The Alpha Bodyguards Books #1-3

Chapter Eight

I was coming apart all right, but it was at the seams. My impulsive decision to accept his invitation, my plan for it to be just a meal, it was crumbling each additional second I spent in his presence.

Mind-bending orgasms.

I couldn’t even comprehend what that meant. But I wanted to. God, I wanted to. I’d come before, but nothing ever earth-shattering, and while I had limited experience with men, I knew an orgasm from Garret Collins would be exactly as he described. Mind-bending.

I took in every inch, every nuance of the surface value of the man standing in front of me, and he was exactly as he looked—muscled and rugged and dominating. But he was also considerate and attentive. I wasn’t foolish enough to mistake his controlled demeanor for complacency for one second, because I’d seen glimpses of what was underneath the detached expression he tried to hide behind. He was capable of commanding both dominance and heart-aching gentleness.

The gentleness I’d experienced firsthand, and that was what terrified me about him.

I didn’t have room in my life to get attached, to anyone. Especially not to a Marine whose value to the US Military was far more important than what he thought he could do for some lost woman he met a mere…

I glanced at the clock on the oven.

Wow.

I’d only known him a couple hours?

Part of me did feel like I was standing next to a complete stranger, but the other part of me, the part that was desperately trying to forget the way he’d kissed me, consumed me, held me like he knew exactly how to take care of me in every way, that part was looking at a man and feeling like she’d been waiting for him her whole life.

Slowly, as if he were afraid he would scare me, he traced a finger across the side of my neck. “Your pulse is racing.” He stared into my eyes like he knew every one of my forbidden thoughts.

“You’re touching me.” His voice, his eyes, the clean scent of him, I wanted to reach for him so bad, but I was afraid if I did, I wouldn’t let go.

Warm, forbidden, his hand settled on my nape. “I am.”

“It’s not a good idea.” I hadn’t been touched, not like this, in so, so long.

Tilting his head, he leaned in and whispered, “I think it’s a great idea.”

“Garrett,” I warned.

His breath whispered across my skin. “A really good idea.”

I could’ve stopped him.

I could’ve stepped back.

I could’ve told him the truth.

I didn’t do any of it.

My eyes fluttered shut, and his lips, all at once hot and soft and firm, covered mine. His tongue darted out, and I didn’t hesitate.

I opened myself to him.

Taking my face in both of his hands, he stepped into me.

Then he kissed me.

Blinding and heart-stopping, my body went off like fireworks on a hot summer night. Red-hot heat raced through my veins as my center of gravity dropped to my core. He plunged into my mouth, and I rushed to tangle my tongue with his.

Light-headed and free, I was flying.

Heat, man, hero, warrior, desire.

He was all of it and more.

My arms went around his neck as he ground his hips against mine. Need surged painfully between my legs, and every one of his dominant strokes took me a step further past safe.

But I didn’t want safe.

I wanted to hurt. I wanted to feel. I wanted to fall. I wanted every word he’d uttered.

“Harder,” I begged.

His huge hands gripped two handfuls of my hair and pulled as he thrust his tongue and his hips. My scalp tingled, and I lifted my leg to his waist because I needed more. Moving with him, against him, feeling his hard length between too many layers of clothes like a cruel joke, I cried out. Frustration and need driving me, I pressed into him, but I couldn’t get close enough.

Brazen, I dropped my hands to his waist and shoved his T-shirt up.

For one unpolluted, perfect moment, anticipation surged. Soft material bunched, and hot skin and hard muscles rippled under my touch.

Oh my God. He was everything.

Thick fingers locked around my wrists, and his lips ripped from mine.

“Brookelyn.” His deep voice vibrated with two syllables that weren’t all mine, and reality crashed into my fantasy.

He was everything. Everything I couldn’t have.

“Sorry,” I murmured, stepping back.

My wrists still in his hands, he didn’t let go. “I’m not.”

“You should be.” Nothing good would come of this.

“I’m not, and I didn’t say I wanted to stop.” Holding firm, he pulled me back into him. “But if clothes are coming off, you need to give me the words.”

I whimpered when my body touched his. I didn’t want words. I just wanted to escape the blinding ache pulsing between my legs. “Don’t,” I pleaded. “Don’t make me feel like this.”

His eyebrows drew together, and he clipped out a question. “Like what?”

I fought the urge to grind into him and lost. My hips dancing in a rhythm all on their own, truth spilled out. “Needy and aching, and so, so hungry.” Every word making my mouth dryer, I licked my lips.

His frown disappeared and his mouth landed on my neck. He swirled his tongue to torture me further. “Feels much better without clothes, sweetheart,” he whispered. “But if you wanna come, you need to give me permission to touch you, beautiful.” His thumb pushed back my shirt sleeve, and he stroked the sensitive skin on the underside of my wrist.

My breath hitched and I froze.

Every muscle in his body went stock-still.

Faster than I could blink, everything between us changed as his gaze shot to my wrist.

The dark, hooded look in his eyes from only seconds ago disappeared, his expression shut down, and his nostrils flared with false understanding.

Holding my wrist up, his gaze cut from my albatross to me as he swept his thumb, gentler this time, across angry, scarred flesh. “What is this, Brookelyn?”

I stared at my ruined hope.

I stared at the puckered, red lines etched across my wrist.

X.

His initial.

Nathaniel Xavier Lewis.

Nathan.

Otherwise known as X.

My one and only lover. The man who’d destroyed my life.

“It’s a scar,” I whispered, kissing my night of escape goodbye.