MILITARY ROMANCE: The War Within Himself (Alpha Bad Boy Marine Army Seal) (Contemporary Military Suspense & Thriller Romance)

by Claire Branson

“Neither am I.” Ethan’s hand curled over her nape, slid down to the small of her back, and then returned to tangle in her curls. “But if you keep doing that, things are going to get a lot hotter in this bed, for both of us.”

  Jessa didn’t know Ethan Boone. He might be married, or involved with another woman, or a total womanizer. Maybe he’d hoped this would happen when he’d stripped off her wet clothes and crawled into bed with her. But if he were that kind of man, he wouldn’t be such a gentleman about it.

  I’m not going to let that monster poison me against men. Jessa remembered all the things she had promised herself in the trunk of that car, too — the things she would absolutely do if she were able to free herself. Her hand trembled a little as she reached out and used her finger to circle his nipple again.

  “Jessa.” His big hand cradled the back of her head. “We don’t have to do this now. You’ve been to hell and back today, darling.”

  “But you want to.” She’d heard the yearning in his voice, and when she shifted, she felt the hard, thick length of his shaft brush against her inner thigh. “Don’t you, Cowboy? And I need you.” Suddenly it became imperative to kiss him, and she used his broad shoulders to pull herself up so she could touch her lips to his.

  Ethan didn’t move as she kissed him, but when Jessa licked the seam of his lips he groaned and rolled her onto her back, clasping her chin and covering her mouth with his.

  Chapter Three

  Jessa groaned as he ravished her with his tongue, stroking it in and out of her mouth with avid hunger, but she needed more. She caught his hand and brought it to her breast, rubbing his palm over her tight nipple to ease the ache.

  Ethan wrenched his mouth from her lips and looked down at his hand beneath hers. “Damn, woman, you taste like heaven, and you feel . . . darling, if you’re going to change your mind, now would be good.”

  He sounded gruff, but Jessa felt no fear. “I don’t want to be good, Cowboy. I want to be alive. I want to live.” She wriggled under him until she could twine her leg around his. It made her feel like a delicate flower vine winding around a massive oak. “And I want to be wanton, and wicked, and wild while I do it.”

  He rested his brow against hers. “You don’t even know me, sweetheart.” He hissed in a sharp breath as she rolled her hips, and rubbed her slick, trembling folds against his shaft. “Oh, man. Do that again.”

  Jessa arched her back as she pressed her breasts against his chest, and then tilted her hips until she felt the thick bulb of his cockhead press where she needed it. “Your turn, Cowboy. Anything you want to do to me?”

  He reached down between them, fisting his shaft and working the heavy dome against her until it parted her. “Look at me, darling. That’s the way, there it is.” He thrust the first inch inside her, shuddering when she tightened around his girth. “Your pussy feels like a hot, slow kiss.”

  Jessa loved how his voice had dropped to a rumble, and how it made a word she’d always thought dirty sound sexy. “You like it that much?”

  “Oh, yes, ma’am.” He forged in deeper and went still again, and when she clenched around his shaft to draw him in deeper, his shoulders tensed. “You keep doing that, darling, and this will be all over, real quick.”

  “I don’t mind,” she said, and nuzzled his neck before she nipped his lobe. “If you come, we can do it again.” She let her breath whisper against his ear. “Next time maybe I’ll give you a slow, hot kiss with my mouth, Cowboy.”

  He went still at her sensual threat, and then he dragged her thighs up around his hips. With a slow plunge he sank into her until their body hair meshed. As a moan escaped Jessa’s lips he drew out, watching her face as he did. Whatever he saw made him groan and thrust powerfully into her, his thickness stroking and filling her softness over and over.

  The firm, smooth pumping of his shaft made Jessa writhe wildly under him, and she clutched his arms as she whimpered, her breasts bobbing with every deep stroke. “Ethan, oh, please.”

  “I’ve got you, darling.” She felt the sensual laugh rumble in his chest as he bent his head and latched onto one nipple, tugging on it until she cried out.

  Jessa arched into him, tightening her thighs around his hips as he plowed into her. Her eyelids fluttered as he changed the angle of his strokes, and his shaft prodded something deep inside that sent little explosions of sensation through her belly.

  “There you are,” he murmured, his whiskey-colored eyes glowing with masculine satisfaction as he slowed his thrusts and watched her face. “That’s where it feels so good, yeah, I know, darling. Don’t fight it, let it happen now. I want to feel your tight little pussy drench my cock when you come. You going to come for me, Jessa? You going to give me all that sweetness?”

  She cried out as his delicious questions and soul-stirring strokes sent her spiraling out of control. Ethan held her and murmured to her as she exploded under him, her body heaving with the force of the hot delight, until all she could do was go limp and quiver from the aftershocks.

  “That’s my girl,” Ethan said, kissing her lips and her chin and the tip of her nose as he kept moving in her, drawing out his penetrations so they added to the glow of pleasure in her belly. “You’re so lovely when you come.”

  As she emerged from the sensual daze, Jessa realized how tightly coiled Ethan’s muscles were, and saw the trickles of sweat gleaming on his face. He was controlling himself so ruthlessly, she realized, so she could come down slowly. This when all he probably wanted to do was take her hard and fast until he pumped her full of his seed.

  Jessa wanted that, too, and boldly reached around to clasp his buttocks with her hands. “Stop holding back, Cowboy. I want all of you. Give it to me.”

  Ethan shuddered over her. “No, you don’t.”

  “I’m not going to break.” She pulled his head down to hers, and whispered, “Do whatever you want to me.”

  Ethan groaned, and then jerked his penis out of her and rolled with her. Urgently he pulled her up on all fours as he clasped her breasts in his big hands. “This is what I want.” He squeezed her mounds as he pumped deep into her pussy, his cock like a piston as he fucked her. “Take it, yes, darling, take it all.”

  Jessa pushed back against his strokes, impaling herself on him and clenching around him as his thrusts grew wilder. “Give it to me, Cowboy. Like that, like that.”

  Ethan crouched over her, his chest heaving and his hands convulsing. Then, he groaned and jerked.

  “Oh, yes.” Jessa tightened around his pulsing shaft, milking every warm spurt of semen that he jetted inside her. “That’s so good.”

  Ethan gently disengaged their bodies before he pulled her into his arms and rolled onto his back, draping her limp, quivering body atop him. “That was . . . .” he simply shook his head.

  “Everything.” Jessa lifted her head and offered him a sleepy smile. “It’s everything.”

  * * *

  Ethan woke just before dawn with Jessa curled up beside him like a contented cat. Watching her sleep made him hard, but as much as he wanted to wake her up with his hungry mouth, and plum her tight, wet pussy again until she whimpered his name, he knew he should let her rest. His brothers would be worried, too.

  Once he slipped out of bed and dressed, Ethan went downstairs to find Liam and Chris dishing up breakfast by lamplight. The smell of coffee brewing in the camp pot, bubbling over a can of sterno made him sigh. “Sorry I didn’t come down last night.”

  Chris made a scoffing sound. “The hell you are.” He shot him a wry look. “I wouldn’t be, either. So was she born strawberry blonde?”

  “Shut up.” Liam handed Ethan a steaming mug. “How is she doing?”

  “Better,” Ethan said. “Her name’s Jessa Cooper, and she’s a vet from Billings. She was too shook up to talk much about what happened, but I’ll guess he snatched her in the city, and brought her out here to do her.” His jaw tightened. “She has a burn from a cattle prod on her back. That must be how he took her down.�
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  “Fucking coward, to do that to a woman.” Chris, the largest and most even-tempered of Ethan’s brothers, bunched his huge hands into ham-size fists. “When we hunt him down, I want a few minutes alone with him.”

  “You’ll have to stand in line, brother.” Liam’s expression grew bleak. “Did she tell you anything more?”

  “He was taking me to his house,” a calm, sweet voice said, and Ethan turned to see Jessa standing in the doorway. “So he must live around here somewhere.” She had put on one of his flannel shirts, which reached to her knees, and a pair of his long socks. “May I have some of that coffee? Black, please?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Liam quickly filled and handed her a mug. He caught Ethan’s glare before he said, “We don’t have to talk about this right now, Dr. Cooper.”

  “I think we do, and please, call me Jessa.” She padded over to Ethan, and blushed as he tucked his arm around her waist. Her discomfort quickly faded as she said, “This man is a psychopath, but he looks and acts completely normal. I never suspected for a moment that he intended to harm me.”

  “Did you know him before he snatched you?” When she shook her head, Liam grimaced. “Do you know why he targeted you?”

  “He didn’t say, but I do a monthly pet adoption feature with the local news, so he may have seen me on television. I’m not the first woman he’s abducted, either.” She dragged in an unsteady breath before she repeated what her abductor had told her.

  Ethan watched his brothers’ eyes darken with fury, and grimly clamped down on his own outrage. “No wonder you nearly killed yourself trying to get away.”

  “Death would have been a mercy, compared to what he had planned for me,” Jessa said softly, and then squared her shoulders. “And I am not letting this maniac hurt anyone else. I need to call the police and tell them what I know.”

  “We will, as soon as the storm passes,” Ethan promised.

  Chapter Four

  After meeting the rest of Ethan’s brothers over breakfast, Jessa insisted on pitching in with the clean-up. She would have done more to thank them for sheltering her, but Liam and Chris chased her out of the kitchen. Outside the big house the howl of the wind grew fainter, and by the time Ethan took her back upstairs, the frosty windows sparkled with sunlight.

  “I think these might you fit you,” he told her as he brought a pair of flannels, worn jeans and a thick, soft pink sweater from another room.

  She inspected the sizes and nodded. “Did your last girlfriend leave these behind?”

  “No, they belonged to my mother.” A flicker of sadness passed over his face. “She and our Dad were killed by a drunk driver while they were out celebrating their twentieth anniversary.”

  “Oh, Ethan, I’m so sorry.” Impulsively, she hugged him. “That must have been a terrible time for all of you.”

  “I was barely nineteen, and downright terrified that I wouldn’t be able to keep the family or the ranch going,” he admitted. “But once I came home, the boys helped me a lot. Our folks taught us to depend on each other, and that’s always seen us through everything.” He kissed the top of her head. “Now get yourself dressed, and I’ll give you a tour of the place.”

  Jessa had no idea how big the ranch was until she and Ethan stepped outside and she saw the huge barns. “Wow.” She tugged Caleb’s jacket around her tighter as she scanned the pastures beyond the outbuildings. “You run this place with just seven men?”

  “Not hardly,” Ethan told her as he scooped her up in his arms, and carried her across the snow to the barn door. “We keep about twenty full-time hands, and hire whatever extra men we need for calving season, round-ups and drives.”

  Inside the barn Jessa smiled as she watched the heads of two dozen curious horses appear over the stall doors. “You’ve got these guys, too.” She walked up to a big white gelding and stroked his nose. “Boy, I miss horses.”

  Ethan chuckled. “You sure are comfortable with them.”

  “I originally trained to be an equine vet, but it’s an expensive practice to set up. I still see a few show horses, but mostly my days are spent looking after cats and dogs.” She rolled her eyes before she moved to the next stall, where a bright-eyed paint dipped her head to nuzzle Jessa’s neck. “Hey, honeybunch. Aren’t you a sweet girl?”

  “Rosie is my work horse,” Ethan told her. “And she probably smells me on you.”

  Jessa turned her head and sniffed her shoulder before smiling slyly at him. “Eau de Cowboy. I like it.” A sharp whinny drew her attention across the barn, where a big chestnut stallion glared back at her. “Sounds like someone’s jealous.”

  “Pete is just bad-tempered,” Ethan said with a sigh. “My brother Caleb bought him at a stock auction, and he’s been a pain in my ass ever since.”

  Jess went over to Pete’s stall, and stopped just as of reach of the horse. “Ethan, he’s got blood on his mouth.” She glanced around. “I need to cover his eyes so I can get in there and have a look at him.”

  Ethan handed her a head drape, which she quickly pulled over the stallion’s face. Once Pete had quieted, she opened the stall door and slipped inside.

  “Let’s see what’s hurt you, big guy,” Jessa said in a soft, soothing voice. Keeping one hand on his hide so he knew where she was, she performed a quick visual assessment. “His lip’s got a nasty gash in it. I see fresh cuts on his forelegs, too.”

  Ethan picked up a dented, overturned feed bucket. “Had himself a temper tantrum, kicked the bucket, and then tried to eat.” He showed her the bent, bloody rim.

  “Did your vet leave a suture kit here?” When he nodded she sighed with relief. “Okay, I’ll need that, some hide salve and bandages for his legs.”

  While she worked on the horse, Ethan asked her if she could remember anything else about the man who had kidnapped her.

  “He was middle-aged, about six foot, with thin, sandy hair, and these awful pale blue eyes.” She shuddered a little as she tied off a suture. “At first I thought he might be a doctor, but he was just wearing a white suit.”

  Ethan hesitated before he handed her the salve. “What color was his car?”

  “It was white, too.” She reached for some bandages. “I didn’t get the license plate, but it was a Lexus. How many people around here drive that kind of car anyway?”

  “Not so many,” Ethan said grimly.

  * * *

  Once Jessa had finished treating Pete’s injuries, she tidied up the stall and replaced his trampled feed bucket with a plastic bin she wedged in one corner. “I’d keep his grain floor-level until that lip heals, so he doesn’t bump it and open it again.”

  As Ethan followed her out to show her where to wash up, he debated on whether or not to tell her that his neighbor, Richard Demesse, had abducted her. Knowing that her kidnapper was only a few hundred acres away would likely terrify her. And if she said anything to his brothers, they’d want to form a posse and go lynch the attorney.

  “Ethan?’ Jessa frowned up at him. “Everything all right?”

  “Yeah.” He felt like a shit for not telling her the truth, but the situation was too rocky to handle right now. Instead he held out his hand. “Want to see what’s in the hayloft?”

  Her gaze darted up before her smile turned puzzled. “You mean, like bales of hay?”

  “No, something else.” Ethan took her hand and led her over to the ladder, helping her up onto the rungs before climbing up behind her to the loft. Watching the sway of her tight bottom made his cock swell against his zipper, and when he stepped off the ladder he was ready to grab her adorable little ass with both hands.

  “Okay,” Jessa said as she turned to him. “What do you want to show me, Cowboy?”

  “You have to find it first.” Ethan glanced down meaningfully at his crotch before he sat down on a wide row of bales. “You look, and I’ll tell you if you’re hot or cold.”

  “Let’s see.” Jessa went first to the barn window. “Over here?”

  “Co
ld. Iced over. Frozen solid,” Ethan said as she moved away. As she spun around and walked toward him, he smiled. “Warmer. A lot warmer. Hot.” He cleared his throat as she stepped between his thighs. “Scalding.”

  “I still don’t see anything.” Jessa dropped down to kneel, and rested her hands on his big thighs. “Maybe you’re hiding it from me.”

  Ethan loved how playful she was. “Not really possible.”

  She glanced down at the thick bulge in his pants. “Oh, I get it. You put it in your pants.” She slowly unbuckled his belt, unbuttoned and unzipped him, and reached inside his briefs as if searching for something.

  Ethan inhaled sharply as her soft, cool fingers curled around his shaft. “Do you like it?”

  “I’m not sure what it is.” Jessa pursed her lips. “It feels very big.” She eased his cock out of his briefs and pretended to study it. “It looks a little painful, too.” She brushed her lips across the straining bulb of his cockhead. “There, does that feel better?”

  “A little,” Ethan said, his voice rough. “But I think it needs more.”

  “More of this?” Before he could answer Jessa parted her lips over him and enveloped his tip with her warm, wet mouth.

  “Oh, yeah.” Ethan pushed his fingers into her hair as she sucked on him, and sighed when she took her mouth away again. “Don’t stop now, darling.”

  Jessa pushed him so that he was flat on his back, and then stripped off her jeans before she straddled him in reverse. Looking at her bare buttocks as he felt her mouth on his cock made Ethan utter a deep groan before he clamped his hands on her thighs and spread them.

  “You’re all wet down here, girl,” he breathed as he stroked the pretty place between her thighs. “I think I’d better do something about that.”

  Now it was her turn to moan as Ethan covered her sex with his mouth, and licked at her sweet, damp folds. He felt her shudder as he pushed his tongue into the soft ellipse of her pussy. Jessa sucked his cock deeper, and he showed her his appreciation by slowly laving her hard, pulsing little pearl.