Dangerous To Love

by Toni Anderson, Barbara Freethy, Dee Davis, Leslie A. Kelly, Cynthia Eden, J. Kenner, Meli Raine, Gwen Hernandez, Pamela Clare, Rachel Grant

  He stands before me, shirt tight against his chest, jeans resting on his hips like they’re waiting for a command, his eyes filled with atonement and questions. I reach up and run my fingers through his silky waves. His eyes flash with hope. They change color, turning from a light honey to a deep bourbon. The change makes butterflies release in my stomach.

  As I look at him and he looks back, we share a primal signal. Our breath quickens. My skin is so warm I feel a layer of sweat form. My hair brushes acutely against my neck. My thumb grazes the light stubble of a day’s growth on his chin. I notice everything and nothing.

  We just are.

  “Carrie?” he asks. There is so much in that single word. My own name has become a talisman for…what? I don’t know. I can’t think.

  I need to act.

  Standing on tiptoes, I brush my lips softly against his. He inhales sharply, pulling me close. His heart hammers against his ribs like it’s tap dancing. My own dances back, like a mating ritual.

  If I ever doubted that Mark is the one for me, I was a fool.

  If I ever thought I could resist him, I was an idiot.

  And if I think for one, single second that I can walk away from his embrace right now, then I’ll be damned.

  There is no turning back, I think as his mouth takes mine. I am leaping into the truth and have to trust him. I have to trust myself. The taste of him fills me. The power of his craving wraps around me. Mark is claiming me now as I offer myself to him, fully and freely.

  I want him.

  I want to be as close to him as two human beings can be. I’ve been alone for so long. Too long.

  No more.

  Forgiveness comes in so many different forms. As Mark brings me into his embrace and I stand on tiptoes, sinking my hands into his hair, stroking the broad muscles of his back, I feel a deep sense of relief. Relief that I can finally exhale. Relief that he wants me.

  For three years I wondered. For three years I hoped. For three years I tormented myself with thoughts of ruining the one love that I couldn’t forget.

  And now I let myself fall into that relief as Mark’s tongue lovingly explores mine, his hands on my back, moving to cup my ass. He tightens his grip and our abs grind into each other. Muscle against skin, bone against bone, lips against teeth and tongue and sighs and moans.

  It all becomes the same thing.

  Us.

  His hands reach down and suddenly I’m in the air. I make a little sound in the back of my throat. Mark groans, our lips still touching. He urges me to wrap my legs around him as he carries me into his bedroom. My ass hits the bed in the same spot where I awoke just an hour ago.

  I can’t touch him enough. My hands are frantic as they slide under his t-shirt and race up his bare back, his chest dusted with golden hair, my thumbs brushing against nipples that stiffen. He sighs and kisses me more deeply.

  “I’m sorry,” I gasp as he kisses my throat, his tongue teasing the soft skin with little flicks.

  “Sorry for what?” he asks, pulling up. I gaze into his eyes, his hair flowing over his forehead. Mark’s lips are in a half-smile of confusion. His eyes are dark with desire.

  “For not trusting you. I should have known you’d never arrest my dad unless you had to.” I stretch my hands out and caress his back with a touch like an apology. A part of me feels like I’m ruining the moment. Sensuality and talks about my dad’s arrest aren’t exactly compatible.

  Mark’s eyes wrinkle with compassion. He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t get annoyed or upset. He gives me a sad smile and says, “I wish I could go back in time and change everything. I lost you for three years.” His brow is furrowed with concern. “I’m never making that mistake again. Ever.”

  My heart is a cloud, rising on a windy day.

  The wind rustles something outside. I hear an animal in the distance, the sound loose and indistinct. Our breath fills the space between us. Mark’s weight is a comfort and a tease. His arms are on either side of me and he lowers himself, propping up on one elbow, freeing his other hand. I arch up to kiss him. We savor each other, our taste like wine and sunshine.

  Well, actually, coffee and late-summer night air.

  “If you’ll have me, Carrie,” he adds between kisses, nuzzling my neck, his words a bit muffled by my own heated skin, “I want to be together again. And this time, I won’t let you leave. Please. I don’t think—” His words choke off and disappear into his throat.

  I slide my cheek against his. The scratch of stubble grounds me.

  “You don’t think what?” I ask.

  “I don’t think I could bear losing you again.”

  “You won’t,” I whisper into his ear.

  “You forgive me for lying all those years? And for being too stupid to—”

  “I forgive you if you’ll forgive me.”

  He jerks up, his face creased with confusion. “Forgive you? For what?”

  “For leaving like I did.”

  The worry lines fade. “Oh. That.” His tone of voice makes it sound like it was nothing. He frowns again, then gives me a gentle look. “How about we forgive each other and wipe the slate clean?”

  “How about you make love to me and we’ll call that forgiveness?” I ask, the words true and real.

  His face fills with a tenderness that makes my eyes tear up.

  “You’ll have me?”

  “You, Mark. And only you.”

  “Only?” One eyebrow rises. There are so many layers to that question.

  “Only.”

  He swallows, hard. His eyes fill with a contemplative emotion I don’t see in him often. Mark’s a do-er. He makes things happen. For him to pause right now means he’s feeling so much.

  So am I.

  “You’ve never,” he says, his voice tight, “…since you left?”

  “No.”

  He blows out a long exhale. “That’s…wow. Carrie, no one?”

  I shake my head.

  His eyelids close so slowly, like he’s in pain. “Me either,” he says, his tone thick with emotion. “I couldn’t.”

  “Not a single woman?” I ask, incredulous. I look him up and down pointedly. My chin dips down to my chest as I survey his body, hovering over mine. My hands find his waist and I squeeze, just enough to make him press down against me. I hold back a moan. “You can’t tell me that someone like—”

  “You,” he joins me, our voices in unison. His eyes eat me up with the same hunger I feel for him.

  I go silent. His breath comes in steady pushes, his chest against mine, his heat blanketing me.

  “We’ve both been waiting three years?” he finally chokes out. Those strong hands clasp me to him, and his mouth takes mine again. The power of the kiss, filled with regret and too much time alone, makes me wonder how much we have pent up inside each of us.

  Three years.

  It’s time to find out.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I arch up and his hands slide under my shirt, pulling it over my head with a yank that is nearly violent in its rush. I whimper, the cloth catching on my injured cheek. It’s as if we suddenly both realize that we’ve wasted so much time. As if those three years are a precious commodity we can’t waste another drop of.

  Which we can’t.

  “Ouch,” I yelp, the eye socket burning.

  “I’m so sorry!” Mark exclaims, halting. “I didn’t mean—” He gives my forehead a sweet kiss, his eyes burning with desire to do the right thing.

  And good old-fashioned desire.

  Time passes with each lick, each sigh, each touch. We’ll be damned if we’ll spend another fraction of a second without being naked and vulnerable, hot and sensual, entangled and sweaty and—

  “Oh!” I gasp as the cold air hits my naked breasts. Mark sits up on his knees and peels off his t-shirt.

  I gasp again, this time in admiration.

  Oh, my God. I’ve forgotten how magnificent his body is.

  No, that isn’t right. I haven’t
forgotten. Not one bit.

  Mark’s handsome chest and strong body have been in my mind forever. It haunts my dreams. The need to touch his skin, to run my hands without restraint across his pecs, to touch him with permission and without end has followed me everywhere.

  For three years.

  I reach up and the second my fingertips make contact with his abs, it’s like lightning strikes. We both jolt, Mark’s stomach curling in, my fingers reaching for more. I can touch him again. Really touch him. And this time, I’m not a scared little teen.

  I’m ready for everything.

  Mark gives me a smoldering look. His lips twitch with a sexy smile. “You, Ms. Myerson, are looking at me like a woman with a mission.”

  I run my hands around his waist to the front, then up the planes and dips of his muscled torso, finally sliding down, down, down…until he inhales sharply, his neck suddenly tight. His thighs flex, thick and coiled on either side of my hips.

  “Not a mission, Mr. Paulson.”

  I begin unbuttoning his jeans.

  “A plan.”

  And then my wrists are high above my head, pinned to the bed, and whatever thin thread of control I thought I had is gone. Long gone.

  Like my mind.

  Mark bends over me and his tongue flicks at my belly button. I gasp and squirm, heat pooling between my legs like lava.

  I feel him smile against my belly. He’s impossibly tall and strong, his arms holding mine high, his triceps bulging before my eyes. But I’m not focused on what his arms are doing on right now.

  That tongue, on the other hand…

  I alternate between excited, unremitting joy and anxiety fueled by the unknown. Mark runs his mouth up, the line following the middle of my body, hot wetness leaving a trail that gives me goosebumps. I wiggle under him but can’t break free. I don’t want to break free. This feels so good. So new. So much.

  His mouth lingers between my breasts and I am transfixed. The stubble along his jaw tickles and titillates. He moves and takes one nipple in his mouth, tongue like wet, hot fudge. I am suddenly self-conscious. What if I’m not enough? What if I’m too inexperienced? He’s seven years older than me and worlds away in terms of life. He’s a war veteran, a federal agent, a man used to going deep under cover to get what he wants. He’s a powerful, dominant adult.

  I’m just Carrie. No one. A nobody with a dad who died in prison. My biggest adventure was moving away to follow dad and working in a check processing office.

  How can Mark want me?

  I tense. Mark stops. His eyes catch mine as his lips separate from my body. My mouth goes dry and waters at the same time. Mark has a way of looking at me that makes all the rules of physics stop applying. I can be weightless and heavy. I can be in motion and still. I can be hot and cold.

  I can be terrified and in love.

  “What’s wrong?” he asks in a voice that makes me melt. He takes my hand and puts it over his heart. His chest hair tickles my palm. I could touch him forever. He feels so good. So safe.

  So strong and good and whole and real.

  “I…I’m not sure,” I say, ducking the question. I know exactly what’s wrong.

  He leans down for a kiss, his lips like velvet as his hands caress my arms, which I’ve brought down by my sides.

  “Talk to me, Carrie,” he murmurs, rolling off me and onto his side. We’re still touching. The room is filled with fire and shadows. I resist the urge to jump up and leave. That’s what I do when I’m nervous. When I’m confused. When I’m overwhelmed.

  I leave.

  It’s so much easier than staying.

  Except…that’s not true any more. Leaving town three years ago robbed me and Mark of all that precious time together. Of a chance at happiness. And now here I am, half-naked under his own half-nude body. Yet I’m struggling with too many wounds from the past.

  And making a few new ones, too.

  He runs his hand into my hair, fingers splaying, his palm cupping my jaw. “Talk to me,” he urges.

  I can’t.

  I touch him instead. Maybe my hands and fingers can tell him what my mouth isn’t ready to say.

  “Is this the language you want to use?” he croons.

  Something in me releases. A layer of tension unclenches. I’m covered in blanket after blanket of fear, and one of them just unfurled, evaporating like dew under a morning sun.

  His hand cups my breast. He’s gentle. Respectful. His eyes tip down, long lashes at rest against his cheek. Mark’s mouth kisses my nipple with oh, so much of a whisper.

  I reach for his body, my hands seeking comfort and so much more. Can you feel safe in the throes of passion?

  I want to find out.

  “You,” he says, pulling back, eyes hooded and looking at my skin, “are so exquisite.” He trails a finger from my collarbone down the hollow of my skin, reaching the top of my breast. I’m buzzing and on fire, chilled and exploding. I breathe in like it takes a hundred years, and breathe out like it’s a blink of an eye.

  I forget to breathe sometimes. I feel it, the air caught in the back of my throat. Mark takes his time. He moves slowly. The way he touches me is purposeful. Determined. Casual and sultry. I can feel the callouses on his hands, right below his fingers. He has the hands of a man who uses them to do hard work.

  I remember how he looked, holding the gun the other night when he broke into my trailer. My screams brought him. What was he expecting? As he plants a kiss on my ribcage and I shiver, I wonder:

  What makes a man break down a door to rescue a woman? What drove Mark to do that? Was it pure instinct? Duty?

  Love?

  “I told you, three years ago, that I loved you, Carrie,” he murmurs against the soft skin he’s kissing. I inhale sharply. A line from his mouth to my core tightens, then turns to a warm wetness I know all too well.

  I know it well because I felt it so often around him.

  Before.

  “And I never got the chance to show you. You left.”

  The line tugs suddenly. Hard, like a yank.

  “You left and I found you, but I didn’t chase you. I gave you room. You took it.” With each sentence, he kisses me. “I knew I had to give you all the space you needed.” Kiss. “I knew that if I followed you, if I gave in to impulse and appeared one day and tried to convince you to come back, that I’d lose you forever.”

  Kiss.

  Every cell in my body fills with a regretful warmth, like my blood can cry.

  “So I waited. I hoped you’d come back.”

  Kiss.

  “But I didn’t know.” His voice is thick with sadness and truth. “I didn’t know, and that’s the part that broke my heart, Carrie. The not knowing.”

  Kiss.

  His lips brush against my belly, the touch maddening.

  “Oh, Mark.” I sit up and pull him to me, needing to feel those lips on mine. I need to assure him. Reassure him. “I’m here.”

  Kiss.

  This time, the kiss is hungry. More urgent, with a kind of madness that comes from the insanity of spending so much time not knowing. Mark’s honesty is tearing my heart in two at the same time that it’s healing me. So many paradoxes swirl in the air between us.

  That’s love, right? Two different truths can live together if there’s enough love to fuel them both.

  I’m kissing him the only way I know how, with my hands stroking his back, my fingers digging in to the hard muscle under his ribs. Our mouths press and our tongues explore, the movements fevered and eager. We’re making up for lost time.

  His hands slide to the waistband of my pants and instead of pausing, all I can think is, Please.

  He reads my mind and in a few seconds I am completely naked, resting on my back as he rises up to unbutton his own pants. His gaze is filled with a kind of rabid lust that is contagious. One touch, and I’ll have it, too.

  One thousand touches, and I’ll never want to live without it.

  “You are…God, Carrie. W
ords are escaping me. All I can think is how beautiful you are. And it’s pretty much the only thing my brain can say.”

  “I don’t mind.” My grin makes him laugh. As he slips out of his pants I gasp. He’s so perfect. Not in a model-perfect kind of way. His body is worn. A warrior’s build. He carries himself in skin with scars and imperfections. He has no tattoos of any kind. A part of me wants to ask how he could be a war vet and not have them.

  Before the words can come out he’s on top of me. The blanket of his hot, vibrant body reduces my ability to think to nothing. Zero.

  I am incapable of anything but sensation.

  Ah. Finally. This is exactly where I need to be. Nothing but touch. Taste. Sound. Sight.

  Him.

  I run my palms up both sides of his body, starting at his hips and racing up his ribs, to his shoulders, then down his back. He’s layered and contoured, ropy and cut. Powerful muscles rest, coiled and ready, beneath skin lightly peppered with hair. I could lie beneath him for the rest of my life, ensconced in his heat and energy, and be fulfilled.

  Thank goodness I don’t have to settle for only that.

  Mark’s hands roam like mine. We take our time, being tender with each other. Three years ago I was too shy, too skittish to be fully naked with him. He was too gentlemanly to push me. We’re more vulnerable and truly naked than we’ve ever been with each other before.

  Which suits us well.

  He’s so primal, like a hunter. His mouth seeks mine, then dips to my neck, my collar bone, my breasts. Seeking whatever he needs, he’s so gentle. This is new for me, this stretch of skin against skin. I move my leg and his thick erection rubs against my hip. The potential of what’s to come fills me with a wet anticipation.

  An urge I’ve never felt before takes over. It’s ripe and ready and bursting. I need him in me. I need my legs wrapped around him, his body over mine, thrusting and joining and—

  He slides down my torso, his mouth making a trail of kisses down to my hip.

  Then without a word, Mark parts my legs and gives me a very different kind of kiss.

  My breath hitches and a million thoughts swirl through my mind, the first of which is full-on embarrassment. Does he…what is he…do I taste okay…do I…?