Hot Zone (Elite Force #2)(19)
Author: Catherine Mann

Inside her.

His eyes adjusted to the dark just as she yanked a string overhead. The single bulb flickered to life inside the eight-by-ten closet full of shelves that had been stocked full of hospital supplies, with a small utility table wedged in a corner. Amelia stood in front of him in her borrowed scrubs, her hair still damp.

His hand gravitated to stroke a strand, finding it even silkier than he could have imagined. Everything about her was so damn delicate, he had to remind himself this woman was tough. He’d come here to check up on her, just to lay eyes on her. He couldn’t trust anyone else’s word. And now it appeared he was going to lay more than his eyes on her. If he had his way, he would explore every inch of her body with his hands, his mouth.

And she was in his arms again, not just to hug but to hold on, to caress and explore his body. He angled his head toward her just as she arched up on her toes, her face tipped. Mouth to mouth they met, tasted. Her tongue explored just as fully as his did. She tasted like toothpaste and coffee. Her hands scaled along his back, shoving his survival vest to the ground.

His mind shouted this was a damn stupid idea in spite of everything she’d said. She was still reeling from the trauma. He wasn’t all that steady either. During that aftershock at the beach cottage, his mind had filled with images of Amelia and the kid trapped again, needing help, calling out to him. He’d been off like a shot to check up on her. And yeah, he knew this was tied up in the past.

She yanked his T-shirt free of his pants.

Any rational thoughts made a double-time retreat. Air whispered over his back, followed by her touch. He traced the hem of her surgical top, hesitating, his conscience kicking him in the ass.

Her cool fingers slid up his spine, her clipped short nails digging into his back. “Stop thinking. I know what I’m doing. I want this. I need to be with you, to forget about all of those horrors that I’m helpless to fix.”

How she’d read his mind, his doubts, his own howling frustration, he didn’t know. Still, he had to be sure, to protect her, even if only from herself.

He smoothed back her hair with a hand that shook harder than a newbie on his first mission. “You’re mixed up because I rescued you.”

“What about you?” Her fingers crawled up his chest to caress his neck, her body melding with his in an unmistakable invitation. “Are you mixed up? Should I be protecting you?”

Blood supply to his brain was seriously compromised, since it was all surging south. His erection throbbed against his fly as he tried to sift through her words. Had she somehow found out about—God, he couldn’t even think of their names right now. “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

“Do you sleep with the people you save very often? Enough that you can be so sure of what I’m feeling?”

Her words flicked cold water on his libido, not totally dousing it but definitely giving him enough of a wake-up call to clear this up. To make sure she understood how she affected him in a way even he wasn’t sure he understood yet. “I’ve never slept with anyone even remotely tied to one of my military rescues, and if you don’t believe me on that, then we need to stop this right now.”

“If you’re sane”—she traced his ears lightly, intimately—“then why are you trying to push me away, unless you think I’m a needy nutcase who doesn’t know what she’s doing?”

The surety in her voice fed the hunger searing his insides. “I’m only asking you to be certain. I don’t want you to have regrets or add to the fallout from what you’ve been through.”

“I am thirty-one years old, and I know my own mind.” Her feathery touch skimmed over his temples, down his cheeks to circle his mouth. “I want to have sex with you, no strings, just now. Together. To affirm the fact that we both came out of this alive. To find some closure. To feel good again.”

She sounded clearheaded and decisive to him. Fair enough. And the way she’d started nipping his bottom lip…

He swallowed hard. “So you trust I have the ability to make you feel good?”

“Very much so,” she said with an intensity echoed in her sky blue eyes, “and I can’t wait for you to prove me right.”

“Okay then.” He sealed his mouth to hers, his arms locking around Amelia as she twined hers around his neck.

She kissed him again, more knowingly now, more familiar. He plunged his fingers into her hair, absorbing the texture, memorizing the feel of her. Burning to see every inch of soft feminine flesh.

Bunching up her top, he inched the fabric higher between them. She covered his hands with hers just below the gentle curve of her br**sts.

“Everything’s borrowed from the rescue supplies,” she gasped breathlessly. “I’m not wearing anything particularly seductive under there. Just a generic sports bra.”

Keeping his eyes locked on hers, he eased the top the rest of the way up, breaking eye contact only for the instant it took to sweep the shirt the rest of the way off.

And then he absolutely could not look away. “You make white cotton look sexier than any lace.”

The horror of the past hours faded as he drank in the curves of her br**sts hugged by the fabric, her ni**les beading in obvious arousal. Then he saw the bruises purpling her ribs, another mark on her shoulder. No doubt, there were plenty more dotting her all over after what she’d been through. He reached toward the largest on her side.

Grasping his wrist, she redirected his palm until it rested over her breast. His fingers massaged reflexively into the softness and she moaned softly in response. Encouraging him. He peeled the bra up with precision, deliberation, savoring every damn second. Her eyes sparked the hottest blue flames back at him, warning him she was every bit as on fire as he was. She stroked under his T-shirt and palmed her way up his chest, scrunching brown cotton in her hands until she cleared his head and flung away the military-issue tee.

He hauled her against him.

Skin to skin.

Bare br**sts to his chest.

Hips to hips, with too many barriers between them. And one very important barrier missing.

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I need for you to wait one second.”

“Why?” she gasped.

“I need to get a condom.”

“You carry them with you to earthquake rescues?”

“Believe it or not, they’re part of the gear in a survival vest—the most efficient way to carry water.”

“Water carrier? Like a balloon? You’ve got to be kidding.”