I inhale her scent. Feel her warmth. Feel her tremble as she teases me, circling her hips. I wait, surrendering control to her.
When she relents and lowers, I grip her waist, bringing her down harder, giving her my tongue. She cries out as I swirl it deep inside.
Her flavor and smell — the soft, tender skin — is a combination as addicting as any drug. I pull her flesh into my mouth, sucking hard, while she writhes on my chest. I grip her waist harder, forcing her to be still. My teeth circle her clit and she wails, grinding down harder.
The hammock sways with the movement, the flickering fire casting shadows on her face, her breasts. The taunt skin of her stomach. She looks down at me and one hand finds my hair. “Make me come, Tate,” she whispers. And I do.
As I capture her juices and go back for more, she shatters again, her cries softer this time, but the trembling and tightening of her body is more intense. A gift. Her orgasm is a gift.
Sitting up, she slides down my chest and stops when her back hits my thighs. She’s cradled against me, her dripping pussy warm on my cock. I want her like this. Facing her. Watching her.
“I love you, Tate,” she says, her hands coming to my face. Her thumb traces my lower lip.
I lift her, centering her over me, no condom, no cares. This is Camille, the woman who makes me crazy. The woman who has healed the cracks in my heart. As I enter her, I tell her the truth. “I love you too.”
Tight warmth envelopes me, pulses around me, as she takes my full length. She inhales deeply as I stretch her. When she exhales, I inhale, needing to capture her breath.
I exhale this time and she breathes in deeply, absorbing the life I’m feeding her. When she smiles, warmth floods my chest. We find a rhythm. In. Out. Our bodies connected, but still. A tear falls and I catch it with my tongue. And we continue to breathe.
In. Out.
She begins to move, rocking back and forth.
In. Out.
I take her breasts in my hands.
In. Out.
Her movements change to up and down, become more frantic.
In. Out.
Our lips touch as she rides me, her mouth accepting my breath, mine accepting hers.
In. Out.
Her insides clamp down as another orgasm hits her. Her fingers clamp on my shoulders and my teeth find her skin.
In. Out.
My balls tighten with the need to follow.
In. Out.
We make love like this, face to face, breath for breath. Time becomes fluid, our bodies move together as one.
In. Out.
As semen moves from my balls and through my shaft, I roar its release into her body. The first body I’ve ever allowed it to spill inside. And it’s okay. Because this Camille. The woman I love. And if we make a baby, I’ll love our baby too.
If we live.
Emotions from so many directions hit me all at once and I feel myself break under the pressure. My face burns, my heart seizes in my chest, my throat fills and I begin to shake uncontrollably.
“Shhhh,” she soothes, and holds me to her breasts while I cry.
Later, much later, she kisses me. Her tongue plunging, twisting with mine. Desperate now, for me.
I stir, filling with blood once again, ballooning inside her, stretching her.
And we make love once more, the hammock swaying with the movement, watching each other, loving each other, through the dying light of the fire.
My eyes open as a scream fills the air, followed by a low growl that feels close. Very close. I reach for the Uzi I secured above me earlier, bringing it to my side.
I hear another sound. Dragging. Ripping. Another growl. A jaguar, looking for a meal.
My eyes close. It found one.
Janine.
Another scream wakes Camille and she shoots up beside me. “What was—?”
Clamping a hand over her mouth, I hiss, “Shhh.”
The loud roar is followed by two smaller ones. Cubs. A momma and her babies. The threat outside our nylon tent just grew exponentially.
Cam lies back down and I turn on my side until one of her ears is on my arm. I press my hand to the other as the feeding begins. I should have buried Janine. I should have made a shovel and dug deep into the ground.
Or maybe it’s better this way.
One life feeding another. Continuing the circle of life. And, in a strange twist of fate, securing our survival, at least for tonight.
But the listening is terrible. The bites. The chews. The snap of broken bones.
I hold Camille closer, press my hand against her ear tighter, muffling her cries against my chest. And like the miracle she is, her battered hand lifts up and covers my ear, closing off the sounds.
But she can’t close the certainty I know deep in my heart.
Even with the weapons, we’re going to die out here.
The jaguar mother has found us.
She’ll eat her fill now, but tomorrow, she’ll be hungry again.
Chapter Thirteen – Link Duffy
From three thousand feet above them, I watch the headlights of the Range Rover wind a path through the dense jungle below. As the Rover goes deeper, I flip the heat sensor on and watch the vehicle on the monitor.
And wait.
Miles are consumed as they drive deeper into the rainforest. Two men and my father. A part of me is still angry that he’s risking himself in this way. A part of me loves him even more for so desperately wanting to save his daughter. And another part is just damn grateful he’s down there. Because now, we have something to track. A destination to breach. Something to do besides fly over a jungle, willing some clue to appear.
In my ear, the pilot says, “Half hour of fuel.”
“Call in support,” I tell him. “I’ll transfer choppers while you refuel if it comes to that.”
“Yes, sir.”
Yes, sir is the right answer. No way in hell am I taking my eyes off that black SUV.
Ten more minutes pass as I wait and track, wondering what I’ll find when I get down there. I dial Deakins through the sat-phone. “Any luck with the satellite, Deak?”
“Yes, sir. It’s being slowed and turned now, but it will still be approximately fifteen minutes before we can secure images.”
My teeth grind. “How much time did my five million dollars buy us?”
“Ten minutes, sir. They feel their viewers will protest if their favorite sitcoms are out much longer.”
I scoff into the phone. “Satellite TV goes out if it sprinkles too hard. How many square miles does ten minutes give us?”
“Approximately two hundred thousand, sir.”
Damn. Less than twenty percent of the entire rainforest.
“Tell those bastards I want fifteen minutes and at least three hundred square miles surrounding our current location. If they don’t give us that, I’m buying their company and firing every damn last one of them.”
“They still want first option to interview Miss Duffy when this is over, sir.”
“Tell them they can interview my dick. No way. Five million and their jobs is all I’m promising.”
“Yes, sir. But you are aware that they will leap at the chance to interview your dick. The video will go viral within seconds.”
I glare at the phone. Is Deakins trying to be funny? I laugh. He actually is.
“Why is it that your team can hack anything but a satellite?”
Deakins clears his throat. “Have you attempted to hack a satellite, sir?”
He’s got me there. “But you’ve tried?”
“Of course, sir. We aren’t government. We can get away with much more, especially with the two teenagers we just hired.”
I disconnect the call, smiling, remembering Tate telling me about his two pimply faced hires and how they consume nothing but potato chips and energy drinks. He hired them after they successfully hacked into Wall Street and then essentially broke through every fire wall in his system. “Keep your enemies close,
” he told me. “And a fridge filled with Red Bull closer.”
Tate.
Dammit, man. Where are you?
But I’m afraid I already know.
He would have stopped at nothing, risked everything, to save my sister. And if he were caught, he would have been immediately eliminated. Only an idiot would have tried to keep someone with his training.
Janine’s face flashes in my mind. Idiot. Maybe he does stand a chance.
The pilot speaks to me again. “They appear to be slowing, sir.”
I look back to the monitor and agree. I widen the view and see additional hot flashes appear on the screen. Additional vehicles and several buildings, less than a half mile from their current location.
I ping the location to Deakins and zoom in on the compound, but there is very little I can see other than the dots of red representing heat.
“Find a clearing and go up,” I tell the pilot. “We’ll jump.”
The helicopter leans as he follows instructions.
I turn in my seat and look back at the team of men behind me. “Prepare to jump in five.”
With no hesitation at all, eight men pick up parachutes and begin strapping them on their backs. They’re ready to find my sister and the boss they admire. More than anything, they’re prepared to avenge their fallen comrades.
Chapter Fourteen – Camille
I’ve never loved someone with my whole heart before. There were always pieces of it sectioned off. Places I’d protect so that when the relationship ended, I’d have some heart left.
As I watch Tate sleep, I surrender it all. I give him every piece of me. I’ll go wherever he goes. Be whoever he needs me to be. I’m not sure how, but we’re smart, we’ll figure it out. Well, at least he is.
“Good morning, baby,” he says, a smile spreading on his lips as those beautiful eyes open and turn my way. “I feel you watching me. Why are you awake?”
I don’t tell him that a throbbing ache in my hand jolted me from sleep. The little sleep I’d had anyway. It had been difficult to rest, listening to the animal outside. Even with Tate’s attempts to block the sounds, I heard enough for it to echo inside my skull.
“I need to go to the bathroom.”
He turns to me and the hammock swings, his fingers sliding down my arm. “Pee?”
I blush and shake my head. God, this is humiliating.
“Okay, so we need to prepare for the appearance of Ravioli Fights Back.”
I slap his arm. “Tate! You’re disgusting.”
He chuckles. “I’m not the one about to poop in a hole.”
A hole?
Terrific.
Tate kisses the tip of my nose and raises the canopy over us. I blink against the light pouring in and hear Tate murmur “hello” to the sun. Maybe I slept more than I thought.
“Stay here until I check everything out,” he tells me, and hops to the ground. I can’t see him, but I can hear his soft footsteps walking the area. A few minutes later, he’s back, fully dressed. He tosses my clothes to me and I hurry to slide them on, while he re-tapes my boots back on my feet.
“Tate…?”
He looks up and lifts an eyebrow, continuing his work.
“Were you serious about the hole?”
He nods. “Very. We want to reduce the — uh — attention of animals as much as possible. So…” He lifts a shoulder. “It’s no big deal. In the army, we—”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, you all probably pooped in the same hole while picking your nose and jacking off to a girly mag.” I cover my face with my hands.
“As a matter of fact…” He laughs and pulls my hands down. “It’s really no big deal. I’ll find you a good spot, dig you a hole and cover it up when you’re done.”
“Oh no! No. No. No.” My voice gets louder with each no. “I’d appreciate the good spot picking. I’d appreciate the hole. But I’ll do the rest, thank you very much.” Then it hits me. “Tate, what do I use to…” I cover my face again.
“Baby wipes. We still have several.”
I fall back on the hammock in relief. “When we get home, I’m buying stock in those things and I might even offer to star in a commercial.”
Tate plucks the little packet out of his pocket and holds them to his face. “Baby wipes. Takes care of asses large and small.”
I grab them and hug them to my chest. “Baby wipes. I thank you for your sacrifice.”
Tate leans his head back and howls.
A few minutes later, I’m staring at a hole, then inspecting every blade of grass and leaf around it. This is scary. Yesterday, that snake came out of nowhere. I shiver and do another scan.
“You okay?” Tate yells.
“Hush!” I yell back.
I’m sure he’s laughing, but I can’t hear much over the insect noise — of which there are a billion crawling everywhere, some bigger than my hand. I take the propeller and sweep it over the grass around the hole. Nothing leaps out at me, so that’s gonna have to be good enough.
I take a deep breath. Turn. Undo my shorts and squat.
Above me, a monkey jumps from one tree to another, eyeing me curiously. He’s soon joined by another, it’s eyes on me too. I begin to whistle the theme from Wicked, as much to distract myself as cover the noise my butt hole is making.
Once, I almost lose my balance. Twice, I slap at bugs crawling up my legs. I nearly go nuts when something flies in my hair, and almost knock myself out when I slap at a mosquito the size of a chicken buzzing at my ear.
Finally, I’m done and praise God for baby wipes again. Tate worships duct tape. This is my pick.
I’ve never used a shovel in my life, but it’s not hard to figure out and soon my prize is good and buried. I’m pretty proud of myself when I stroll back to the clearing, still on high alert for anything that wants to eat me.
Back at the camp, I notice Tate’s been hard at work. The hammock is down, a fire stoked and I pick up the smell of cooking food. I sniff. Ravioli for breakfast. Awesome. I won’t let anything spoil my good mood.
Except my hand. It’s throbbing again. Worse even than yesterday. But I’ve heard that pain gets worse before it gets better. Hopefully the better part will happen soon.
By the time I’m at the fire, the good mood has fled and I’m panting for breath in the humidity. Sweat drips into my eye and I wipe it away. I look around for Tate and see him — oh no — draping palm fronds in a pile. My fading good mood gets significantly worse when I realize what he’s covering.
Poor Janine.
Poor Tate.
He shouldn’t have to do that alone. I muster my courage and walk his way, my legs getting more wobbly with each step. He sees me and shakes his head, waving me back. I stand there, unsure what to do. He adds a few more fronds and heads my way.
“You okay?”
I force a bright smile. “Yeah. Are you?”
His face is grim and he walks directly to the stream, squatting to wash his hands. “Let’s eat and head out.”
“Okay. Where are we going?”
He splashes water in his face. “Anywhere but here.”
I busy myself scooping ravioli into bamboo cups and pour myself some tea. I drink it down, then pour another.
“I’ll clean your hand when we’re finished,” he says, and picks up his food.
“It’s okay. I’ll do it this time.”
He frowns at me.
“I can do it,” I insist. “You finish packing us up, while I whine and cry.”
He’s still frowning. “Sure?”
I flash him a bright smile, then it fades away when I look over his shoulder to Janine’s remains. “Sure. I’m ready to get out of here too.”
The meal is consumed quickly and I soon have vodka in hand. I take a drink before unwrapping the bandage. It looks bad. I’ve been avoiding looking at it, so this is the first time I’ve really examined it closely. Gooey and red, with brown tinges. A scab, I realize, that hasn’t hardened because it’s covered too much. I
wonder if we should let it air out for a while. Turning, I search for Tate, and spot him a good piece down the river. I’ll ask him later.
Gritting my teeth, I pour the alcohol and begin counting until the stinging becomes bearable. For good measure, I pour on another dose and suffer through that pain, as well. Tate didn’t use the cocaine last night, only the antibiotic cream. I follow his lead and soon am all patched up, and proud of myself again. I’m contributing something.
Forcing myself to my feet, I clean the dishes and pack them away in a parachute bag. When Tate comes back, he looks impressed.
I wipe the sweat away and take a bow. “See, you might make a country girl out of me, yet.”
Chapter Fifteen – Link Duffy
They say it’s darkest before dawn and they’re right. It is. Especially out here with only the stars.
In any operation, the waiting is brutal. This one has been the worse. But it’s smart to wait. I know it.
I don’t have to wait anymore.
Opening the helicopter door, I give the command and eight men follow me out into the night. In my earpiece, the other helicopters give similar orders. In a few minutes, I’ll have sixteen men on the ground.
My chute opens and I steer myself to the small clearing and pull the nylon down behind me when I land. “Ghost lead down,” I say into my mike. Soon, I have sixteen confirmations. Time to get to work.
Night vision goggles make it easier to locate the trip wires. All eyes are on the ground or in the trees. This place will be rigged heavily, even more so than the first house. It takes an hour of steady creeping to get a visual.
As hoped, the place is quiet. The few guards at their posts are quickly taken down and dragged into the trees.
I assign perimeter teams, as well as teams to breach the main building and both warehouses. A quick inspection shows the barn to be empty.
Signaling the breach teams to move, I’m on the run, four men at my back. Three others take the rear entrance. We want silence for as long as possible, and I step aside while a ghost takes care of the lock.
Badass: Jungle Fever (Complete): A Billionaire Military Romance Page 23