To Trust Her Heart

by Carolyn Faulkner

  The plane landed without incident, but not without three armed men jumping out just as it coasted to a stop, brandishing automatic weapons and making sure that the area was secure for them. For her, she knew, because the man who was sitting next to her on the couch with his own gun at the ready, was quite fully capable of taking care of himself. Maddie wasn’t at all sure that she would ever get used to the sight of him like this. She was just beginning to realize how little she knew of him, how little of his warrior face she’d seen, during her years with him, although she would have sworn she’d seen the worst of him when he spanked her.

  It was getting to be a trend to be packed into a big black SUV, and that’s where she ended up again, she guessed for the trip to his cabin, only this time there were four other people in the vehicle, and she was in the back seat, squashed between himself and Kaz. It was a good thing she was a basically small person or she would never have fit.

  The trip took several hours, as they drove deeper and deeper into the woods. When they finally reached a small clearing at the end of an unkempt dirt road, she got a view of his cabin, and realized that his warrior demeanor wasn’t the only thing he’d downplayed.

  While the other three exited the vehicle, guns drawn, the two who were squashing her between them remained in place but hyper alert. Ty kept trying to shove her down onto the floor, but there flat out wasn’t room for her there between those two behemoths.

  Eventually, one of the advanced men shouted the all clear, and only then did Ty very carefully unbend himself out of the vehicle, still sweeping his gaze around compulsively for a long while before he let Maddie out. She tried to brush past him, figuring all clear meant that everything was fine, but iron strong fingers literally dragged her behind him before she got more than two steps.

  “Don’t ever do that again.” His voice was like death, and that was the only thing that made her obey him, for the moment.

  The two men sandwiched her between them, guarding her as if she was the President and they were Secret Service agents, until they got to the house, which had already been cleared by the first swarm of men.

  Maddie couldn’t take her eyes off the place as she was maneuvered to it. And he called it a cabin? It was gorgeous, and much too big to be referred to by such a diminutive word. It was a good sized house with a surprisingly number of windows. Maddie had always thought that windows were an inherent security risk, but perhaps not any more. She knew that whatever security gadget he could get, Ty would have, and she was right. He had a retinal scan and a finger print pad, albeit well hidden, at the door.

  Once in side, the two of them finally left her the hell alone to go do whatever it was that they did while she wandered around trying not to snoop too much.

  She was wandering, open mouthed, through the gourmet kitchen when she knew he was behind her. She didn’t know how, but she’d always been able to tell when he was near her. He was much too much of a professional to ever make a sound, but they had some sort of very basic, very physical connection. “Do you like the kitchen?” Ty couldn’t stop himself from asking. He’d had the whole blasted place built for her, but even more so the kitchen, because he knew how much she enjoyed cooking.

  “It’s friggin’ gorgeous, but, unless you’ve attended the Cordon Bleu in your spare time, it’s a complete waste!” Ty was the kind of man who nuked coffee only to have his mug explode.

  He grinned wryly, not yet willing to admit the truth to her. “Nope.”

  “I didn’t think so. None of this equipment looks like it’s even been turned on, much less used.” Immaculate stainless steel appliances gleamed from every nook and cranny.

  Ty was directly behind her. She could sense him, even before he reached out and swung her into his arms.

  Knowing it was useless to object, she nonetheless couldn’t stop herself. “Ty, put me down!”

  “I don’t think so.” He paused a moment, catching her eye, before continuing in complete seriousness, “You’re never going to get away from me again, Maddie Scanlon.”

  Chapter Six:

  Then he proceeded to carry her up the gleaming staircase to the master bedroom suite, where he bore her down onto the enormous bed, following closely, as if he knew that she was immediately going to try to pop back up again, which she did, quite unsuccessfully. It wasn’t the first time she’d wished that she’d fallen in love with a ninety-eight pound weakling instead of an over six foot four behemoth. “Let me up,” she growled. “And, just for the record, my name is no longer Scanlon.”

  His answering growl sounded somehow much more frightful than hers, especially when he caught her eyes and vowed huskily, “We’ll see about that.”

  Maddie glared up at him on an exhausted sigh. She’d recognized quickly, from prior experience, that she wasn’t going anywhere until he decided to allow her to, and relaxed back onto the mattress. There was no sense in exhausting herself with him all at once. The man was a stevedore, and unrelenting bulldozer, and she knew she had to save her strength, mental and physical, or he would wear her down without breaking a sweat - and then where would she be?

  Maddie frowned. Right where she’d awakened this morning, was the embarrassing answer – in bed with him, exhausted and sated beyond words, damn the man!

  He, of course, was making himself comfortable, lying in that position that was so blasted familiar to the both of them, just to her right side, with his platter sized hand claiming her still flat stomach. She reached down to try to lift it off her, using the barest of her fingertips to grasp his wrist as if it was a particularly offensive piece of trash, but failed miserably again, although she hoped her expression said it all and dampened what she knew was his more prurient interests.

  But she should have known that Ty wasn’t going to be that easily deterred from his goal, and she couldn’t even budge that small part of him. When she peeked up at him, which she knew was a mistake in the first place, he had that infuriating almost grin of his, along with one raised eyebrow, as if to say that she should have known better that to think that she was his match in any physical way.

  Maddie glared up at him, but had absolutely no fear of him whatsoever, despite the fact that he tended to spank first, and ask questions later. It wasn’t fear that she was concerned about. It was the throbbing bolts of pure sensual lightening that he was creating simply by the presence of his hand just inches from the private territory her body desperately wanted him to claim, but that her brain screamed against.

  But he blew away any hope of being able to control those sensual impulses that made her want to arch her hips to entice him to explore further south of her navel simply by growlingly whisper, almost off hand under his breath, “I can feel you trembling.”

  Her breath left her forcefully, all at once, leaving her lungs aching. For some reason, her eyes filled with tears at his words, and, try as she might, Maddie could not wrestle them back under control. She wasn’t a woman who was given easily to tears, except for a few short days each month, and she had rarely cried in front of Ty.

  Ty was acutely aware of everything about Maddie, always had been, always would be even on his deathbed, he was quite sure. There was something magnetic or chemical between them, and he was as alert and aware as any caveman trying to protect his mate from the elements, herself, and any other cavemen in the area. He glanced up, expecting to see her face twisted in anger, and instead he saw the tracks of the tears as they leaked into the baby fine hair at her temples, and it was like being sucker punched.

  Maddie never cried. Oh, she got moody a bit before her period, but nothing terrible. He could count on the fingers of one hand the times he’d seen her cry, and all of them seemed to stem from seeing his wounds once he got back from a mission.

  Operating completely on instinct, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against him, toe to chest, simply holding her as tight as he could without breaking any bones. Not for the first time, he realized just how his arms had ached to hold her, and how good it fe
lt to have her so close again. Of course, parts of him were none too happy with the platonic nature of their embrace; the bulge in his jeans was becoming a mountain, nestled as it was against her warm belly.

  Desire, as old as the world itself and blazing as if they hadn’t been separated for almost as long as they’d been married, hit her like a sledgehammer and Maddie knew that all he had to do was reach down and cup her bottom, or kiss her in that demanding, fiery manner of his, and she would give up any pretence of exasperation in favor of feeling those masterful hands on her suddenly all too eager body.

  “Why the tears, sweetheart?”

  She could see the real concern in his eyes, and swallowed hard. “I just… It’s just that this is hardly where I expected to end up today, and we’ve had people shooting at us,” Maddie’s voice broke completely on a sob at that statement, but she recovered quickly and continued, “and you’re here and apparently I have absolutely no ability to resist you sexually,” she looked up at him with trembling lips and a breaking voice that cut at his heart. “I’m just trying to get my head wrapped around things, and I don’t think I’m doing very well with it at the moment,” she whispered.

  Ty pressed his lips to her temple, almost overcome by rage at the fear in her tone and eyes. He didn’t care that LaValle had come after him, hell, he would have almost been disappointed if he hadn’t, considering he’d been responsible for LaValle’s worthless son being imprisoned for life in Great Britain on espionage charges. Ty had had it out for the man ever since he killed the closest thing to a best friend he had, Rafe Estevez. But LaValle was slippery as an eel, and he’d wiggled out of a very carefully laid trap Ty and his men had set for him.

  But this was it. This was the last straw. He would never let Maddie be hurt and it stuck badly in his craw that she was even so much as aware of the situation, much less actually scared about it. Ty’s teeth ground together tightly until his jaw ached. By involving Maddie, LaValle had signed his own death warrant.

  Ty tipped her face up so that she had to look him in the eye. “I’ll keep you safe, Maddie. I’d lay down my life for you in a minute, you know that.”

  She switched from looking vulnerable and scared to slightly annoyed in a split second. “That’s not right either, Ty. I’m not your wife or your girlfriend. I don’t want you dying for me under any circumstances.”

  Ty leaned, just a bit, turning her onto her back and fitting himself intimately between her legs effortlessly, before she had a chance to protest in any way. He brought his lips to hers in one of the gentlest, yet most dominant kisses she’d ever experienced. Withdrawing just the slightest bit, so that his lips still bumped up against hers as he spoke, “You’re mine. You always have been, and you always will be. And I take care of my own.”

  His hands moved slowly, deliberately up under her shirt, claiming that which he apparently had never stopped thinking of as his personal possessions. And, dammit, her body was hardly complaining the way her brain was screaming what should have been complete outrage.

  But he’d always known just the right way to touch her, his big hands, that were capable of wreaking so much damage and vengeance and had never given her a moment of pain, unless one counted the searing spankings. Otherwise, he treated her like a treasure of inestimable value that was his to drive to the edge of distraction.

  And he had much too much experience at it for her comfort.

  Her nipples were already peaking in his palms, he’d long since moved the cups of her front clasp bra to one side, sliding those just slightly rough fingers over her breasts to cup them confidently. They nestled there as if they’d found a long lost home, as his thumb sought and found those aching nubs, pinching just slightly as he rubbed in a move that he knew drove her absolutely crazy.

  Ty was her ultimate lover. He was the perfect man for her in more ways than she cared to count. He did treat her as if she was breakable, and to him, with his depressing strength and ability to kill someone with his bare hands without batting an eyelash or breaking a sweat, she certainly was.

  But although he was always mindful of her delicacy next to him, and he did his level best never to hurt her inadvertently, he was very dominant in bed, and, because he knew how it turned her on, he liked to impart just the slightest touch of pain to her nipples, pinching just enough to make her gasp and arch against him, as if they hadn’t been separated for so long.

  Of course, the back of her brain screamed, he’d had last night to get back into practice, as well as the time on the plane and she knew, in that moment, that she wasn’t going to be able to resist him. He was too right for her, physically and sexually. His size made her feel safe and submissive at the same time, and despite the fact that she wanted to rail against both of those feelings with everything in her, especially after all the years without him, she couldn’t summon one reason to her mind as to why they shouldn’t make love. Maddie knew that that was just her libido overriding her common sense, but when his bowed his head to worship each of her straining buds with his hot, wet mouth, it just didn’t seem to matter.

  The only thing that mattered was that he continue exactly what he was doing!

  Ty knew the moment she surrendered. He always did. Sometimes when he’d come home from being away for a while, she could be a little standoffish, as if she wanted to let him know that she wasn’t at all happy at his absence. But he’d always been able to get her to melt against him, as she was doing now.

  Her shirt and bra disappeared over the side of the bed in record time, along with his shirt and then her jeans and panties.

  Damn him! Maddie thought as her body dissolved into bliss at feeling his jean covered bulge pressing against her nude mound. Apparently he remembered absolutely everything she liked even the most minute and intimate of details.

  Well, two could play at that game, she decided, leaning her head up enough to reach his ear and nibbling on it lightly, then licking the strong, thick column of his neck. Her reward was his full body shiver, and the way he ground his hips into hers.

  Maddie ran her hands boldly down his back, feeling the muscular ripples rise and fall, loving the feel of him beneath her fingertips and palms. She didn’t stop until she encountered those twin, rock hard mounds of his, squeezing them teasingly, and making his whole body jerk.

  Suddenly, though, Ty rose on his elbows, giving her a stern look to growl, “I think turnabout is fair play, woman.” Before she had a chance to think what he might do in retribution, he shinnied down her body, keeping her legs open and back, claiming that most private of areas with his mouth while slipping his index finger deep inside her.

  She wanted to protest. She wanted to order him away from her, to slink out from under him and out of the room. But she couldn’t. Her body was in control, and it never wanted him to stop what he was doing right then.

  Ty breathed deeply of the scent of her he’d missed so much. He knew all of her secret desires, and he intended to exploit that intimate knowledge to his own advantage as best he could. He wanted her, now and forever, and he wasn’t going to take “no” for an answer.

  Every moan, every arch of her body made him just that much harder. He thought he was going to explode just by bringing her to paradise. He was so attuned to her responses. Ty redoubled his efforts, sliding a second finger up inside her while holding her eyes with his. Gritting his teeth, he barely got out, “You are still so damned tight, Maddie!”

  Maddie thought she was going to die, from both the embarrassment of it all as well as the sheer force of the blood that was pumping through her veins and nearly bursting heart.

  She would have sworn that the snapping sounds from outside were merely some animal snapping a falling limb underfoot, but then she recognized that they were coming in short bursts, and Ty was already halfway across the room before she had even thought to recognize that they were machine gun bursts. Maddie heard Ty yell, “Get down on the floor! Maddie, get down on the floor,” and she did that. She did him one better, crawling und
er the bed, listening to the sounds of windows shattering and pock marks being made in Ty’s gorgeous house.

  But it wasn’t the house she was worried about. She’d buried herself so well that all she could hear was indistinct yelling. It sounded like the majority of the battle was raging outside in the front yard, and she had no idea how many people were out there or who was winning, but she knew for damned sure that she wasn’t about to move from the spot she’d found. Nope. Not going do it.

  Not even for Ty, when he came to find her later, after it had all gone down and his men were taking LaValle and his henchmen to jail for a long, long time. He found her there, shaking and shuddering, under the bed, still nude, and somehow he knew that that was even worse.

  “C’mere, baby. It’s all over. I promise.” He’d forgotten how horrifying a gunfight could be to someone who hadn’t been in one. He struck on something and thought of doing the E.T. thing. “I have jelly beans, cinnamon and lemon, your favorites!”

  When she’d recovered some, she would ask him why he kept her favorite flavors of jelly beans on hand, just to see him blush.

  It took him just a few seconds to find a bag and put one under so that she could reach it easily, then leave a trail of alternating flavors to get her to the point where he could slide her out and into his waiting arms, which is exactly what he did, smothering her in kisses once he got her there and hugging her so hard she thought she heard a rib crack. “I am never going to let you out of my sight again, Maddie. You’re just going to have to put up with me. I won’t let you get away from me again.”

  All Maddie could say was “I love you,” whether he wanted to hear it or not, whether she ought to be saying it or not. None of that seemed to matter any more. Whatever they had been in the past was not what they had to be in the future. He made her feel more alive than anyone she’d ever been around, and he’d put his own life on the line several times to keep her alive.