THIRTEEN
W ith May cradled in his arms, Henner swept to his feet and turned for the bed. In three steps, he reached the side and gently let her slide to her feet.
She kept one hand anchored on his shoulder. When he searched her face, he saw why—she appeared stunned by the kiss they shared.
Her dark eyes gleamed with emotion that he didn’t understand. But he wanted to know everything May thought, felt and did. There was so much they didn’t know about each other, things he couldn’t wait to tap into and store away in his vault of secrets about the beautiful woman.
How much longer would they have together? He’d been on ops like this enough to follow his gut, and his gut was telling him that things were coming to a head. Soon they would get inside that hangar and take care of the bomb.
After that…he and May would part ways. She would be off to the next government contract and take care of another explosive.
And he’d return to ghost status.
She brushed her thumb over his jaw in the most tender caress, then turned to the bed and drew down the covers to reveal the clean white sheets.
His gut clenched with need at the sumptuous view of her ass. Unable to help himself, he grasped her hips and tugged her flush against his groin.
Issuing a soft gasp, she twisted her head to peer at him over her shoulder. “AJ…”
His lips quirked. He released her.
She climbed between the sheets and reached out for him. He didn’t immediately move, watching her closely.
“I didn’t mean to make this about sex, May. I intended to offer you comfort.”
What he offered her comfort for seemed to hover in the air between them, an unaddressed weight.
She flicked her fingers to urge him into bed with her. He eased himself down beside her and she rolled directly into his arms, her body pressed against him.
He drew a deep breath of her sweet scent. “I know what you found out tonight is difficult for you.”
When she nodded, strands of her hair caught on his beard stubble, the fine threads linking them.
The brush of her sexy body against his left him aching for more, but this wasn’t about getting her to sleep with him.
“How did someone like you end up single for so long? I’m not allowed to have a family, but you? You can have it all.”
She drew back enough to see his face. Lying this way with a woman, just talking, wasn’t something he’d ever done before.
“It’s complicated. I’ve been in committed relationships, but they never last. It didn’t help that my father put two of my boyfriends through a test.”
He studied her. “What sort of test?”
“If he offered them money to leave me, then they weren’t for me.”
Too stunned to formulate a response, he stared at her for a long beat.
“I can see you getting angry, AJ. Before you say anything, I’ll tell you that my father was only looking out for me. After that, I was in a couple more long-term committed relationships, but at some point…I realized those people didn’t add to my life.”
“It doesn’t sound like any of them deserved you.”
Her eyes softened, the depths blooming with a quiet warmth. Henner had watched the sunrise all around the world, but the dawn of emotion in May’s eyes beat them all.
An unspoken affection simmered between them. They stayed that way for endless moments—neither willing to break the connection. Flickers of the fire they shared burned on and on.
If he had it his way, it could keep on burning until the end of time.
Her lashes fluttered, and she took a deep breath. “Does it bother you…being in Blackout? Knowing that you can’t have someone important in your life?”
He never saw her question coming. Hell, nobody had ever asked him that before because he never got close enough to people. He had one-night stands in foreign cities and gave the women a false identity.
The urge to twitch his shoulders in discomfort mounted in the seconds that ticked by. He forced himself to relax and focus on giving her an answer. She deserved nothing but total honesty from him.
“I don’t think about it much. The minute I took that oath, I cut ties. For my country. For the people who are weaker and unable to defend themselves against threats.”
“I understand. You switched off that part of your brain. I’ve done it too.”
He peered down at her. “You have?”
“Yes. It’s hard not to be a bit jaded when two of my exes agreed to take a payout rather than stay with me.”
His jaw tightened until it creaked. “Give me names, May. Give me names and I’ll make sure they wish they were never born.”
Her jaw dropped. “You’d do that for me?” She shook her head. “What am I thinking? I don’t want that—I don’t care about those guys anymore. I was just trying to make a point that guys are disappointing. This is why I’m single. I live my life on my terms.”
With a gentle splay of his fingers over her spine, he drew her against his chest again. His heart throbbed steadily in the silent minutes ticking by.
“I’m not much better for you. You couldn’t take me out in public. You know…if we were together.”
She was already quiet, already still. But something in her shifted, going utterly motionless. Her breath caught and the moment hung suspended.
The kind of moment that happened right before the ground fell out from under your feet.
In a rush, she released the breath she was holding. “That’s true. But you can’t be as bad as the guy I thought was going to marry me and when Dad offered him money…he took it.”
“You don’t have to worry about me being after your money. After all, I already live in a mansion.”
A laugh burst out of her, wild and free. She tossed her head back and shook with amusement.
Henner drank in her beauty, soaking it up like people did rays of sunshine on vacation, hoping to carry a bit of it away with them when they returned to daily life.
He wanted to grab on to this blink in time and carry it away with him. Hell, he needed it.
Goddammit, he needed her .
Cupping the back of her head, he drew her laughing mouth to his and kissed her. Her laugh cut off, morphing to a throaty moan.
Passion exploded between them with all the force of the bomb inside that hangar. Flipping May underneath him, he took control, delivering drugging kisses until she was putty in his arms and begging for more.
He tore off her top and ducked his head to kiss and suck her bare breasts. Between slick strokes of his tongue over her hard nipples, he roughed out, “I fucking love that you never wear a bra.”
She moaned and raked her nails lightly over his shoulders, dragging him closer. When he pulled one bud into his mouth, she arched upward on a cry.
Her silky fingers pattered down his chest to his abs and lower to cup his hard cock. It surged into her grasp and pulsated in beats that felt like a bass drum beating in his body, even as his heart drummed for this woman he couldn’t, shouldn’t touch but did. Every throb pushed her deeper under his skin until he felt it in his soul.
Fuck. The one thing he was never supposed to do, and he’d gone and fucking done it.
Fallen for May.
Every fiber of him wanted to show her what he could never say. That she was beyond amazing, smart and witty, gorgeous and perfectly irritating…
He stripped off the rest of her clothes and lowered his tongue to her sweet pussy. The light taste of her arousal had his balls about to burst.
“AJ!” She bucked into his mouth with every thrust of his tongue. When he withdrew, he lapped a path up to her clit and trapped it beneath his tongue.
Her body bowed and quivered. When he eased one finger inside her, her pussy answered with a tight clamping of her inner walls. He fucked her in slow thrusts, burrowing deep, deep, deeper with each pass. The soft wall of her pussy gushed with juices when he applied pressure to her G-spot.
Dragging in harsh breaths, she raked her fingers through his hair, drawing a stinging sensation that he locked away in the vault of his mind.
“I’m…I’m…oh god!” She let go for him, shaking on his tongue and finger while he continued to show her just how deserving she was of all the things the world had to offer, like pleasure and a good man who knew how to give it to her.
Like love.
She collapsed on the bed, panting hard, chest heaving. Slowly, he lifted his head from between her thighs and ran his tongue across his lip, gathering the flavor of her release.
If he thought her eyes were soft with some unspoken emotion before, now they glowed like twin candles.
“I didn’t want to like you.” She reached for him.
Moving up her body, he braced his weight over her but let her feel the full nine inches of his desire. “What sweet pillow-talk.”
Her body rolled as she swallowed a giggle. “S-sorry!”
He flashed a grin at her and then ground his cock into her soaking pussy in a way that silenced the laugh on her lips and widened her eyes.
She curled her fingers into his ass, drawing him closer. “Get your clothes off.”
He arched a brow. “You may have higher clearances than I do…but I outrank you.”
* * * * *
In a flurry, he stripped. Only the whisper of clothes and the soft panting sound of her breath filled the room.
“Look what you do to me. I’m hard as steel.” AJ gripped his cock at the base, his fingers wrapped around the thick, turgid rod aimed at May’s pussy.
Heat coiled low in her belly as he swished the mushroomed head over her soaking folds…then slowly sank into her.
His stare stayed on her face as though he was memorizing her, and concentration creased between his brow like he was fixing the sensation in his mind.
It wasn’t just the feel of her lover stretching her…filling her…that made her breath catch. It was AJ. The way he looked at her. The way he touched her.
Talking about her exes resurrected those faded memories and revealed how different this moment was. She didn’t need rank, clearance or even common sense to know what was between her and AJ was rare.
For a fleeting second, her heart pounded with fear at the thought of never experiencing these feelings again. She was falling—hard and fast.
She wrapped her arms around his neck, drawing him into her kiss. Her heart pounded faster as her mind and body careened out of control.
As if sensing it, his grip on her tightened too. The gentle bite of his fingers into her ass as he lifted her hip into his slow thrusts made her breath hitch. The intensity blazing in his blue eyes made her feel like she teetered on a cliff’s edge.
With a sexy roll of his muscled hips, he sank inside her, then withdrew in the same motion. His body unhinged her. But the way he moved inside her felt less like just sex and more like he was worshipping her.
Or he was telling her something that he couldn’t put into words.
Need spiked inside her, driven by the mixture of sensation and emotions. On his next withdrawal, her inner walls clutched around him.
He stopped, gazing down at her. “Christ, May. The way you’re looking at me right now…”
“I know.” Her heart performed a slow flip as more than heat passed between them.
He locked gazes with her and began to move again. Grinding his hips so his cock sank so deep that her insides throbbed with desire. She rocked her hips to meet thrust after thrust.
Suddenly, he stiffened. Pleasure rippled over his rugged features. His hard lips clamped into a line.
Then he rolled off her, dragging her on top of him.
She paused over his stiff cock, sucking in this moment of power and control. He didn’t wait for her to take him to the hilt—he thrust upward, filling her.
“Oh god.” Her rough whisper shook with the bliss of having AJ so deep.
For a moment, she couldn’t move or think or even breathe. Then he brushed his thumb over her clit and sent her through the roof.
Molten heat spread through her, originating where his fingertips pressed into her lower back, urging her into action and traveling through every inch of her body—especially where he ground his thumb into her throbbing nubbin.
Watching her face closely, he strummed her clit over and over again. Juices flooded, and he seemed to sink even deeper.
Shivers snaked down her spine. Each graze of those magical fingers was more than a touch. It was a demand that had her body steadily climbing to the pinnacle of ecstasy.
Climbers claimed that the view from the top of the mountain was the best, but she thought it was this moment. The steps it took to get to the peak were worth memorizing.
That breathlessness stole over her again as fear hit for a second time. If she feared this whirlwind and forbidden relationship coming to an end…she was absolutely terrified to see that view from the top. Because she knew with every beat of her heart that she would face the truth.
She was one stroke of his cock, one intense look in those vivid blue eyes, from falling totally in love with him.
Her chest tightened, making it difficult to breathe. The world narrowed to a pinpoint that only included the two of them. Her and her partner. Her Navy SEAL. AJ.
With a roll of her hips meant to drive him just as crazy as he made her with his finger and cock, she arched. Instinct took over. Her body knew what to do. It had to get closer to him, to feel the source of the pleasure he used to unravel her.
When she felt his hips still again, she looked down at him.
In a quick move, he rolled her into the mattress and took over once again. Sweeping his lips across hers, he kissed her like it would be their last time, and those perfectly callused fingers clamped on both of her nipples.
She cried out. Intense sparks shot through her. Need blasted up. She rocked her hips and he knew what to do.
Every movement, every caress…the warmth of his breath skimming over her throat set off a chain reaction.
He thrust his cock inside her and pumped his hips hard and fast, taking her in a wild rhythm that sent her over the edge the instant his thick cock stroked across her G-spot.
Her pussy flooded. A cry tore from her lips. He captured her scream with his kiss and coaxed more from her with his tongue as he began to jerk hard from his own release.
His muscles flexed in her hands. She latched on and rode out the moment, savoring every growl he uttered.
Her ears picked up words too. Tender words.
“I need to come inside you. I need to fill you with my seed. Make you mine. Make a family.”
Her eyes stung hearing words spoken in the moment that could never come true. Inside this hotel room, it was too easy to pretend that a relationship with AJ was possible.
Unwilling to give up the dream quite yet, she clung to him, kissing him back with every ounce of passion he gave to her.
Sharp and sweet, tension coiled. She held her breath.
Her release a flood so intense that it crashed into her. She shook. She gasped.
She screamed his name.
Long moments followed with nothing but aftershocks and the hum of pleasure running through her body.
When her mind returned from her out-of-body experience, she was draped over AJ. Under her palm, his heart drummed in a warm, steady rhythm that warred with the chaos waiting out there for them.
Her brain picked up that thread and ran with it. Simpson. What dangerous games was the man playing? Anything involving an income that would allow him to purchase so many expensive works of art must be deep in the criminal world.
Reality was as relentless as the thump of AJ’s heart under her fingertips.
With a quiet sigh, she leaned away from him to meet his stare. Though his expression gave nothing away, she knew what he was thinking.
What they were both thinking.
Though they’d immersed themselves in this private cocoon, hidden from the world, it didn’t change the danger waiting for them outside this room.
The cold shadow of what they were about to face fell over them.