Intimate Danger

by Amy J. Fetzer

  He pushed up her shirt and kissed her ribs, crushing back the need to bury himself inside her quickly and appease this wild hunger for her. But it wouldn’t matter. She was more than under his skin. She was inside it. And when her hand closed around him, she took him with her—away from danger and isolation, from ignoring everything for the mission.

  Since they’d met, she made him indulge in feelings and sensations. Trapped with her, he gave them freedom. She stroked him heavily, her little hand working him into a frenzy that threatened his control.

  Mike gritted his teeth, then grasped her wrist. “Nu-uh.”

  “You can’t be the only one going mad here, ya know,” she said.

  “I gotta be, this once.” He pulled her hand free.

  “There you go, assuming again.”

  “We’re finally alone with absolutely no interruptions. Baby, I’m having my way with you.”

  “Oo, prisoner again,” she said and they laughed.

  She crossed her arms over her chest, pulling off her shirt, but Mike wasn’t waiting, bending to taste the smooth texture of her skin, the simple pleasure of pushing down her bra strap and exposing her so damn sexy. The urge to hurry battered at him.

  His gaze slipped over her plump breasts, smoothing the roundness, and then he leaned down. His lips closed warmly over her nipple and he drew her into the warmth of his mouth, watching her expression of pleasure. Her head fell back, her body bending into his. The motion ground her warm center to his erection and she thrust back as he licked and scored his teeth over the soft underside. He held her gaze as he ran his finger inside the edge of her bra cup, then pulled down. Her nipple spilled into his mouth. She smiled, watched him taste her, and it drove her sensations over the top. Mike wished they were in a soft bed with hours of time.

  “You’re wearing too much,” he murmured, destroying her composure with nibbling on her neck as he worked her slacks open, his hand dipping inside to cup and rub. She wouldn’t be still, squirming to get the rest of her garments off. She practically tore at his shorts and, naked, he stuffed them beneath her, their clothes a cushion as he licked slow heavy circles around her nipple.

  “Oh, Michael. You’re good at a lot of things.” Clancy was breathless, her body awakened from a long sleep and her hands roaming over his broad shoulders, his sculpted chest. She wrapped her hand around him, slid her fingers over the moist tip, and laughed softly when he groaned, drew in air through clenched teeth.

  “Jesus,” he said and clasped her hands above her head. “No wonder they locked you up.”

  Her smile was bone-melting and he swept his palm from throat to hip, molding her flesh, his gaze lingering over her, naked and shameless for him. Her eyes held the awareness of her power, her shape like an hourglass, plush and ripe, and wrapping him in her scent and sensation. Mike felt privileged, the moments of denying himself any bond in his duty for his country magnified as she touched his face, slid her thumb over his lips. It was a simple thing, and he wanted more of it, to connect deeply with her and seal this connection tighter.

  His hand rested on her belly, then slid softly to between her thighs. He nudged them apart, leaving a damp trail of kisses down her throat as he parted her, loving her quick breaths, yet he taunted, slowly drawing a line up her center, circling the tiny bead of her sex. Then he found her, slick and hot, and he slid a finger inside without stopping, and loved that she lost her breath. She chanted his name, telling him how she felt, what he did to her, and Mike felt like a king about to conquer a willing captive.

  He withdrew and plunged, and her hips caught the motion, and on his side, Mike devoured every degree of her pleasure. He wanted her mindless like him.

  “Michael, come here,” she demanded, spreading beneath him. “I need something bigger.”

  But he wouldn’t go, watching her twist as he dipped and stroked. Then he introduced another finger and she cupped his face, devouring his mouth with a lush erotic heat and thrusting into his palm. Then she enfolded him and his muscles locked.

  She threw her leg over his hip. “There is a better solution,” she said, stroking the tip of him against her center.

  “Jesus, I’m trying to go slow and you are not helping.”

  “Then show me some of that Gannon speed.”

  His gaze snapped to hers. She thrust her hips enough to put him inside her a bit, and he grunted and cursed, then nudged her thighs wider, and slid between. He held himself poised, and a million thoughts ran through his mind, nothing sticking long enough to make sense. He felt privileged and freed, his need beyond passion, beyond control.

  Clancy stared up at him as she thought she’d never expected to see this man humbled to anything. Yet he was, in his eyes, his expression as if he was undeserving, and her throat strained. For the world, the enemy, they saw strength and deadly skill. Clancy saw need and unguarded man. She guided him, loving the exquisite pressure, his gaze trapped with hers, and they prolonged it, her hips rising to his. He sank into her, helpless and trembling.

  She kissed his neck, then whispered, “Now, that’s what I’m talking about, Boy Scout.”

  He chuckled and lifted his head. “You have no idea what this is doing to me, do you?”

  His breath shuddered, almost gasping, and Clancy was so moved she felt her eyes burn. “How can I not?” she said, brushing her fingers across his hair, dribbling down the side of his face. Gently she laid her mouth over his, licking the line of his lips, slowly, before sliding her tongue between and making him crazy.

  “You’re evil,” he moaned against her mouth.

  “I prefer wicked.” She sat up, forcing him deeper and forcing him back as she climbed onto his lap, never breaking contact.

  She straddled his broad thighs, her mouth rolled over his, down his throat, and her tongue snaked to lick his nipple. His grip on her hips tightened as she suckled and he let his head drop back and savored it till he needed that mouth on his again. He took it, cradling her face and savaging her soft lips till she was gasping and wild on him.

  “I take it you liked that.”

  She thrust back, riding the motion. “I like every damn thing.”

  He gripped her hips, his body nail hard and sliding deeply. Her delicate flesh clasped him in a tight fist, her willowy rocking like a cord pulling him quickly to a climax.

  “There’s that speed,” she said, and the knots in him tightened. Her muscles locked and clawed, and yet she smiled, met him, and thrust harder. Her whispers echoed in the cave, the secrets of the past watching them as she made love with him. He enfolded her breasts, thumbing her nipples, and the sight of him disappearing into her tormented her. She spared him nothing.

  Her body rippled like a river, battering him in sleek waves of pleasure, and she quickened, thrusting longer and harder. She was untamed, the wild child breaking free, her kiss more erotic, her fingertips digging into his shoulders as her body spoke to him, urging him with her. He reached between and circled the bead of her sex.

  “Oh, Michael,” she said softly, drawing it out. She couldn’t breathe, her body beyond her control and in his. Her blood hummed, rushing to between her thighs, and she wanted more, only more of his thick arousal sliding into her, her body tightening with each moment closer to the peak. He pushed long and slow, then quickened, and Clancy fought the tension, wanting this to go on, but her body wouldn’t allow it.

  Then she came.

  Mike consumed it. Her soft flesh tensed and clawed him, the grip of tender muscle trapping his erection. He leaned, lowering her to the cushion of clothes, and he pumped, his control slipping. Scarred and seasoned melted with feminine luxury, wet and hot. Primal. Captive sensations ripped free, roaring through his blood, and blinding him.

  Yet Clancy matched him, her hips rising to prove her greed. She was quicksilver sleek, pulling him along with her, and he plunged into her with a frantic, erotic pulse. He met her gaze, her smoky eyes intense as her body swallowed him in the ancient ritual.

  “Michael,
yes,” she gasped and he felt it, her climax squeeze him, the flex and pull of delicate flesh. Sitting back on his calves, he crushed her to him as if to bring her into his very core. He pushed on her lower spine and thrust upward, deeply, elongating, and the untamed monster inside him broke free. His groan rose in the chamber, melting with her gasps of ecstasy, and they shivered through the unending rapture.

  He held her tightly, his kiss strong and softening as the pleasure ebbed to a humming in his blood. He slid his hand up her spine to the base of her skull, his fingers sinking into her hair, and she tipped her head back. She met his gaze, and Mike swiped his hand over her hair and kissed her softly.

  Then Mike understood.

  In the isolated cave of ancient gods, trapped with no prospect of survival, he found destiny.

  Clancy found part of her soul.

  Colonel Hank Jansen grabbed his phone, spoke his name, yet his attention was on the documents in front of him.

  “Hank, what are you getting into?”

  He recognized General Craig Runold’s voice.

  “I’m trying to find out what happened to my men, General.”

  He didn’t have to explain. If Craig was calling him, he knew exactly what he was doing. Investigating Clancy McRae, Yates, and Cook. But more specifically, this research project.

  “Back off.”

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  “You need to stay out of this, Hank. It’s not your business.”

  “These are my troops under my command. Not Cook’s.”

  “He has the authority to run that hospital.”

  He looked at the testing and transcripts. Clancy McRae had created something astonishing, and while personally he wouldn’t volunteer to have it inserted, he didn’t know the mind of another man. “That may be so, but not for human testing.” Never.

  The general was quiet for a moment, then said, “What?”

  “They used it on my team.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Is it? I have substantial proof in physical test results from Dr. Figaroa.” He didn’t mention the ensign, knowing full well when the shit rolled downhill it would hit the innocent. “And my Tango team leader has seen Clancy McRae. In Peru.” Runold was well aware that the team was sent in to recover the UAV and never returned. “I think she went looking for the men.”

  “That’s madness.”

  “Perhaps, but it doesn’t change the fact that Cook used my Marines for this. And frankly, sir, putting Cook in charge of anything but the watercooler was the most asinine move the chiefs could have made. His past gives me plenty of suspicion that he authorized this. He’s way out of the UCMJ and into federal crimes.” The uniformed military code of justice was the law in the armed services.

  The general hesitated. “There is more to this.”

  “I’m not backing down.” Not when his men could be dead because of it.

  “Hank,” he said softly. “I’m getting pressure.”

  “You’re not the one facing their families and having to tell them we used them like lab rats.”

  “We don’t want a full-blown investigation in this or for the press to get wind.”

  “We can keep it in-house.” He already had, and wondered if Major Yates had said something to Cook to bring this on. Cook might be an ass, but he still had influential friends.

  “No, you don’t understand,” Craig stalled, and Hank could hear him sigh. “Clancy McRae is the one we don’t want investigated.”

  “Why?” Hank looked down at the woman’s records. “Aside from some trouble when she was a kid, she has a clean record and an amazing mind.”

  “If anything defaming comes from this it will reflect in a bad light and we can’t afford a scandal.”

  We? As in the U.S. government. “Reflect on whom? Cook? I don’t give a damn.”

  “No, she’s Daniel McRae’s daughter.”

  “The Sec Nav?” The secretary of the Navy. This was growing bigger by the moment.

  “You see my point, then.”

  “No, I don’t. McRae didn’t know about this testing, Craig. Her signature is on some documents, but I’m betting it’s forged because the woman has stated clearly in other quarterly reports and documentation that going forward too soon would be detrimental to the entire project. And with the evidence taken as a whole, this says she wasn’t in the loop and Major Yates admitted as much to me. It’s the reason I think she went south. To look for the men, to help them.” What did she know that Yates and Cook had ignored? It was a brave and foolish thing to do. There was a lot more trouble in that little section of the world this week and she was in the middle of it.

  “The men are MIA, but if the enemy…whoever shot down that UAV and chopper without a heat signature,” the general said, “gets a hold of these men? Uses them? Their enhanced strength, intelligence?”

  Hank went perfectly still, an icy chill racing under his skin. “You’re not suggesting we eliminate the problem, are you?”

  “Of course not!” Craig said, insulted. “But they’d have an advantage. They have to be found or confirmed KIA.”

  “Gannon will bring them home, but you can’t have it both ways, Craig. Hidden, I can understand. Swept away, no. Cook is going to pay for this.”

  “You’ll bring Miss McRae down and the Sec Nav.”

  “Wanna bet?”

  Jansen ended the land call, then turned to the computer, tapping to the satellite link. He grabbed his encrypted phone and dialed. He needed to reach Gannon. A-sap.

  Circle the wagons, he thought. Then he saw the text message from Gantz.

  A new can of worms, he thought.

  The buzz of passion lingered, his long drugging kisses melting her insides as he pulled her legs around his waist. It meshed him deeper inside her, stirring her desire.

  “Swim?” he said, then fell back into the water with her, kissing her and sharing air as they bobbed to the surface.

  “It does taste like a rock,” she said, water dribbling over them, and he pushed her hair off her face.

  “You taste better.” Better than anything, he thought and kissed her again, wanting to remind himself of moments ago, to keep it trapped in her mind like it was in his. He leaned against the edge of the pool, his arms hooking him and his body floating.

  Clancy looked her fill. His skin was tanned and tight, his only paleness on his rock-hard rear. She took a single stroke and floated over to him. “You have a decadent smile on your face right now.”

  His gaze slid over her round breasts underwater and pushing on his chest. “Not nearly as it should be.”

  She looped her arms around his neck. “Oh, Boy Scout, we’ve just scratched the surface.” She lay fully on him and felt him harden.

  She’s got me roped, he thought. And worse, she knows it.

  “We really don’t have time to play, do we?”

  The statement shattered the moment, and his expression darkened. “No, if Richora has the Hellfires, he’s moving them somewhere fast.” Richora had to have it, he knew too much not to know where they were.

  “It’s huge.”

  “Dismantling it wouldn’t be hard. It’s a rocket, not a nuclear bomb.”

  “But just as much damage in the right place. He’s Shining Path?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Not to me.”

  Mike kissed her once, then hoisted himself out of the water. Clancy floated, watching the spectacular twist of muscle as he pulled on his boxers.

  Then he reached for her, and with one yank pulled her out of the water and into his arms. Slick and naked, she tempted him to play, but that wouldn’t get them out of here.

  She went for her things. “This is the only way, I know, but I don’t like it,” she said, pulling on a clean shirt, but nothing else. She wrung and fluffed her wet hair.

  He sat, strapping a knife to his calf, then checked his gun. He took back the calf case he’d given her and holstered it. Then he noticed her boots, and frowned at the plastic packet sliding o
ut of them. He took it, turning it over in his hands, and knew what he held. “This is classified material, Clancy.”

  She glanced, still. “I told you I hacked.”

  He opened the plastic and unfolded the papers. The faces of his team stared back at him, the creases telling him she’d looked at them more than a few times. It touched him and Mike realized the magnitude of her quest to find them.

  “I know them, Mike.” He met her gaze. “Not like you, but I know the kind of men they are.”

  “Good ones, damn good ones.”

  They’d have to be, to have a spot on his team, she thought.

  “Can you help them? If they’ve gone ballistic, can you stop it without that Terminator thing?”

  The question startled her. “I’m still working that out. I’ve got to be able to replicate the Terminator’s chief components.”

  “You tried that.”

  “No, I tried to remake the machine. But if I can replicate one factor of its operation, it might stall it.”

  “Stall what?”

  She met his gaze head-on. “It’s implanted, Mike. It will be permanently embedded in a day or so.”

  “Jesus.”

  “If I can stop it, they should be okay. If I can’t and it embeds, I can’t do anything unless we’re in the lab. It could leave irreparable damage.”

  His expression darkened, and she knew that although he had accepted it, he still hated the idea in its basest forms.

  She handed him the flashlight, sullen. “I created it to help.”

  “I know, but…” He clamped his lips tight. She didn’t inject it. He was pushing his anger on the wrong person.

  “No, you don’t. Know why I was in jail? Why I got the choice of the Navy? Because of special circumstances. I climbed behind the wheel of a car, very stoned, and had an accident.”

  “Was anyone hurt?”

  “My brother. He lost his legs.”

  “Oh God. Clancy.”

  She put her hand up to stave off the sympathy she didn’t deserve. “He doesn’t blame me. He was just as high, and not belted in. I was. But I was driving. I blame me.”

  Mike was quiet for a long moment, trying to imagine her life since then. “I have nothing to say that would comfort you. I can’t convince you not to blame yourself, so I won’t try.”