Into the Blue (A Wild Aces Romance)

by Chanel Cleeton

  I heard the plea in his voice, felt a rush of pleasure at the sound of my name said with such aching gentleness. Once again, my head warred with my heart.

  “Trust me. Please.”

  It was a small thing—a concession to make in the bedroom—and yet, we both knew what he was really asking had nothing to do with sex. He kept sneaking his way past my defenses, and I kept letting him, because no matter how hard I fought to deny it, he had always been my weak spot.

  I waited for him to touch me again, to use his body to tempt me. I was so close, so turned on, that I didn’t doubt that it would take little encouragement for me to break down my walls in order to get off. But he didn’t. He didn’t touch me except for the point where our hands met, didn’t speak except for those three words—

  Trust me. Please.

  And then I remembered why I’d never hidden myself from him, why he’d had every single part of me years ago. Because he was a good guy. He was honest and he was fair, and for all of his flaws, he had never lied to me. Ever. As much as I’d been angry with him for the fights we’d had, for the way we’d broken up, he’d been honest with me there, too. He could have told me things would be okay, could have lied about the demands of military life, and I would have probably believed him considering how little I knew about the Air Force. But he hadn’t. He’d given me the facts, answered my questions, even when the truth had made a future together seem insurmountable. And he hadn’t once tried to convince me to give up my dreams of being a lawyer. If anything, he’d supported me, wanted me to follow my dreams, even when it put us on opposite paths. He wasn’t a player. He wasn’t an asshole. He might have been wild when he was younger, but he’d never been a bad guy. So I gave him this part of me, too, because in the end it had always been his.

  “Okay.”

  “Thank you,” he whispered, his voice thick with emotion.

  I nodded, a lump in my throat, a flutter in my stomach, and a pounding in my heart.

  He walked over to the big whirlpool tub and I admired the view before me, anticipation running through my veins. He bent down and turned on the water, filling up the bathtub.

  He gestured for me to step in and I did, feeling simultaneously turned on and a little self-conscious. I didn’t know why, but for some reason this felt as intimate as sex, or maybe more intimate in a different way. We were both naked, but I felt like I was even more exposed, like I was giving him a sneak peek into my daily routine, giving him a part of myself, even as it was something as little as this.

  I sat down, sinking back until the water spilled over me.

  “Is it too hot?”

  I shook my head. It felt so good. I’d had a crazy day at work and I hadn’t had much downtime between coming home and our date, so this was the first chance I’d had to really relax.

  “Close your eyes.”

  And with that husky, sexy tone, there went relaxing.

  My pulse raced and I opened my mouth to protest, but something in his gaze, the sheer force of how much he wanted me, of how much he was enjoying this—and how badly I wanted the release he offered—had my mouth and eyes closing instead.

  “Good girl.”

  Who was I kidding? At this point he could tie me to the bed and I’d be down with it.

  I sat there, the jets pulsing around me, the warm water lapping at my skin, my muscles relaxing. I couldn’t hear Eric anymore, didn’t know if he was standing there staring at my naked body, if the sight of me was getting him even harder. And something about that, the idea that I was just spread out before him, waiting, had my nipples tightening and another pull of arousal pulsing between my legs. And then I heard the low strands of music coming from the radio on my nightstand—“Heart Skipped a Beat” by The xx.

  The scent of vanilla filled the room next—the oils and bath salts that I kept on the edge of my bathtub. A little hum of pleasure slipped from my lips. Between the music, the warmth of the water, and the aroma wafting around me, I’d somehow surpassed relaxed and gone straight to a meditative state.

  He gave good bath.

  Minutes passed and I waited for Eric to touch me, waited for him to speak, wondered if he was even in the room. I could have opened my eyes, but I was a rule follower to the extreme, and somehow it felt like cheating.

  And then I felt something brush against my breast. At first I wondered if it was the water from the jets, but then I felt it again, a stroke down the side and back again. I bit down on my lip.

  He’d always had big hands, but I’d never really appreciated how large they were until I was reduced to the feel of him touching me. With each stroke his movements grew bolder, his touch firmer, but still, he avoided my nipples. He cupped my breasts in his hands, testing the weight of them, squeezing, pressing them together. The water caressed me, both soothing and tormenting my aching nipples.

  He groaned, another flash of heat filling me at the sound falling from his lips.

  “You look so gorgeous like this. So fucking beautiful.”

  His thumbs tweaked my nipples, and my head rolled back as a little spasm of pleasure filled me.

  Holy hell, he really was fan-fucking-tastic with his hands. He played with me, over and over again, until whimpers escaped my lips, until I was moaning and thrashing, water spilling over the edge of the tub, hitting the tile floor.

  He didn’t stop.

  His hands glided down my stomach, stealing the breath from my body, and then his fingers found my clit, and the beginnings of my orgasm roared.

  He wasn’t gentle and it wasn’t slow. He touched me as though he knew how close I was and he was determined to take me there.

  When it started, when my body began trembling under his touch, his fingers slipped inside me, filling me as I clenched around him. When my orgasm subsided, he lifted me in his arms. My eyes flickered open and I stared at the wall of chest, pressing my lips to his heart, feeling soothed and relaxed, and falling maybe just a little bit deeper in love as he laid me down on the bed.

  I waited for him to pounce, but instead he just stared down at me, a crooked smile on his face and so much emotion in his eyes. He reached out, his hand on my knee, holding me steady, and then he spread my legs before him until I was sprawled out on my comforter.

  I couldn’t look away.

  Eric leaned forward, covering me with his big body, burrowing his head in my neck again, inhaling, his breathing ragged as he pressed a line of kisses down my throat. I felt him against me, the head of his cock brushing against my clit, and then lower until he was pushing inside me with a groan. He went slowly, his muscles tense, sliding in deeper, inch by inch, until he was fully seated inside me.

  We’d had the condom discussion and I was on the pill, so as much as this was just another thing that bound me to him, another way my guard went down, I welcomed it, loved feeling him like this, knowing there was nothing between us.

  I wrapped my arms and legs around Eric, holding him against me. Our gazes locked, and his mouth opened as though he wanted to speak, and I knew, simply knew, the three words that would tumble from his lips if I let him. I didn’t know if he saw the answer in my eyes, understood that I wasn’t ready to hear them, wasn’t sure I would ever be ready to hear them again, even as they blasted through me, but he shut it down.

  And then he began to move.

  My eyes slammed closed as he thrust in and out, as he took me closer and closer to my second orgasm of the night. I held on to him, our bodies one. I came, and then a minute later, his body tensed inside me and his orgasm followed.

  We collapsed on our sides, our limbs entwined, and the combination of a long day, alcohol at dinner, and two mind-numbingly good orgasms had me losing the fight against sleep. Just before I drifted off, it occurred to me that my heart was wide-fucking-open, but at the moment, I just didn’t have it in me to care.

  THOR

  I watched
her sleep, my fingers clutched tightly in her fist, my heart in her palm.

  I still loved her. No question about it. I’d never felt this way about anyone else, would never feel this way again. Becca was it for me, and even as I watched her fight it, I damned well knew I was it for her.

  You couldn’t fake what we had. Couldn’t duplicate it. We were so fucking lucky to have found each other once, and even as I’d always suspected it, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that letting her go was the biggest mistake of my life.

  Now I needed to fix it.

  I’d started thinking about my options, trying to figure out what I wanted to do next. I had a year left on my Air Force commitment, but that would probably get extended a bit due to our deployment to Afghanistan. The squadron needed bodies, and I had the experience they would rely upon. Technically they couldn’t force me to extend past a year if I decided to get out of the military, but I owed the Wild Aces and the guys I flew with, and if I could fix my problems in the cockpit, then I wanted to have their backs in combat.

  I was about to pin on major in the next month and I should be getting my next assignment. All of my choices had been Viper combat squadrons, and at the time, location hadn’t mattered much to me.

  Now it did.

  Even if I got Shaw, even if I had three years close to Becca, I would still finish out the rest of my time until retirement going through normal PCS moves. That would mean seven years of the same problems we’d fought about when we were together. Neither one of us was getting any younger; she wanted a family, and given the way she’d grown up without parents, I was sure she would object to having kids only for me to be gone and miss the important events in their lives—first steps, first words, birthdays, holidays.

  Then there were the Guard and the Reserve, which had the benefit of keeping me in the Viper, but they were a crapshoot in terms of availability. They were a pretty sweet gig considering they gave you all the perks of being a fighter pilot without the hassle of moving all the fucking time, so they were as competitive as hell and you had to hope the stars aligned and a spot opened up when you needed it. I couldn’t make that promise to her because even if I made the decision, there was no guarantee that there would be an available spot for me to take.

  Rock, meet hard place.

  I could get out completely, but I was still left feeling like my skills were pretty fucking limited—can blow things up with a missile looked pretty useless on a résumé—and considering how much time I’d spent advancing in my career, I wasn’t sure I wanted to start all over again.

  But if anything would convince me otherwise, it was the girl sleeping next to me.

  NINETEEN

  BECCA

  “I don’t want to interrupt your bang-fest.”

  I laughed at Lizzie’s not-incorrect characterization of the past two days with Eric. “I promised to babysit. You know I love Dylan. It’s no big deal. Honestly. Besides, you and Adam need a bang-fest of your own. Get a hotel room and show your husband the lingerie you bought.”

  Lizzie sighed. “I’ll give you one last chance to back out, because as much as I feel like an asshole taking you up on your offer, I haven’t gotten laid in three weeks. Dylan’s taken to sleeping in our bed again, and Adam is starting to get growly and not in a good way.”

  I grinned, shifting the phone to my other ear as I flipped through the file for an upcoming case. “I’m there. Does six o’clock work? That should give you guys plenty of time.”

  “Bless you. That’s perfect.”

  “Good. Tell Dylan that I’ll make his favorite dinner and we can watch a movie.”

  “By his ‘favorite dinner,’ do you mean animal-shaped pancakes?”

  I winced. “Yeah. Sorry about that. I didn’t realize sugar at night was kind of a no-go for a six-year-old, but he got so excited that I didn’t have the heart to tell him no. What can I say? I’m a sucker.”

  Lizzie snorted. “Hey, you’re the one who has to deal with the fallout. Have fun.”

  We said good-bye, and I hung up, dialing Eric’s cell next. We’d had tentative plans to hang out and I felt bad for canceling, but I also thought it might be a good thing to have a night apart. We’d spent the past two nights and mornings together, and I was already growing way too used to seeing him when I came home every day, to him sleeping next to me, supplying me with orgasms, and then being there when I woke up in the morning. We hadn’t talked about the fact that he was leaving soon, but it was only a matter of days, a week at the most, and I needed to slowly start weaning myself off him, because the withdrawal symptoms would be a bitch if I went cold turkey.

  He answered right away, sounding out of breath. “Hey, babe, what’s up?”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, just painting my grandmother’s house.”

  I grinned. “I thought it was just the kitchen.”

  “It was just the kitchen. Now it’s the whole house.”

  Okay, that was a little cute.

  “She says ‘hi,’ by the way.”

  “Tell her I said ‘hi’ back.”

  I’d always had a soft spot for his grandmother, and she’d continued to treat me like I was a part of the family even after we’d broken up.

  “Wait . . .” Silence filled the line. “Okay, we’re invited to Sunday brunch.”

  I froze. Sunday brunch was kind of a tradition. She had it after church and always hosted a big crowd in her tiny house. We’d gone when we were dating and engaged, but I hadn’t had the heart to go in the years after, always making up an excuse when she invited me. It felt too weird to be back in that house without Eric beside me.

  “And I promised that we’d go to church with her,” he added, his voice cheery.

  Oh, hell no.

  Church in Bradbury was an event. Everyone went. If I showed up with Eric and his grandmother, the gossip would spread throughout the town before the service ended.

  No freaking way.

  “Sorry, I think I have plans. You should totally go, though.”

  “Come on, don’t be a heathen,” he teased.

  I snorted because I was pretty sure there was a snowball’s chance in hell that Eric had seen the inside of a church unless he’d done so at his grandmother’s insistence. I had no problem with going; I just didn’t want to go with him.

  “I have to cancel our date tonight,” I said, ignoring his invitation.

  “Why?”

  “I promised Lizzie I’d babysit. She and Adam really need a night out.”

  “They have a kid?”

  Sometimes I forgot how much he’d missed.

  “Yeah, Dylan is six. He’s my godson, and a holy terror, and he’s relying on me to make him animal-shaped pancakes for dinner.”

  He chuckled. “I would never stand in the way of a cat-shaped pancake.”

  “Actually, Dylan likes zoo animal–shaped pancakes. He’s discerning that way.”

  “I see. And you can make these?”

  I heard the skepticism in his voice, and considering he’d seen my artistic and culinary skills—or lack thereof—I didn’t blame him.

  “I use a mold,” I admitted reluctantly. “But seriously, he thinks it’s magic and I can’t lose my godmother street cred. Competition is fierce. Adam’s sister has a pool in her apartment complex.”

  Eric burst into laughter. “God, I forgot how competitive you could be.”

  Valid.

  “Okay, I’ll make you a deal. I’ll forgive you for canceling our date if you agree to come to church and brunch on Sunday.”

  I groaned. “No.”

  “Come on, babe.”

  “Don’t call me ‘babe’ at your grandmother’s.”

  “Pretty sure I called you ‘babe’ before.”

  “Yes, but that wasn’t using sex voice,” I hissed.

  He c
racked up again. “Sex voice?”

  “DO NOT SAY IT OUT LOUD.”

  It took him a minute to get his laughter under control enough to speak.

  “Well, now you have to come; she’ll be too worried about your immortal soul if you don’t.”

  His grandmother was one of the nicest, least judgmental people I’d ever met, so he only said it to appeal to my sense of guilt—of course, it worked.

  “Fine. But no hand-holding. No kissing. No mentions of our sex life.”

  He snorted.

  “No one can think we’re anything other than friends.”

  “I was worried we were just fuck buddies, so friends is a vast improvement—”

  “DO NOT SAY ‘FUCK BUDDIES’ AT YOUR GRANDMOTHER’S HOUSE.”

  My cheeks flamed as horror flooded me. I buried my head in my hands as he burst out into more laughter. When the laughs had finally subsided, it hit me.

  “She’s not anywhere near you, is she?”

  “Nope,” he answered cheerfully. “She went outside to garden after I asked you about church.”

  “I hate you,” I muttered.

  “You wound me.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m hanging up now.”

  “Wait.”

  “What?”

  “Go to the Harvest Dance with me.”

  Jesus. What was up with him today?

  “No way.”

  The Harvest Dance was pretty much the event in Bradbury. They held it at an old farm on the outskirts of town with hayrides, dancing under white lights, and marshmallow roasts. It was a huge tradition that I’d experienced every single year Eric and I were together.

  You didn’t go to the Harvest Dance with someone you were just sleeping with. It was so sweet, it was saccharine, and while I secretly loved the rustic romance, there was no way we could go to something like that and keep things casual. When Eric eventually left, I’d be the one stuck here with the questions, and the pitying looks, and the whispered conversations about how I couldn’t find a man no matter how hard I tried.