by Jianne Carlo
Lincoln let out a string of foul words.
Ten minutes later they were back in the cabin.
He strode through the main chamber, which housed the kitchen, a two-seater round table, one extra-large tweed couch, and a low hutch bearing dishes, glasses, and cutlery. Destiny didn't realize until he halted that Lincoln had carried her into the bedroom.
“I take it we're here for the duration,” she more stated than asked. “You can put me down.”
“Shit.”
“What?”
Forehead wrinkled, he crossed his eyes. “I think we lost the juice while we were in the car.”
Sergeant Lincoln Chapman belonged in an asylum. “Juice?”
“Listen. You don't hear the refrigerator humming anymore, do you?”
“We've no electricity?” She hadn't meant it to come out as a whine.
“Tell me you bought supplies.” His half-hooded eyes studied her face, and warmth crept across her cheeks. “You didn't, did you?”
He automatically assumed she had no brains whatsoever. Fine. A big-city girl wouldn't know anything about supplies, of course. Uneducated twit. Tolstoy had probably been a once-in-a-lifetime guess.
“I have a couple bottles of wine and some bread and cheese.”
Thunder rumbled across his features; fine lines creased his broad brow. “I counted three vibrators on that kitchen counter, one Deep Throat DVD, the whole Debbie Does Dallas collection, and Candy Stripers. Tell me, Ms. Parker, exactly what were your plans for this cabin?”
“It's not what you think,” she answered as a noonday-desert heat climbed from neck to forehead. “I'm an editor, and I'm here to help one of my writers fix her sex scenes.”
One brow lifted. “And I'm President Obama.”
“It's true.” She jabbed a finger into his chest. “Put me down.”
“And vibrators and porn will help how?”
“I thought between the wine and the toys and the DVDs I could get my author to loosen up.” Destiny wriggled, but that only made his arms tighten. “For God's sake, why won't you put me down?”
“You feel good, and you weigh nothing,” he replied, hefting her in his arms as if to prove his words. “You do realize the only way we're going to stay warm is body heat.”
His mouth quirked up, and the harsh expression he'd worn since opening his eyes vanished. A satanic gleam lit his hazel eyes, more emerald than honey. “There's a shed adjacent to the car. I'm going to search it and see what I can find. You go through every cabinet in this cabin. Make a list of everything you find. Got that?”
Her mind hadn't gone further than the words body heat.
When he dumped Destiny on the mattress and left the cabin in a blur of long legs, wide shoulders, and taut ass cheeks, she let out a long, warbled moan and covered her face with damp palms.
No electricity meant no hot water, but that might turn out to be the least of her problems.
Get off the bed. Make a list. Try not to think about if he had hair on his chest. Don't think about the size of his feet. Or his palms. Or his penis.
He'd probably call it a cock. Didn't army guys do that all the time?
Destiny hopped off the bed. She stuck all the sex toys and DVDs into her carry-on and unpacked the rest of her stuff into a dresser drawer. A quick check of the bathroom revealed a footed bathtub, a pedestal sink, and a brass-framed mirror. She sent a fast Hail Mary to God when she found the toilet tucked away in what looked to be a linen cupboard. It even flushed. And there was toilet paper, at least a dozen rolls.
She found several woolen blankets above the toilet paper, shook one out, and tied the fabric sarong-style over one shoulder and fastened the soft material around two jeans belt loops.
The first kitchen cabinet she opened yielded ten packs of candles. By the time Lincoln returned, Destiny had finished her list, and a dozen flickering candles imbued a soft golden glow to the main cabin.
Surveying the room, she sighed.
Wasn't this every woman's fantasy?
Stuck in a warm cabin in the mountains with a hunk who looked like he knew more about sex than Antonio Banderas. So he thought she was easy. It wasn't as if they'd ever meet again in real life. And he didn't seem to have any problem with her being ten pounds overweight. Okay, okay, maybe fifteen. But who would know? In four months she turned twenty-seven, and she'd never had torrid sex, never had a hot affair.
The wind howled and lifted the top of a snowdrift into the air when Lincoln, carrying a bundle of logs, kicked the door open. An icy finger sailed on the gust, trailing a chill around Destiny's neck. She wished she'd packed a scarf, and tugged the blanket over one ear.
Lincoln used his boot to slam the door shut.
“Why didn't you start a fire?”
“With what?” She'd held a dozen lit matches to one log, and the wood didn't even catch a spark.
He looked to the ceiling.
“The normal tools—paper, logs.”
“Bite me,” Destiny snapped. All dreams of a romantic snowed-in couple of days went poof. What a bully.
He stacked the logs on the other side of the fireplace and, in less time than it took her to inhale, or so it seemed, had a blazing fire crackling and spewing sparks. The scent of pine infused the air.
“I will.” He stood and unzipped his parka. “You like it rough, I take it?”
Lincoln shrugged out of his jacket, stowed the garment on the three-hook wooden coat stand to the right of the door, turned to face her, and smiled.
She shivered. The man had a bone-melting, devil-may-care grin.
“What?” He couldn’t mean….
“You like to be bitten?” A forefinger stroked the cleft of his chin.
“None of your business. What are you? Into kink?”
“Depends on the kink. I'm not into pain, but I'm not averse to a love bite here and there. Or a few spanks.”
Spanks? She was in over her head. Cripes, she'd always wondered about that. Pervasive guilt from Sunday school lessons and spending three hours in a porn superstore made her blurt, “Look, let's get a few points cleared up. Those toys and DVDs weren't for me. I don't do that kind of stuff.” She paused, trying to erase the image from her pupils of her over his knees.
“And here I was hoping that deep throat was your specialty.” He started unbuttoning his shirt. “Do we have food?”
“I made the list as you ordered.” She pointed to the sheet of paper on the kitchen counter. “We have a ton of dried beans, onions, potatoes, apples, garlic, pears, cereal. Not to mention a freezer full of meat—most of it venison. We won't starve. What are you doing?”
He'd shed his uniform jacket to reveal a black T-shirt. The thin cotton material slipped and slid around the cut of his biceps. Destiny's mouth went dry, and all the moisture in her body zipped to her labia.
“Did you find towels? Soap?”
He pulled his undershirt over his head.
Those ripped pecs, that ridged stomach, sucked all the oxygen out of the air. A swirl of chest hair, a tad darker than the sand of his brows, kissed milk-chocolate areolae, drifted and thinned like an arrowhead directing Destiny's attention to the—gulp—taut, swollen sex organ straining his tight trousers and a-begging for a viewing.
“I'm flattered, baby, but you don't wear the jaw-dropped look well.” Amusement curved his lips, and flames licked his irises, making them the color of melting brown sugar.
An inferno galloped across her body, humiliation and chagrin battling a rising fury.
“Sara? Soap? Towels?”
“Bathroom,” she growled.
“I'm starved. Did you start dinner?” He draped the shirt over his shoulders and in three strides disappeared into the bedroom.
Destiny collapsed onto the sofa. “Irritating, egotistical, conceited, pompous ass. Am I his personal servant? Did I start dinner? I should stew him.”
Addicted to the Culinary Institute of America's cooking classes, she could've whipped up a three-course gourm
et feast without working up a bead of sweat in less time than it had taken Lincoln to crash into the pear tree. The gremlin responsible for too many just-missed promotions fueled her narrow-eyed squint at the open bedroom door, and the temptation to play the big-city-woman, didn't-know-how-to-boil-water role he'd lumped her into soared and beckoned. She almost submitted.
Then Lincoln broke into song, humming at first, and then singing a carol-like version of “We Three Kings of Orient Are” in a voice so low, so full of depth and richness, all thought of petty revenge took flight. Arrested, she sat up and stared at the flickering candle flames licking supple shadows through the main cabin.
As his voice soared on the words “field and fountain,” she succumbed to the beauty of his singing, closing her eyes and swaying in time to the rhythm. The moment hung and hung, then ebbed and rose on an incredible free fall, suspended, time seeming to stop as the strength and power of his song shattered all links to modern-day civilization, the image of the kings' pilgrimage on a van Gogh starry, starry night almost too beautiful to bear.
Silence broke through her enchantment. Blinking, mesmerized, and unable to remember her train of thought, she lurched to a standing position and drifted into the kitchen. On autopilot Destiny uncorked the wine, poured two glasses, arranged a platter of cheese, apples, and pears, and set everything on the coffee table.
The quiet grated on her nerves, but she forced herself to perform mundane tasks, cutting five fat carrots into logs and chopping potatoes in half, all the while listening, trying to figure out what Lincoln was doing in the bedroom. After taking two small portions of venison from the freezer, she threw everything into an enameled Dutch oven, covered the contents with some of the wine, and added dried thyme, parsley, rosemary, salt, and pepper to the pot. Earlier Destiny had said another small Hail Mary when she'd discovered the stove was fueled by gas. She set the temperature to four hundred and fifty and meandered over to the couch.
A soft thud reached her ears, all her nerve endings sparked and pinched, and she scrambled onto the soft upholstery, curling her legs together on one side, and reached for one of the wineglasses. Pretending she didn't hear the dull slapping of his bare feet meeting the wooden floor, she sipped the fruity merlot and leaned forward to pinch a slice of bread in half.
“You lied to me, Destiny Driven.”
She shot to her feet, her fingers slipping and sliding around the balloon goblet. The doughy bread fell to the floor.
He had her passport in his hand, the book folded to show her picture.
Naked save for a towel tied around his hips, he towered over her, and for the first time since stepping foot in the cabin, fear climbed and clogged her throat.
“Who is Sara Parker?”
Chapter Two
Lincoln gritted his back molars as shades of cherry he'd never known existed highlighted Destiny/Sara's cheeks, dipping a shade darker when her mouth opened and closed and no words followed.
Whatever she intended to tell him wouldn't be the truth. Those fathomless obsidian eyes of hers skimmed his nose, flitted to the kitchen, alighted on the door. She opened her mouth again, shot a glance at the roof, wriggled her shoulders, and let out an audible sigh.
“Sara Parker is my professional name.” Distracted by the husky, musical rasp of her voice, he almost missed the rest of her explanation. “My mother named me Destiny, and my last name is Driven.”
She worried a bottom lip so fat and juicy, he knew that blowjobs, Deep Throat, and Destiny Driven would forever be intertwined in his head. Right before his gaze she seemed to deflate, head drooping, pouty mouth pursing to one side. Lincoln had never noticed a woman's eyelashes before, but hers cast half-moon shadows on her glowing olive skin.
From the second he'd regained consciousness, he'd been captivated. The woman had the face of a Madonna and the body of a stripper. She'd managed to cut him out of the tree and get him inside the cabin while dressed for the balmy tropics, and hadn't whined once. Obviously capable and intelligent, she'd attacked the task of rescuing him with determination and success.
Not to mention the fact that she felt like heaven in his arms, soft, supple, and succulent in all the right places. No way could he spend even two hours holed up with her without getting inside her pussy. And the thought of sliding his dick between those bountiful breasts had him leaking precum.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, to what planet had his famed discipline rocketed? Lincoln narrowed his eyes and focused on a spot above her head as he tried to will his twitching dick into compliance.
A choked gasp caught and held his attention.
Jesus.
Her jaw had dropped, and her gaze was fixated on his groin.
His cock rose to the occasion.
Her little hand clamped over her open mouth.
His eyes crossed as the image of his dick disappearing between those plump lips did a fast salsa in his mind. Beads of sweat peppered his forehead.
Get a fricking grip, Chapman.
She's a civilian. Slow, easy.
Saliva coated his tongue when her nipples pearled and pushed against the soft, cotton, V-necked sweater she wore. When he'd opened his eyes earlier to find two perfect, naked breasts within sucking distance, mounding and bouncing against his chest, his arousal had been instantaneous, his dick going rigid on a heartbeat. Then she'd moved closer, tracing a damp cloth over his face, and those luscious beauties had grazed his chin.
Lincoln had thought he'd entered the Christian version of the seventy virgins in paradise. The memory of olive tits, tipped with After Eight chocolate circles and nubs, surged and whirled on a free-fall draft, threatening the last ropes binding his control. He slammed his hands onto his hips.
The loose side-knot on the towel surrendered to three forces—gravity, slick skin, and his raging arousal—sliding in a soft whisper to the planked pine floor.
“Oh,” she squeaked, the sound half smothered when the fingers clamped over her mouth became a fist. Her head bent, and he couldn't see the expression on her face, but her left hand rose.
Higher, closer, come on, Baby Doll—go there.
Destiny had the voluptuous, hourglass shape of the classic Vargas Playboy pinups on which the first Barbie must have been based. Raven hair, stray locks glinting navy as a slight breeze flared and dimmed a dozen candle flames, fell in gentle waves to her midback. Her shiny locks curled and teased the undersides of mouthwatering globes he couldn't wait to suckle, lick, nibble, and torture.
Delicate fingers and toes, strong legs longer than her torso, he guessed she stood just under five-seven. No emaciated, hunger-deprived runway model, his Destiny, her lush curves screamed sex, yet she looked untouched, and he'd bet his left nut she'd never had mind-blowing sex. Never begged, or squirmed, or shattered into orgasmic explosions.
She had him as pumped and primed as he had been when he'd tried to beat Kittinger's 102,800 feet, record-setting altitude jump.
An alarm rang, jangling bells exploded into the silence, and Lincoln's thoughts jumbled and frayed.
What the hell?
Honed reflexes had his gaze sweeping the cabin, and he twisted around to the source of the noise.
“Dinner.” Her throaty utterance drew his attention.
Glancing over his shoulder, he stifled a stream of curses.
So blasted close to paradise.
A dark, oblong knot in one of the wooden floor slats seemed to fascinate her.
Time to change strategy, Lincoln decided. “I'll get dressed. There's a stack of sweats”—he stopped, remembering her reaction when he'd taken off his shirt earlier, and continued, trying to keep the triumphant amusement out of his voice—“in one of the bedroom drawers.”
Her throat worked.
He grinned, pivoted, and bent over to pick up the towel, giving her a peep show. Hearing on alert, he caught her indrawn breath and almost gave in to the temptation to wiggle his butt before stalking to the bedroom.
When Linc’d “gone to the shed” e
arlier, he retrieved his backpack, sorted out his weapons and supplies, pocketed the essentials, and secreted the rest of the items in a dark corner. Under the pretense of taking a bath—he had a quick but thorough wash—he stowed his stash under the bed, and then combed through all her belongings.
The porn DVD selection set his hormones on overdrive. When he found the cuffs, the leather strips, and the silken scarves, the temptation hovering around the corners of his brain cemented into rampant desire. Lincoln made his decision then and there; Baby Doll was his for the duration.
In the bedroom, he donned navy sweats, glanced at the passport he'd thrown on the white down comforter, and his lips thinned. Part of her explanation about her name had a ring of truth, but her body language when she rushed the words blinked lying like a Vegas booty joint's neon sign.
Screw first, worm the truth out of her later.
He padded back into the kitchen/living area. She never noticed his return.
Destiny had a hidden Susie Homemaker streak. She'd set the table. Place mats, napkins, bowls, cutlery, and wineglasses decorated a round, two-seater wooden table with a tree trunk as the supporting center leg. Two pillar candles flickered oval, elongated shadows across a ceramic blue-green plate. Local pottery, he guessed. A smile tugged at his lips as he observed her stirring a pot. Her lips moved, and her bare toes curled and uncurled when she sprinkled dried leaves into the liquid.
He caught the aroma of wine, meat, onions, and hints of something else. Destiny could cook. The notion surprised him. The New York women he knew ordered in or ate out. Their idea of cooking—putting together prepackaged appetizers, salads, and entrées, couldn't match his mom's worst St. Patrick's Day stew.
“Smells heavenly.” He leaned over her shoulder when she stirred the navy pot. As he reached to dip a finger into the rich, creamy brown liquid, he blew a soft breath over her ear. She stiffened; the spoon's movement halted.
