Thunder Running

by Rebecca Crowley

  Or like the time a strange number came up on her phone and she had to leave the bar to take the call. She frowned at the sidewalk on Main Street as Chance’s captain explained that a patrol had been ambushed and he was one of three soldiers still unaccounted for. She moved through the rest of her shift like a zombie, refusing her boss’s offer to go home early, shaking cocktails and pulling draught beers and handing them over with a smile while her mind was thousands of miles away in Afghanistan, praying her husband was alive. When she couldn’t work any later she went home, where she paced and cried and wrung her hands until her phone rang again, and she answered with her heart not daring to beat. It was the captain again, breathlessly relaying how Chance had turned up to the outpost wall, hypothermic, his radio crushed, hauling another soldier over his shoulders. She sobbed with relief, barely able to thank the officer for his call, and when her phone rang two hours later it was Chance’s Gulf-Coast drawl on the other end, the first thing out of his mouth a joke about how the army would probably charge him for the broken radio.

  There had been mornings she’d skipped class and called in sick to work, too depressed to get up, dozing until midafternoon and then hating herself for being weak and wasting the day. There had been nights she couldn’t get to sleep, certain she heard an intruder creeping through the grass, jumping at every subsequent creak and shift in the old house until she gave up and switched on the light, reading book after book until dawn. There had been moments she was certain she couldn’t survive another hour without him, times she wanted to call some imaginary army headquarters and say she gave up, she couldn’t do it anymore and they had to bring him home.

  But she endured. She treasured every second of their phone and Skype calls, and found ways to keep breathing through the hours between them. The six months never really got easier, but they did get shorter. And now here she was, only minutes from the end.

  “I see a bus!” someone shouted near the entrance. An excited hush fell over the room as people gathered wandering children, unfolded handmade signs, readied cameras and gave their makeup a final onceover. Tara backed up against the nearest bleacher, afraid her legs wouldn’t hold her if she tried to scramble onto one of the higher ones for a better view.

  People started to cheer as the sound of a bus hissing to a halt was audible from outside. So many of the wives seemed to have brought friends or family members to take photos, and she briefly wondered whether she should’ve asked Laurel or Mia to be here with her.

  She discarded that idea almost as soon as she’d had it. She and Chance had spent their lives facing off against the world. Now they had each other, and they didn’t need anyone else.

  Suddenly the double doors on the far well banged open and the cheering escalated to a fever pitch as the 13th Infantry’s Alpha Company marched in, then halted in formation.

  Tara’s heart beat so loudly in her ears that she could hardly make out what the commander said in his brief speech. She caught something about service and bravery but she was busy scanning the group of people in identical camouflage uniforms, searching for the one who was coming home to her.

  “And we remember those still in harm’s way, and pray for their safe return.” The commander stood back from the podium as the first notes of the Star-Spangled Banner came over the loudspeaker.

  She saw him.

  The next few minutes sped by so quickly she could barely process what happened. The song finished, the troops were released from duty, and the room became a melee of bodies looking and finding and colliding in reunion. She lost sight of Chance behind a big family and when she rounded them he was gone. She drifted aimlessly through the crowd, craning her neck, furrowing her brow, worried he’d gone out to the parking lot when he couldn’t find her when a hand touched her shoulder.

  “Hey, sugar, you want to make a bet?”

  She turned around and burst into tears. He was gaunt and pale and alive and she threw her arms around his neck, squeezing so hard, not sure she could ever bring herself to let go. He hoisted her up off her feet and she wrapped her legs around his waist, not caring what the other wives thought, not caring how her skirt rode up her thighs, losing herself in the heat of his body and the bony hardness of his shoulders and the irrepressible scent of honeysuckle slicing through the old-rubber smell of the gymnasium.

  “You’re here,” she gasped when she could pull enough air into her lungs to speak. “You’re home.”

  “Of course I am, sugar. This soldier’s life means I’ll never stop leaving, but I promise I’ll always come home to you.”

  “And I’ll always be here waiting.”

  As Tara took in his devil-may-care grin, his mischievous green eyes, the absolute commitment she knew sat safe and stalwart in his heart, she realized just how much she’d won when the roulette ball hit on green. She had a man who understood her, who cherished her, who blazed through life with her same ferocious heat and loved her for it. And she knew without a doubt that no matter what tried to pull them apart, from money to family to wars on foreign soil, they would always snap back, staggering toward each other, collapsing together. Two sticks blackening and fusing in a bonfire, the flame roaring up into the sky.

  About the Author

  Rebecca Crowley inherited her love of romance from her mom, who taught her to at least partially judge a book by the steaminess of its cover. She writes contemporary romance and romantic suspense with smart heroines and swoon-worthy heroes, and never tires of the happily-ever-after. Having pulled up her Kansas roots to live in New York City and London, Rebecca now lives in Johannesburg, South Africa.

  Find her on the web at www.rebeccacrowley.net or on Twitter at @rachelmaybe.

  Look for these titles by Rebecca Crowley

  Now Available:

  The Homefront Trilogy

  Boots on the Ground

  Alive Day

  Elite Operators

  Secure Target

  It takes a strong heart to connect roots with wings.

  Boots on the Ground

  © 2014 Rebecca Crowley

  Homefront, Book 1

  With a life that started in foster care and nearly ended in the mountains of Afghanistan, Grady Reid is more than ready to hang up his sergeant’s stripes when his Army contract expires.

  Small-town Meridian, Kansas, seems as good a place as any to finally put down roots. He’s dumped his savings into a ramshackle farmhouse and is on his way to trading bullets for bull breeding when an exquisitely beautiful, totally unattainable blonde turns his head faster than a pivoting cutting horse.

  Dr. Laurel Hayes longs to escape the confines of stuffy, small-town life for an adrenaline-fueled, transient lifestyle delivering medical aid in unstable regions around the world. Then she meets Grady, a man with enticing eyes, a slow smile—and not an ounce of the wanderlust that tugs at her soul.

  Their lives are headed in opposite directions. But as something more powerful than attraction, desire, or even lust draws them together, something’s got to give…or their hearts could break under the strain.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Boots on the Ground:

  “What’s everyone having? This round’s on me,” Kenny called over the music, his wallet already in his hand.

  “I’ll help you carry,” Laurel volunteered after Christina and Peter gave their drink orders. She followed Kenny’s back as he wove toward the bar, skirting around the people dancing in front of the low stage. He reached the row of taps first, but just as she saw him turn to make sure she was behind him, one of the more inebriated dancers staggered backward and hit hard against her side. As she teetered on her high heels, one ankle twisting painfully beneath her, a firm, warm hand closed on her arm and dragged her upright.

  She didn’t need to look up to know whose touch it was.

  “Why is it every time I go out for a drink, I end up rescuing you? I’m starting to t
hink this is all some sort of elaborate plan.”

  Grady released his hold and stepped back, transferring two of the six beer bottles he held by the neck into his free hand. She guiltily dragged her gaze up to meet his, and sighed in relief when she found amusement tugging at the corners of his mouth.

  “Laurel, are you okay?” Kenny rushed to her side, concern drawing his brows together.

  “I’m fine. I’ll see you guys back at the table, okay? I’m just going to catch up with my friend Grady for a few minutes.”

  Kenny gave Grady a skeptical once-over, and she knew exactly what he was thinking—he’d known her for years and never heard of this friend. But he nodded, shot her a look that was a clear reminder to be careful, and made his way back to the bar.

  She indicated the bottles he carried. “Thirsty?”

  “Saturday night special—three for five dollars.”

  “It’s packed in here.”

  His smile was tight. “I’m trying to be okay with that.”

  “Want to get some air?”

  She was afraid he would hesitate, that he’d give her the pitying look that precedes a letting-her-down-gently statement, that he’d shift awkwardly and explain he was here with someone else. But to her thrilled surprise, he took a deep breath. “Yeah. I do.”

  She trailed him away from the crowd and around a pool table, averting her gaze as they crossed near where Peter and Christina sat. He led her to a back corner, where she recognized his two friends from the bar near the highway. Chance was leaning forward and speaking earnestly, not even noticing as Grady clunked the full bottles down amid the empties. Ethan sat across from him, his face in his hands.

  She didn’t have time to say hello before Grady was edging past them to the back door, and she had to hurry to keep up with his long strides. The door shut behind them with a slam, and then everything was quiet. They were alone.

  Her stomach clenched with nerves as she realized the significance of this moment. This was her second chance—and almost certainly her last.

  She pushed her lips into a bright smile.

  Don’t mess this up.

  The taut ache in his shoulders eased the instant they stepped into the parking lot, where row after row of pickup trucks gleamed under the pole-mounted lights. The dark, crowded, booze-fueled atmosphere made him jumpy as hell, but Ethan refused to leave, and he and Chance agreed that they weren’t comfortable leaving the captain in there on his own.

  Still, he was wound so tightly that when he saw Laurel stroll in with some accountant-looking guy in a suit, he figured it was a trick of his imagination—not unlike the RPG teams and AK-47-wielding guerrillas he sometimes saw in his peripheral vision. After all, he’d thought about her a lot the last couple of weeks, always with a pang of regret and resigned disappointment. He wasn’t ready for a woman like her—he might never be. It was a hard lesson but an important one.

  But then she walked right past him, and as soon as he got a whiff of that fresh, fruity perfume, he knew she was the real deal.

  It hadn’t taken much time in combat for him to develop a firm belief in fate and a willingness to follow where it led. For the esteemed doctor to waltz into a down-home dive bar seemed to be fate’s version of screaming in his ear.

  Even in the harsh glow of the streetlights she looked gorgeous, her hair drifting loose around her shoulders, her luscious body poured into a patterned dress that matched the blue of her eyes.

  Fate. He took a step closer.

  “Who’s your date?”

  She frowned briefly, as if she’d already forgotten the poor guy existed. “Oh, Peter? He’s a lawyer friend of my brother’s.”

  “Is he boring you?”

  “To tears.”

  Emboldened by the relief of the open space and the two bottles of beer he’d already downed, he put his hands on her waist. Laurel’s body was trim but not skinny. She was taller than average, with full breasts and flared hips, and the robust, vigorous air of a woman unafraid to ask for what she wanted—and that made him harder than the gun on an M1 Abrams tank.

  “What’s boring about him?”

  She ran her hand down the center of his chest, studying each snap on his shirt as she went. “His suit. His car. His season subscription to the Kansas City Ballet. His apparent inability to laugh at my jokes.”

  “Maybe your jokes aren’t funny.”

  “They’re hilarious.”

  “Do you see me laughing?”

  She looked up, and the harsh light illuminated a heartfelt emotion glittering in her eyes that was as soft as it was deep, and it made his throat constrict and his stomach twist. She raised her hand to his face, smoothing her thumb over his cheek.

  “I see you,” she whispered.

  He kissed her.

  There was no tentative exploration, no slow build. Within seconds his tongue was pursuing hers, his mouth led hers in a quickening rhythm, and the hungry pressure of her lips started a fire roaring low in his groin with the speed of a match dropped on a puddle of kerosene.

  She smelled like sunshine and cool spring mornings, and each time their mouths met and parted and met again, he sought the sweet, white-wine-tinged taste of her with renewed vigor. It was the kind of feverish, insatiable, shameless kissing he thought he’d left behind in the backseats and bleachers of his younger days, but any reservation about manners was soundly snuffed by her soft moan as their teeth clicked together in their haste to devour each other.

  His hand moved to her lower back, pulling her closer, and she slid her fingers to the nape of his neck. The material of her dress was silky against his callused fingers, sliding over his skin in a way that reminded him she was not the type of woman he usually picked up in dives like this one, the type who either left before dawn or accused him of being a coldhearted asshole before slamming the door and driving off. Everything about Laurel felt somehow freer and more confident than what he was used to. She kissed with open desire. The hand at his neck was honest in its urging, while the fingers splayed on his cheek said she was ready to follow wherever he wanted to go.

  Which, at this point, was all the way to the bold, bright moon hanging overhead.

  One affair, thirty days.

  His Taste of Temptation

  © 2014 Cathryn Fox

  In the Line of Duty, Book 3

  Since his last relationship blew up in his face, bomb expert Brad Crosby has lost his appetite for “permanent”. But his kid brother’s best friend? Now there’s a curvy morsel he could wrap his lips around.

  For years Brad has been the star of Madison Graham’s fantasies. If only she were the kind of put-together girl he prefers, not a pastry chef whose makeup consists of a dusting of powdered sugar on her nose. A belief that’s confirmed when her apartment floods and he offers to let her sleep in his bed—alone.

  Wrapped in Brad’s sheets, she dreams of his touches, his kisses, the feel of his body on hers. Except her dreams feel like reality—and come morning, she realizes it wasn’t a dream at all.

  Soon the two are burning up the nights. But as Madison’s sweet love grows on him, Brad can’t help but think of extending their time together.

  Too bad Madison keeps reminding him their affair has an expiration date.

  Warning: May contain heat, explosive sex, and Fourth of July fireworks that pale in comparison to the sparks between a sworn bachelor and a tempting pastry chef.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for His Taste of Temptation:

  Laid out on his side on Madison’s wet, tiled bathroom floor, Brad finished cutting the wall away to give him better access to the pipes, but how he was supposed to concentrate with Madison prancing around in those high heels of hers was beyond him.

  She stopped by the bathroom door for the umpteenth time. “You sure you don’t need anything before I go?”

  Oh, he needed
something all right.

  “I’m good.”

  She pointed to her medicine cabinet and he watched the way her blouse tightened on her breasts. “I just have to brush my teeth, then I’ll be out of your way.”

  “Yeah, okay,” he managed around a tongue gone thick. She went up on her toes, and he shifted restlessly at the sight of her curvy ass in that tight pencil skirt, her high heels giving her lush cheeks a sexy lift.

  “Fuck,” he murmured under his breath as he assessed the pipes.

  “What?”

  “Nothing. There’s just some water still leaking so I have to drain the system.”

  “Oh, did you want me to do that for you?”

  “Not dressed like that I don’t.”

  An almost uncomfortable look came over her face as she gave herself a once over. “My meeting—” she started to explain, but he climbed to his feet and cut her off.

  “I’ve got it,” he said, his cock needing a reprieve from the sexy yet professional clothes draping her body before he did permanent damage to himself. Honestly, it didn’t matter what she wore. Even dressed in sweats she rubbed him the wrong way, or the right way…or…fuck…if only she’d rub him.

  He took the stairs two at a time until he reached the basement. He found the water tank and went to work on draining the system. Once complete he hurried back upstairs. He stepped back into the bathroom, and his feet splashed on the water still pooling on the tile. The hurried sound of Madison’s high heels clicking on the stairs behind him had him spinning around.