Jericho (A Redemption Novel)
Page 10
He didn’t like it. Something inside of him twisted painfully. Where was the little bit of sass she kept so well hidden? Where was the woman who was brave enough to call him names?
He grabbed her by the waist and pulled her close so she settled right between his thighs. He hardened slightly. It never failed. Her nearness always did something to him. It heightened his senses. Being this close to her was almost painful.
He had very little control left when it came to her.
“What happened earlier tonight?”
She blinked at him, then swallowed, as if she was trying to gather courage. “I was giving you some space. I thought you were mad at me.”
“I wasn’t mad at you until you pulled that little stunt tonight.”
“It wasn’t a stunt. You sent me away. What was I suppose to think?”
He slid one hand up the back of her shirt, and with his free hand he cupped her cheek. He never had been smooth with women. He had never known how to talk to them, but Georgia was the exception. She was the only woman, the only person, who understood him the slightest bit, and he had hurt her. He hadn’t meant to hurt her. He had sent her away simply because if she stayed he would have done something he might regret.
“You’re supposed to think that you drive me absolutely insane with your little kisses and soft touches.” He pressed his lips to the crease in her neck and groaned. Her skin was so soft. So different from his. He wanted to place his lips all over her naked body. All over her curvy little behind and on her hips and feet and legs and every place that lips could go. “You have no idea what’s going on in this head, Nurse Williams. You have no idea how I really feel about you, because if you did you would be running away. I’m trying very hard to be respectful. To treat you the right way. To keep my hands off you, but you make it very hard for me when you touch me the way you do.”
She relaxed into him and shut her eyes. “This feels nice.”
He stroked his hand down her back as she snuggled into him. He wondered when the last time anybody had held her was. Thinking back on his life, he had never shared an embrace with a woman like this. Holding somebody so close was more intimate than sex. She trusted him. She wasn’t afraid of him when so many women were.
This was new for him, and he didn’t understand why out of all the men in the world she’d chosen him to trust. He didn’t want to do anything to break that trust.
“It does.” He delivered slow, soft kisses to the seam of her neck. She was so soft. She smelled so damned good. She responded to his touch so well that if he died never getting to kiss her anyplace else he would be happy. “Do you have any idea how your lips feel on me, Georgia? I can’t describe it, but every time you kiss me I can’t go back to sleep because I spend the whole night reliving how they felt on me. And when I do sleep, I dream of you. Of kissing you. Of touching you. It’s driving me insane.”
“I won’t do it anymore,” she said in a broken whisper.
“I don’t want you to stop.” He pulled her closer. “But you’re going to have to.” He took his lips from her neck and looked up at her. She was so beautiful. Even in her prim scrubs. Even with her hair bound back so tightly. It almost hurt to look at her. “You can’t touch me like that anymore.”
“Okay,” she whispered.
“Don’t you know why?” He searched her face for understanding, but all he got was those big sad light brown eyes. “You can’t touch a man who’s never been touched before. He doesn’t know how to handle it.”
“I can’t be the only one who’s touched you before. Who’s kissed you. Somebody has to have touched you before.”
“Nobody. Not like you anyway. I’m big. I’m ugly. A lot of people are scared of me.”
“You’re not ugly, Christian. I think you’re gorgeous.”
Beautiful sweet girl. He could tell by the look in her eyes that she wasn’t lying to him. He hoped one day that she would find somebody who would take care of her. He hoped that she would meet somebody worthy of her love. “I like you very much, Georgia Williams.” He kissed her cheeks more times than he could count. He wanted to kiss her lips, to taste her, but he knew that if he stepped over that line he would not be able to stop himself. Even touching her now, holding her close, was dangerous. His control was about to snap at any moment.
He had to let her go. But he couldn’t give her up completely. Not their friendship. That meant something to him. That was something he would always think of fondly. She would be the good memory to get him through bad days.
He loosened his hold on her, slightly preparing to release her, but he couldn’t force himself to just yet. He needed a few more moments to soak up her sweet warmth. After a few moments she placed her hand on his knee. The touch almost undid him, but he didn’t ask her to remove her hand. But then it slid up to his thigh, and in a move that he never expected, she touched his cock.
He looked up at her. It had to be an accident. Sweet little Georgia could never be so bold, but she looked him in the eye and wrapped her fingers around him. Yes, she could be that bold. She was sweet, but there was another side to Georgia that he was forgetting about. One that screamed out to be let free.
“Georgia, what are you doing?”
“Just this time, love.” She rested her head on her shoulder as she slid her hand down his shaft. “Show me how to do this for you.”
He clamped his hand over hers, prepared to pull it away. It was the right thing to do. He knew he didn’t deserve this or her. He had done nothing in his life to earn it.
“Please,” she said, seeming to read his mind. “Show me.”
He turned his head to look down at her. She looked right in his arms. She felt right with her body nestled into his. “You’re absolutely beautiful. Did you know that?”
A slow, stunning smile spread across her face. His heart squeezed. Mine. It was a dangerous thought, but he still thought it. Actually, it was more as though he felt it. Shit. He knew he was going to carry her around with him for a long time, but he wasn’t prepared to keep her with him for the rest of his life.
He took her hand and slid it back up his cock and down again, squeezing her fingers more firmly around him. Yes, she was his. For tonight. She wanted to do this for him and he would let her. At this point he was powerless to stop her.
She kissed his mouth. He had dreamed about the way her pouty lips would feel on his. But he didn’t kiss her back. He didn’t taste her mouth or push his tongue past her lips to deepen their connection. Because he knew if he did he wouldn’t be able to stop. He knew if he started kissing her he would haul her into this bed and make love to her. And if he made love to her he would never be able to let her go.
She deserved more than him. More than a big, cowardly, wounded soldier.
He loosened his grip on her hand, letting her take over. She was a quick study, giving him long slow strokes that felt so good they were acutely painful. Her touch was everything he could have imagined, but it still wasn’t enough. He wanted more of her. He wanted her closer. He slid his hand up her back, under her bra, touching as much bare skin as he could manage.
“Georgia,” he breathed.
She moved her hand faster, seeming to know he was close to the edge. He pumped into her grasp, imagining what it would be like to have her all the time. Not having to steal moments in the middle of the night. Imagining what it would be like to know that when he woke up she would always be there.
Those thoughts proved too much. He came. Hard. His seed spilled all over her fingers. She looked up at him as if she wasn’t sure what had happened. But then she smiled at him again and stepped away to the sink to get a washcloth. She cleaned them both, and set her full pouty mouth on his one last time.
“Good night, soldier.”
* * *
Georgia slept soundly that next morning. She hadn’t expected to
. She expected to be horrified at what she had done with Christian. But she wasn’t. She couldn’t regret it. She felt close to him when she hadn’t felt close to anybody for so long. And it wasn’t the type of closeness she felt with her sister. It was more than that, more intense.
He’d wrapped his big arms around her and made her feel safe and beautiful and all the things she had been missing for so long. She didn’t feel empty when she was with him. He made her feel powerful and womanly and sexy. He made her want more with him.
That scared her. She shouldn’t want what she could never have.
A little sadness settled around her heart. She knew she could never touch him again the way she had last night. They’d talked about it. She had promised. But she was glad she wasn’t the only one to feel madness. He felt it, too. It was in his beautiful words and the way his kissed her face and stroked her back.
He thought he was some kind of animal. She could never see him the way he saw himself or the way the rest of the world saw him. He was so gentle with her. He made her want to explore her sexuality. She hadn’t realized it was possible because she had never thought she would get over her rape.
It made her feel hopeful. Hopeful that maybe one day she could have a happy life with a man. So when she settled into bed that morning, instead of feeling guilty or shameful like she had been raised to, she dreamed of him and about how good she felt when she was wrapped up in his arms.
When she woke up two hours later she was still exhausted, but as much as she wanted to turn over and go back to sleep she couldn’t. Abby was sitting beside her, staring down at her. She was better than any alarm clock on the market.
“Hello again, my love.” She picked her up and lifted her over her head in an attempt to wake up her tired muscles. “You’re getting heavy. Now that you’ve turned one you’ve packed on the pounds.”
Abby frowned at her, apparently not liking Georgia’s joke. “Good God, what a face! If you’re giving me that look at one, what kind of looks am I going to get when you’re sixteen?” Georgia pulled her baby to her chest and held her tightly. Sixteen. Georgia was so tired she didn’t know if she was going to make it to see Abby’s sixteenth birthday.
The lack of sleep was starting to get to her. Her head ached horribly. Most days she went around with a headache until she forced herself to take some aspirin. Her body was starting to feel the effects, too. She ached all over. But as much as she wanted to get a full night’s rest, she couldn’t. She needed to spend time with her baby.
When she’d first learned she was pregnant, a counselor at the women’s center had brought up adoption. It was an option she had never thought about. But the counselor had told her that some mothers had a hard time coming to terms with how their babies were conceived, that once they were born they had a hard time raising the child of their rapist.
Georgia thought about it then. How would she feel raising a child who looked like Robert? Or acted like him? What if her baby grew up to have some major character defect like the man who made her? It was all terrifying to Georgia, but she’d taken the risk. Because even though the baby was half of him, it was half of her, too. And she knew she couldn’t give part of herself away.
She only wished she had some sign that she was doing the right thing for her child. The guilt never seemed to go away. Abby wasn’t going to have the life Georgia always thought her children would have. She wasn’t going to have a mother and father to love her. She wasn’t going to have the best of everything. She didn’t even have a mother who could give the best of herself because she spent so much of her time exhausted. But what could she do? If she switched to the day shift she might get some sleep, but she wouldn’t get to spend as much time with her daughter.
Georgia worked twelve-hour shifts. Abby would have to spend all day in day care. Even if the separation didn’t break Georgia, the cost of that would.
Right now she didn’t have a choice. Unless some divine intervention occurred, she was going to have to keep this up until she collapsed.
* * *
“You look less blown up, son,” General Lee said when he walked into Christian’s room the next morning.
Christian smiled, glad for the visit. Since Georgia had left him last night he had spent entirely too much time thinking about her and her touch and her smell and the way she felt pressed against him. Thoughts of her were driving him crazy. He needed a distraction. He needed to turn his thoughts from her. “Thanks. I think.”
“Don’t mention it.” He lowered his big body into the chair beside Christian’s bed.
The general, fresh back from his cruise, looked a little different himself. He was very tanned, almost the color of baked bread, and he was wearing blue jeans. Christian found the jeans more surprising than the pink shirt he’d worn before he’d left.
His shirt was still tucked in and his clothes were neatly ironed. But the thing that had changed most about the general was that he looked relaxed. The intensity seemed to have melted from his face, from his entire body. Hell, he looked happy.
“How was your cruise?”
“My wife liked it.” He shrugged in typical fashion. “She wants to go on another at Christmas. I agreed to take her.”
“Did you like it?”
“Didn’t have to pay for a single meal on the boat. I had steak nearly every night. Good steak, too. Not that stuff they served in the chow hall on base. Have you ever had molten-lava cake? Damn thing was like a chocolate volcano. It was good.”
“It’s okay if you like to cruise, sir. I hear senior citizens often enjoy them.”
The general’s brow furrowed. “You’ve become a real smart-ass since you were blown to hell.”
“It’s your fault. You went all soft on me.”
“Soft. I’d still give it to you good in a fight,” he retorted, and Christian believed him. “Listen. I have some news for you from your doctor.”
“From my doctor? Why isn’t he telling me?”
“Because I wanted to, and just because I’m retired doesn’t mean I still don’t have pull.”
Christian sat all the way up, nervous for the first time in a while. A million rapid-fire thoughts ran through his mind. “What is it?”
“You’re going to be released in two weeks.”
His gaze shot up to the general’s. “Oh?” At first he felt elated relief, but then he realized that leaving here meant he would have to return to life, and without the marines, he didn’t have one.
“You’ve been promoted.” He stood up and saluted Christian. “Captain Howard, congratulations.”
The news sent Christian reeling. Promoted? He thought he was going to be discharged from the marines, not promoted. He didn’t deserve it. He’d survived when he shouldn’t have. His men had died. His body wasn’t what it used to be—he had damaged skin and an arm he could barely move. They were going to let him go back and hold a gun and lead men? It didn’t seem real.
“Are you sure?”
“Would I lie to you about something like that? You were damn brave out there and your country appreciates it. The real question is what are you going to do now that you are eligible to go back?”
“I’m going to go back, sir,” he said without hesitation. “There is nothing else for me.”
“You know there is life outside of the marines.” The general shook his head. “I’m not going to go into that with you again. You know how I feel about it. But if you’re going to stay in, you don’t have to go overseas. You’re a born leader. Have you ever thought about training new recruits?”
He hadn’t. He hadn’t thought about anything except getting cleared to serve again. “It’s something I might consider.”
The general nodded. “If I haven’t told you before, I’m proud of you, of what you did out there. You’re the kind of man who would make any father proud.”
“Why didn’t you go into the family business? Wasn’t that in the plans for you since you were a child?”
He had thought about that question from time to time. There was a place for him, or so he was assured by the man he had chosen to run the company in his father’s place. “My mother wanted me to be a doctor. My father never said that he wanted me to run the business, but I think he expected me to come back to it eventually. When they died I was twenty-one. I didn’t know anything about running a business. Especially one as big as my father’s.”
“But you still own the company?”
“I have sixty-five percent of the shares.”
“Have you ever thought about running it now?”
“I wouldn’t know where to start. I’ve been a marine for almost eleven years. I don’t think I could trade my combat boots for loafers.”
“I don’t think they make loafers in your size.” The general reached up and set his hand on Christian’s shoulder. “You’re not twenty-one anymore. You’ve learned a lot. You’ve led before. I can’t imagine leading a company is much harder than leading men into battle.”
“It’s just a different kind of warfare.”
“I’m not suggesting that you take over, but I am telling you that you have options now. You should think really hard before you make a decision.”
CHAPTER 10