She rinsed off as best she could with a bucket of water she scooped out of the surrounding bayou and a bar of soap out of her pack. It wasn’t a great bath, but it was better than nothing.
Ford helped her roll a big log over next to the distiller, and they sat down on it to dry their feet next to the fire. Jungle rot was a real threat when feet spent hours on end soaked in filthy water. They stripped off their boots and socks and stuck their feet as close to the flames as they could stand to thoroughly dry their skin.
Munching energy bars, they watched the flames and listened to the night sounds. Ford kicked back looking relaxed, but she felt stretched as tight as a wire. He identified what kinds of owls were hooting, named the night birds and toads behind various calls and trills, and told her what insects clicked and whirred beyond the circle of firelight. But then a big, deep, roaring sound split the night. Ford grinned broadly.
“What’s that?” she asked sharply.
“Gator. Big bull by the sound of him. Looking for a girlfriend.”
She looked around quickly at the margins of the clearing. “How close is he?”
“A deep sound like that carries a long ways. He might be as much as a half-mile away.”
“He sounds closer,” she declared. She pointed her high intensity flashlight around the edges of the clearing. No eyes stared back at her out of the night. Thank God.
“Now what?” she asked, hoping she didn’t sound as tense as she felt.
“Bed.”
Crud. There went her blood pressure the rest of the way to sky high. Instantly, images of him pinning her down, hurting and humiliating her, flashed through her mind’s eye unbidden.
Thunder rolled ominously in the distance, muted by the heavy vegetation.
“Roof’s good,” he said into the quiet that followed. “I fixed it while I was waiting for you.”
Waiting for her. God, if only she could interpret that romantically. Instead, the comment made her skin crawl. Which was totally unfair to him. He hadn’t done anything to indicate that he was a rapist.
Jerkily, she banked the fire under the distiller. The drum was wide enough that even if it rained hard, the embers should stay dry and hot enough to keep the distiller working.
The first fat, cold drops of water hit her face and she raced after Ford into the house. Thunder rolled again, low, and deep, vibrating through her being.
“You have a bedroom staked out for yourself?” she asked.
“First one on the left.”
“Guess I’ll take the one across the hall, then.” She stepped into the abandoned room. A wooden chair sat in one corner, and a steel bedframe with no mattress occupied a side wall.
She shined her flashlight into the corners, checking carefully for rats and spiders. She batted down a few cobwebs but had the place more or less to herself. Ford must have given the house a thorough cleaning for it to be so free of visitors.
A knock on her door spun her around. She threw it open nervously Ford stood there with an old-fashioned kerosene lamp glowing softly in his hand. “Thought you might like a little light.”
She took the lamp and set it on the chair seat. She looked up and he’d leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb and crossed his arms. The man looked like a freaking Greek god posed there like that. “You’re thinking loud, Lambo. What’s up?”
He shoved off the doorjamb, and her entire body tensed, poised for battle.
“We need to talk,” he announced.
Professional alarm shot through her. “Okay. Talk.”
“Sit.”
Crap. That was how Perriman started his “You’re out” speech. She perched awkwardly on the edge of the bed frame. Ford made a restless lap around the spacious room, stopping to prop his right leg up on the bed frame. His nearness practically made her nauseous. Dammit. She had to get over this irrational fear of being alone with big, strong men. That was the whole point of becoming a SEAL, herself. She wanted to know she could kick any guy’s ass and take names.
He massaged his knee absently. If she wasn’t mistaken, the joint looked swollen under his pant leg. It was nice to know that today had taken at least a little toll on him, too.
“Perriman’s right. You do have what it takes to be a SEAL. You don’t need me to beat it into you or break you to prove to you how much you can take.”
“Umm, thanks, I think?”
He continued grimly. “I don’t think running you around a swamp for weeks on end is going to teach you anything.”
“Thank God,” she breathed.
“Don’t thank me, yet. I’m still going to bust your ass. Just in other ways. Perriman told me he more or less ran you through the INDOC program.”
He took a deep breath. Whatever he was about to say next was important to him.
“Look, Zee. I’m coming off an injury. Trying to get myself back into fighting shape. I’m going to push through my conditioning regimen, and if you can keep up with me, then you’re good enough physically to be a SEAL. I’ve got a bunch of technical stuff to teach you out here. As long as you can absorb and retain it, you should be good to go. If and when we can get some more women out here, we’ll work on team building stuff with all of you. But until then, I’m going to dump as much knowledge into you as I can. Does that sound fair to you?”
Her initial gut reaction was to be suspicious. Was he really offering her an olive branch? On the surface, it was more than fair. It was mature. Respectful of her abilities. “Yeah. Sure.”
Something shifted between them as she stared at him and he stared back. The invisible rope was back, electric and alive, coiling between them. It was fascinating and dangerous.
A huge crack of thunder nearby made her jump, and it effectively broke the intense sexual tension of the moment.
“Right then. G’night, Trina.”
“’Night, Ford.”
He retreated, leaving the warm, golden glow of the lamp behind. She stripped off her damp clothes and laid them out carefully to dry overnight. Until she got some more clothes, these were all she had, and it was important to take care of them. She was tempted to jam the chair underneath her doorknob, but forcibly restrained herself from doing it. If she survived this training, she would live in the field with a half-dozen or more men just like Ford. She had to get over her stupid fears.
She stretched out on the thin foam bedroll that had been strapped to the bottom of her rucksack. She was exhausted, but found herself lying awake listening to the rainstorm roll in. One day down. Who knew how many more to go. Not that it mattered. She would take each one as it came.
Trina woke abruptly to a muffled sound of pain that made her blood run cold. She laid perfectly still as she’d been trained to do, assessing and listening. A few raindrops slapped the glass of her window. Surely that wasn’t what had jerked her from a dead sleep so abruptly.
There it was again. A low moan.
Crap. Ford.
She exploded to her feet and was across the hall in a single breath. Crouching low, she eased open his door and spun into his room, ready to hurt whoever was messing with her teammate.
His room was dark, but her night-adjusted vision aggressively probed every shadow for the problem. No visible intruder. A movement, and she lasered in on it. Mattress. In the corner. Thrashing. Another moan.
She exhaled in relief. Ford was having a bad dream. Jesus, he’d scared her there, for a minute. She moved over to the mattress on the floor and knelt beside it.
“Ford,” she whispered. “Wake up.”
She expected him to jolt awake as sharply as she had, but he didn’t. He flung an arm toward her but then rolled onto his back, his hands twitching. “Oh, my god,” he groaned. “No.”
He sounded like he’d just watched his best friend get hit by a bus. Her heart ached for his pain. She reached out to touch his shoulder.
Ford’s hands whipped out, grabbing her around the neck and throwing her down with shocking violence. He was on top of her, straddling her and stra
ngling her, so fast she hardly knew what had happened. Terror exploded in a red mist behind her eyeballs.
“Ford,” she croaked, barely able to make a sound past the painfully tight vice around her neck. Instinct warned her against fighting back. He would meet aggression with even more aggression. But she couldn’t help herself. She panicked. No matter how hard she thrashed or kicked or swung her fists at him, his hands tightened more and more around her neck.
His heavy body pinned hers down. She was ten years old again, and he was a full-grown man. Spots danced before her eyes and her vision narrowed down to an even darker tunnel within the shadows of his room. Must. Break. Free.
Chapter Six
‡
Desperate and near passing out, she went entirely limp in his grasp. Maybe if his dreaming mind thought he’d killed her he would let go of her neck so she could breathe.
His fingers loosened and she sucked in a gasping breath. Ford stared down at her grimly, still straddling her hips. She stared back, panting.
He knew. Somehow, the bastard knew about her fear of being molested. Rage abruptly supplanted her terror. He’d attacked her intentionally!
“What the hell are you doing in here?” Ford growled.
She thrashed, trying to free herself, but he slapped his hands on her shoulders and forcibly held her down. The ease with which he did it threatened to overwhelm her rage and turn it back into abject fear.
She ground out, “I was trying to wake you up from a nightmare, but you attacked me.”
“You know better than to grab a SEAL.”
“I only touched your shoulder,” she replied defensively.
“You should’ve put your hand over my mouth in a combat wake-up. I’d have known it was a teammate and that there was trouble close. Or, you could’ve touched me on the foot and stood back.”
She’d forgotten. She’d been too worried about him to wake him up properly.
She noticed that, as he stared down at her, his expression was ravaged. Whatever he’d been dreaming about was still close to the surface of his mind. And it was clearly devastating.
Her gaze dropped to his glorious chest, reveling in smooth skin over flexed muscle. The sprinkling of hair was just right, not too much and not too little.
“Let me help you forget your nightmare,” she murmured low.
He shook his head. “You don’t understand what you’re offering.”
“Show me.”
“Stop it.”
“No.” She was going to conquer her terror, dammit. To take this bull by the horns and wrestle it into submission. She couldn’t live in fear of her teammates.
Reaching up, she tugged on the back of his neck, pulling his head down toward her. He only partially resisted, giving way millimeter by millimeter to her urging. She had no illusions about the fact that he was strong enough to resist her if he wanted to.
Closer and closer he came to her, staring intently into her eyes. Yes, she was scared. Yes, her stomach was leaping and twisting, demanding that she run away. Right now. But she was not giving in.
His hands landed on either side of her head, and his biceps flexed in a display of tightly restrained power. Her hands drifted hesitantly across his powerful shoulders and down his arms to wrap around those biceps. Her fingers didn’t even come close to spanning the bulging muscles.
She pulled him down even more, and he lowered himself in a slow motion press that stole her breath away as the distance between them disappeared inch by inch. His stare never left hers, weighing her response, testing her reaction to him.
She levered herself upward until her mouth touched the hollow where his neck joined his shoulder. She kissed the spot, reveling in the leap of his pulse as she tasted him.
“Stop,” he said with considerably less conviction.
She made her body relax beneath his, cushioning his hardness. “Kiss me, Ford,” she whispered. “I promise I’ll make you forget everything else.”
“You’re sure?”
She gulped. It was all or nothing. She either beat the monster in her head or she was done as a SEAL. Right here. Right now. “I’m sure,” she whispered.
He closed the remaining distance between them swiftly. His mouth captured hers and reality evaporated, leaving behind only a vast empty darkness cocooning the two of them in a private world of their own.
Okay. This wasn’t so bad. She kissed him back tentatively.
His legs slid down the length of hers, tangling with hers until she couldn’t tell where she stopped and he began. And then realization exploded across her stunned mind. She’d been naked when she bolted in here to save him from the boogeyman, and he was naked, too.
He spoke low, his voice intense. “You have the power to stop this any time. Just say the word.”
God. He said that like he knew everything bout her past. Like he knew exactly what her deepest, darkest fear was.
And just like that, it was okay. Yes, he probably could rape her if he chose to. But he’d given her control of the situation.
She arched up into him as a sound of pure lust escaped her, her mouth open and willing beneath his as his head dipped down to hers again. His lips were warm. Resilient. Full enough to make for fantastic kissing. Her hand slid behind his head, pulling him closer, or maybe in a preemptive strike to keep him from having second thoughts and pulling away.
He inhaled sharply, tensing momentarily, and then exhaled as he settled against her more deeply. His tongue plunged between her lips. She met the invasion with her own tongue, testing and tasting back as he claimed her in no uncertain terms. His body moved on hers, and she gasped at the amazing sensation of all that power and strength consuming her.
She couldn’t have remained still if her life depended on it. She kissed him hungrily, her hands roaming across his back, measuring the width of his shoulders, sliding down his ribs to his narrow waist. Everywhere she touched him, she found heat and muscle and restless energy. But it was okay. Safe. Lord, he was addictive.
Her thighs cupped his raging erection, cradling it close. Her hips rocked forward of their own volition, and he made a hungry sound in the back of his throat that drove her out of her mind with lust.
He rolled onto his side, taking her with him, a powerful hand in the small of her back keeping her tucked tightly against him. His free hand roamed over her rear end, pressing her more snugly to him as she surged against his physical perfection. It was impossible for her to stop clinging tightly to his neck or to stop herself from kissing him. She’d fantasized about it so continuously earlier that, now that the moment was upon her, she was voracious for the real thing.
He met her lust with abandon, kissing her back like he’d been looking for her his whole life. His hand skimmed up her side, past the indentation of her waist, and forward to cup her breast, and she thrust forward into his palm greedily.
He bent his head down, and his mouth, hot and wet, closed on her nipple. She about leaped out of her skin. Her fingers tightened against his scalp, drawing him even closer.
Until he pulled free of her grasp with shocking ease. He kissed his way down the flat plane of her stomach and his hand stroked her leg with a long, sensual caress down the back of her thigh, knee, and calf. He hooked her knee with his hand, lifting her leg and draping it over his hip. And then, oh God, his hand cupped her core. He didn’t even have to do anything for her to gasp and shudder, burying her face against his shoulder as pleasure overcame her.
“Been a while?” he muttered.
“You have no idea.”
A short grunt. “I might.”
She returned the favor, her hand slipping between them to grasp his cock. Sensations slammed into her. Hard. Satin smooth. Pulsing. Huge. “Oh, my goodness,” she breathed.
A silent gust of laughter escaped him. “That’s a word for it,” he growled as he pushed on her shoulder, rolling her to her back and looming over her. He swore under his breath. “I’ve got no protection with me.”
“I’m
on the pill and haven’t had sex in more months than I care to count. Which is to say, I’ve got nothing contagious.”
“Same,” he ground out. “Except for the pill part.”
She smiled at his dry humor. But then he asked darkly, “You okay with this?”
“Try me,” she challenged.
“You really shouldn’t throw down dares in front of men like me,” he muttered warningly. And then he was all heat and motion and muscle and hot skin on her. Not that she was any less urgent against him. She’d wanted him from pretty much the first moment she’d laid eyes on him. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d actually felt this safe with a man. Which was ironic, given that he was by far the most dangerous man she’d ever been in bed with.
His hands and mouth roamed hungrily across her body, unerringly finding her hot spots and teasing them to a fever pitch. He was thorough and merciless in his seduction, exploring every inch of her body, leaving her no place to hide, no room for modesty. She felt so energized that her entire body zinged with high-voltage lust, charged and uncomfortable, demanding release in no uncertain terms.
“Ford, please,” she begged.
“Please what?”
“Now. Take me now.” Her limbs moved restlessly and her entire body strained toward him.
He made a sound of satisfaction and captured her hands with his, entwining their fingers as he pulled them up beside her ears. He used his entire body to pin hers to the mattress, and he went utterly still, waiting.
She stared up at him and he stared back so intensely she almost had trouble meeting his gaze. Tension built between them until it was taut enough that the air thrummed with it, a living breathing thing.
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