Operation: Monarch

by Valerie Parv

  Chapter 10

  He slid a finger down to where the robe had gaped open exposing the cleft between her breasts. She felt her breath quicken.

  The lights seemed brighter, the sounds sharper, Garth's touch more arousing than she had ever experienced before. She clasped her hands around his neck and pulled his head down until her lips were a breath away from his.

  For a heartbeat she thought he was going to resist her kiss. She had started to strain upward, intending to take from him what she needed, when he met her more than halfway, crushing her mouth under his until her mind reeled.

  She tried to keep the kiss soft, friendly rather than passionate, but she needed him too much, had waited too long. A faint moan escaped her throat as she took and took the comfort she needed, the affirmation of life she hungered for after all that had gone down tonight.

  He trailed kisses along her upper lip and the bridge of her nose. A shudder shook her. His hold tightened. "It's all right, you're safe now."

  She stirred in protest. Even now he didn't understand. "It isn't reaction."

  "Then what?"

  "You."

  A teasing glint lit his gaze. "No bet this time?"

  "No bet." More like a sure thing. She grazed her hand along the side of his face, feeling the slight rasp of new beard. Not wanting any more misunderstandings, she said quietly but firmly, "Right now I'm where I want to be, doing what I want to do. Got it?"

  His eyes danced. "I'm a little slow. You'd better show me."

  She didn't need a second invitation. Sliding her hands under his belt, she tugged his shirt free and flattened her palms against his ribs. He was so lean she could practically count them. When she touched them, he squirmed. She laughed. "What's the matter?"

  "Ticklish. I think you made your point."

  She let her own eyes gleam. "An Achille's heel, Remy? You think I'd give up an advantage like that?"

  He dodged her seeking fingers, pulling them out from under his shirt and cuffing them between his own. "You'd better. I'm warning you."

  She jerked free and put her hands on her hips. "You and whose army?"

  "That does it."

  He swung her into his arms. Mindful of the other people in the house, she stifled a cry of mixed pleasure and alarm. "What do you think you're doing?"

  "You started this. Now we're going to finish it."

  Snapping off lights as he went, he carried her down a hallway, almost tripping over Gusto, who lay on his back with his paws in the air outside one of the doors. Brett's room, she supposed. She crammed a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter.

  The dog opened an eye and regarded them with mild curiosity. "Humans!" its expression seemed to say. Recognizing them, it went back to sleep. With no tug-of-war toys and no food involved, their activities were of little interest, she gathered.

  Garth eased a door open with his foot. The room was small and crammed with maritime souvenirs. Brass lanterns, life buoys and flags jostled for space alongside deck chairs, coiled ropes and model sailing ships. A storeroom, she thought at first, then she noticed a bed pushed into one corner amid the chaos. The spread was patterned with anchors and chains.

  Still holding her, he pulled the spread back revealing crisp white sheets and a soft almond-colored blanket. He pulled them back, too, then lowered her carefully onto the sheet. "It's a very narrow bed," she whispered.

  He went back and closed the door, flicking on a bedside light in the shape of a lighthouse. By its glow, she saw desire darkening his features. Her own powered higher. "We'll work out a way to share it," he said.

  His way was to place a knee either side of her hips and as she lay with one arm bent behind her head. As he reared above her she decided she could look at him all night this way, although it would be a terrible waste.

  His hands were busy undoing the robe's tie belt. It fell away exposing the navy bathing suit. She saw him frown. "Something wrong?"

  He pushed his hair back with one hand. "This has got to be the ultimate challenge."

  Like most men his age, Garth could figure out how to undo a wide variety of bras. Panties were a breeze, he thought. How in the devil was he supposed to peel her out of a one-piece bathing suit?

  She made it easy for him by shimmying up onto the pillow and sliding the straps off her shoulders. He gulped. In the spill of light from the lamp her skin glowed like opal. He frowned again as he saw the hollow of her throat marred by scratches she'd sustained hurtling through the forest on the island.

  He bent to her and touched his tongue to the worst of the scratches, feeling tremors rock her. "You should have Dr. Pascale take a look at these."

  Her back arched. "Not right now."

  "No." He pushed the stretchy material down to her waist, dragging in a lungful of air at the perfection her breasts revealed. She was as gorgeous as every fantasy he'd ever had. He couldn't help himself. He had to taste.

  As he took the first one, then the other into his mouth, his tongue teasing and tasting, he heard a low moan start deep in her throat. Slow and easy, he reminded himself. She'd been through a lot tonight.

  Later he'd get her to talk about it. In the meantime, he wanted to give her something else to dream about when she closed her eyes.

  They were already closed, he saw when he lifted his head. Her silken lashes lay against her cheeks that were hectic with color. Her head was thrown back and her lips were slightly parted, an invitation he couldn't refuse.

  He kissed her slowly, deeply, drawing out the moment. When he stopped, she made a protesting move he interpreted as not wanting him to leave. Fine with him. He wasn't planning on going anywhere for the rest of the night.

  He undid the buttons of his shirt and tossed it onto a deck chair inscribed with the name, Titanic. Not the real thing, he doubted, although knowing Brett he wouldn't be surprised.

  Garth didn't need an iceberg ahead of him to know he was sinking fast. He had promised himself he would stay cool around Serena, not let her get to him this time. Now he accepted she had done that years ago and nothing much had changed.

  He was ready for her touch to sweep him to the edge of control, but not for how fast she nearly pushed him over it. As her fingers skimmed down his sides and became busy with the fastening of his jeans, he felt the power of her slam through him, felt himself filling with the need to take what she offered.

  She finished undoing the studs and the zipper just as he started to wonder how much longer they could contain him. He stood up long enough to kick his clothes away and heard her pull in a breath he was man enough to read as admiration.

  She had scrambled out of the robe and bathing suit. When he pulled her against him he felt fireworks explode in his head. "I want you so much," he said.

  "I know. I want you, too." She sounded breathless, but he heard no shadow of doubt in her voice.

  He bent his head and skimmed her hairline with his mouth. "You smell of the ocean."

  "I didn't get around to showering."

  He kissed her parted lips, enjoying the taste of her before he murmured, "I'm a man of the sea, remember? Salt tang turns me on faster than French perfume."

  She arched against him. "Show me, now."

  It would have been easier to comply. Everything in him wanted to take what he needed without ceremony. But that wasn't how he wanted their first time to be. She deserved more.

  "There's no hurry," he soothed. "We have all night."

  Gently he pushed her back against the pillow, enjoying the sight of her in the yellow glow of the lighthouse lamp. She was an island of loveliness in a chaotic world. "You're beautiful," he said, unable to tear his eyes away from her.

  She reached up and stroked his flanks. "So are you."

  "Men aren't beautiful."

  "Tonight, when you appeared beside me in the water, you were beautiful."

  He grinned. "I thought you were mad at me for coming to your rescue."

  "I was mad at you for switching places with Brett and putting y
ourself in danger."

  "And now?"

  "I'm still mad, but I don't want you to think I'm not grateful."

  He trailed a finger down her stomach, enjoying watching her quiver. "How grateful?"

  She pushed his hand away. "This isn't payment for services rendered. I'm here because I want to be. Because I want you."

  "I wouldn't have it any other way."

  "Just as long as we understand each other."

  "I guarantee it." He amazed himself with how well he understood her, perhaps more than she would want him to. He trailed a line of kisses from her throat all the way down between her breasts, lower and lower until he heard her whimper. She didn't need to tell him she wanted him. He could taste and feel her desire every time he touched her.

  His own desire threatened to ignite. He fixed his gaze on the Titanic deck chair, thinking of icebergs forging through water so chilled it could freeze the soul. It didn't help. She had barely to touch him to turn his blood to steam. She could seduce him just by lying there.

  Not that she showed any inclination to be so passive. Holding his gaze with a heavy-lidded look, she caressed him with enchanting care, as if she thought he might break if she was anything but careful. He felt himself slipping. If she kept this up, there was no way he was going to last as long as he wanted to.

  He sat up and allowed himself to look at her, giving himself time to regroup. "You're gorgeous," he said. "It's an inadequate word, but there's no other."

  "Gorgeous is fine," she said dreamily.

  He picked up her hand and pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist, troubled when he saw her wince as he inadvertently touched the scratches on her arm. "Poor Serena. You're not as tough as you want everyone to think, are you?"

  He'd touched a sensitive spot inside her, as well, he understood. She proved it when she said, "Are we going to talk or make love?"

  "Why are we here?" he asked on a hunch.

  Her eyes flew open. "I would think you could work it out."

  "I mean why now? Why not when we were alone at Allora?"

  She looked annoyed. "Don't ask difficult questions."

  "I am asking. I want you to want me, not a remedy for your nightmares."

  "What makes you think I'll have nightmares."

  "I was keeping a lookout for you from the end of the jetty. I saw what happened at the cabin," he said carefully.

  She twisted beneath him, her expression turning bleak. "Then you know a man died because of me tonight."

  He shook his head. "He died because of his own greed. It wasn't your fault."

  "I know. I was a cop before I joined the R.P.D., remember? You learn to deal with death when it's unavoidable, and you move on."

  He stroked the hair away from her brow. "But you never learn to accept being defeated by it."

  Seeing her gaze blur, he felt his insides twist. She didn't ask how he knew how she felt. As a Navy DARE, he had undertaken assignments that sometimes involved death and destruction. Like anyone who dealt in the ultimate stakes, he knew how outraged a person felt when death won.

  "Nothing you can do now will change what happened," he reminded her.

  She sighed. "I know that, too. It's just hard to feel this—this alive, knowing it's at the expense of another life."

  "If I learned anything as a DARE it's that love is an affirmation of life," he insisted gently. "Sometimes it's our only way of triumphing over our old enemy."

  Some of the distress ebbed out of her expression, replaced by a need he recognized because he shared it. "You're right, and I'm being foolish," she admitted.

  He stroked her face, pressing kisses to the inviting hollow of her throat, right above where he felt her pulse throbbing. "It isn't foolish to have regrets. It's what makes you human."

  She nodded. "I don't want to become so hardened that events like tonight stop mattering to me."

  "There, you see? Asked and answered."

  She smiled and he knew she was over the worst of her self-recriminations. They would return in the deep well of night, when she was alone. He knew because they did for him. But for now she was going to be all right.

  He had almost decided that she should be left to sleep, alone, when she linked her hands around his neck and pulled his face down to hers. "You sure talk a lot."

  Desire surged through him anew, so potent he shook with it. "What would you rather do?"

  "You know the answer, and it isn't because I can't bear to be alone," she said. "I mean, I don't want to be alone—but you can be sure it's for all the right reasons."

  "Now we understand each other."

  Begrudging every heartbeat away from her, he reached for his pants and retrieved a condom from his wallet, only enduring the time it took to sheath himself for her protection. Then he stretched out full-length beside her, the narrow bed giving him no choice but to lie half on top of her. Not that he minded. In fact they could make better use of the space if he covered her body with his own, he discovered. When he did, her deep sigh of satisfaction told him she approved.

  Judging by the throaty sounds she made when he lifted himself over her and buried himself in her softness, she had no problem with anything he wanted to do. And he was very, very inventive.

  * * *

  Dawn was pushing fingers of iridescent red light into the room as she lay on her side, giving him what room there was and feeling more content than she could ever remember. The sound of Garth's deep breathing mingled with the night sounds outside. She was glad he had made her consider why she wanted him to make love with her.

  She hated that he was right. At first she had turned to him to banish the nightmare vision of the young kidnapper dashing into the burning cabin seconds before it was engulfed in flames. Falling debris must have knocked the man unconscious with no time even to scream. She welcomed this smallest of mercies.

  Asking Garth to make love with her hadn't been a conscious plan. More an act of self-preservation. She simply hadn't wanted to go to bed alone, knowing what awaited her the moment she turned out the light.

  She should have known Garth would want more.

  He wanted her to want him, only him.

  And she did, dear Heaven, how she did.

  Sated as she was, and with every part of her singing a sweet song of weariness, she still wanted him at this very moment. She wasn't in love with him, she told herself firmly. What they shared was a bond of wonderful chemistry, nothing more.

  There couldn't be anything more. When this was over, he would return to his life—or to the castle, as fate and his DNA decreed—and she would return to her work and her life with memories to last forever.

  She liked her life as it was, with no one depending on her to fill their needs. Knowing it was a legacy of her parents' neediness when she was too young to handle it didn't change reality. Love led to a relationship and then to the kind of oppression she'd thrown off so traumatically in her teens.

  For the first time she questioned her decision. Then just as firmly rejected the doubts. She'd been there. She knew what would happen. Better to stick to the chemistry.

  "Thinking about the island?"

  She looked into Garth's open eyes and saw her own contentment reflected there. For a moment guilt gripped her at the self-indulgence of her thoughts. "No," she admitted. "I was thinking about you."

  He smiled lazily. "I like the sound of that."

  "Egomaniac."

  "What man wouldn't? I meant it when I said you're beautiful. Waking up beside you is pretty amazing, without finding I'm dominating your thoughts."

  "I didn't say you dominated them. Only that I was thinking about you."

  "As in?"

  She gave him a shove that almost toppled him off the edge of the bed until he grabbed the first thing handy, which happened to be her. As their bodies connected, fire tore through her and longing so strong it stole her breath. "As in this has to be a one-off experience," she said desperately.

  Garth recognized wishful thinking whe
n he heard it. He suspected she knew how close they were to repeating the experience right here and now. Titanic he thought. Icebergs. Nothing helped. He sat up and swung his legs to the floor. Maybe if he wasn't touching her.

  "I agree next time we should go for a larger bed."

  "That isn't the problem."

  "Then what is?"

  "You. Me. Us. If you turn out to be the ruler of Carramer, you can't have a relationship with your bodyguard."

  "I can think of at least one royal who did." He mentioned Mathiaz, Baron Montravel, who had married his former bodyguard, Jacinta Newnham, only a few miles from where they were now. They lived at the royal enclave of Chateau Valmont, a short drive from Brett's house.

  "Well you can't have a relationship with me."

  "I thought what we shared was pretty spectacular."

  She gave vent to a sigh of frustration. Why couldn't he make this easy? "You know it was. Better than spectacular. Extraordinary."

  He turned a teasing gaze on her. "You want us to try for whatever comes after extraordinary?"

  If it was possible, he would be the man to take her there, and she found herself trembling anew at the prospect. "I'm serious," she insisted. "I don't want to get involved with anyone, extraordinary or not."

  He propped himself up on one arm. "Because?"

  If she shared her reason with him, he would probably demolish it with logic, the same way her parents used to win every argument with her. "Because I don't want to," she repeated.

  He trailed a finger down her backbone, making her shiver. "Have you heard the saying that life is what happens when you're busy making other plans?"

  "I thought you didn't want to get involved, either."

  She felt his lips glide over the small of her back, and her bones started to melt. "I've learned never to say never," he told her.

  "We should get dressed." What had happened to making this a one-time experience?

  "No hurry. Brett hates getting up early, and the Pascales were exhausted enough to sleep well into the morning."