“You are so damned beautiful,” he said on a low growl.
Gripping her hips, he withdrew almost completely and then drove into her again. His movements became stronger and faster, and his face was taut with desire. The base of his cock tormented her with each driving motion until she could no longer bear the exquisite sensations.
She cried out as her orgasm hit her, feeling her body clench around Matt’s unyielding flesh. With a hoarse shout, he thrust one last time and then stiffened, his head thrown back and the cords in his neck standing out in sharp relief. He pulsed strongly within her for several long seconds, before his head dropped forward and he exhaled on a shuddering sigh.
Withdrawing from her, he discarded the condom. Megan scooted herself back against the pillows, using her feet to push the coverlet down and drag the sheet over herself. Matt slid in beside her and pulled her against his side. Megan went willingly, laying her head on his shoulder and letting him curl his fingers around hers.
“That was amazing,” she murmured, sliding a leg over his.
“Pretty unbelievable,” he agreed, and pressed a kiss against her hair.
Angling her head, Megan studied his features. His eyes were closed and a contented smile played around his mouth. She took the opportunity to study him, noting the strong jaw and finely chiseled lips. His lashes were thick and incongruously long for a man, and when he opened his eyes to look at her, she was struck again by the color of his irises.
“I can’t believe you don’t have hordes of women waiting for you at home,” she said, tracing a finger along his collarbone. “I mean, look at you. You’re gorgeous.”
He laughed softly and smoothed a tendril of her hair back with one finger. “I’m glad you think so.”
Megan raised herself on one elbow. “I do.” She gave him a teasing look. “You’re sure there are no former girlfriends back on the east coast?”
Matt made a shrugging motion. “None that I’d be interested in getting in touch with.” When Megan didn’t respond, he continued. “Being in the military isn’t exactly conducive to relationships, and being a sniper has a way of freaking some people out. All I’m saying is that some of the girlfriends I had weren’t all that supportive of what I did.”
Megan absorbed this, silently acknowledging that in the beginning, she’d had some difficulty accepting what he did for the military. But she understood the necessity of his job and it had never occurred to her not to support him, completely and unconditionally. Slowly, she lowered herself back to the pillow.
“Hey,” Matt said, propping his head on his hand to look down at her. “That wasn’t supposed to be a downer. I had a job to do and I did it.”
“You haven’t really told me why you’re leaving the military, except to say that you’ve had enough. Is that why you’re getting out?” she asked. “Because you weren’t getting any support?”
“No,” he said quickly. “I got support from those who mattered. It’s just time I did something different with my life.”
“Like what?”
To her astonishment, he actually looked uncomfortable. “I have some plans,” he hedged. “Nothing definite yet, but I’m working on it.”
Megan searched his face, but his expression was shuttered. “I see,” she finally said. Even during their correspondence, he hadn’t been clear on what he intended to do once he returned to civilian life except to say that he needed some time just to unwind and consider his options. “If there’s anything I can help you with, let me know.”
“Well, maybe you can help me understand why you waited six months for a guy you’d never even met. You can’t tell me that you don’t have men lining up at your door.”
Now it was Megan’s turn to laugh. “There’s not much opportunity to meet single men at an elementary school,” she finally replied, pretending the change of subject didn’t bother her. “I don’t really go out much, and most of my close friends live outside of Massachusetts. Not that I mind. I’m more of the stay-at-home-and-watch-a-movie type, anyway.”
“I hope you’ll let me come over and watch a movie with you.”
Reaching up, she cupped his lean jaw. “Consider yourself invited. It’s strange, but I feel closer to you than to any other guy I’ve ever dated.”
Matt turned his face into her palm. “I feel the same way. You’re not like any woman I’ve met before, which is a good thing.”
Megan didn’t want to think about where their budding relationship might go. She told herself to take it a day at a time. He’d just come back from eighteen months in Iraq and she’d been waiting for him with open arms. Any guy would take what she’d offered. Would he still be interested in her once he settled into civilian life and realized he could have his pick of beautiful women?
“I guess time will tell,” she finally answered. Not wanting to pursue the topic, she traced a finger over the white bandage above his ear. “Can you tell me how you were shot? Was there a battle?”
Matt laid a finger over her lips. “We got involved in a firefight with some insurgents, and I did something stupid. I left my post and made myself a target. But I’m fine. Really. I don’t want you to worry about it.”
Megan pushed his hand away. “Why did you leave your post? You must have had a good reason, right?”
Matt hesitated. “Yeah, I had a good reason. But it’s over now and we don’t need to talk about it.”
Clearly, he didn’t want to discuss his injury or how he’d received it. Still, Megan couldn’t dispel the gory images playing through her head. She shuddered and pressed closer to him.
“I’m so glad you’re safe,” she whispered, brushing her lips over his. “And that you won’t be going back.”
Instead of answering her, he kissed her back, his lips moving sensuously over hers, even as his hand began a leisurely exploration of her body. Megan pulled away, vaguely disturbed by his silence. “You’re not going back, are you?”
He nuzzled her neck, catching her earlobe between his teeth and then soothing the area with his tongue. “Nope.” He lifted his head. “But there is something I have to tell you.”
Megan drew in a deep breath, bracing herself for whatever it was he had to say. “I’m listening.”
“There’s nothing I want more than to spend the entire weekend here in this room with you. Believe me about that. But something’s come up and I have to return to base at oh-six-hundred tomorrow morning. I’ll try to be back as soon as I can, but I’m not sure how long this thing is going to take.”
Megan frowned. “What thing?”
Matt actually looked embarrassed. “Just an awards ceremony. More of a dog-and-pony show for the press than anything else. But I have to be there.”
“Are you getting an award?”
“A couple of medals, no big deal.”
Megan gave a huff of disbelieving laughter. “I’m not sure that’s true. You must have done something pretty extraordinary to be receiving a medal. I thought they only gave them to heroes.”
“Trust me,” Matt said quietly, “I’m no hero.”
When he didn’t elaborate, she pretended to be absorbed in drawing an intricate pattern on his chest with her finger. “So, do you have family coming to the ceremony?”
“Nah. It was a last-minute thing. There’s a four-star general visiting the base and the top brass apparently thought it would be cool for him to make the presentations, so there wasn’t much time to contact family.”
“But could you bring someone if you wanted to?” Megan persisted.
“Sure I could.” He slid his hand beneath her hair to cup the nape of her neck and pulled her down until his lips were a mere breath from hers. “Listen, I’d ask you to come but I’m not sure how long it will take and it might be boring for you. You’ll be happier here. You can go down to the beach, do some shopping, or just hang out. I’ll be back before you know it, and I promise I’ll make it up to you.”
He captured her lips in a kiss that was both searingly hot and sweetly tender. His arms sl
id around her, one hand tangling in her hair while the other slid down her back and over her rump to possessively cup and knead her buttocks. Beneath her hips, she could feel him growing hard again, and an answering need began to build low in her womb.
But as he rolled her beneath him, Megan couldn’t help but wonder why he seemed so determined to keep her and his military life separate.
5
FOUR DAYS LATER, Megan opened the front door of her town house and scooped the morning paper from the small porch. She looked at the two envelopes she held in her hand, both addressed to Sergeant Matt Talbot. She’d become so accustomed to sending him letters that even though he was back in the States, she couldn’t quite get out of the habit. But these letters were different than the ones she’d sent to him in Iraq.
She’d deluded herself into thinking she had known him through his letters and sporadic phone calls. The truth was, she hadn’t known him then, not really. She hadn’t experienced what it was like to be held in his arms, to have his mouth and hands on her. To have the full, potent force of his attention focused on her. To lose herself in him.
Since returning to the east coast, she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him. A pleasurable glow from their weekend still clung to her and she’d written the letters late at night when she missed him most, knowing she’d revealed more than she should have given the short amount of time that they’d known each other. But she hadn’t exaggerated when she’d told him that she felt closer to him than she had to any other guy.
Megan had had relationships before, and some of them had been really good. But in the end, none of them had worked out. She was ready to share her life—and her heart—with someone. With Matt. After their amazing weekend together, she was certain that he felt the same way. Now she tucked the stamped envelopes into her mailbox for the mailman to collect.
A breeze caught the loose ends of her silk dressing gown and swirled it around her bare feet and she paused for a moment to savor the salty-fresh scent of the ocean.
Her town house was located several blocks from the waterfront, but on a quiet morning like this, she could hear the surf pounding against the seawall. She’d been raised on the coast of Maine, within a stone’s throw of the ocean. When she’d moved south, to Massachusetts, she knew she had to live within walking distance of the beach. There was no way she could afford the expensive homes along the waterfront, but her little town house suited her just fine, and she could walk to the beach within a matter of minutes.
The sound of the surf reminded her that she was back on the east coast while Matt was still thousands of miles away on the west coast. Was he awake at Camp Pendleton, maybe going for a morning run along the beaches of the Pacific?
With a sigh, Megan stepped back inside and closed the door firmly behind her. In the two days since she’d returned to Massachusetts, she hadn’t heard from Matt. He’d said he would call, but hadn’t been specific about when that might be. Did he think of her? Did he miss her? Or had he just chalked up their time together as a fun weekend interlude?
After their first night together, he’d woken her at dawn with his mouth on her breast and his hand stroking her bottom. She’d been shocked at how swiftly her body responded to his, how she could go from feeling sleepy to sexy in a matter of minutes. They’d made unhurried love, and then she’d curled up in the bedsheets and watched as he dressed.
“I don’t know what time I’ll be back,” he’d said as he’d kissed her, “so don’t hang around if you have things you want to do.”
He’d left his credit card for her to use, despite her adamant protests that she did not want it and would not use it. As if she really wanted to go shopping alone, or have lunch by herself at some seaside restaurant. She’d flown all the way to California to be with him, and he thought she might have other plans?
In the end, he hadn’t arrived back at the hotel until after sunset, although he’d kept his promise and made it up to her. She smiled, thinking about the little restaurant he’d taken her to and how they’d walked back to the hotel along the dark beach. When they’d come across a deserted lifeguard station, Matt had urged her up the wooden ramp to the covered deck, and had kissed her and tormented her with his mouth and hands until she’d all but torn his clothes off and begged him to take her. And he had, up against the wall of the hut, surrounded by darkness, with the pounding of the surf drowning out her cries of pleasure.
Now she placed the newspaper on the kitchen table and poured herself a cup of coffee, telling herself that if she didn’t hear from Matt today, she would call him tonight. What she wouldn’t do was get all freaked out about the fact that she hadn’t heard from him. After all, he was discharging from the military and he probably had a long list of things he needed to do.
When the phone rang, she startled, sloshing hot coffee over her fingers. She flapped her hand in the air as she snatched up the handset, her heart rate already accelerating in anticipation of hearing Matt’s voice. “Hi, sweetheart.”
“Oh, hi, Mom,” she said, sinking into a chair when she heard her mother’s voice on the other end.
“Are you okay?” her mother asked. “You sound a little blue.”
Megan sighed. “I’m okay. I thought you were someone else.”
“Someone else, as in someone male?” Megan heard the hopeful note in her mom’s voice.
“Yes,” she replied, rolling her eyes. “Matt Talbot, the marine I was telling you about. He’s back in the States, but he’s doing his out-processing in California and I was just hoping he’d call.”
“You realize it’s barely six o’clock in the morning on the west coast?”
“Well, maybe he’s an early riser,” Megan said, not wanting to tell her mother that Matt was definitely a morning person, or how she knew that little tidbit of information. “Anyway, what’s up?”
“I wanted to let you know that Erin and the kids are coming to visit next week, and I know she’d love it if you could come up, even for an afternoon.”
Megan thought of her sister and her three rambunctious nephews. She missed them like crazy. Being so far from her family had been the most difficult part of moving to Massachusetts. Unlike most of her college friends, Megan really enjoyed spending time with her parents and her sisters, and she loved playing with her young nieces and nephews.
“I can come up midweek,” she replied. “Maybe I can take the boys to the arcades.”
“They’d like that. Oh, and I also wanted to remind you about the Fourth of July weekend. Will you be bringing anyone? Your marine, maybe?”
Megan loved the annual cookout at her parents’ beach house on the Maine coast with her three siblings and extended family. Her dad and brothers-in-law always prepared a lobster- and clambake on the beach, and the day usually involved a rousing game of beach volleyball, bodysurfing and sandcastle competitions. After dark, they would build a small fire on the sand and watch the fireworks.
Would Matt want to come with her? She didn’t want to commit him to coming without talking with him first. In fact, she wasn’t sure their relationship was even to the point where he’d be interested in meeting her family.
“I’m not sure, Mom,” she stalled. “I’ll ask him, but he may not even be back on the east coast by that time. Or he may want to spend that day with his own family.”
“Well, there’s plenty of time to decide. We’d love to meet him.”
They chatted for a few minutes more and then Megan hung up the phone and unfolded the newspaper. She took a sip of coffee and then nearly choked on the hot liquid as she read the headline: Local Soldier Survives Bullet to the Head; Hailed as a Hero for His Actions.
Even before she scanned the article, Megan knew it was about Matt. She quickly read the story, which provided all the details of the gunfight that he had been reluctant to share with her, including how he had rescued an Iraqi child from danger. The article went on to say that in addition to saving the child, he’d also provided protective fire cover to several oth
er marines, enabling them to scramble to safety. The last paragraph said he was a recent recipient of both the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star.
Megan frowned, recalling how he’d insisted the medals were no big deal. Why hadn’t he wanted her to know that he was receiving two of the highest honors the military could bestow on a soldier? It made no sense to her. Despite his denial, he was a hero in every sense of the word.
Beside the article was a photo of Matt, the exact same photo that Megan had first seen on her boss’s computer at work. She understood then that Matt’s mother must have contacted the local newspaper and Megan felt her heart constrict with longing.
Setting her coffee aside, she decided to get dressed and go for her morning jog along the beach. There was something infinitely soothing about being near the water, and right now she needed that. As she entered her bedroom, the phone rang again. Her mother, most likely, having forgotten to tell her something in their earlier conversation. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she picked up the cordless phone from the bedside table.
“Did you forget something?” she asked in a teasing tone.
“Oh, yeah,” answered a deeply masculine voice. “I forgot to tell you how much I’m looking forward to seeing you again.”
“Matt!” Megan’s heart did a somersault and then exploded into frenzied action. “I wasn’t expecting you. I thought you were my mother.”
He chuckled, the sound curling warmly inside her ear, and she could easily imagine his face creasing into a smile. “Babe, I am definitely not your mother, and I expect she wouldn’t approve of the things that are going through my mind right now where her daughter is concerned. How’re you?”
Megan couldn’t lie. “Missing you.”
“Yeah, me, too. I wanted to call you earlier, but things have been a little crazy here. Today’s not looking much better, so I thought I’d call you before I left for the base.”
“I’m glad you did. The local paper ran a front-page story about you, Matt. About what happened to you over there, and how you saved that little girl. They’re calling you a hero.”
Born on the 4th of July Page 14