Way to go, idiot. Talk about the very person she doesn’t want to think about.
But Thea smiled. A small, fond smile which tore at Ben’s heart.
‘When I was a kid I couldn’t pronounce Alethea, so I used to tell people my name was Ethel. Dan loved it. Even when I started to be known as Thea he still called me Ethel. It was our thing. No one else could share in it.’
‘Right...’ Ben swallowed uncomfortably. He wished he’d never asked. Somehow it had made him feel closer to Thea. He didn’t want to feel closer to Thea. He clenched his fists as the image that had haunted him for the last three weeks swam into his head in high definition.
Dan...cradled in his arms as he lay dying on that hard desert ground.
Their two-man patrol had walked straight into an ambush and the two of them had been alone and pinned down by the enemy, with only a rocky outcrop for protection. Ben had tried and tried to stem the bleeding but it had been just too severe. Time had started to run out for the guy he’d fought alongside twenty-four-seven, for three hundred and twenty days of their last year’s tour of duty. And for multiple tours over the last seven years before that.
Grief hovered in the back of his mind but he refused to let it in. There was no place in his mind for mourning—he had to stay strong for Thea. She didn’t know the half of it. And he was never going to tell her. Besides, wasn’t he the king of shutting out emotions? He’d been doing it well enough for the last decade and a half.
‘Did you ever wonder how we’d never met before?’ Thea asked suddenly. ‘I mean, you were Daniel’s best friend and I was his sister.’
‘Not really.’ Ben paused thoughtfully. ‘Dan was always careful to keep the two sides of his life separate—his personal life and you, and his Army life. I think after your parents died he didn’t have the easiest time of it in the kids’ home. He never really talked about his past to anyone.’
‘Except you?’ Thea observed. ‘Because he trusted you?’
‘Right,’ Ben answered bleakly.
‘But still...’ Thea shook her head, still confused. ‘If he trusted you that much, surely you’d have come with him round to the flat?’
‘No, I never came round.’ Ben shrugged. ‘You have to understand I’m a commissioned officer. Dan wasn’t. Being part of a team and in each other’s company twenty-four-seven is one thing, but socialising back home isn’t that easy.’
‘Because the Army don’t allow it?’
Thea frowned, confused. Ben didn’t blame her. The Forces had their rules, their protocols, and if you were a part of it then it all made sense. It could save lives. But to an outsider trying to understand it might seem strange.
‘They don’t encourage it,’ Ben admitted. ‘We have separate messes for socialising. But the Army do realise that the bonds formed in war time don’t just dissolve when you get back home. So, like some of the others, Dan and I used to go on training runs together, and we headed into the mountains once or twice a year—but always off the base.
‘Right...’ Thea hedged. ‘But when you were deployed together he never even showed you a photo of me?’
‘Having a photo of your wife, or girlfriend, or baby is one thing. But having a photo of your sister... There’s no way Dan would have risked the guys seeing a photo of a girl like you. It would have invited attention...comments that a brother wouldn’t want to hear about his sister.’
‘Oh.’
Thea flushed a deep scarlet as the meaning of his words sank in. He found it surprisingly endearing—a reminder than she had never really appreciated just how stunning she was. Even now.
‘Tell me what you thought the first time you met me,’ she said. ‘On that date we went on together.’
He stiffened. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to be having.
‘Please, Ben. I need to hear something...pleasant... Everything’s gone so very wrong. I just want to hear what you told me that night.’
Ben met her wobbly, pleading gaze. She wanted distraction, a better memory to offer some flicker of consolation at one of the worst times of her life. After the way he’d treated her, surely he owed her that much?
‘I thought you were the most beautiful woman I’d ever met,’ he said quietly. ‘Not just aesthetically, but on the inside, too. You were fun, impetuous...you had a vibrancy about you which was wonderfully infectious to all those around you. You made everyone want to be near you, to be part of your group.’
He’d been on a rare night out with some other officers—at a crowded bar—when Thea had slipped into the space beside him. They’d started talking casually and that had been it—he’d never felt such an inexorable attraction to a woman before. He’d excused himself from his group as soon as he’d been able to, just to spend the rest of the evening in Thea’s company.
‘Oh...’
She sounded let down, and he knew why. She thought he’d understood her better.
He hesitated, then conceded. ‘At least that’s what you wanted people to see. But beneath that veil there was a quietness, almost a shyness about you when you thought no one was watching you. Judging you. I assumed it was a defence mechanism you’d created after your parents had died, to stop people asking if you were all right.’
‘Really? You saw that?’
Her evident pleasure that he’d seen a part of her others had been only too happy to ignore made him want to kiss her and berate her all at the same time. And that was the damned problem.
‘So the next day, when you told me we couldn’t see each other any more...?’ She hiccupped, clearly torn between not wanting to say the words and needing to know the truth. ‘You didn’t have feelings for me anymore?’
How was he supposed to answer that? From the moment they’d met he had been hooked. This spellbinding young woman had persuaded him to take her to a funfair. There had been a small group of them—Thea’s friends—but he hadn’t even noticed them after the first few minutes. He had only seen Thea.
They’d hurled leather balls at the coconut shy, laughed their way through the hall of mirrors and shared an incredible, intense first kiss at the top of the Ferris wheel.
In most of his life—even much of his childhood—Ben had never felt as happy and free of responsibility as he had that evening with Thea. And he’d known even then that she had an ability to make him fall for her such as no other woman ever had.
And now she wanted to know why he’d walked away from her. What could he say? He owed her something. Perhaps a variation on the truth was the safest option.
‘We’re just...weren’t a good match. I’m sorry, Thea.’
Her body seemed to curl even more into his arms and he felt worse than ever. But it was a necessary lie...no, a half-truth... They weren’t a good match. Ben could recall tantalising glimpses of a real inner confidence and a love of life, rippling constantly beneath that artificially shimmering, vivacious exterior. He had seen them from the beginning. She was the kind of person who made people feel good, want to bask in her warm glow for ever.
He wished he could be the kind of person who made her feel good, who could inspire that hidden side of Thea.
Instead he knew that he was the kind of person who would eventually extinguish that dancing light in her soul. If he was the kind of man his father had been he would drag Thea down, as his mother had been dragged down. What kind a life would that be for a woman like Thea?
He’d known as he’d walked her home that night, wondering at the way she had made him feel about her after just one incredible date, that he needed to walk away from her before he did hurt her. But he hadn’t been able to. Even as he’d walked up the pathway to her ground-floor flat his head had been telling him one thing whilst his heart had been making plans to take her out the next day. Imagining a future with her.
And then Dan had opened the door and demanded to
know what the hell Ben was doing with his sister.
Dan—the guy who’d had his back through countless tours of duty. The buddy who would have given his life for Ben, and for whom Ben would have sacrificed his own.
Only Dan had and Ben hadn’t.
So, just like that, the woman he had thought he might actually be able to fall in love with had been off limits. Still, Ben had to wonder whether Dan had been the real reason that he’d walked away from Thea.
Or just the excuse.
He could have fought for her. The thought slid, unbidden, into his mind. But would that have been fair? All the women he’d dated in the past...he’d never felt strongly enough about any of them. With Thea it was different. It had been even from that first meeting. But the closer you were to someone, the more hurt you could cause. Ben had learned that from his parents. If his father had taught him anything, it was never to get close to anyone. Or let them get close to you.
It was a lesson he’d do well to remember with Thea.
Lost in his own dark thoughts, it took Ben a while to realise that she was asleep. He heard her breathing ease and deepen, felt her heartbeat drop to a slow, rhythmic pulse. And for the first time in a long time—with Thea still wrapped in his arms—Ben fell into a deep, restful sleep of his own.
He woke to the sound of an unfamiliar phone alert. A text? An email? Not wanting to wake Thea, Ben squinted through the curtains to the darkness beyond. Years of field experience told him it had to be around four in the morning.
Nevertheless he felt her stir beside him, felt her raise her head up and then reach across him for her phone. He felt the skim of soft breasts and lacy fabric against his bare chest and fought to stop his body’s primal reaction. He didn’t stand a chance.
Thea froze.
For a moment Ben vacillated. Should he apologise? Leave? She had wanted him there, to comfort her. She had trusted him. Such a base reaction was the ultimate betrayal of that trust. He had no doubt she would consider it as unexpected as it was unwanted.
He was shocked when, instead of scooting off the bed away from him, Thea reached out and touched his face.
‘Don’t, Thea. It’s not a good idea.’ He gripped her wrist, stilling it and moving it away from him as he opened his eyes and came face to face with her direct gaze.
She still looked pale, drained; but there was a glint in her eyes which he hadn’t been expecting—something he couldn’t quite pinpoint.
It held him in her bed, motionless. Part of him knew he should leave. He had promised her this was a marriage on paper only, assured her she could trust him. Still, part of him wanted to stay. He couldn’t deny his attraction to her, and all their talk last night had only made it harder to put his feelings for her safely away in their box.
‘Why isn’t it a good idea?’ she whispered, gently twisting her wrist from his loosened grip, slowly returning it to his face.
She traced the outline of the scar which pulled at the corner of his eye. ‘Some war wound, huh?’ Her voice shook as she spoke,
Memories punched into him. The last time she’d asked that exact question had been on their one and only date, moments before they’d shared their first kiss. Could it only have been six weeks ago? It had been a gentle yet powerful kiss which had rocked him to his foundations in a way he’d never suspected a mere kiss ever could. It was the moment he’d realised he wanted more, so much more, from this woman.
She’d asked him how he’d got it—assuming, as others had done in the past, that it was something to do with the Army. Ben had always been happy to go along with their assumption—not that he’d dated a lot since his career had begun to come first. But instead he’d found himself telling Thea how the scar was a result of running into an open kitchen drawer when he was boy.
In fifteen years he’d barely even spoken to anyone about his mother. But that night he’d regaled Thea with the story of how he’d been running away from his half-furious, half-scared mum, having been found blown halfway across the room after jamming a kitchen knife into an electrical socket, trying to retrieve his wedged-in toy soldier.
Thea had been shocked and amused in equal measure, with no idea of the enormity of what Ben had just done in telling her something so personal. And now she was tracing his scar and asking him the same question again. Deliberately reminding him of that night.
He felt his willpower slipping.
He snatched his head away, jackknifing his body upright to slide her off him and launching himself sideways out of the bed. But she slipped her arms around him, stopping him from leaving the bed completely.
‘We can’t do this, Thea,’ he repeated.
If he didn’t stop this his self-control would crumble, and at some point she would come to hate him for letting this happen She would never forgive him for not staying strong enough for both of them.
‘I don’t want to be alone. Not tonight,’ she whispered hoarsely.
Grief was still etched into her expression. He felt torn. He was supposed to be here to look after her, to support her—how could he walk out on her now?
He had to get things back to where they’d been a couple of hours earlier. He could hold her, comfort her, but nothing more was going to happen.
He moved back to the bed and sat down to pull her into his arms and soothe her, as he had a few hours earlier, but Thea had other ideas.
Turning her head to his, she pressed her warm mouth to his skin, kissing his temple, his cheek, the skin inches from his mouth.
He moved his hand to stay her. ‘Stop, Thea. Neither of us are thinking straight.’
‘You’re wrong...’
Her shaky voice should have told him more, but he didn’t want to hear.
‘I know you still want me. And it’s precisely because we aren’t thinking straight that we can do this. We need this. I need this. I need oblivion. Take me away from all this. Make me forget the last three weeks. Make me forget everything. If only for a short while.’
‘It will still be there afterwards,’ he said.
Resisting her touch was taking all his willpower. She was right—he did still want her. Despite the promise he’d made to himself six weeks ago, never to go near Thea again, he hadn’t stopped wanting her or thinking about her. She had haunted his dreams.
‘Just make me forget for a moment. Please, Ben, can you do that?’
She touched him again and his mental grip slipped further. He shouldn’t give in, but he was losing control, his head was spinning. Grief, guilt, lust—all mingled together with his lack of sleep over the last month, and Ben struggled to pick his way through the tangle of emotions.
As if sensing his weakening resolve, Thea slid hesitant fingers under the waistband of his boxer shorts, looking to him as if for compliance. He should stand his ground, tell her that she was still grieving and scared and confused, that she didn’t know what she was doing.
Except it seemed as if she knew exactly what she was doing. She seemed to know what she wanted and just what effect she was having on him. And, as she’d already pointed out, she knew only too well how much he wanted her.
With a slight dip of his head he conveyed his acquiescence, sucking in deep breath as Thea slid his boxers off him and surveyed every inch of him. Then, almost shyly, she took his hand and moved it to her breast. Her nipple was hard against his palm.
The effect was instantaneous. Pushing her back into the middle of the bed, Ben moved to cover her body with his, and as she arched slightly to meet him every inch of their bodies was pressed into delicious contact. Slowly he lowered his mouth to hers, to claim it as his own, but she squirmed slightly beneath him.
‘I don’t need the niceties,’ she said, flushing red at her boldness. ‘I just need you to take me. To make me forget.’
Ben scanned her face. It must have taken some courage for
her to say that. He hesitated. Since he’d met her, kissed her, six weeks ago, she had danced into his late-night fantasies, but this wasn’t the way he’d imagined their first time to be. Still, there would be plenty of time for languid, indulgent exploration of each other’s bodies the next time—and the time after that. If immediate release was what she wanted now, this time, then he wasn’t objecting. He just wanted Thea—to touch her, to claim her.
He slid his knee between her legs, gliding his hands over her skin.
‘Open for me,’ he murmured, revelling in her immediate compliance, sliding his fingers between her legs and finding her hot and wet.
‘God...’ He gave a guttural groan. ‘You’re going to be my undoing.’
She gasped as he dipped inside her, finding her clit and flicking back and forth, knowing just the right amount of pressure to elicit a moan of pleasure from her. But before he could continue her hand pushed down between their bodies, her fingers latching around his wrist as she pushed him away, wrapping her legs around him instead and shifting her body so it was central to his.
The tip of his erection skimmed her damp heat and he heard another low moan. It took him a moment to realise it was his own voice.
‘No niceties, Ben. Remember?’ Thea muttered.
‘This is all you want?’ Ben asked. Holding back when he was this close was almost unbearable, but he had to be sure.
‘It’s all I want,’ she confirmed, burying her head in his shoulder.
Unable to hold back any longer, he pushed inside her, feeling her stretch around him, tilting her pelvis up slightly to draw him in deeper and deeper. Her arms slid around his back, holding on to him as he rocked inside her. He knew he was close—six weeks of almost nightly dreams of Thea, and none of them had come close to the reality. And this wasn’t even their best. But, if the way she was tightening around him was anything to go by, he wasn’t the only one close to the edge.
Resting his weight on one arm as he continued his relentless rhythm, he reached for her thigh with his other arm, hooking his hand under her knee and locking her leg around his back. The action opened her up just a fraction more, and Ben heard her little sounds of pleasure as he thrust deeper, harder. Then she was arching up again, her breath quickening, and as she orgasmed she tightened around him—only moments before he felt his own climax crashing over him. His back stiffened and he groaned, spilling inside her, barely able to think but careful to hold his weight off her.
The Army Doc's Secret Wife Page 3