Chapter 4
God, her taste. Champagne and woman. Lauren.
He’d spent way too many nights these past months staring at the ceiling, thinking of her mouth, sporting a massive hard-on that wouldn’t go down. Just wouldn’t. Nothing he could do about it, either. His dick didn’t want his hand, it didn’t want another woman, it didn’t want anything but her, under him, and that wasn’t going to happen.
Except now, maybe it was.
He was going to take Lauren to bed. Something he’d been wanting for months, fiercely, was going to happen.
Fuck. He had to be careful because he was over excited. Maybe it hadn’t been a good idea to go without all these months, for the first time in his life. The only times he was abstinent was one missions and his dick, and everyone’s dick, stayed down when bad guys are shooting at you. Blood in your groin in a firefight is a surefire way to the grave.
But other than that, he liked sex, a lot. Until he met Lauren where he got that double whammy of wanting her and not wanting anyone else. And…she scared him.
For all the fucking he’d done in his life, this new thing didn’t have any rules for him to follow. He wanted her so intensely he didn’t know if he could control himself so he found himself stiff and formal around her. He didn’t dare make a move because then when she rejected him he couldn’t be around her any more and he’d rather cut his own balls off. And she would reject him, no doubt. The kind of woman who wanted him wasn’t subtle about it. Most women in bars just walked up to him and asked. Maybe accept a beer or two but the reason they were with him was never in doubt. The rules were clear. He’d buy the beers and the dinner, spring for the pool table, no question. And he was going home with them, no question.
There wasn’t any dancing around the topic. No long discussions. Not much talking at all, actually.
One chick he met in San Diego walked up to him, looked at his crotch, smiled and walked out. He followed her, they went up to her apartment, had sex and he left early the next morning, deployed on a mission to Colombia. They never spoke and he had no clue what her name was.
So in his experience women were pretty easy to understand and what they wanted was pretty clear. A stiff dick and stamina. Great. He could provide that.
Lauren? Shit, who knew what she wanted?
After that first meeting where he scared her, she got it that he wasn’t going to hurt her. He worked for the husband of her best friend.
And then she started…talking to him. The damndest thing. Asking his opinions on things, things he knew nothing about. He answered in as few words as possible but she pondered them carefully, those gorgeous gray eyes that turned silver in sunlight watching him carefully.
Nobody listened to Jacko except teammates and then he usually talked shooting. Sometimes tactics and strategy, for a change of pace. Bikes, too, because he was a known expert.
Lauren talked to him about everything . And she listened to what he had to say. He found he really liked that. He also found he’d rather spend one minute talking to Lauren about anything at all than hours of fucking.
She tasted so delicious. He breathed her in, nose next to a satiny cheek. He licked slowly in her mouth and stiffened when she stroked her tongue over his. Jesus. He had to tighten his groin muscles because he nearly came. Like some randy teenager about to pop his cherry.
This was not good if a kiss made his dick twitch, hard. He couldn’t touch her anywhere except her mouth. Not yet anyway, not until he got himself under control. But fuck, how was he supposed to do that?
He pulled away slightly and looked down at her. His hands were planted on either side of her head. He had big, strong hands. And he was really excited. He had to be really careful here.
She looked up at him. He’d never been so close to her before. She was so amazingly beautiful. Even up close her skin was perfect, smooth and pale, now slightly pink. Luscious mouth swollen from his kiss. Her eyes were an incredible silver blue with a dark blue rim and they flashed light as she shifted her eyes left to right, reading his face. He always had the impression that she could see right into his head, which scared him. But didn’t scare him enough to walk away.
“I was hoping you’d do that,” she whispered.
“Do what?”
“Kiss me.” She gave a small smile, watching his eyes. “I planned for it while we were crossing town but couldn’t figure out how to do it. How to ask you.”
It took a second for the words to penetrate. “You were planning how to get me to kiss you?”
She nodded, never taking her eyes from his.
“Breathing did the trick.” She could look all she wanted, all she’d see was the truth. “And you didn’t have to ask after all.”
She could feel that. He was leaning against her. Not with all his weight, but he was close enough for her to feel his hard-on. It was massive and it freaking hurt. Every night since he met her that he hadn’t had sex was now very present. It felt like he’d never had sex before. He was going to have to play this carefully because, right now? He wanted to throw her to the ground, run his hands up her legs, with the silky material of her skirt riding his hands, rip her panties open and slide right into her.
Her eyes widened because he must be pumping testosterone into the air by the ton. He was breathing heavily, every single muscle tense.
He had to do something, fast. He didn’t want to scare her. Of all the women in the world, this is the one he wanted to treat like a queen. He wanted to worship her, pet her gently all over, coax her into his bed. And at the same time he wanted to fuck her senseless.
So, yeah, self control was key.
Jacko was all about self control. You don’t pass BUD/S without huge self control. But right now it was slipping through his fingers, draining his head, inflating his dick.
Slow , he told himself. This has to be slow. Because though the images running through his head were definitely X rated, Lauren hadn’t actually signaled that they were going to have sex. They’d kissed. That was it. So before he strategized how he was going to have sex without going wild maybe he should try to find out if he was going to have sex at all.
It would kill him if she said no. He was as worked up as he’d ever been in his life. But if she said no, he’d simply…go out and shoot himself.
“Do you—” his voice was hoarse. “Do you want to sit down? Talk?”
Her eyes were still searching his, flashing silver in the dim light. “Actually, um…” She turned a bright red. “I was wondering whether you want to make love.”
Hell yeah! Jacko stifled the shout in his throat because, well. Screaming probably wouldn’t do it for her. So he cleared his throat and scanned his empty mind for something to say that wasn’t hell yeah . “Yes,” he said. “I’d, uh, like that.”
Like he liked breathing.
“Okay.” She relaxed, smiled a little. She’d been worried he’d say no? It flashed on him that being so aroused around her all the time had made him stiff. In all senses. And maybe she’d interpreted that as indifference.
He wasn’t indifferent. It was as if she walked around with a big red arrow pointing at her from the sky. Spotlit by a light so bright it hurt his eyes and he couldn’t look at her directly.
She was still watching him, a little frown now between her eyebrows. Moving carefully, Jacko reached out and smoothed it out with his thumb. He didn’t want her frowning because he was being a jerk. No, sir.
“Kiss me,” he said and she frowned again.
“What?”
“Kiss me.” He needed to hand her a little power.
She smiled again, faintly. Man, he wanted to see huge smiles on her face, wanted to see her sated and happy, having had a million orgasms.
She didn’t smile enough. She always had a slight sadness and he could never figure out why. Well, they going to have sex and he didn’t want sadness in the bed. He wanted joy and heat.
She cupped his face, still watching his eyes closely as if checking to make sure he didn’t escape. He didn’t move, barely breathed. Her hand felt soft and warm against his cheek.
“Kiss me,” he said again. Putting everything in her hands.
He held himself still because he wanted to grab her, grab her hard. Right now, he was holding onto the wall and his self control by his fingernails. She lifted herself on her toes to get closer to his mouth, pulling herself up by her hands on his shoulders. Her show, all the way. All Jacko did was stand there, fingers curved, holding onto the wall and to his control, trying not to groan when her hips rubbed his dick as she lifted herself up.
She was a little slumsy, slightly missing the mark, kissing the corner of his mouth. He didn’t care. She could kiss any part of him because his entire body was now a huge erogenous zone. He’d read somewhere that the skin was the largest organ of the body, and he believed it because he could feel every inche of it, on fire. His dick was the second largest organ, it felt like.
Then she got it right, tilting her head, her mouth perfectly aligned with his, open, warm, wet. When she licked his lips he once again nearly came.
Shit, this wasn’t working. He was going to have to get naked fast because he did not want to come all over his tux trousers.
Naked. With Lauren. The image in his head came fast, completely uncontrollable. The two of them naked, him on top, moving in and out of her, her pale slender legs hugging his hips.
Whoa. Again he pulled himself back just in time. One second more and he’d have disgraced himself. Though he wouldn’t have shot his wad, no no. Even if he’d come, he’d still be hard. It was entirely possible that he’d have wood for the rest of his natural life if what he was feeling right now was any indication.
Not being aroused felt like an impossibility if Lauren was anywhere in the vicinity.
She was making love to his mouth. That was the only term possible. On tiptoe, she moved her mouth over his, licking into his mouth, retreating to kiss a corner, coming back openmouthed for another deep kiss. He held himself still, willing himself to stillness when what he really wanted was to crush her against him so as much of her was touching as much as him as possible.
Nice thought, but the images in his head weren’t nice. They were on the edge of rough and he didn’t want that with Lauren. He didn’t want rough or hard. He wanted to be gentle because that’s the kind of woman she was but … it was like there was a hot wind in his head blanking out everything and he wasn’t one hundred percent certain he could keep control.
Which was crazy because Jacko was all about control.
So he stood still, hands on her living room wall, moving only his lungs and his mouth.
Lauren pulled away, dropped down. Looked at him uneasily.
Shit. She thought he was uninterested. He wasn’t uninterested. His dick was radiating interest that could probably be picked up on the moon. But how could she know that? She’d just kissed a guy who barely responded.
Jacko had a very specific skill set that came in really useful if you wanted to whack enemies of the state. Not so useful when it came to relationships.
If he wanted this, he was going to have to go after it, and he had no clue how to do it.
He pried one hand off the wall, with difficulty. As if he were Spider-Man and his Spidey-fingers were fixed to the wall. Slowly, he brought his hand to her face, ran the back of his finger down her cheekbones. Jesus, her skin was so soft. How could anything human be this soft?
Lauren was still looking at him uncertainly, a little frown between her eyebrows. He smiled, wondering if it was an okay smile. He showed teeth, was that enough? He was trying to regulate his features while regulating his breathing and his dick and it was like patting his head and rubbing his stomach at the same time. Because all his attention was on her, on the pale oval of her face, the feel of her against him, small breasts against his chest, moving as she breathed.
She sighed, breasts rubbing against him again and he swelled. Lauren’s eyes opened wide, flashing silver.
“Yeah,” he said. There was no filter in his head. He usually measured every word he spoke, but now his mouth opened and what was in his head just popped out. “Your breathing has that effect on me. Everything you do is such a turn-on I’m scared…” He drew in a deep breath himself and felt every inch of her along his front. “I’m scared I’m going to come.”
“You want me,” she whispered.
Jacko blinked, swallowed. A thousand words tangled in his throat and only one came out, and it came out in a croak. “Yeah.” He pressed his lower body against hers. “I, um, I thought you could tell.”
She’d lost that slightly anxious look and gave a small smile. “No. I mean you want me. As opposed to a generic woman.”
A generic woman. Weird way to put it. Right now, Jacko couldn’t remember what any woman he’d ever met looked like. He got as far as one head, two arms, two legs and blanked out. There was only Lauren and he knew every specific for her. The way her eyes flashed silver in a certain kind of light. The way her skin glowed as if she were lit from within. That delicate little knob at the corner of her narrow wrists. How her hands were so slender and how the tendons on the back of her hand danced when she drew. How she could blind him with her smile yet her eyes always remained slightly sad.
He remembered every single word she ever said to him.
Every cell of his body pulsed with desire. With lust. This wasn’t sex after a dry spell. This was as if he’d never had sex before.
Was this going to work?
It had to or either his heart or his dick was going to burst with suppressed desire.
He cleared his throat. “You’re—you’re not a generic woman. You’re Lauren Dare and I have wanted you since the second I met you.”
Her eyes flickered. Was this news to her? Then her mouth turned up slightly. “That’s, um, interesting. I hadn’t actually understood that.”
Jacko nearly sighed as he realized the huge divide between men and women. His bosses, Midnight and Senior, talked about this often. Metal, too. Metal looked like a thug as much as Jacko and could never find a woman who wasn’t either scared of him or wanted to fuck him precisely because he looked so rough. It bothered Metal, but it had never bothered Jacko. He lived in a world of men and exited it long enough to fuck, then went right back in.
Inviting a woman into his world hadn’t really ever occurred to him. Only now that he wanted Lauren, he realized that though he wanted this like he wanted his next breath, he was opening up a real hornet’s nest, because men and women didn’t speak the same language.
Lauren thought he was indifferent to her and every man at ASI knew his dick was dragging the floor following her around.
By the same token, women’s words all seemed to mean something different. It was going to be a problem, which he was definitely going to tackle after he’d had Lauren about a million times and got this major wood out of his system. Maybe two million times.
He took the hand he’d unclamped from the wall and placed it under her elbow. He touched only cloth, which was probably a good thing. Because right now? He wanted to toss her to the ground and jump on top of her.
Don’t fuck this up , he told himself.
He moved away, every cell in his body stiff, directing her by his hand on her elbow. He drew her away from the wall.
“Jacko?” she said, making the word a question.
“I thought we could—we could take this to the bedroom.” He looked at her carefully. She wanted to fu—to make love. They should be in a bed for that because though for him up against the wall, down on the floor, bent over the sofa, naked in a field of snow—all those worked for him, Lauren was a lady and he wanted her to be comfortable and that meant a bed.
Didn’t it?
Hell if he knew. Nothing about any of this was familiar to him.
“Bedroom,” he repeated, whole sentences now beyond him. The house was small and he had an excellent sense of space and knew where the bedroom had to be. But having her lead him there would again put some control in her hands.
Her head tilted. “That way.”
Yep. That way. He nudged her across the room, down the corridor, stopping on the threshold of her bedroom. There was a little light filtering through the snow from the streetlight outside her bedroom window. Bed, chest of drawers, rocking chair. But it wasn’t those that told him he was in the right room—it was the smell. The whole frigging room smelled of her skin.
Fuck.
He couldn’t do this and not breathe. That wouldn’t work. But every time he took in a breath, it was as if he breathed in Lauren.
He walked her to the bed, stopping just short of it, feeling as if he were strapped with bricks of C4, just about to detonate. Lauren was looking up at him and in the dim light she seemed unearthly, some shimmering creature sent to earth to torment him. Beautiful, magical, unattainable.
She reached up on tiptoe again and kissed him, moving her mouth over his, tasting him. Not unattainable, no. But still beautiful and magical.
Jacko cupped her head with his hands, soft warm hair tumbling over them, and deepened the kiss, sliding his mouth over hers, tasting her, breathing through her. She curved her hands over his wrists, anchoring him, as if he might run away.
No, he wasn’t going anywhere.
He lifted his head, looking down at her, her skin glowing in the semidarkness like a pearl. His body was split into two. Above the waist he could just stand here forever, looking at her face. Below the waist, his dick was screaming— get going you asshole! What are you waiting for?
A sign. That’s what he was waiting for. A sign that her excitement was one billionth of his.
He kissed her again, slow and deep, then raised his head just a little, feeling her breath wash over him. Her eyes were closed, mouth a little swollen.
“Jacko,” she whispered.
Okay. That was a sign. Wasn’t it?
He let go of her head, lightly ran his palms over her shoulders, down her sides to her narrow waist, touched the zipper at her back. Looked at her.
She smiled.
Yeah.
Slowly, Jacko unzipped the dress, spread it. It fell unnoticed to the floor and he stared. Oh man. She had on a lace bra, pretty and delicate. There wasn’t enough light to see exactly what color it was—something pale. Pink or yellow, maybe. There was plenty of light to see that it had a front opening. Jacko reached out and touched the fastening, watching her eyes. He could do this by touch, absolutely, no need to watch his hands. He could field strip his rifle blindfolded. A bra was nothing, if it weren’t for the fact that his hand was shaking lightly.
She couldn’t know what that meant—for a sniper’s hand to shake.
Her breasts were surprisingly full for such a small woman. He opened the bra and it slid to the floor and his hands were on her, soft and warm and perfect. He flicked his thumbs over her nipples, felt them harden, heard her breath speed up.
Panties.
Fast.