by Simone Stark
Now that you’ve flirted with me (like a pro, I might add), the gloves are off, cher. I get to flirt back. I get to ask…if you got me messy, would you clean me up? I get to tell you that if I got you messy, I’d get you so clean it would be filthy.
She sighed, imagining the same. Imagining his tongue sliding over her skin, catching all the bits of powdered sugar, lingering on her neck, at the tip of her breast, in all the places she ached for Roux when she was alone at night, dreaming of him.
Since we’re on the subject of filthy, how about this? Mardi Gras beads aren’t just tossed in the bottom of the box, béb. They’re given for very specific acts…which I have not performed. Yet. Let’s just say that now I owe you a thorough examination of my fur.
But you should know that when I finally see you, and your examination is complete, Dr. Trent, I’m going to return these beads, and I’m going to want you to earn them proper. You see, after all these letters, tempting me with your mind and your heart, I want a look at all of you.
I want you to lift your shirt for me.
Abby sat down on the couch, eyes and mouth wide, unable to stop herself from reading that sentence again and again. Nine words that set her on fire—making her want to strip naked and crawl into bed and read them again and again, sliding her hand over her too-hot, too-sensitive skin, pretending it was his hand. Pretending it was him.
Her Roux.
She exhaled, leaning her head back against the couch and closing her eyes. What was she doing?
They didn’t know each other. They’d exchanged a handful of letters. That wasn’t enough to know each other. She didn’t know anything about him.
And he knew even less about her.
He didn’t even know what she looked like. He thought she was her sister. It occurred to her, fleetingly, that he hadn’t mentioned the picture at all. Not that it mattered—something had to have inspired him to set her on fire with this letter. Something like a picture of Kelly.
Her heart ached with the truth.
No good could come of her obsession with Roux. Especially now. Especially once she’d lied to him. It wasn’t like any man would take well to being told, “Oops, I sent you a picture of my hot sister instead of me. My bad. Hope you like muffin tops.”
She almost didn’t read on, except of course she did, discovering that he’d changed topic as though it were perfectly normal to tell her he wanted to get her naked and immediately follow it with a discussion of books.
I’m reading the biography you sent. Did you know that Lafayette and his beautiful wife were madly in love? She died young and tragically, but her last words were to him: Je suis toute à vous.
Lucky French bastard.
À vous
Abby set her fingers to her lips and then to the French words. She understood better than anyone how letters could keep someone warm. But he was being kept warm by the wrong person.
She’d lied to him. And there was no way this ended well.
Things might have gone differently if she hadn’t reached for her laptop, discarded on the coffee table. If she’d set the letter down and went out with her friends.
Maybe then she would have let the fantasy go on for another letter. For two. For ten.
Instead, she opened the browser to a translation tool and typed in the French words from his letter.
Je suis toute à vous.
I am always yours.
She slammed the laptop shut like it had burned her.
CHAPTER SEVEN
HER LETTER WAS LATE.
There’d never been a gap of longer than two weeks between Roux’s letters and Abby’s replies, and it had been three weeks, four days. His team had been on a mission in the mountains of Yemen, finally obliterating the ISIS cell they’d been sent to destroy, so Roux had been out of camp and without access to mail for two weeks—two weeks of dirt and dust and firefights and fucking hell made somehow better by the promise of a letter waiting for him back at camp.
Red had taken a bullet to the arm during the mission, so once Roux made sure he was taken care of—back to base in Germany for rehab—his first priority was Abby.
Then a shower, clean clothes, food and sleep.
But Abby first.
Abby before everything.
Always Abby.
Except there was no letter waiting.
Roux was a commanding officer in the Army Special Forces. A team leader of the most highly skilled soldiers in the United States military. He was an expert sniper, a medic to rival ER doctors the world over, and was known for his unwavering calm. Over his career, he’d faced the worst of Al Qaeda, ISIS, the Taliban and Boko Haram without flinching.
And somehow, it was the absence of a pretty pink envelope that wrecked him.
Where was she? Had something happened to her?
Christ. Had something happened to her?
Why wasn’t he with her? He couldn’t keep her safe from the goddamned desert.
He stood there, in the center of his tent, staring at the spot where her letter should have been, imagining all the ways she might have been hurt. Imagining twisted metal, fire, hospital beds. Men.
Fucking hell.
The thought rocketed through him, making him cold with rage. If another man had touched her—had hurt her—Roux would tear down every building in Colorado to find and destroy him.
Roux took a deep breath. He had to calm down. To think clearly.
She wasn’t hurt. He’d know if she was hurt. He’d have felt it. He carried her in his damn heart. He’d know. He rubbed a hand over his face before he screamed to the empty tent. “Fuck!”
He had to find her.
Fucking now.
Just to know she was okay.
“Sarge?”
Roux spun toward the voice, finding Martinez in the door to his tent. “What.”
The word came out low and violent, and the soldier’s eyes went wide as he took a step back. “Sorry.”
It took Roux a second to remember that the kid had just finished his first mission—that he was likely tired and overwhelmed by the experience. Roux took another breath, trying for calm. “No. It’s fine. What do you need?”
“I got mail for you.”
Roux’s breath caught in his chest, relief coming so hard and so fast he thought he might pass out. “What?”
“It was mixed in with my stuff.” Martinez lifted his hand, that pink stationery gleaming like fucking gold.
Roux went for it like a starving man went for food, tearing it open before the kid even left the tent. Christ. She was okay. She was still there. She was still his.
Dear Roux,
I’m sorry. But this was a mistake.
What. The fuck.
Had he scared her off? Maybe she’d thought it was weird that some stranger in the middle of nowhere, halfway around the world, wanted to strip her naked and do nasty things to her. Nasty, filthy, fucking wonderful things.
This was not a goddamned mistake.
It was the best thing he’d ever done. It was the best thing that had ever happened to him.
I just…I’m afraid of what you’re doing to me. It’s too much. You’re too much.
No. You’re perfect.
I’m just not enough.
Trust me, this was a mistake.
I’m sorry.
Abby
No. Fucking. Way.
She wasn’t ending this. Not when it had just begun. Not when he intended for it to go on forever.
He went for the door of his tent. Showers, sleep and food could wait.
Abby first.
Always Abby.
CHAPTER EIGHT
SHE WAS A MESS.
It had been three weeks since Abby had written to Roux—since she’d ended it. Not that there had been anything to end. They’d written to each other on and off for a few months. It wasn’t like they’d been going steady or anything. Maybe she’d overdone it with the letter ending it. Maybe she should have just stopped writing.
/> Maybe then she wouldn’t be waiting for a letter from him every day.
Maybe she wouldn’t be spending her Saturdays pining away for him in a dog park. She looked down at Darcy waiting patiently at her feet, tennis ball in his mouth, tail wagging in anticipation of her next throw. “I have to get over myself.”
Darcy’s tail wagged.
“Drop it.”
Darcy did not drop it.
Abby took the slimy ball in hand. “So gross. Drop it.”
Darcy held on tighter.
“Darcy, you could go easy on me, you know. I’m nursing a broken heart.”
Darcy growled, as if to say, And whose fault is that?
“I will win. I have thumbs.” Abby pulled harder, finally extracting the ball. Darcy barked and backed up, ready to take off when Abby threw it. She did, and he bounded away happily, unaware of his owner’s sadness.
She looked down at her watch, realizing that she had to get home if she was going to change in time for Naomi’s party that afternoon—she didn’t think Kelly would appreciate her turning up in yoga pants and a t-shirt that read Fur Fox Sake. Not that Abby imagined anyone at a three-year-old’s birthday party even giving her a second glance. Unless maybe Noisy Nicolai was single and into pathetic spinster aunts.
A girl could dream.
Except the guy who sang “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” at kids’ birthday parties wasn’t who she was dreaming of. She was dreaming of a big, bad American hero with broad shoulders and brown eyes and a beard she wanted to rub up against. She bet he had one of those ridges above his hip. The vee that peeked out above low-slung cargo pants.
What did a girl even do with that vee? She didn’t know how she would respond when faced with it. And right there—that was proof that Roux was not for her. He was about twenty-five different kinds of out of her league. He was stratospherically out of her league.
With a sigh, she herded Darcy into the back of her Jeep and headed back home, unlocking the door to the house as her cell rang from the zippered pocket of her yoga pants. Ugh. Kelly was probably pissed she wasn’t there yet. Abby wasn’t going to be popular when her sister heard she wasn’t going to be there for at least another forty-five minutes.
She pulled out her phone and answered it without looking. “I know. I’m late. I’m sorry!”
Silence.
She pulled the phone away from her ear to make sure the call had connected. Unknown number. “Hello?”
“What did I tell you about apologizing, cher?”
Her heart leapt into her throat.
Holy crap.
It was Roux.
Holy crap.
He was on her phone.
“I—” Think, Abby. “Who is this?”
He laughed. Deep and low and rumbling and totally perfect, the sound rolling through her just like she’d imagined it would. Straight to her stomach, sending it into not entirely pleasant somersaults. Straight to somewhere else. “You really want to play that game?”
She clutched the phone tight and closed her eyes. “Roux.”
He let out a long breath, as though he’d been holding it in. “Christ,” he said softly. “You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting to hear you say that.”
“How did you get my number?”
“I’m a highly trained special operative of the United States Army, cher. You think a li’l thing like a phone number would trip me up?”
“Where are you?”
“Germany.”
Safe.
It was her turn to exhale, feeling somehow lighter knowing he wasn’t in danger. “Good.”
“You worried about me, darlin’?”
She closed her eyes, then whispered, “Every day.”
There was a pause. And then his soft, liquid reply. “I’m safe, baby.”
The words rioted through her, the endearment making her ache. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t know what he sounded like. He couldn’t become more real. She couldn’t regret what she’d done any more than she already did. Not and survive. She shook her head. “Roux. I can’t.”
“I know,” he said. “You’re late.”
She was late? For what? Oh. Crap. “It’s my niece’s birthday. But—”
He interrupted before she could tell him that wasn’t what she’d meant. “Then you’d better go. I’ll call you later tonight.”
“No!” she blurted out. “I mean. You can’t— I don’t—”
He inhaled, long and slow, and she was instantly jealous of his calm. Of the way he seemed to be able to survive this phone call. “Okay, cher. Here’s what we’ll do. You go to your birthday party and you sing your song and you eat your cake and you come home and you get naked and get into bed. And I’ll call you at eleven o’clock your time. And you’ll answer the phone. And then I’ll make some things clear. But first, I’m gon’ make one thing crystal clear.”
She was too shocked by the way he said it all—as though he simply had to speak the words and they would come true—to say anything but, “What thing?”
She could have sworn she heard him smile at that. Through the phone. Across thousands of miles and an ocean.
“This isn’t a mistake.”
He was gone before she could reply.
CHAPTER NINE
ABBY WAS in bed at 10:25 with her teeth brushed, her face washed, and the lights off. The blankets were pulled up to her chin.
She was not naked.
She was not naked, because she had no intention of answering the phone when it rang. She intended to be asleep when it rang. She was an intelligent woman, one who knew her own mind. One who knew better than anyone that answering the phone was a terrible idea because nothing good would come of it.
Nothing good would come of hearing his liquid voice in the darkness.
Nothing good would come of wanting him.
Nothing good would come of prolonging the inevitable, which was Roux discovering that she’d lied to him and she wasn’t beautiful and blonde and perfect, but plain and pudgy and decidedly imperfect. He’d take one look at her and realize that they were no kind of match and run for the hills.
Which would break her heart, because she wished he’d take one look at her and lose the power of speech and lift her in his arms and take her to bed.
But fantasies were not reality, and a girl had to have a head on her shoulders.
Darcy sighed and rearranged himself against her leg like a deadweight, and Abby reached down to stroke the dog’s ear, soft and velvety. “I’m going to sleep now.”
The dog did not reply.
Silence stretched, and Abby stared up at the dark ceiling for interminable minutes before turning on her side, finding Bennet curled up on the next-door pillow. “I am,” she told the cat. “Right now.”
Bennet blinked.
More silence.
The clock on the bedside table glowed. 10:37.
Abby closed her eyes. “Now.”
This isn’t a mistake. The words echoed through her, dark and sinful on a gorgeous Cajun drawl.
Her eyes flew open. She should never have answered the phone. Now she could hear him. Now she could imagine him, tall and muscled and handsome and bearded and instead of consoling herself with the idea that his voice was probably high-pitched and Mickey Mouse-like—because obviously the man had a flaw—she knew the truth.
He had a voice like sex.
And suddenly, every word he’d ever written to her, every flirt, every promise, every sentence was in her head. Dark and devastating.
Abigail Trent, you are perfect.
She sighed and rolled over. Darcy lifted his head. “What? I’m getting comfortable.”
If you got me messy, cher, would you clean me up?
She groaned and turned her face into her pillow. “Uggghhh!”
She was going to be haunted by that voice. Forever.
Darcy sat up. Bennet leapt from the bed and sauntered out of the room. Abby sat up and called after the cat, “Oh, am I bothering you
?”
Bennet didn’t look back.
Abby checked the clock. 10:53.
Heart pounding, hands trembling, and time wouldn’t stop marching.
She got out of bed.
Darcy followed.
She sat.
Darcy sat.
Looking at the dog, Abby said, “I’m not answering when he calls.”
Darcy tilted his head.
“Maybe he won’t call.”
Darcy lay down.
“He won’t call. Men don’t call. They don’t call so much that there’s a whole thing about how men don’t call.”
Darcy put his head on his paws.
“He won’t.” She lay back down. “He won’t.”
The phone rang.
Darcy’s head came up.
“I’m not answering,” she said into the darkness. But she was already reaching for her phone. Because obviously, obviously, she was going to answer it. Connecting the call, she set the phone to her ear. “Hello?”
“I told you you’d answer the phone.”
The arrogance in the words was palpable. She hated it. Or, rather, she hated the way it hummed through her, like he knew every inch of her, better than she knew herself. Still, she wouldn’t let him win. “Who is this?”
He laughed. Soft and low and secret and then that was humming through her and she wanted to crawl inside the sound and live there. “Did you do all the other things I asked you to do?”
Her heart began to pound, remembering the list he’d given her. “I went to a birthday party and sang a song.”
He remembered it, too. “Did you eat cake?”
She closed her eyes, knowing where the questions were going. Not prepared. “What time is it there?”
“Oh-six-hundred.”
She released a breath. Six a.m. was not sexy. This wasn’t going to be sexy. “I ate cake.”