by Meli Raine
Love. Only love can do that.
Sensual strokes, his movements so careful that I want to beg him to move, carry the first minute. He buries his cheek against my neck and bites my earlobe, making me gasp. The twinning of a tiny pinpoint of pain with so much joyful movement just heightens the pleasure.
Who knew? I surely didn’t. And now that I do, I want nothing more.
Mark’s scent fills me, a mix of sweat and man and my own essence. We’re creating an infusion that will consume my senses for days to come. Years to come. Decades, even.
Yet centuries would never, ever give me enough.
“You okay?” he asks softly, moving my hair from my ear. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
I laugh. “Hurt? This is the opposite of hurt.” I wrap my legs around his waist and angle up, a sudden electric spark making me clench.
He groans. “You feel so good. Oh, so good, Carrie.”
I reach up to kiss him, biting his lower lip and sucking. He returns the kiss with more, his lips so hard, his tongue so demanding I feel bruised.
In a good way.
He pulls back, then thrusts in, the friction making me shudder. Another wave begins, off in the distance, as if my body is the ocean and my climax is on the horizon, just beginning. Again? The rolling bliss of bonelessness changes. It shifts, my body clenching and pulsing. My blood plumes and recedes, the buzzing bliss like a gift from the divine.
He moves with tight, taut thrusts and a kind of primal push that tells me Mark has abandoned reason, pitching into that privileged state where he’s willing to be vulnerable not only with me, but to me. He moves with such power and grace, the heat and fullness of him suddenly changing as he groans, the sound like an expression of love, my hands on his back, pressing him to me as he comes.
We breathe in short spurts against each other. We’re sweaty and panting, our bodies spent and happy.
Hearts, too.
He gives me a look that I can’t describe. I see all of him when he looks at me like this. Every part. And he sees me. In his eyes I’m turning, slowly, like a ballerina on a music box. His eyes admire me. He cherishes me.
I’m his.
The word “love” hangs in the air between us. It’s like a pendant on a gold chain, suspended between us. I want to say it. I feel it. I breathe it in and out. I touch it in the slick heat of his skin. I absorb it in the salty scent of his skin. I taste it on his lips.
But it goes unsaid.
That’s fine.
We have the rest of our lives to say it.
I am exhausted. I crash, the weight of my eyelids so heavy suddenly. Mark feels it, too. We snuggle together, wordless and weightless. Sleep takes us to another place where love is unencumbered by the real world.
Where we just are.
Exactly where we’re meant to be.
Chapter Seven
Everything that happened with Mark feels like a dream as I wake up and stare at a strange ceiling. The bed is cold. Birds chirp unfamiliar songs outside. A foreign odor of men’s cologne fills my senses. I shift my legs under the covers and snuggle in to the pillow and then halt.
I’m not in my own trailer.
I sit up suddenly and a blast of cold hits my chest. I am naked. The sheet feels like it’s judging me as I yank it up, covering my nakedness.
I am unclothed, alone, and in Mark’s bed. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, inhaling his essence. My palm seeks out where I know he was last night. The bed is still warm.
Then I hear the unmistakeable sound of a coffee maker gurgling. Leaning back, I rest my head on the pillow and look up at the ceiling fan as it makes its slow, lazy circle. Over and over, all it does is spin. It has one job.
I wish my own life were so simple.
My thighs ache and my nipples brush against the soft fabric of well-worn sheets. Mark’s bedroom is neat as a pin but everything is old. Faded. When I knew him, he bought everything used. Second-hand. We haunted yard sales and consignment shops for fun. I once asked him why he liked to buy everything this way and he passed it off with a wave and a grin.
“I don’t like to be tied down to my possessions. If I ever had to leave everything behind, I don’t want to leave anything important behind,” he’d said.
Those words had lingered, staying with me the night I snuck out of town three years ago.
Now, though, they take on a completely different tone. I know the truth about Mark. He’s deep undercover and in thick with drug dealers at the university. He’s searching for El Brujo—not “a brew home,” like I thought.
El Brujo is the biggest drug lord in North America. The guy’s been featured in all the major newspapers and magazines for years for the size of his drug operation. When the President of the United States talks about the “war on drugs,” he really means the war on El Brujo.
Mark told me what happened to his brother, Chase, and his brother’s girlfriend, Allie. He told me everything. El Brujo, their father, and Allie’s stepdad were caught in a competition that almost led to Allie being handed off to El Brujo for a drug debt. Women are traded like property. Given away for their virginity.
Treated like something you consume. Like a drug.
Chase had called Mark in desperation and the two saved her from a fate worse than death.
Being attached to things doesn’t make sense when you live a life like Mark’s.
Being attached to people doesn’t make much sense, either.
A sense of unreality makes me blink, over and over. I wonder for a split second whether I’m expendable. I left him three years ago. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Would it be as hard for him to disappear on me? What do I mean to him? Last night I gave him everything I have—mind, body and soul.
We claimed a sensual connection between us that we couldn’t continue to fight. Fate makes you act in strange ways. The pull of fire and heat in Mark’s eyes was too strong to keep at bay. Knowing so many truths makes me realize how hard it is to hide. It takes all your energy to keep your own truths from leaking out.
Keeping secrets is harder than facing the truth. At least when you face the truth you deal with the consequences.
When you have to hide your truth, all you get is a big dose of isolation.
“Hey,” Mark says in a voice that sounds like the purr of a big lion. He’s carrying two mugs of coffee and hands me one. I sit up and try to keep my breasts covered with the sheet.
He gives me a wide grin. “You know I’ve seen those before. And I’m happy to see them again.”
In that moment I realize he’s naked, too.
Oh, my. The view is extraordinary. His body is like carved marble and forged steel. Each muscle bulges or rolls, curving along slopes as skin stretches over so much power. He has a body honed by athleticism and precision. All that work in the military, with the DEA, has made his body close to perfect.
And then there are the scars.
Last night I touched a few. In the morning light I see so many. Light hair covers his strong thighs and the chiseled contours of his chest and abs. Underneath, though, I see criss-crossed scars from scratches. The jagged edge of a thicker wound. The flesh-toned scarring that looks like an amoeba.
As he crawls under the sheets he presses his legs against my soft thigh. The contrast makes me smile.
And heat up.
“What’s that?” I ask, pointing to the amoeba-shaped scar. It’s under his hip. As I point, he moves slightly, and my finger lands somewhere other than his thigh.
“That?” he says with a throaty laugh. “You need me to tell you what that is called?” He hardens against my fingertips and I join him in his chuckle.
“No, I know that perfectly fine. In fact, let me show you how well I know that,” I whisper, threading my fingers around his shaft. Mark inhales sharply, the air whistling between his teeth and soon, my question about the scar fades as I watch him descend into ecstasy. Ecstasy caused by me and only me.
He may be the big federal a
gent undercover trying to protect me, but in this moment I have all the power.
His body tenses, every muscle corded and taut as my hand takes him right where expected. Suddenly, his palm wraps around my wrist. I’m in an iron grip and can’t move. He flips me, so fast and powerfully I’m on my back in less than a second, his hot chest covering mine, his mouth slanting and claiming. His tongue speaks in nine different languages without saying a word. Our breath comes in fits and starts as I open my legs.
Desire pools in me, unquenched and insatiable. How can I want more when last night was so much more than enough? He kisses a trail down to my collarbone and reaches down with one hand.
“You’re so wet,” he murmurs. I moan at his touch. He takes this as encouragement and he should. This feels so good.
This feels so right.
Nothing is between us now. No secrets. No lies. No cover-ups. No misunderstandings. No clothing. No pretense.
Nothing is between us but our own respect and hope and love and mutual desire to be together in every way possible.
As his abs slide against my belly and his mouth takes one nipple in, his tongue frenzied against my sensitive skin, I arch my back and sigh. It’s a sound of longing and contentment. Of need and want. Of relief and pleasure.
He reaches for the nightstand drawer and I stop him.
“I’m on the pill.”
He gives me a look of such unfiltered joy that I laugh.
“You didn’t say anything last night,” he asks in a voice filled with questions.
“I’m saying it now,” I whisper, reaching between us and guiding him in.
And as he enters me once again, his eyes intense and smoky as he looks at me, I welcome him in. I welcome him home. I welcome our future with the joining of our bodies.
We’re together.
Finally, together.
“I have missed you so much, Carrie,” he murmurs, eyes full of love and something more than passion. “You’re mine and I’m yours.”
Tears of joy well in the folds of my eyes. My fingers seek out his chest, palms eager to know every inch of him. I thread my fingers through the hair at the back of his neck and pull him down for a kiss. He tastes like coffee and sweetness. Like reunion and resolution.
I’m home, too. When he’s in me, I’m finally home.
A deep, sultry sense of something bigger than us both begins to build inside me, growing with each stroke as he makes love with me. I can’t stop kissing him. I wrap myself tightly around him, as if I could turn us into one person. One soul. One heart.
One spirit.
The mingled flesh makes my pulse race as Mark kisses me with abandon. His thrusts feel like breaths, as if his very life depended on each stroke, each push, each slow beat. My blood rushes through me like it needs to be as close as possible to the surface of my flushed skin. It needs Mark as much as I do.
We come in a rush of throaty cries and moans, my own voice an echo as he calls out my name. I am drowning in love and connection. I am bathed in the pure essence of being with him. I am surrounded and cocooned, completely entangled in him.
At one point I stop knowing where he ends and where I begin.
I wish I could bottle this moment and live it forever for a thousand years.
He brushes my sweaty hair from my face. I see mirth and contentment etched into his features. This is the Mark I remember. Playful and sexy, hot and protective. Worry lines that filled his face when I returned to town seem a thing of the past. The weight of the world had pressed hard against his chest all these years.
Telling me everything has lifted that weight. He looks so young and carefree. Mark looks like he could do anything right now. Be anything.
And he can.
“You’re amazing,” he whispers to me, placing a kiss on each cheek as I let my legs unwind from around his hips. My toes take in the fine muscles of his ass as I let my knees drop. Every inch of skin between our torsos is touching. I’ve never been so close to another person before.
This feels so good.
“No. You are,” I murmur back, the smile in my eyes radiating up.
He laughs. “I guess we just have to be amazing together, then.”
“I think we just were.”
Mark rolls off and reaches for his mug of coffee. He drinks some, then makes a face. “Tepid.”
“What?” I tease. “You expect great sex and hot coffee? You can’t have it all, you selfish beast.”
“Well,” he says, pretending to be put in his place. “If I have to pick just one...” He sets his cup of coffee on the end table and reaches for me.
“I didn’t mean now,” I stress. I pretend to be a prude.
His face falls. He looks so dejected that I can’t help but laugh.
“Don’t you need some, uh...down time?” I arch one eyebrow and look pointedly at his not-so-throbbing member.
“What, that?” He points to his groin. “That needs ten minutes.”
“Ten minutes?”
He frowns. “I know. I’m getting old. When I was eighteen it was five minutes, tops.”
I snort with laughter just as both our phones begin to buzz.
“Damn,” we say in unison. He climbs out of bed, giving me a fine view of his ass as he rummages in his pants pockets to find his phone. I jump out of bed to find my backpack, but by the time I get to my phone the buzzing’s over.
It’s my morning alarm, but it’s Saturday. No work.
Mark, on the other hand...
“Shit,” he mutters.
“What is it?” I ask.
Secrecy flashes in his eyes before he can hide it. He gets that blank look I’ve come to realize is a mask. It’s a way to protect who he really is on the inside from who he has to pretend to be on the outside.
“Don’t,” I say in a voice filled with warning. “Don’t go into lock-down mode.”
His eyes widen, nostrils flaring, lips drawn. He gives me a raw look.
“You’re right,” he says with a ragged breath. “Habit.”
“We have a lot of habits we need to break.” My words are so true I feel tears fill my eyes. “It’s not just you. It’s me, too.”
He sets his phone down on his dresser and is in bed in seconds, cradling me in his arms.
“I’m not on duty today, but this case with Amy is so big that we’re all pretty much on standby. I don’t want to turn on the television, but if I do, you’ll see that some hikers found a body in a canyon.”
My whole being goes tense.
“Oh, God,” I whisper.
“It’s not Amy,” he reassures me. I let out a huge breath, not realizing I’d held it. “But it’s a woman who looks a lot like her, and who looks just like one of the suspected kidnapping victims.”
“No. Oh, that poor woman.”
I feel him swallow, hard, his neck against my back. Something about his body, his voice, sets me on edge.
“There’s more,” he says reluctantly.
I’m right.
“More?”
“The body. It was found—” He interrupts himself and makes a strange sort of groaning sound, like he can’t say what he needs to say next.
I just wait him out.
He inhales, his shoulders tense. Time is frozen. Whatever he’s about to tell me has something to do with Amy. I almost don’t want to hear it. As long as it’s not her body they found, I still have hope.
“The body was found mangled.”
“Mangled? Like an animal got to it?” Out in the canyons, there are plenty of predators. Wild cats, for one. It wouldn’t surprise me if a dead body got chewed on by an animal. I shudder at the thought, though.
“No. Someone mangled her very deliberately. A human did...this.”
A cold chill radiates up my back. “Mangled her...how?”
Mark takes a deep breath and says, “She’s missing both arms and legs.”
I jump up, separating my skin from his. My horror makes me instinctively move away from him for no
reason I can understand.
“She’s WHAT?”
He grimaces. The pain of humanity is etched into his face.
“I know. It’s disgusting. Her kidnappers did this.”
“How do you know?”
“The arms and legs were removed with surgical precision.”
“And she wasn’t like this before?”
He shakes his head.
“No. She wasn’t.”
Oh, God.
Amy.
I close my eyes and will myself to be logical. Rational. To think my way through this. I can’t be of any help to anyone, much less Amy, if I freak out.
“Any leads on who did this?”
Agony fills his face. “No. I wish. We’ve made it a federal case now. One of the women who was kidnapped is a confirmed Mexican citizen. Another is from Nevada, so it’s crossed state lines. Except I’m deep undercover, so the chief here doesn’t know that.”
“He doesn’t know it’s a federal case?”
A bitter grin takes over Mark’s expression. “Oh, he knows that. He’s pissed about it, too. Most small-town cops are. No one with any local power likes to have it taken away, but in this case, I can’t be outed. I’m still just Mark Paulson, the local cop. They have no idea I’m really DEA.”
I nod, absorbing all this. Then I realize we’re talking about it all naked and in bed. The sun is streaming in and highlighting our bodies. It’s like we do this all the time. No big deal. Just having our morning coffee in bed, stripped down to nothing but our bare selves.
Oh, and I lost my virginity last night.
And my best friend’s been kidnapped by someone who cuts women’s arms and legs off.
The room begins to spin.
Chapter Eight
“Carrie? Carrie?” Mark’s voice sounds like it’s coming from the end of a very long hallway. He sits up and grabs me as I slide down, then gets me on my back, a pillow under my feet. I’m staring up at the ceiling fan. It’s spinning.