by J. S. Scott
“Desperation and training,” he growled. “There was no way you were putting that beautiful mouth on that asshole. I’d have to be dead first.”
The vehemence and savageness in his declaration made her heart skip a beat. When had anyone ever cared about her that much? Certainly, the agents in her team were like friends, and they’d protect her as much as she’d be willing to protect them. But none of them had this wild possessiveness toward her, this raw desire to keep her safe. “I didn’t want you to be dead.”
“What did you want me to be?” he rasped.
“Exactly like you are right now.” Dressed in only a pair of flannel pajama bottoms, his usual fuck-me hair that seemed to occur every day from pulling on a winter hat to take Shep outside, Tate was every woman’s wet dream. His body was hard beneath hers, and when his smoky eyes flared with heat, he was irresistibly, impossibly, undeniably the sexiest man alive. Tate Colter would always be just a little too cocky, arrogant, and untamed. But she liked him that way because he was also kind, sweet, and gentle: traits that were hidden beneath a hardened exterior. Sometimes he was a conundrum, but Lara understood him more and more every day.
Because we’re so damn much alike.
Nothing and nobody had tugged at her feminine instincts like Tate did. She’d spent years being tough, trying to keep pace in a male-dominated profession. She couldn’t afford to be anything except businesslike and impersonal, better than everyone else at what she did because she was a woman, and she had lived for her job for a very long time.
I want to live for myself, just for a little while.
She pulled herself up on her elbows and stared down at Tate’s perfect, muscular body. The flannel nightgown she wore was far from sexy, but he still looked at her as if she were a Playboy centerfold and he was a horny teenager.
“I think I made you a promise when you were in the hospital that I’d like to fulfill right now,” she said seductively. Her finger ran down his muscular chest. She had wanted to lay her hands on this man, pleasure the hell out of him, since the moment she’d made that vow.
“Not until your face is healed,” he demanded roughly.
“It doesn’t hurt.” Lara loved seeing the hunger in his eyes.
“Then kiss me,” he challenged as he speared a hand through her hair.
Careful not to lean on his chest, she leaned down and let him pull her mouth to his. She might have been the instigator, but Tate immediately took control. He licked, bit, and teased her lips before his tongue slid into her mouth to conquer her completely. She moaned against his lips, her tongue eagerly bantered with his.
He ravaged.
She surrendered without a fight, opened to him as he claimed her mouth as his, tenderly but dominantly. Her body caught fire as she became tangled in a web of desire so potent that her entire body trembled with need.
This is exactly how a kiss should be.
It should always be as life-altering as the assault to her senses was from Tate’s embrace right now.
Her hand crept down his abdomen, relishing every defined muscle and indentation her fingers stroked over as she explored him. Finally, she jerked the drawstring on his pajama bottoms, eager to touch him.
Tate ripped his mouth from hers. “Lara, don’t. I want you too damn bad right now, and your face is still healing.”
“I don’t need my face,” she purred. “Just my mouth. And my cheek feels fine. The swelling is gone and it’s painless.”
She made contact with his enormous, erect member immediately because Tate was commando, nothing but flannel covering his hard erection. As she moved down to his knees, she yanked on his pajama pants. “I want you naked,” she said boldly. She didn’t want anything between her and Tate right now, and she quickly pulled the flannel nightgown over her head to reveal her bare body underneath. Her confidence faltered as she heard a low, reverberating sound come from Tate’s mouth. But as she glanced at his expression, it was pure molten heat; his covetous eyes devoured her body.
She tugged on his pants, even more eager to feel the proof of his arousal. His cock popped out of the material as she drew it down; Tate lifted his ass to help her.
“My leg is scarred up,” he said in a warning voice.
Tate actually had small scars everywhere, according to his history in the Special Forces, but they made him look like a warrior, and they made him even more dangerous and attractive. Although Lara winced for the pain every one of them had probably caused him, they didn’t make him one tiny iota less desirable. They were part of Tate. And Tate was beyond perfection to her.
His leg was scarred, and she gasped as she pulled the pants from his feet and tossed the flannel to the floor. “Oh, God, this must have hurt like hell.” She traced the healed dark scars lovingly.
Tate moved to put his leg under the covers at the bottom of the bed, but she grabbed it before he could hide it, and kissed the scars as she made her way up his lower body. “Don’t. There isn’t one thing about you that I don’t find incredibly hot,” she told him in a husky, shaky voice. He’d gained these scars saving lives, protecting their country, and no doubt by doing a mission that was incredibly risky. “You’re my hero, Tate Colter.” She palmed his cock as she moved next to his hips.
“Christ, Lara. You’re killing me,” he grumbled in a tormented voice.
She smirked at him as she lowered her head. “Then I guess I’ll just have to bring you back to life.”
Lara wasn’t exactly incredibly experienced with tasting a man, even though she’d bragged to Tate to make him stay in the hospital. Instinct took over as she twirled her tongue around the tip of him and licked the droplet of moisture from the head. She closed her eyes, and savored the taste of him: warm, masculine, and heady. After she licked up the inside of the shaft, she finally took him into her mouth; his member was so large that there was no way she could take him completely. She wrapped her fingers around the base of the shaft, and moved them in time with her mouth as she devoured him.
Tate’s tortured groan made her pussy clench almost painfully, and she became completely consumed, tightened her suction around his cock, and moved faster and faster.
“Dammit, Lara. I’m going to explode.” Tate speared his fingers through her hair and guided her faster, harder.
He let go of her head to give her a chance to escape, but Lara wasn’t going anywhere. She took him as deeply as possible. Tate’s release pulsated into her throat, and she continued to stroke as he had an orgasm that had him crying her name in a hoarse, raw voice. “Lara.”
His breathing was hard and heavy as he speared his hand back into her hair, massaging her scalp as he caught his breath. “Damn, you were right. My head did blow off,” he rasped. He pulled her up beside him and flipped her on her back.
Stunned, Lara looked up at him in surprise. He changed their positions so fast that she hadn’t even seen it coming. “What are you doing?” He had her hands pinned over her head.
His eyes shone like liquid silver. His big body now covered hers.
“I have to watch you come now, baby. I need to hear you moaning your pleasure while I taste your sweet pussy.” His hand moved between their bodies; his fingers probed her folds.
She was saturated and slick, and Tate let out a satisfied grunt. “You’re already wet. Getting me off turned you on?”
“Yes,” she told him breathlessly. Her entire body quivered beneath his with a need so powerful that she could hardly catch her breath.
“Good. Because I’m going to enjoy the hell out of this, too.” He lowered his head and kissed her. His dominant nature surfaced as he held her wrists fast and ravaged her mouth like he owned it.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” Lara pleaded when Tate let go of her lips to run his tongue along the sensitive skin of her neck.
“Baby, this isn’t going to hurt for either one of us,” he answered in a husky voice against her skin. “All I want is to taste you until you forget about anything except me.”
Heat flooded between her thighs at the sound of Tate’s demanding, sexy voice. He was in his element when he was sexually dominant, true to his nature, and his raw passion ramped up her desire to the boiling point. Here, she could let him take control of her body, trust him to pleasure her until she nearly lost her mind. She didn’t have to be in control right now, and all she did was relax into his caresses and feel.
He released her wrists; his mouth moved to her breasts, and he teased one of her pebbled nipples with his teeth and tongue. “These are fucking perfect,” he growled against her breast. His large hand cupped one and then the other, stimulating her hypersensitive peaks until she couldn’t stand it anymore.
“I need you,” Lara moaned. Her hands gripped the sheets as her back arched in pleasure. “Fuck me, Tate.”
“Believe me, baby, I plan on it. Eventually,” he answered gutturally. His mouth moved in sensual licks, nips, and erotic kisses to her abdomen. “Right now I just want to brand you as mine.”
His tone was ravenous and greedy, as though he couldn’t get enough of touching her. Those words from any other man might have been almost scary. But not from Tate. Never from Tate. He was protective and thoughtful, possessive and vulnerable, rough and heartbreakingly tender. Bossiness was second nature to him, and she understood that. She’d gladly hand him control so she didn’t have to think for a while. She trusted him, she understood him, and that made all the difference in the way she reacted to his words.
She breathed a sigh of relief as he finally parted her thighs, his heated breath so close to her sex that it made her shiver in anticipation.
“You’re killing me.” She moaned his earlier words intentionally.
He took her hands and placed them on her breasts. “Pleasure yourself, baby.”
All thoughts of modesty were gone, replaced by her body’s cry for stimulation. She cupped her breasts, pinched her nipples ruthlessly to try to make the aching need throbbing inside her subside.
“You look beautiful like this,” Tate growled. “So needy for me. So ready for me to satisfy you.”
“Yes. Do it, dammit. I need you.” Her body was coiled tightly, her desperation for Tate out of control.
“Time to revive you,” he told her fiercely, but with a touch of humor that he sent similar words that she had said to him right back at her.
Lara’s ass lifted at the first touch of Tate’s mouth. He delved through her folds and into her pussy just like he did everything: totally focused, wild, and completely relentless. His sensual assault was erotic and carnal: his lips, teeth, tongue and nose completely buried in her pussy as he pushed her legs apart even farther to give him deeper access. His tongue rolled from bottom to top on her tender, pink flesh over and over again. He brushed the tiny bundle of nerves with every pass of his tongue, and her body ached to climax.
“Oh. God.” She had never felt anything as raw and hot as Tate’s mouth between her thighs; his lustful groan of enjoyment vibrated against her clit. She abandoned her breasts and fisted his short hair. “Yes, yes, yes,” she chanted. Her entire body reacted to what he was doing to her; her channel clenched painfully.
He flicked his tongue over her sensitive, engorged bud and focused on her clit as he pushed two fingers into her channel, finally filling her. She clamped down on his fingers as he curled them around her g-spot, massaged it, and then retreated to enter her again and again.
Her back arched and her head thrashed on the pillow as Tate continued to tease her clit in the same rhythm as he moved his fingers in and out of her slick sheath. “Tate, I can’t take it. I can’t.” The pleasure was so volatile that she felt as if she was ready to shatter.
She squeaked as he moved his other hand beneath her ass, teasing a finger between the cheeks of her ass. She was so wet that her juices easily coated the finger that he used to tease her anus, and eased the tip of it into the tight opening.
He was testing her limits, and Lara comprehended that—in the tiny corner of her mind that could still function. He teased and probed, never ceasing the motion of his tongue and the fingers that fucked her mercilessly. Every sensation Tate created was new and intense, and she had no boundaries with him. Everything he did to her had her ready to explode.
The tension in her body snapped. The coil in her belly unwound as her body pulsated violently. “Tate!” she screamed up toward the ceiling. His name turned into a long moan of pleasure as she had a climax like she’d never experienced before. She held onto his hair as her channel clenched tightly around his fingers. Spasms rocked her body as she arched her neck and rode the waves of her orgasm.
She panted through the remaining ripples of pleasure as Tate lapped at her climax and grunted in satisfaction against her pussy. His hands slid up her body. Both of them now coated with perspiration, they seemed to melt and sizzle into each other from the heat of their flesh.
Claiming her mouth the second he came up over her again, Tate kissed her roughly, and then tenderly. Lara tasted herself on his lips. She wound her arms around his back, relishing the feel of his hard, hot, demanding body on top of hers.
His cock entered her before his lips even left hers, and he buried himself to the root inside her.
She whimpered as he filled her, the sensation so sublime that she dug her short nails into his back.
“Fuck, yeah. Mine. You’re mine, baby. This is all for me,” he said harshly, possessively, staying buried as deeply as he could get inside her.
She wrapped her legs tightly around his waist and held him inside her. “It’s all for you,” she panted, knowing it was true. No man had ever made her feel the way Tate did, and most likely never would. Every action, every motion was elemental and feral. Her body strained to make this man join with her, belong with her. She claimed him as surely as he possessed her. “Fuck me. Please.” Her body trembled, ached for Tate.
He pulled back until he was almost out and powerfully entered her again. “I need you so damn much.” His declaration was animalistic and vulnerable at the same time.
She stroked her hands up and down his back as she felt his big body shudder. His cock entered and retreated in a fast, hard motion that satisfied her desperation for him. “Yes. Harder.” Lara wanted the punishing force, the pummeling rhythm. This was like an affirmation that they were both alive after what had happened at the airstrip, and her body quivered as Tate shifted positions; his cock pressed against the sensitive area inside her that set off another climax.
She clenched his back again. Her nails bit into his skin to keep her grounded as her hips rose to receive every thrust of his cock. Her walls clenched him as she came; her muscles around his cock tightened on him, milking him.
“That’s right, sweetheart. Let go. Come for me,” he demanded harshly as he continued to pound into her. He groaned as he entered her one more time and found his own release.
They came down together in a mass of tangled sweaty arms and legs. Tate rolled off her, but kept one of his legs between hers. His arms wrapped around her waist and shoulders; he entwined his fingers in her hair and held her head against his chest protectively.
Lara rested against him. Her breath still came hard between her lips, her body completely sated, knowing that Tate had just changed her life irrevocably. “I didn’t know it could be that intense,” she admitted breathlessly.
“Me neither,” Tate said huskily.
He drew her head back gently, tugging lightly on her hair as he laid a gentle kiss on her lips that made her heart skitter with an unfamiliar emotion that she didn’t recognize at first. Then she realized that it was an emotion she hadn’t felt in a long time—it was happiness.
Tate knew he was screwed, and not in the good way.
The next morning, he watched as Shep sniffed along the edge of the woods and looked for the perfect place to do his morning thing. He held the leash lightly, letting the pup explore.
She’s going to leave eventually. She doesn’t belong here.
Problem was, Tate wanted Lar
a here, and if she left, it would completely gut him. His damn chest already ached every time he thought about Marcus, still not quite able to accept what his eldest brother had done. The thought of Lara leaving to return to Washington would eviscerate him.
He’d never really thought he was lonely until he’d met her. He’d always preferred to be alone. But now he could admit it…something vital had been missing from his life, and that something was actually someone—Lara.
The thought of her kneeling before that terrorist bastard, ready to do anything to save his life, messed with his head and humbled him completely. Fuck knows what he would have done if he’d had to watch her be violated. It had nearly killed him just to see another man touch her, and it was some dickhead terrorist.
She’s a strong woman.
Yeah, his woman was a kick-ass female, but she also yielded to him so sweetly in bed that his cock got hard just thinking about the night before. She was a seductress, but in some ways so damn innocent. The combination of those two things tied him up in knots with wanting her. Just her reaction as he’d fingered her ass told him she was innocent in many ways. He’d never been much of an ass man, but Lara made him want every single part of her, greedily and completely. In fact, he craved her like a damn addiction, barely able to disentangle his body from hers to get out of bed when Shep had been whining to go outside.
I never knew it could be that intense.
Tate could still hear her saying those breathy, sexy words to him, and remembered how much they had affected him. Hell, he hadn’t known it could be quite like that either, and he was probably a lot more experienced than she was. He’d had his share of women, but never had it been anywhere close to what he experienced with Lara.
Maybe I can fuck her out of my system.
As soon as he thought about that idea, he dismissed it. Lara was like crack to him. The more he got, the more he wanted.
He let out a masculine sigh as Shep finally found his pissing spot. It was so cold he could see his breath in the crisp air, but it would be a decent flying day because the weather was sunny and clear. He’d promised Lara he’d fly her into Denver later to file some reports at the FBI office. Hell, he’d be willing to do just about anything if it would keep her here longer. She’d pointed out that she could easily drive, but Tate was of the mind that flying was always preferable. It saved time, especially in the winter on mountain highways, and he’d rather be in the air than on the road any day.
