Heroes In Uniform (314 page)

“Oh, baby. You've got my head spinning.”

“
Mmm
,” she murmured. “Here, I'll hold you.” She pinned his hands to the camper, and deepened the kiss, her tongue seeking out the deepest hollows of his mouth. “Better?”

Yielding himself completely to the pleasure of her exploration, he felt a rumble of satisfaction vibrate deep within him. “Oh, yeah.”

He tried to move his hand toward her but she held it firmly, her body retreating before the strength of his arm. Kissing her, he pushed her around until her back was against the camper, but she kept going. As one, they slowly rolled down the side of the truck in a lazy spiral, pressing first one then the other against the cold metal of the camper. Lost in the kiss, they rounded the corner of the back bumper.

He stopped and held her tight, groping for the tailgate handle. “I want to make love to you,” he whispered, “but I'm never going to get up those stairs.” He raised the back hatch, then swung the tailgate carefully down behind her. “The futon we bought is still in here.”

He helped her up and eased her onto her back on the mattress, pulled off their boots, and limped in beside her. “Now, where were we?”

She smiled dreamily. “About to make love.”

“
Mmm
.” He pulled her close and kissed her. “But we have some unfinished business first, don't we?”

Her body stiffened a little under his hands. “Do we?”

He rubbed his cheek over her hair. “
Uh-huh
. You were going to tell me you love me, remember?” He looked down at her expectantly.

“Oh, Wolf. You know I do.” She reached up and pulled his mouth to hers.

“Say it, then.”

She faltered. “I...”

Frowning slightly, he regarded her warily. “Why won't you say it?”

Avoiding his eyes, she traced a finger down his shirt front, not answering.

“Is there something wrong?”

“No,” she said quickly. Too quickly.

“Spill,” he ordered, lying back. “If you're not sure of your feelings for me, I want to know about it now. I won’t go through another day like today.”

She lay down next to him. “I am sure of my feelings. I'm just afraid if I say it, you'll somehow think I’m pressuring you, and you’ll leave.”

He put his arms around her. “Baby, why would I do that? I've already said how I feel about you.”

She lifted her shoulder a little, burrowing in his chest. “You left me when I said it in the alley.”

He couldn't figure out what she was getting at. He hadn't left her at the alley. She had said she loved him, and afterward, he'd—

Hell
. He
had
left her standing there. But, surely, she must realize... “Pup, I didn't walk out on you. I was trying to get away from
myself
. From what I'd done to you.”

“What? Making love?”

Barely Dangerous: Chapter One Hundred and Eighteen

“That wasn't making love,” Cooper said. “I was angry and violent, and I took you in a back alley like a tomcat. Like you were a—”

Maggie gasped at what she was hearing. She couldn’t believe that was how he felt about last night. “You did no such thing!” She nibbled her lip. “Okay, maybe you were a bit angry. We both were. But I would never have let you do it if I didn't think—”
Think what? That he loved her? No, at the time she was sure he didn't
. “If I thought that's how you meant it.”

“Pup—”

Her confession just tumbled out. “It was my fault for provoking you. I'd only wanted to—” She stopped, suddenly afraid of how silly it would sound. And manipulative. Maybe he really
would
get angry.

“Wanted to what?” He stroked her back, listening intently.

She swallowed. “You wouldn't tell me whether or not you still wanted to see me after the case was solved. I just...needed to know.”

He studied her. “So, you decided to make me jealous, so I'd show my feelings?”

She nodded.

He shook his head. “Oh, Maggie. What a couple of fools we are. If we'd been honest with each other from the beginning, we'd have had a whole lot less trouble, all around.”

She sighed. “You can say that again.”

He tipped her chin up. “Let's make a promise always to be honest with each other from now on.”

She smiled into his eyes. “Oh, Wolf, I promise I'll always be completely honest.” She kissed him and whispered tentatively, “I love you so much.”

He kissed her back, and hugged her close. “That's what I wanted to hear. Say it again for me. I'll never get tired of hearing it.”

Filled with happiness, she kissed him, and told him again and again.

Laughing, he rolled onto his back with her on top. “To think you were only using Dinny Paxton to make me jealous. And here I'd thought—” He grunted, running his hands over her arms. “Never mind what I thought.”

She froze.
Oh, God
. She'd just promised to always tell the truth. What would she do? “Listen,” she started slowly. “About Dinny—”

“Forget Paxton.”

Her body shuddered as Cooper gathered her in the warmth of his arms, his mouth seeking hers.

“Woman, get naked for me.”

When he was settled between her legs at last, she cradled him with flesh and soul, welcoming him home.

For a moment, they lay still, searching each other's eyes. Finding need and desire.

Finding love.

She opened herself fully to him, inviting him into her mind as she had her body.

As she watched his eyes grow dark as midnight, a swirl of smoky mist wafted through her consciousness. Then he was there in the smoke, sharing her thoughts, her love, the sensations of her flesh.

He smiled, and his mind opened for her, as well.

She stepped in, wrapping herself in the security of his love for her, in his longing, in his happiness. She knew he was hers alone, and her joy was complete.

Joined as one in body and mind, they began to move. The smoky sensations that assaulted her were more vivid than any she had ever imagined. Feeling Cooper's passion along with her own, sharing his actions and her own reactions, she was swept into a realm of incredible closeness.

“Can you feel my love?” he whispered, gazing down on her with infinite tenderness.

She smiled. “To the ends of the earth.”

He slipped his powerful cock in and out, in and out of her, watching her soul through her eyes. “Don't look away, baby. This feels too good.”

She raised her legs to his back and moved under him, with him, reveling in the erotic adventure of experiencing lovemaking from two sides. She felt her own body sheathing him, and him thrusting into her.

When her eyelids drifted shut, suddenly she was bereft of his awareness. She popped them open, saw his sultry smile, and knew a flood of returning sensation.

He slid his arms under her thighs and lifted them higher. “Don't close your eyes,” he ordered.

She gasped as he plunged deep into her. “I don't know if I can keep them open.”

Her body shuddered with the overwhelming heat of their union. As he took them deeper and faster, she moaned her ecstasy.

And knew, to the last cell in her body, that she had found home.

Barely Dangerous: Chapter One Hundred and Nineteen

Cooper felt Maggie melting beneath him, floating into that timeless space just before her body shattered in his arms.

He willed her to keep her eyes open, so he could be right there with her when she came apart under him. He longed to kiss her, but didn't want to break the contact.

Instead, he envisioned for them both that he was running his tongue over her lips, in her mouth. He showed her mind how he would caress her body with his lips until she cried out his name. He could feel her coming close to the edge of oblivion.

He was close, himself. Through her mind, he could feel his own heavy, throbbing cock as he thrust deep between her legs. She entered the vision he was painting, wetting her lips and showing him her tongue twining with his, even though their mouths weren’t touching.

He was crazy with need. But he held back, wanting her to come first. He hungered to share the pleasure of her release in the smoke of their joined minds and bodies.

As he felt her craving his.

He shot his fingers through her hair, grasping thick strands of it, his breath coming in gulps. He felt sensations he couldn't identify, pleasure in unknown places, hot emotions, and velvety desires. He cradled her jaw in his palm, touching her cheek.

“Come to me, pup. Let yourself go.”

He felt her last tether to reality dissolve as her aching twinges of orgasm started, shallow at first, sharp and rough around his rock-hard cock. He felt the sensual convulsions moving deeper and stronger, raging through her womb, racking him with her pleasure along with his own.

“Wolf!” she cried.

And he felt the first erotic tremor of his own climax coming hard and fast after hers. He grasped her face in his hand to keep her focused. And then the exquisite spasms of carnal pleasure took them both to a whole other plane. As he spilled the hot essence of life into her, she came again, and again.

The final torrid waves of their shared rapture passed, and he collapsed on top of her, groaning in ecstasy.

With his last iota of strength, he rolled onto his back, holding her close above him.

“Good fucking night. I think you've killed me.”

She let out a long, contented moan, and nestled into him. “Only because I love you.”

“And, oh, baby. What a way to go.”

Barely Dangerous: Chapter One Hundred and Twenty

The next morning, Coop awoke to a persistent throbbing. His leg throbbed, his ears throbbed. He looked down at Maggie snuggled at his side, and his heart throbbed. He felt her hand roam over his body and his—

Suddenly, he realized it wasn't his ears throbbing, at all, but someone banging on the back of the camper.

He sat up, hit his head on the roof, and now it throbbed, too.

“Damn it to hell.” He rubbed his head, and noticed a quilt. She must have gone up to the cab to fetch it after he passed out last night. He covered her, and leaned down to give her a kiss on the nose before he scooted to the open the back hatch.

Everything was going to be all right. He was sure of it.

Absolutely sure.

Right up to the moment he opened that hatch and saw Special Agent Dinny Paxton staring back at him.

Shit
. Coop was instantly surly. Paxton was the last person on earth he wanted to see that morning.

“What the hell do you want?” he asked.

“Who is it?” Maggie asked sleepily.

Dinny leaned into the camper. “Sweetheart, it's me.”

“Din?” She sat up, drawing the quilt around her.

“Heard you had some trouble last night. You okay?”

Coop quickly pulled on the jeans they’d partially slit down one leg last night so he could fit them over his bandaged leg.

“She's fine,” he said testily. “You didn't answer my question.”

Paxton looked him in the eye. “I've come to take Maggie back to L.A..”

“Like hell. She's staying with me.”

A smug smile settled on the agent’s face as he studied Coop. “Better ask the lady about that.”

Coop scowled, but as soon as he turned and saw Maggie's guilty expression, he knew he'd been had. She had lied to him again.

Would he
never
learn?

With a last, deadly glare at her, he grabbed his shirt and threw himself out of the camper.

“Wolf!” she called after him. “Cooper, please!”

Fuck that
.

He limped furiously down the path to his camp, cursing himself the whole way. He was so angry he couldn't see straight, and nearly fell several times as he flew down the steep trail on his wounded leg.

How could he let himself be fooled by that perfidious woman, time after time?

His temper hit white-hot when he burst into his camp. His belongings lay strewn on the ground, his tents collapsed—the aftermath of the previous day's encounter with Greasy and Raiders.

Swooping up his duffel bag, he started cramming his belongings into it, helter skelter. He would not spend another damn minute in this fucking place.
Not one
.

He'd finished with his clothes and was jamming pots, pans and camping equipment into a backpack when Maggie ran into the clearing, breathless.

“Wolf, please—”

He turned his back on her. “Go away, Maggie. You made your choice when you lied to me. I have nothing more to say to you.”

“Please listen—”

“After everything we said last night! You
swore
to be honest with me. And the whole time you were lying.”

“No! I didn't lie. Cooper, please, I love you—”

He whirled around to face her. “Then tell me why you're leaving me for that goddamn bastard.”

“It's not like that. There’s nothing between us. I swear to you.”

With all his might, Cooper hurled a set of metal dishes, complete with flatware, against a nearby tree, and stood sucking down breath after breath to calm himself. “Then what, exactly, is it?”

Maggie looked from him to the plates and back again, then took a hesitant step toward him. “I can't tell you.”

He bit off a curse and continued packing. “Fine. Have a nice life.”

She went over to him and put a hand on his arm. He shucked it off.

She sank down on a tree stump, and he could feel her eyes on him, following his every move. When he finally felt calm enough to look at her without thinking of murder, he turned.

There were tears in her eyes.

Damn it
. He would
not
soften.

“It's you I love,” she said softly. “Only you. You've got to believe that.”

He swiped up the dishes. “You've got one hell of a way of showing it.”

She hung her head. “This wasn't supposed to happen for another couple of days. I thought—”

He stuffed the dishes in the backpack. “Were you planning on telling me you were leaving, or was I just going to wake up one morning and find you gone?”

She had the gall to look stung. “I've wanted to tell you all along. I've begged and begged Dinny, but he keeps saying no. Please trust me, Wolf. There's nothing personal between him and me. It's just...something I have to do.”