by Hilary Storm
I’m still her Commander, well technically not, but who gives a shit. I care about her and part of my job will be to discuss how everyone on my team performed. Jade did everything she was supposed to do, but this, this can’t be ignored. They won’t allow her to return or to recommend her for another mission anywhere if she can’t handle what happened out there. I know how hard she has worked for this.
This is her life. It will destroy her if she can’t handle it. She’ll be behind a desk, shuffling papers or worse yet, she could be discharged. That, I know damn well she’d not be able to handle. Fuck.
She starts to relocate her tiny frame from dickfuck to me. As she does, I lift the armrest up, giving her the comfort she needs to rest her head on my shoulder. This is where she needs to be, even though I desperately want to kiss her, to run my fingers through her hair, and calm her. I know I can’t, not yet anyway.
I play the part of her leader, letting her breathing calm. She stills in my arms, and I know she’s fallen back to sleep. I sigh heavily then shift my gaze to Harris who is watching us, or should I say me, with confusion smeared all over his face.
“What?” I mouth dryly.
Those damn eyes of his give him away. He wants to know what the fuck I’m doing. Better yet, he wants to know why.
“Is she alright?” JJ questions from his seat across the aisle and a row back. I tear my scrutiny away from Harris. My attention spins in the opposite direction.
“She will be.” That’s really all I can say.
“I hope you're right.” His reply is full of concern. He can’t say anything more, either. By the way he’s casting his look at her, I know the kid cares about her. He looks up to her. What man wouldn’t? She’s strong, courageous, and a damn fighter.
“Is she sleeping?” I whisper to him. I need to make sure before I spill my guts to Harris. JJ nods his head then stuffs his earbuds back into his ears, going back to the movie he was watching on the small monitor attached to the back of the seat in front of him.
“What the fuck is going on between you two and don’t fucking lie to me.” Harris snaps. Which no doubt has me teetering on the edge of grabbing him by the throat and telling him to shut his fucking mouth.
But I don’t and I won’t. What I will do is tell him what he needs to fucking hear. What he needs to know before we land and before he thinks for one damn second he’s going to get anywhere near her once we’ve been cleared to go about our daily lives.
I decide to toy with him a little and play stupid.
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I whisper low. I’m not about to wake her up. This is out of line on his part, and he damn well knows it. Not that I have room to talk about being out of line.
“Don’t play dumb, Maverick. I’m not as fucking oblivious as you think. I see the way you look at her. You want her.” His tone is arrogant.
“This isn’t the time or the place to have this discussion.” I let my stare challenge him to say more.
“I don’t see why not. Look around. There isn’t a single person paying attention to you having your arms around her except me.” His brows lift.
I contemplate my answer. Do I tell him or not? If I do, I risk the chance of him opening his mouth to Jade, letting her know he knows. Or worse, telling someone of rank that could ruin my career and hers. If I don’t, he’ll go after her. He’s a man like me, who goes after what he wants, and we both know he wants her for more than a quick fuck. She’s the only one who is blind and can’t see it.
She sees him as her friend. A friend whom, thank god, I stopped before they fucked. Before he used that fuck to get under her skin. The difference between Harris and I is, I went after what I wanted the first chance I got. Where he’s had years to tell her how he’s felt about her. Years he wasted. He fucked up.
This woman lying in my arms, sleeping on my shoulder, is right where she is meant to be. With me. I’m going to have to fight tooth and nail to make her see it. I may have fought hard on every mission I’ve been on, every deployment I went to and I know damn well she'll be worth the fight.
There is nothing I will fight harder for than her. I need her as much as she needs me. And I’ll be damned if a man who isn’t man enough to tell a woman how he feels about her will stand in my way.
“You want the truth, Harris? Here’s the truth. She’s mine.” I growl the words through a whisper, hoping she doesn't wake up. He’s somewhat shocked, but his expression is angrier than anything.
“It's funny how she doesn't seem to acknowledge that herself.” He leans closer, making sure I hear him. “She's not something that I'll walk away from, and she's sure as fuck not someone I'll let get into something that’s going to hurt her. Let me ask you, Commander, why exactly was Jade’s back full of bloody scrapes and scratches?” I look toward the stewardess coming down the middle aisle, not wanting to get into it with him. Why can't he just understand that I'm not fucking around here?
“What Jade and I do is none of your fucking business.”
“That’s where you're dead fucking wrong. If she gets hurt, I feel obligated to find justice in who wronged her. If you're some fucked-up asshole who gets off on making people bleed, you just need to walk the fuck away from her. Consider it saving your own life.”
“That's not how it is.” I look down to her sleeping peacefully on my shoulder. Christ. I really don’t give a shit what his opinion of me is. It’s her I care about. Her opinion matters. She has to know I want more than sex with her. I’ve told her this.
“Look, I have nothing but respect for you as a leader and a soldier, but Jade is not an area I’ll settle on. She deserves happiness. If you're what causes that, then you’ll have my full support, but if I see one fucking tear in her eye that you caused…. Be prepared to meet me for your day of reckoning.”
“I can work with that.” Because the last thing I want to see is another tear escape her gorgeous eyes.
“And don't fucking claim her like a piece of property. She's a human being, a strong one at that, who can make her own decisions. And until she tells me she's taken, I'll be right beside her, just being me.”
I want to like the man who went to battle with me to take down one of the most notorious terrorists of all time, but this guy is choosing to go to war with me now.
“Harris, don't kid yourself, you don't stand a chance in a war with me. I'll ruin you. I'll make you disappear into the depths of hell on a fucking mission you'd rather die than finish.”
“And I'll climb out of that hell to come find you if you so much as put another fucking scratch on her porcelain body.” We may disagree on who should hold her at night, but we agree on Jade’s safety. I want her happy too, and I will do my best to make sure she recovers from the nightmares she's bound to have.” I swallow hard and take in the words he’s saying. If she comes with me, I'll do everything in my power to make sure she's not hurt.
“I can respect that,” I say truthfully.
“Good. I'm glad we could see eye to eye.” He sits back finally, looking straight ahead at his monitor, and stuffs those earbuds in his ears. Keep them there, asshole; and you will stay the hell away from her.
CHAPTER NINE
JADE
The jolt of the plane landing wakes me up. I’m incredibly warm and definitely not sleeping on a soft pillow. No, what I’m lying on is hard, but damn, I’m right where a part of me wants to be though. His smell gives him away. He’s all man. Rough, rugged, and tough man that’s easy to feel safe near. When I open my eyes, I see one of my legs is curled up underneath me, my inured arm is sprawled across his chest, and my head is lying on his shoulder. God, he feels good with his arm wrapped around me, caging me in tight to his body. I go to move, my body aching to stretch. I’m pulled tighter into him. My mind wonders how I went from falling asleep on Harris’s shoulder to Kaleb’s.
“Hey, sleepyhead.” His voice is raspy. He must’ve fallen asleep too.
“Hey.” I jerk out of his hold, realizing what I�
�ve done. My eyes dart to Harris, who is sleeping. I hope he missed just how sprawled across Kaleb I was. I roll my neck around and stretch my legs out the best I can, trying to regain feeling in my limbs from this long flight.
“Those must be some killer pain pills. You were out and you snore.” They must be. I still wonder how I went from Harris to him. Kaleb chuckles as he stretches his arms over his head, those tattoos pulling taut when his muscles flex in his upper arms. Right now, I don’t care how I shifted my body in my sleep. He’s a distraction. One I’m not sure if I want to eat off of, or choke on.
Shit. I would love to finally get a close-up of every one of those tattoos. I wonder if he’ll ever tell me the meaning behind them. And don’t even let me forget about those damn abs. His thin t-shirt doesn’t leave a damn thing to the imagination, not that my mind will let me forget them. They’re hard, defined, and bulging through his t-shirt, and I can still feel the ripple on my fingertips from when I was sprawled across him like a desperate magnet.
In spite of sleeping for the most part of the flight, I’m still exhausted. All I want to do is go home, take a long, hot shower and sleep for days. Then wake up and figure out what in the hell I’m going to do with my time off. I need a distraction, anything to help me keep my troubled mind off of that boy.
“He’s right, you do snore. Loud.” My head swings around to Harris.
“What the fuck ever. Like the two of you don’t.” I roll my eyes at him.
“I will the minute I hit my bed, that’s for damn sure.” JJ leans forward, stretching. He looks worse than I feel, which says a lot, because I feel like shit.
“Won’t we all.” Harris looks at me, then to Kaleb. The way he glares at Kaleb has a red flag instantly waving in my face. Something happened while I was sleeping, I can feel it. The tension between these two has hardened. Damn them. I’m not in the mood for whatever kind of bullshit these two have going on between them, and if Kaleb said anything about what happened between the two of us, he’ll wish to god I didn’t save his ass, because I will kill him myself. Even though it will be a long time before I even think about having sex with another man, there could never be anything between the two of us. We’re entirely different.
I’m not a prude, that’s blatantly obvious by the way I let him fuck me in every hole he could, but we aren’t even on the same page when it comes to sex. The cheeks of my ass clench together when I think of the way he roughly took what he wanted, his demanding ways making me submit to him. God, I’d be lying if I didn’t love every minute of it. The way he touched me, fucked me like he could never get enough.
I need to get the hell away from him and have some me time. I could hit the clubs with my girlfriend Mallory. Anything to make me forget him. It’s been way too long since I’ve done something for myself, but when the Army is your life and you’ve done nothing but train for the past few years to set goals to fulfill your dreams, going out is the last thing on your mind. I haven’t had time to myself in I don’t know how long.
“Let’s get out of here.” Kaleb extends his hand out to me as soon as the airplane comes to a stop. He helps me stand, and I stretch more, holding my sore arm tight against me. The pain has faltered some, leaving me with a slight discomfort, but it’s nothing I can’t handle. The pain pills will help. I drop his hand the minute I step out into the aisle, making him frown.
“Just go,” my cranky ass tells him. I watch him and chastise my stupid hormones the entire way off the plane, all the way down the hallway. Stupid woman. Why did you taste the forbidden? He’s ruined you for a long time.
“You’re riding with me.” He grabs my hand again like we’re a damn couple as we walk through the airport after saying goodbye to JJ and Harris.
Harris seemed distant, his hug brief, no smart-ass comment like he usually drops either.
“What happened between you and Harris, Kaleb?” I jerk my hand from his when we exit the door. The sweet smell of Florida hits my senses immediately. The tang of the salty air has me breathing it in. I’m home. American soil has never felt so good.
“I’ll tell you when we get to my Jeep.” I can’t help but laugh, don’t ask me why. I never gave a thought as to what kind of vehicle he might drive. Hell, I never thought about anything except the way he fucked me and the way he made me feel. A part of me wants to know everything I can about him, while the rational part of me knows I shouldn’t.
“God, your laugh is beautiful.” He stares down at me. For the first time since I met him, I feel my skin blush. It’s strange being able to hear those words from him, knowing he can speak his mind now without having to hide anything. I’m at a loss for words.
“Thank you,” I reply politely and feel extremely uncomfortable. This is so unlike me. I know I need a ride to the base to get my evaluation done and tell my superior officer what happened to me. I’ll need to fill him in on how well Kaleb guided us through our mission, like the great leader he is.
It’s a half-hour drive, and I’m worried about spending that much time with Kaleb. I’m afraid of the things he’ll say. He made it perfectly clear in the hospital that he wants to explore what he thinks we have once we return home, and now that we have, I wish I would have told him I wasn’t riding with him. I know damn well both Harris and JJ would have taken me.
I follow him across the street into the parking garage, keeping my eyes off of his tempting ass and the strong muscles across his back. He’s mouthwatering. He’s dangerous, and if I don’t stay the hell away from him, he could destroy me. All he wants from me is a fuck. With the kind of man he is, I could easily fall for him. I may be strong, a soldier trained to harden both her inner and outer shell, but there isn’t any amount of training that can guard my heart. He would break me. Shatter me. I can’t have that. Especially with everything going on right now.
“Nice,” I say when we stroll up to a white older model Jeep. “This is my girl. 1979 CJ5. My parents bought it for me when I was sixteen. I love this thing.” He pulls out a set of keys from his pocket and unlocks my door before tossing our bags in the back.
“I like it, it’s you.” He turns toward me, crossing his arms over his massive chest. His gaze turns instantly dark. “Is that a compliment, Jade?” I study him. My mind is so foggy and the effects of the pain pill have to be lingering still; there is no way the woman that I am wouldn’t have a smartass comeback waiting to snap back.
“Kaleb. I merely said it’s you. Which means it’s manly. Nothing more.” His lips twitch. Why is this so strange?
“You’re a shit liar, Jade. There’s more. There will always be more. This wall you’ve suddenly built around yourself will not stop me. You know damn well I have the sources to blow that wall to shreds, to make it shatter. I have no clue what’s running through that gorgeous head of yours, but we will be talking. You will listen and most importantly, Jade, you will become mine.” He’s speaking to me as if he’s still my Commander, and I don’t like it at all. Finally, I feel Jade swim to the surface, plunging her way through the murky waters and ready to show her true self.
“You don’t own me. No one does. No one ever will. And if I decide I want to be in a relationship, it sure as hell won’t be with a man like you.” I’m so angry right now. I go to move past him, but he reaches out to draw me close to him. He wraps his arms around my waist carefully. I sigh out of frustration. This arrogant bastard will not listen to a word I say, and it’s pissing me the fuck off. All he had to say was I will become his and the fog lifted from within my head. Like I’m something that can be owned.
“I don’t want to own you. I want you to be yourself. To see you smile, laugh like you did back there when I told you I drove a Jeep. I want to surprise you with shit like that. To turn your world upside down, to drive you insanely mad with desire. Then turn around and fill that desire with everything I’ve got to please you. I know you can’t get this shit through your thick skull, but goddamn it, Jade. How many times do I have to tell you that it’s more than sex? I wan
t us to get to know each other. Jesus Christ, what the hell are you hiding from?” I stand stoic. His words shock me to the middle of my chest. How can I tell him I have no idea what I’m afraid of when I don’t even know myself? Maybe it’s the way whatever this is between us started off. I knew the man for five minutes before I had his dick slamming into my pussy, making me want to yell out like a crazy woman.
Then it hits me, my brainwaves working overtime. I’m a slut. I let a man fuck me every way he could without knowing a damn thing about him. Without giving a second thought to the way I would feel about myself when we returned home. He knows everything about me, and I don’t know a damn thing about him, except for the little bit he told me. How can he stand here and not see me this way? Not see me as the slut I am? I feel tears pricking my eyes and I hate it. I hate the woman who has returned home. When I left here trained and prepared, I never thought I would come back broken and weak. This isn’t me at all.
I pull away from him somehow and try to find some sort of strength to speak.
“Kaleb, I’m not hiding from anything. I’m scared. With everything that’s happened between us and then I shot that child. I can’t think straight.” My hands fly up to my head, squeezing the sides as the pounding headache travels from the back of my head around to the front.
“Come on then. I won’t push you anymore about us for right now, but I won’t give up, so you’ll have to deal with it eventually. I want you. What I will push you on, Jade, is that you talk to someone about what happened out there. I can’t help you with that. You may be pissed off, but I’m recommending that you do. Now let’s go get this over with so I can take you home.” He pushes himself off from the Jeep and extends his hand out to me to guide me up and in. All I can think about as I watch him walk around the front, climb in, stick the keys in the ignition, and crank his so-called baby on, is going home.