t that the blinding flash of the obvious here? This woman. Rayna. The one who didn’t get a category because she was a category. Light as mist but fierce as hail. Tiny as a sprite but formidable as a queen. Special. Incredible. A miracle.
His. Just for a few perfect hours, he’d have her in so many ways he’d dreamed. She wanted it—and goddamnit, did he want it.
He almost tossed his head to see if there was a demon on one shoulder and an angel on the other. “Hell,” he growled. “Ray-bird, I don’t think you understand what—”
“Stop it. I’m not thirteen. I damn well understand what I’m asking for!”
“No.” In one instant, he went from his half-respectful pose to sliding hard between her legs. “No, I don’t think you do.”
Thud. Thud. He locked her wrists down to the mattress on either side of her head, not compromising his hold or his stare. “I don’t do smooth jazz and long, slow walks on the beach, honey. I’ll fuck you like a Stratocaster solo, hard and long and sweaty, until your ears ring and you don’t know which way is up anymore.” Her pupils dilated and her mouth parted, and shit if that didn’t turn him on in five fresh ways. “I won’t tie you up. I won’t use any kinky toys. But I promise your skin will carry my marks. My taste will linger on your tongue. Your body will remember, for a very long time, exactly who’s been inside it.”
He dragged his grip from her wrists to her elbows, leaving trails with his thumbnails on the way. Rayna shuddered and arched against him, almost stopping his next words from getting past his dry throat. “Be careful about asking for the fire, little bird, if you’re not ready for the burn.”
Funny that he mentioned fire. The woman met his scrutiny with eyes that were filled with the stuff, turning into someone he barely recognized as she panted hard. The flames burned brighter as he circled his thumbs to the tender flesh of her inner elbows. She cried out and writhed as if he’d stroked her whole clit. Fascinating. Exhilarating. So accessible, so real. He loved watching her, observing what he could do to her.
Finally, she collected herself enough to rasp a reply. “You got flint and sticks inside those pants, Boy Scout? Or are you just going to talk all night?”
His grin busted his face so wide, it hurt. But only for a second. After that, he was too busy capturing her mouth with his. Commanding her lips to form with his. Meshing her tongue and teeth with his. She opened eagerly for him, giving back every degree of his passion. He moaned with wonder. For years, he’d kissed nothing but carefully schooled submissives who assumed they should let him do all the work, let him be all the kindling. How long had it been since a woman returned every drop of lust he gave from their first kiss? She astounded him. Ignited him. Scared the shit out of him.
He wanted more.
A lot more.
As they kept going at each other like teenagers at Gas Works Park, adorably breathy sounds erupted in her throat, driving him to
the edge of insanity. But the woman wasn’t going to settle for the edge. Since he still had her arms pinned, Rayna raised her legs for her cause. She wrapped both around him, dragging up his T-shirt with her toes, climbing his spine with the balls of her feet. The action forced his mouth from hers to make room for his astonished huff.
“Fuck.” He pulled away long enough to help her finish the task, balling his shirt up and tossing it to the shadows. Her little gasp of admiration, joined by her curious fingers at the round three-part tattoo over his heart, shot his body full of electricity. He dipped back in and suckled his way to her neck, her scent swirling into his senses. Cinnamon. Cardamom. A little exotic. A lot erotic. “You never told me you were part Gumby, honey.”
She trailed her mouth to the base of his throat. “Yoga is very helpful for stress levels when you’re on the run from slave traders.”
“Is that so?” He teethed her earlobe.
“Uhhhh…” She gasped and wriggled. “Uh-huh.”
“Jungle yoga.” He grinned against her nape. “That sounds real nice. Were you…naked?”
She lightly kicked his ass through his pants. “No! You ever been bitten by a baseball-sized bug, Sergeant?”
“A number of times.” With no more warning than that, he moved his grip into the bottom of her shirt, shoving it up and then off. “No bugs in here,” he drawled, drinking in the sight of her erect breasts. She colored a little, but that didn’t stop him from dipping his head to one of the perfect mounds, dragging her nipple between his teeth. Goddamn, she tasted amazing. He took in more of her warm, delicious flesh as Rayna arched into him, tangling her hands in his hair again.
“But plenty of—oh, mmmm—bites.” She finished it with a longer mewl as he slid his mouth to her other breast, tugging at the nub with similar demand. He joined his hiss to hers as she dug her nails into his nape and along his shoulders. Her eagerness was a goddamn stream of liquid fire on his body. To know she desired him like this, to feel it in her frantic touch, to see it making erotic shadows in her eyes, made his dick pulse just as if she were licking every inch of it with the tongue she sneaked out to wet her lips.