Heatseeker (Atrati) (25 page)

“When you started spouting idiocy.”

“Twenty-year-olds can be supreme idiots.”

“Yes, they can, but it seems to me like you still harbor some of those thoughts.”

“Maybe, not a lot, but some. Maybe,” he said again, clearly not sure.

She shook her head. “You think too much.” He always had.

He sighed, his expression pained. “I used to overthink myself out of the right answer on tests.”

She remembered. It used to frustrate him so much, but he kept doing it. “And you thought yourself out of us.”

“I . . .”

There wasn’t anything to say to that. Knowing he’d had this idealized view of her back then, a view he still clung to today despite what he could see with his own eyes, told her more than anything else could that they had no future.

But they had the present. And in the present, they were going to save Jamila Massri. Somehow. Some way.

“We have a job to do.”

“We’ll do it. Jamila Massri won’t die because she got entangled with the wrong man.”

It was a promise Rachel hoped he could keep. Hoped
she
could keep for Jamila.

“But right now, you need to lie down.” Kadin reached for Rachel again.

She allowed the touch to land, the big hand to caress her back.

“Maybe you need something else, too.”

“Payment for my debriefing?” she asked, not sure if making love again was the smartest move for her.

Not sure if she had a choice, the way she was feeling.

She desperately needed the connection after opening up and reliving pain from so recently and so long ago. She thought he did, too. And she still cared enough about him for that to matter.

She didn’t know how many days she had left of Kadin’s presence in her life, but she would take advantage of them while and when she could.

His brown eyes turned dark with desire so fast, she could have no doubts about how much Kadin Marks wanted her.

Fantasy woman or not.

“It’s not exactly payment if it doesn’t cost me anything I don’t want to give,” he pointed out.

“Opening up about what happened costs enough for both of us.”

Rachel couldn’t and wouldn’t even try to say it hadn’t cost him, too, emotionally. It was clear that it had.

Kadin nodded, his demeanor so serious, so intent. “Maybe it does, at that.”

He stepped away from her. Removing his clothing with quick, economic movements, he didn’t take his time stripping. But her body responded as if he was putting on a show worthy of a professional.

Only no stranger dancing on a stage, no matter how perfectly honed his body or handsome his face, could turn her on the way the smallest glimpse of Kadin Marks did.

At the sight of his naked body coming into view, Rachel felt a familiar tightening in her lower belly, while her nipples drew into tight buds inside the lacy bra he had bought her. He had muscles on top of his muscles, legs as thick as her waist.

Having that body next to her in bed made her feel safe, feminine, and hot. Really, really hot.

She’d wanted him from the moment she woke in his tent in the forest.

His sex was already well on the way to rock hard, and her vaginal walls contracted in response, sending shivers of sensation through her.

Her lungs struggled to get enough air as her entire body flushed with heat.

He looked at her, his expression turning feral as he took in her reaction to him, none of which did she make the least effort to hide.

This between them, at least, was as real as it got. No fantasy needed.

They were so hot together, they could melt the glacier cap on Mount Everest.

He made a primitive sound as he crossed the distance between them to yank her fully clothed body against his naked one. “You drive me bat-shit crazy when you look at me like that. You always have.”

“Like what?” she taunted, making free with her hands all over his exposed skin.

“Like you can’t wait for me to be inside you.”

“I can’t.”

That sound, almost a whimper, mostly a growl, came out of his throat again.

He had scars that showed he hadn’t spent his entire career at the end of a sniper’s rifle. She traced them now with her fingers.

As she touched one on his chest, he said. “Extraction in South America.”

She nodded, leaning forward to kiss the scar. Then she licked over it, tasting his salty male skin, bringing back visceral memories she had thought were buried so deep, even
she
couldn’t find them again.

That first weekend of leave he’d had from the Marines that he
hadn’t
told his family about. Only Rachel.

She hadn’t told anyone else, either, except Linny.

Rachel hadn’t had to lie to her grandmother about staying over with a friend. Because Grandmother simply hadn’t asked. Or cared.

A freshman in high school, Linny had thought it wildly romantic that Kadin wanted to spend the time alone with Rachel and encouraged Rachel to go.

Kadin had rented a hotel room downtown, spoiling Rachel with an in-room whirlpool bath (which they’d made delicious use of several times over the weekend) and a romantic steak dinner delivered by room service.

They’d eaten naked, feeling grown-up and naughty, no clue what the future held for them both.

That weekend, they’d shared the kind of intimacy that wasn’t supposed to be possible when you were young and naïve.

At one point, Rachel had been determined to taste every inch of his body. Kadin had let her, but it had pushed him to the limits of his control.

When he’d finally snapped, he’d made love to her with near-violent passion. And she’d met him thrust for thrust, hungry kiss for hungry kiss, until they’d both collapsed into sleep so deep, they hadn’t heard their wakeup call the next morning.

She’d been so certain that weekend that this man would be hers for a lifetime.

Instead, they’d only seen each other twice more before he’d been sent to the Middle East. When he returned a year later after increasingly sporadic letters and e-mails, he broke it off with her, telling her that she just didn’t fit his life anymore.

No wonder. He’d seen her as an idealized version of herself she could never hope to be.

He, on the other hand, really had been her ideal man. Probably still was, if she let herself think about it, scars and all. His only important flaw? The fact that he didn’t love her and never really had.

But love and happily-ever-after were for other people. Hadn’t Rachel realized that finally after learning of Linny’s suicide?

She only had
now,
and she was set on taking advantage of it.

Her fingertips found another scar on his back, and she outlined it with a barely-there touch.

He grumbled, “Afghanistan.”

“It feels like a gunshot wound.” She should know. There was a distinctive pattern to the puckering of her own flesh where she’d been shot.

“It is.”

“There’s no exit wound.”

“The medic had to dig it out. I was out of commission for a while, but they got me back into the field. And I got my target before I passed out from the pain.”

“A Marine’s too tough to stop fighting because of something so little,” she mocked, hiding the fact that she was more impressed than she wanted to be.

He really was a hero.

He kissed along her hairline, teasing her ear with his tongue. “
I
didn’t check myself out of the hospital against medical advice.”

No, that had been her, but she hated hospitals with a deep, abiding passion. She could never shake the memories of that time in the hospital after her parents’ accident. Her dad had been pronounced dead on arrival, but by a cruel twist of fate, Rachel had been there, dropping off another girl who worked with her at the chain pancake house.

The other girl had cut herself after dropping a tray of glasses. She’d gotten four stitches and gone home. Rachel’s life had been changed forever by that trip to the ER, though.

She’d stood on the sidewalk, horrified as she watched the paramedics roll the first stretcher into the ER. She’d seen the blood and the broken, lifeless body and had no idea it was her dad. The second ambulance arrived, and another stretcher was rolled out, and Rachel had seen it was her mom.

Then she’d known.

The next hours were spent in a haze as she waited for her mom to wake up, agonized over knowing she’d have to tell Mom that Dad was dead. The doctors were so hopeful that, despite the extensive injuries and coma, Mom would rally and get out of the ICU.

They’d been wrong, and Rachel had never had to deliver the devastating news. To Mom. She’d had to tell Linny and their grandmother.

“Good to know,” Rachel said, pushing the old trauma away. “You still have a practical streak.”

“You still don’t.”

“You’d be surprised at how practical I can be now.”

He tugged her top off. “Maybe I’m more interested in your wanton streak.”

Chapter Seventeen

“I
t’s still here.” But only with him. Only for him.

He followed the line of lace along the top of her bra cup with his fingertip. “I knew this would look hot on you.”

“I couldn’t help noticing that all the undergarments you bought me are on the sexy side.”

“A man has to take his pleasures where he can.”

She shook her head, smiling. “So, you’re saying that you’re an opportunist?”

“Can I help it that it excites me to think of you looking so damn sexy where no one else gets to see?”

She looked down at his impressive erection and shook her head. “I guess not.”

“Would you want me to?”

“No.”

As he undressed her, Rachel went back to touching the marks on his skin that hadn’t been there ten years ago. He continued telling her where each one was from, and she would touch, kiss or lick them . . . sometimes all three.

He was shaking with need, his sex engorged and leaking steady drops of pre-come when she gave a biting kiss to the last scar on his left thigh. (That had been a knife wound like one of her own.)

She knelt before him, completely naked now, her fingers gliding over the firm contours of his thighs. “It’s hard to believe the knife could pierce your muscle—it’s like granite.”

His gaze shifted to a knife scar that marred her right side. “They’re damn effective weapons, knives.”

“Not effective enough.” She was still alive, and so was he.

“It was too damn close.”

“Was it?” she asked, surprised, because the scar on his thigh wasn’t very big and nowhere near an artery.

“Not that. Yours.” His erection hadn’t flagged, but his mind was clearly going places she didn’t want it to right this minute.

“Stop. I healed. I’m fine.”

“Show me.”

She smiled up at him, knowing he didn’t mean what she was about to do, but that just made it better. He expected her to stand, to let him do some touching, too.

Instead, she opened her mouth and took the head of his cock inside. The sweet, only slightly salty, flavor of his pre-ejaculate exploded over her palate as the scent she would never forget filled her nostrils.

His own unique fragrance, strongest right at the base of his penis. It was a clean scent that drove her crazy with need.

She’d read about pheromones, but he was the only man whose scent caused her body to prepare for his.

He gave a harsh groan, tilting his pelvis toward her. “So good, Rachel.”

She knew. He loved this. She hadn’t done it for anyone else. Ever. Didn’t know if it was easier with a smaller penis. Didn’t care.

She liked the way her jaw stretched around him, the way only the head fit comfortably in her mouth. She always pushed farther, but he’d never pressed her to go so far that she gagged.

And he never made her feel like it wasn’t enough. She wrapped her hand around the long, thick shaft, stroking him in time with the movements of her head. He reached down and enclosed her hand in his, helping. Exciting her so much, she could feel the wetness between her legs.

“Shit, angel . . . that’s too good.” He sounded like a man in pain, but she knew it was the opposite.

She would have laughed if her mouth wasn’t too busy.

“I’m going to come, Rach,” he groaned out.

She didn’t let up on her suction, or the movements of her hand.

He didn’t pull his hand away, either, showing what he wanted to happen, even if he was giving her the out.

She reached up with her spare hand and tugged gently on his balls, something else she remembered he loved. Kadin shouted as he came, his salty essence shooting down the back of her throat.

She always forgot how strong the flavor was—so different from pre-come. Or maybe it had been the intervening years, but she swallowed quickly, feeling a primeval joy in taking him inside her this way.

It didn’t have to make sense. Even he didn’t need to understand.

She only knew she liked it.

Still half hard, he pulled back. The satiated pleasure in his gaze in no way diminished the desire there. “Your turn, angel.”

“I . . .” She hadn’t let anyone go down on her, either. Not in a decade.

The sex she had had was accomplished with rubbers and efficiency, at her instigation. And maybe that was one reason it had never come close to comparing to this.

It didn’t matter.

Kadin never let her pull back. He would give her pleasure until she screamed from it. And she would revel in the sensations only he could wring from her.

He lifted her to her feet and then swung her into his arms and carried her to the bed.

“I never realized what a caveman streak you’ve got going,” she teased.

“You bring it out in me.”

She believed him but had no breath to say so as he started touching her in ways guaranteed to bring her to the brink before his mouth ever closed over her sex.

He played her body with the confidence and expertise of a master. The master of her pleasure.

By the time he pushed her legs wide and up, she was shivering with unsatisfied desire. He smiled as he took in her sex. “Still so pretty down here, all dark pink and swollen, shiny with wetness.”