Afterburn

by Kira Sinclair

  “I wanted an outside view of the situation, Chase, since I knew yours was a bit…skewed.”

  “Skewed? My memory of that night is nowhere close to skewed, Sabrina. I remember every last detail whether I want to or not.”

  “Yes, and it’s common knowledge that you don’t believe you deserve this medal.”

  A growl erupted from the back of his throat. The sound made her take a half step back. She didn’t fear that his anger would get the best of him; she knew he had more control than that, but the sound still set her on edge.

  “You want to know what happened that night? I’ll tell you. I made a choice. A bad decision. One I didn’t believe was right even at the time but I did it anyway. I evacuated two men who shouldn’t have been in the middle of a war zone, two men who’d come there on a publicity stunt not realizing or caring that their presence put the lives of men and women in danger, to safety. I placed their lives above those of the men and women fighting and dying around us.”

  He finally looked at her again. Gone was the anger, replaced by a tearing pain and guilt that ripped into her gut. She’d had no idea. She’d known he was upset, with himself and the situation, but she hadn’t realized how deep the pain went. How much he tortured and blamed himself. For something he couldn’t have controlled.

  “You did the right thing, Chase. The senator and his assistant weren’t trained for battle.”

  “That’s what everyone keeps telling me. It doesn’t matter. I could have done my job better in the first place and no one would have needed to be rescued.”

  Without waiting for her to say anything more, he spun on his heel and walked away, leaving her with a huge aching hole in the center of her chest.

  HOW THE HELL do you tell someone they’re married?

  Rina thought the Band-Aid approach was probably best. She sat in her car, looking up at Chase’s apartment. She had to do this tonight. She had to see him. The way he’d left this afternoon…she couldn’t leave things that way. She couldn’t leave him hurting and alone. Although, she supposed she was about to make the whole situation worse.At least he’d have something else to concentrate on.

  The General would tell her to buck up. To do what she knew was right. How come doing the right thing had never gotten any easier than it had been when she was six and accidentally broke her grandmother’s antique vase?

  Somehow she didn’t think this could be fixed with some super glue.

  If the only thing she had to be worried about was his reaction to her news…then she wouldn’t be so uptight.

  The real problem was that she didn’t trust herself. Not around Chase. The more she saw him, the more he touched her, teased her, tempted her, the more she lost the will to resist. She wanted him more each and every damn day until she wasn’t certain she’d be able to control the urge the next time they were together.

  She didn’t like feeling that out of control of her own actions.

  For almost a year she’d chalked her stupidity up to a few too many drinks and an empowering feeling of being free and wild for the first time in her life. Since Chase had walked back into it, she’d acknowledged that maybe the strong sexual buzz he poured into her veins simply by occupying the same space might have been a contributing factor.

  The alcohol she could handle—by eliminating it from her diet while Chase was around. The sexual attraction…that she couldn’t seem to master. And the damn man knew it. She had no doubt that if he wanted to push her, she’d lose her mind and any hope of an annulment right along with it.

  And she needed this annulment—for her career and her sanity. She wasn’t the kind of woman who got married by accident by Elvis. That wasn’t who she wanted to be.

  Taking a cleansing breath, Rina closed her eyes and tried positive realization. She pictured in her mind how the next five minutes would go. And they did not include anything resembling kissing, groping, or wild, mindless sex.

  She just hoped her body was paying attention to the command.

  Walking to his front door, she squared her shoulders, straightened her spine and rang his bell.

  “Sabrina.”

  “Rina.”

  He grinned at her, ignoring the correction. That superior turn of his lips was like nails along a blackboard. It bothered her more than his stubborn use of her full name.

  “Can I come in?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Stepping back, he motioned her inside. The door snicked shut behind her, nothing loud or unusual, but for the first time in her life she began to appreciate how convicts must feel the first time they entered that cell. She felt trapped, aroused and out of her element.

  Clearing her throat, she pushed the feeling away. It was silly. She was a grown woman, a capable woman, with an excellent job she was good at and a life she was proud of. And once this was taken care of she could have it back.

  “Nice place.”

  “Thanks. It doesn’t quite feel like home yet.”

  “It will.”

  “Maybe.” He shrugged. Something about his expression seemed…off. Or maybe it was the way he’d said the single word—like her father when he was just humoring one of her “girlie” tendencies.

  “Can I offer you a beer?”

  “Er, no thanks.”

  He stood there, staring at her, making her feel itchy and warm all at the same time. There was something about his intensity. She remembered having it entirely focused on her, on her pleasure. And she couldn’t help but want that again. Heat settled at the juncture of her thighs, smoldering and roiling.

  He crossed the space between them. Rina took an instinctive step backward, her knees hitting squarely on the edge of his coffee table. If he hadn’t reached out and grabbed her, she’d have sat right down on the glass-topped surface.

  Real graceful.

  “I, ah, wanted to apologize to you. I should have asked for your version of the events. I just didn’t want to upset you.”

  “I know that.”

  Instead of letting her go like she expected, he brushed a single finger up and down the length of her arm. She shivered at the innocent caress. No. Spinning out of his grasp, she winced as her knees connected with the edge of the table again.

  “Do I make you nervous?”

  “Yes. No.” Rina closed her eyes for a moment of strength, wishing she could erase the past few moments. Opening them, she looked into his dark blue eyes and answered truthfully. “A little.”

  “You’ve never been nervous around me before.”

  “Things were…different.”

  “How different could things be?”

  Oh, if he only knew.

  The twinkle of mischief and laughter that brightened his eyes made her smile automatically in return. She’d forgotten that. How he could make her smile with nothing more than one of his own. Seeing him enjoying himself had always made the world seem a little brighter, a little lighter.

  “We’re obviously still attracted to each other. Are you seeing anyone?”

  “No.” Rina shook her head slowly, realizing he’d given her the perfect barrier that her damn sense of honor wouldn’t allow her to exploit.

  She couldn’t lie to him and say she was seeing someone…not when she was going to tell him she was his wife. Their marriage might not be a real one, but she’d taken a vow—no matter that she hadn’t realized she was doing it. He might not appreciate it or even expect it, but as far as she was concerned, until they had this little problem taken care of she’d made a promise to him that she would keep.

  Which made the churning fire in her gut even harder to ignore. It had been a long time….

  “Maybe we should sit down.”

  “Maybe you should tell me why you came over here, because something tells me it isn’t the reason I was hoping for.”

  “No, it isn’t to have sex.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Chase moved a step closer into her personal space. The scent of musk and sandalwood came with him, along with the h
eat of his body. Her own body seemed to recognize him immediately, and the pulsing ache increased.

  His hands burrowed into her hair, his fingers cupping the back of her head. His thumbs traced the line of her jaw before dipping down over the sensitive side of her neck to the curve of her collarbone. A shiver started from the touch of his thumbs to race down the length of her body.

  Her lips parted. She felt their reluctant separation, as if some part of her was fighting against the unwanted reaction, even if most of her couldn’t seem to resist.

  Her breath sped up. She could feel it, somehow warmer than usual, flowing in and out of her lungs. Her body hummed, with anticipation, fear and the sense of a lost battle.

  He hadn’t even kissed her and she was a goner. Not that it mattered. Not at this moment. She wanted his kiss. Wanted it more strongly than anything else she could ever remember.

  No sooner had the thought flitted through her mind than he obliged. His lips touched hers in a light caress that did little to assuage the need pounding through her. It only made her hungrier.

  So she took, grabbing his retreating head and pulling him back to her mouth. She dived into him, fingers digging into his scalp, tongue sparring with his. Standing on tiptoe, she molded their bodies together simply for the pleasure of feeling his war-hardened muscles against her own.

  A groan vibrated through his throat and his hands turned as demanding and expectant as hers, running up and down her spine, over her arms, latching on to her ass.

  She arched her head back in surrender as his mouth traveled down her exposed throat. His hands flicked open the buttons on her lightweight top as his mouth sucked and licked a trail of fire down her neck, across her shoulders and toward her aching breasts.

  She felt breathless, rushed and eager. She was mindless, the world hazy except for the clarity of sensation where he touched her. She throbbed. She wanted. She yearned for more.

  Chase dropped to his knees at her feet, his fingers working the buttons of her jeans. His hands slipped inside, reaching around to cup her rear and pull her closer to him. Her fingers speared into his hair, twisting the military-short strands, needing something solid to hold her to reality.

  He stared up at her from the V of her opened jeans; his eyes were dark and dilated with a passion that made her feel more powerful and alive than she had in months. Years. Ever.

  She’d only ever come close to this feeling with him….

  Reality slammed in like a ton of bricks hitting pavement.

  Chase bowed his head to kiss the white lace triangle covering her sex. The warmth of his breath seeped through the fabric, fracturing her thoughts for a fragile second.

  Then the jagged pieces came back together, poking into her conscience and spurring her to action.

  “No, Chase. Stop. We can’t have sex.” Her hands pushed against his shoulders, slipping off before finally finding purchase.

  “Why not?”

  “Because we’re married.”

  6

  “WHAT DID YOU SAY?”

  The floor rocked beneath Chase’s knees, the sensation eerily similar to the moment of takeoff, that split second right as aerodynamics take over. He stared up at her, those lush green eyes and kiss-swollen lips, and wanted nothing more than to ignore her words. To pretend he hadn’t heard them. To surrender them both to the unbelievable storm of desire he’d been fighting since the moment he’d seen her again.“We’re married.”

  But he couldn’t do that. “How is that possible?”

  His voice echoed against the naked white walls as he climbed to his feet and moved away, away from temptation and her words.

  Straightening her clothes, she reached for her purse—he hadn’t even noticed she’d carried one when she’d landed on his doorstep—and pulled out a sheaf of papers.

  “That was exactly what I thought when this arrived in the mail.” She separated a sheet from the stack and thrust it at him.

  He stared down at a marriage certificate, complete with his name, her name and a bunch of scrolling curlicues around the edges that he supposed were meant to be romantic. They weren’t.

  “Is this real?”

  “Unfortunately.”

  The room rocked again, almost as if his apartment had started pulling Gs.

  “How did this happen?”

  “We were both a little drunk and didn’t pay attention to the fact that they also did real weddings. Apparently, when we asked for the Elvis wedding neither one of us made it clear we wanted the fake one so they assumed we were there for the real thing instead of the punk-your-friends version.”

  “Don’t you need a marriage license…” His voice trailed off as he remembered the sheets of paper they’d filled out. Without the fog of alcohol, he realized how weird it was to have to give all that information for fake photos.

  “Yep. We signed in front of a notary who took care of all the details for us. Part of the complete package, apparently.”

  He stared at her, uncertain what to say. There was no protocol for this kind of situation. Rolling around inside his head was a jumble of emotions—shock, anger, confusion. At the center of them, though, was desire. No matter what, he wanted this woman. And probably always would.

  “It could have been worse. I could have gotten pregnant.”

  Chase frowned at her. “That isn’t even funny.”

  “I’m sorry. I know it isn’t. I just meant that this is something that can be fixed.”

  “Fixed? You mean a divorce?” His lips pulled into an unintended sneer on the word. It was the last thing he’d ever wanted. Not after the disaster his parents had turned into.

  “Annulment. It’s the legal equivalent of turning back time.”

  “Great. Fantastic.” Chase heard the sarcasm in his own words. Raking a hand across his scalp, he stared down at the piece of paper in his hand, reading each and every syllable several times just to let them all sink in.

  His mind raced…remembered. And he groaned. “We were married by Elvis.”

  Sabrina laughed. She honest to God laughed. Not just laughed but collapsed onto his couch in a fit of laughter that had tears streaming across her cheeks.

  Chase stared down at her, not entirely sure what to do with her. “I’m glad you think this is so funny.”

  Swiping at tears, she looked up at him from her prone position on his sofa. Despite everything, he couldn’t prevent the flitting image of her there, naked, beneath him.

  “Not funny. Trust me. I’ve just spent the past eleven months worrying about how you were going to take this and all you can think about is that Elvis married us.”

  Chase straightened to his full height. “Well, it isn’t exactly how I pictured getting married.”

  “I shudder at the thought of you picturing it at all.”

  Something she’d said finally registered in his mind. “Eleven months. You’ve known about this for eleven months?”

  “Yes, that—” she pointed at the piece of paper still wobbling in his hand “—arrived in my mailbox about a week later.”

  “A week? You’ve known about this for that long and didn’t think you should tell me? Call me? Write me a goddamn letter?”

  Blood began to fill his head; he could feel it pounding behind his ears. His chest tightened. How could she have kept something this important from him?

  “How? I couldn’t very well send you a letter about something like this. Dear Chase, by the way, we’re married. Calling was out of the question. Something like this deserved face-to-face time. Besides, it wasn’t worth the risk of someone else finding out. That’s the last thing we need.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean it could end both our careers if anyone in the air force finds out that we’re married. We’re both guilty of fraud.”

  He wasn’t certain how to feel. How to react. What to say or think. Part of him wanted to grab Sabrina and shake her. Another part wanted to pull her into his arms and claim her as his so that no one—not the air
force, not the General, not even Sabrina—could take her away from him again. That, more than anything, was what scared the hell out of him.

  “Well, excuse me for not reasoning this whole thing through quickly enough for you, Sabrina. But apparently you’ve had eleven months to figure out the repercussions while I’ve only had about five minutes.”

  Her response was a thinning of her lips and a narrowing of her eyes. He didn’t appreciate the implication that somehow he was at fault in this situation.

  “I deserved to know, Sabrina.” His words were low and dangerous. She’d been the one making decisions about his life without even informing him that they needed to be made.

  She stood up from the couch, unafraid to ignore his warning, uncompromising as she stood toe-to-toe with him, defending her choice. “Yes. But not like that.”

  There was fire in her eyes, anger mixed with something that sparked a primitive response in his already racing blood.

  He moved closer, nothing more than the subtle leaning of his body to hers. But her immediate response was to take a step back. Her eyes, hard emerald-green, tore straight through him, and left him feeling off balance and…wrong.

  Chase followed as she retreated. He wasn’t entirely sure why. Perhaps it was the need to regain some semblance of control over the situation.

  She stopped only when her back hit the wall with a quiet thud. His body was flush with hers. Her scent surrounded him, a mixture of strawberries and sex, innocence and sinful surrender.

  He stared into her, the urge to take everything she could give strong and powerful. His eyes latched onto her lips, pink, plump from their earlier kisses, and inviting—even if she hadn’t meant them to be.

  Her tongue licked across them. Need knifed through him.

  But instead of voicing an invitation, “Stop” fell from her parted lips. The single whispered word held none of the conviction it had minutes before when she’d demanded the same thing. And yet it doused him just as surely as if she’d screamed it.

  Moving away, Chase pulled in lungfuls of air and sanity.

  “Why did you wait?”