by Diana Layne
“Damn.”
“That was one thing too many.”
“No shit. And that you’ve even given consideration to coming back after that?”
“Jeff really didn’t leave me much choice.”
“Always a choice. You could leave like I did.”
“Like you . . . did?”
She heard her teeth grinding in her ears. “No one likes a smart ass.”
“Even one who tells the truth?”
The night ended soon after that, MJ changing Ben’s dressing and leaving him in his bed, alone, no matter how much he tried to persuade her to join him.
As she laid on the fold-down sofa later, the same sofa where Ben had probably spoken more than he had in years, she thought of his confessions, his lost child. She ached to be back in her apartment, in her own bed with her daughter snuggled against her side. When MJ had spoken to Dottie earlier in the day, she’d reported Angelina was doing fine. And maybe she was. Living so long in a hospital, the little girl had to be resilient. It was MJ who was suffering.
Maybe by tomorrow she and Ben would figure out the connection of the dead senators and be able to predict the next move. If not, MJ would give Tasha another day before heading back to Texas, packing up Angelina and disappearing out of the country. Vista could figure out how to find Tasha without MJ. Wasn’t her problem.
Feeling like she had a little more control of her life, if it was only an illusion, MJ fluffed her pillow, closed her eyes and hoped Ben would stay out of her thoughts, and sleep would come easy tonight.
A few hours later, Ben’s scream woke her.
“Noooo!”
Chapter 15
Heart pounding, MJ fumbled under the sofa, her hand closing over the cold steel of her gun. Had Tasha come in the night and attacked Ben in his sleep?
With her Sig P220 securely pointing the way, MJ blinked to adjust her eyes to dark, as she tiptoed across the room.
She edged around the doorway.
“Don’t shoot.”
“Ben?” Light from the moon gave an eerie glow to the room. He sat in bed, a shadowy figure, staring into the distance.
“Did I yell out loud?”
She lowered her gun, took a deep breath and got her heart rate back down into just over the speed limit range. “Bad dream?”
He ran a hand through his hair and finally shifted his gaze to look at her. “The explosion all over again.”
She handed him the glass of water left on the night table. “I guess talking about it brought back memories.”
“They’re never far away,” he admitted. His hand shook when he sat the water down. Her heart went out to him. She knew what he was feeling.
What the hell.
She laid her Sig on the night table. “Scoot over.”
“What?” he asked, even as he complied.
“You need a hug.” She climbed into bed.
“Only a hug?”
“Damn you’re–”
He laid his finger over her lips, his breath warm on her cheeks. “Yeah, I know. I’m a persistent little pest.”
She ignored his act. “Just pretend I’m a teddy bear.”
He had started to wrap his arms around her but paused to say, “That takes a better imagination than I have.”
“Try it. It’s better than a bottle.”
“That’s debatable. Booze helps me sleep. You lying next to me isn’t going to help me sleep. You don’t fall into the teddy bear category. Now, maybe a tiger, or–”
“Well, if I’m not going to be a help,” she rolled over and threw back the blanket, “I’ll just go back–”
“Not so fast.” He wrapped his arms around her then, pulling her back to spoon against him. “Keep your claws in though.”
She wasn’t amused, though she realized that while she’d been the one to offer comfort, he was trying to make her feel less awkward for doing it. And it was definitely easier now that she wasn’t facing him.
Still, the sensation of being held by this man made her feel strange, in a place that felt vaguely familiar, yet at the same time totally different. Exciting, even. She held motionless while her pulse picked up speed.
It isn’t a love interest she told herself. Nothing like with Keith. Absolutely not on the same plane as Niko.
And yet with Ben she had the same urge to share things as she had with Niko.
Perhaps because Ben had shared so much of his pain with her tonight. She and Keith had never shared deep dark secrets or much of their past. The relationship burned too hot between them. And that should have been a warning she realized now.
“You know the thing about a hug?” Ben said, fortunately interrupting her thoughts before she started categorizing his attributes. But also reminding her she was in bed wrapped in his arms.
“It’s not a hug unless you put your arms around me.”
She took a breath, forced her stiff protesting muscles to relax. “Oh. I know.” She twisted back to face him. “Sorry, I zoned out.”
“You can pretend I’m Angelina.”
She managed a sound that hopefully resembled a small chuckle, feeling an odd gratitude he was making her impulsive gesture easier for her. “That would take an imagination beyond mine.” She echoed his earlier words.
“Or pretend I’m a very desirable man.”
Forget the gratitude. Typical male. “Ha. That’s even more difficult.”
“Don’t spare my ego.”
She met his gaze, found a frown marring his face. “You don’t need anyone to tell you you’re a desirable man.”
“You hide it well.”
This was getting more difficult by the moment. “Just because I don’t desire you–” The disbelief in his eyes made her cut herself short. Who was she kidding? “Oh, here.” She hugged him, a quick move so she wouldn’t be tempted to extend the moment. “Now, shut up and go back to sleep.”
He refused to let her escape so easily. He held on, keeping her arms in place around him.
“Relax.”
The advantage of being held so closely meant she didn’t have to continue to look at him. The disadvantage, of course, was being held in a man’s arms. Not something she’d envisioned, at least for the next fifty or so years.
Definitely different from Angelina. Muscles ridged his body. And while he wasn’t soft and cuddly and he didn’t smell like baby powder, but like warm hot-blooded male, holding him wasn’t bad.
Maybe even comforting. A little.
Which definitely made it bad for her. But what she felt didn’t matter. She was here for him. Think mommy thoughts. “Better now?”
He took a deep breath. “This is nice.”
He relaxed his grip. She could pull away if she wanted. This time she didn’t try. She only leaned away far enough to look at him. His eyes closed, his face no longer tight with the lingering bad dream.
MJ resisted the urge to push his hair back from his forehead. Dark and wavy, his hair was longer than hers. She wondered what that thick texture would feel like. She could make a casual, even comforting gesture to satisfy her curiosity.
She lifted her hand.
He opened his eyes.
Her breath caught at the honesty and pain, the hope and vulnerability, she saw in his gaze. She lowered her hand to his hair. She could offer solace and satisfy her curiosity at the same time. His eyes drifted closed again as she smoothed his hair back, same as she did for Angelina. It might not be so hard to get used to consoling an adult.
As she brushed her fingers through his hair, she mentally nodded. His hair was thick, slightly coarse and very appealing. Those motherly comforting feelings she’d experienced were leaving. The closeness she felt disturbing. Move your hand. Take it away.
He opened his eyes again. This time his gaze told her he’d recognized her feelings. He looked at her lips.
She sucked in a breath. “Don’t even think about it.” The words came out soft and breathy, not nearly as effective as she’d intended. Think forceful. She tried again. “I
’m only here to offer comfort.”
“Sex is comforting.”
“You’re hopeless.”
“How about gratitude?”
“Gratitude? For?”
“I saved your life.”
“I saved yours,” she countered.
“Okay, how about this? I’m a man. You’re a woman.”
Couldn’t deny that. Especially the man part. She felt his growing erection against her legs as further proof. “Since you’ve moved onto a biology lesson, you’re all better now. I can go–”
He pulled her tighter. “Don’t leave.” His tense tone drew attention to how suddenly all his muscles had tightened.
“Stay.” He took a breath. “Stay here.” His voice sounded closer to normal as he added, “I’ll be good."
That nightmare must’ve really shaken him.
She stayed.
As his breathing deepened and he drifted on the edges of sleep, she turned to seek a more comfortable position. He pulled her close, spooning behind her, pulling her butt close into his crotch, it was still obvious he was semi-erect. She caught her breath, waiting for him to make another move, waiting for him to get hard and ready again but he never did.
Eventually she relaxed and thinking she heard thunder off in the distance, she fell asleep.
MJ, still half-asleep the next morning, relished feeling comfortable and secure until she realized the feeling came from being wrapped in a man’s arms. What the hell?
Her heart pounded, blasting away the remnant fog of sleep, and she remembered where she was at the same time she noted Ben’s breathing was too shallow for him to be asleep.
She jerked and twisted in reaction.
“Easy,” he said, his hold remaining loose enough that she was able to turn again to face him.
She blinked, met his gaze. “Sorry, for a minute I didn't know where I was.”
He grinned. “Right here in bed with me.”
“You’re not starting that again, are you?”
“Staring what?” He sounded convincingly innocent.
She did no more than raise an eyebrow before she rolled to get up.
He stopped her at the edge of the bed. “Thanks. You’ve done a lot for me.”
She looked over her shoulder, read the appreciation in his gaze. “No more than you did for me,” she reminded him. “We’re even. Now, get up and out of that bed.”
“Why? It’s raining.”
MJ paused and listened. He was right. Rain pounded off the roof. “Rain’s not going to stop us from looking at those dead senators.”
“Oh, joy, just the way I want to spend a day,” he grumbled and followed her out of bed.
Aside from the boredom, the sexual tension between her and Ben continued to grow all day, in spite of her best efforts to build walls neither could scale. And yet, she still felt it on the other side of the wall, as they sat side by side studying countless bios of the senators she’d downloaded, trying to find a match to the pictures they had, and then trying to find some connection. Through all the tedious brain work, the sexual tension remained, building, pounding, pulsing, and trying to break through.
As calm and easygoing as she’d discovered Ben to be, he was showing signs of enforced confinement as well. Finally after they’d been at it for a solid hour after dinner, he announced, “I gotta take a break,” and escaped to the front porch.
She stayed at the computer another fifteen minutes before she gave up and joined him to watch the rain drip off the roof. He had resorted to sitting on the porch and whittling tree limbs into slender arrows. She chose to pace.
“I don’t think she’s going to show,” he said, holding a newly stripped limb out for inspection, marking the place to make his first cut to trim it to size.
MJ stopped pacing and waited for a rumble of thunder to pass. “Unfortunately, I’m beginning to think you’re right.”
Still, MJ felt something, like they were being watched. Though she saw no evidence. Of course, the steady rain obscured many things. If Tasha were here, what the hell was she waiting for?
“If she killed that last guy, she would’ve had time to get here by now. Even if she were walking.” Ben started twirling the knife blade around the limb.
MJ chuckled at the image of Tasha trudging on foot, most likely in those Italian designer heels she preferred, across the state line. “Maybe she got sidetracked.” Like MJ believed that, but what else?
“Maybe she just wanted us out of the way.”
Yes, there was that. “A definite possibility,” MJ admitted. “But I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit here watching you whittle enough arrows to take down an elephant while Angel’s back in Texas."
“I’d need to make a bow first.”
“What?”
“To take down an elephant. I’d need to make a bow to shoot the arrows. A big bow.” When MJ only sighed, Ben slid his knife into its sheath and asked the question pressing on her mind. “We going after Tasha?"
Oh, being stuck with him even longer was not high on her want list either. MJ frowned. “Pack up your arrows, Tonto. Tomorrow we take off. You can make a bow on the way.”
“Maybe the rain will stop by morning.”
MJ didn’t bother to answer. She headed for bed.
* * *
A hand over MJ’s mouth startled her awake. Instantly alert, her fingers formed claws, moving in for attack when Ben saved his eyes by saying, “Easy, it’s me.”
He moved his hand from her mouth.
Eyes wide, muscles trembling as the wild adrenaline rush receded, she asked, “What the hell are you doing here? Is Tasha here? Another bad dream?”
She’d been having her own dream, she recalled. One that involved both Ben and her being naked.
He answered her with a kiss. Still caught in the remnants of her dream, she kissed him back without hesitation.
Wait. Her brain caught up. Though her body, already primed and ready, protested, she made herself lean away.
She tried again to get an answer, even though it wouldn’t take an Einstein to figure it out, maybe Ben was sleep walking or something. “What are you doing?” she repeated.
“If you have to ask, I didn’t do it right.” He kissed her again. His firm lips moved in a delicious rhythm, seducing her own lips to cooperate. Nope, not sleep-walking.
Willpower, don’t desert me now, damn it.
“Ben.” Too much time of enforced isolation and sexual innuendos, she told herself. But logic didn’t stop a different sort of trembling, this time from desire, not adrenaline, from rolling through her body. Logic versus desire turned into a damned fierce battle within herself. Logic finally won, even as he was still laying small kisses on her mouth during the battle. “I thought you understood I’m not interested,” she said against his lips.
“You don’t kiss like you’re not interested.” Another kiss.
“You. . .you startled me.” No reason to admit the truth. Just stop this before it starts. Ignore those persistent signals as pesky as Ben himself that her body was sending.
“So stay startled.” He moved his mouth to plant small kisses down one side of her neck. Further protest died before the words formed leaving her mouth open in a perfect circle of delight. Delicious, delicious shivers down her neck, down her spine, hurtling onward, downward–
Finally she gathered her strength to resist before she started moaning and rubbing against him, begging him not to stop. From somewhere, she didn’t know where, she found the words and managed to say, “You did have another bad dream.”
“Maybe.” He nibbled on her ear.
Oh, man, that was supposed to stop him cold. Bad plan A, she needed a plan B.
Which her mind refused to cooperate because it was floating off to pleasure land while desire swam in her stomach, worked its way in delicious tickles up her backbone. Another couple of minutes and she’d be beyond the ability to make him to stop. The last of her willpower seemed to be floating away.
His l
ips found hers again.
Oh, hell. She kissed him back this time. Resistance is futile.
No. Resist. Resist, damn it. There was something she needed to say before– She twisted away and gasped, “Wait.”
He raised his head, eyes glittering in moonlight, the rain having stopped sometime earlier in the night.
“I’m not your wife.” There, she said it. Hallelujah how she found the strength she didn’t know. But she wanted to make damn sure he knew she didn’t want to be a substitute.
“No, you’re not.” He stared at her. “And I’m not Keith.”
Ouch. Didn’t see that one coming. Protect herself. “Good thing, I’d have to kill you.”
“I won’t betray you, MJ. I won’t hurt you.”
“Of course you won’t. This is just sex.”
“Is that a yes?” he asked.
“It’ll never be more than sex. We’re not going to get into a relationship.”
“God forbid,” he agreed, pulling her nightshirt up and over her head. “Just sex. Happy?” His hands found her breasts, his lips followed. She forgot to answer. She forgot the question.
“See, I didn’t waste my money,” he murmured.
“Waste. . .money?” The condoms. “Smart ass.”
His mouth closed over a breast, pulling a pleasure-filled moan from her throat. She touched his hair, wrapped her finger in the thick wavy strands.
The sensation.
It had been too long, sex just for pleasure. Not comfort, not love. Pure just-because-it-feels-good-do-it pleasure.
There’d been no time.
No desire.
No need.
He tugged off her pajama pants. His boxers followed. Warm skin. Hard ridges meeting with soft curves. Her body swelled in anticipation, throbbed with emptiness.
His erection pressed hard and heavy and tempting.
Now there was time. Desire. And need.
Oh, yes, her body needed this. A night of sex, of being wanton, and then she could go back to being MJ the mom. MJ the small town mechanic. Her nice predictable life, just like she liked it.
For this moment, however, she was MJ the wanton woman, who wanted Ben the very sexy man.
She was fast losing her need for foreplay. Besides, foreplay created intimacy. She just wanted relief. No intimacy necessary. Just a nice satisfying orgasm over and done with.
