Until There Was You (Coming Home, #2)

by Jessica Scott

  Her body was soft where she brushed against him. He could have crushed her to him, but he didn’t. Conscious of her earlier panic, he skimmed his hands up her arms to cradle her shoulders gently between his palms. When she shifted and sighed against him, when her fingers curled into his chest, only then did Evan dare slide one hand into the soft mass of her hair and angle her mouth so he could take all of her.

  Need, raw and powerful, slammed into him, overpowering the cold control he’d maintained from years of practice. Nothing, not even the first time he’d kissed her, had ever struck him with such naked force. Need made him want to wrap her in his arms and drag her into the crisp, cool darkness.

  Her gasp collided with his a moment before he traced the seam of her mouth with his tongue. Her skin was slick and hot beneath his touch, her mouth offering a warm, wet feast of texture and taste. He drank from her, taking everything she had to give. It was a gentle, unending battle for supremacy that neither of them could hope to win.

  * * *

  Claire was not prepared for the strength of her reaction to Evan’s sensual assault. She raised her hands to block him, but instead her palms collided with the soft, warm cotton beneath his steel-grey jacket. She almost smiled, but that would have required that she do something other than hold on for dear life.

  She didn’t want this. Not with him. Not with anyone. Sooner or later, everyone let her down. Years at war had only reinforced the lessons she’d learned far too young. But with Evan, every stolen look dragged her closer to the edge of the abyss. And kissing him was a dangerous gamble, threatening far more than casual, mindless sex.

  Because what Evan offered was the promise of something so rare, so fleeting, she was certain that the moment she allowed herself to crave it, he would vanish. Or worse, let her down.

  Right now, none of those things mattered as she lost herself in Evan’s taste. Her palms ached to touch his bare skin, to feel the raw power of his body beneath her touch.

  This was a bad idea. A disaster.

  And Claire no longer cared.

  * * *

  Evan was lost in her. Her tongue danced with his, smooth strokes that mimicked the movement he craved with her body. His hunger built until he was aching and hard, desire lashing inside him like a war drum. Touching her, molding her feminine strength with his palms, was by far the stupidest thing he’d done in a long, long time. The temptation to strip bare her defenses along with her body demanded relief. He had no ability to resist this woman. She was a rare, fierce creature, one that yielded beneath the onslaught of his mouth even as she held her own against his desire.

  What had begun as a reaction to something powerful was now sweet torment, a relentless downpour of ragged desire that branded them both. Arousal ripped through him, a pure, unadulterated lust. Where this woman was concerned, there was no restraint. No half measures.

  For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what it was about this woman that drove him to distraction. But as he pressed against her, he wished with everything he was that they were alone and naked where he could do this right.

  He cradled her cheek in his palm as he eased back, nibbling on her bottom lip. He didn’t want to give up the taste of her but he wasn’t an idiot. Even if he managed to get her to bed tonight, they had to work together for the next few weeks. Kissing her might be the sweetest mistake, but taking her to bed would be worse. It would ruin the only chance Evan had ever had at getting to know this fierce, vibrant woman who hid so much vulnerability behind a warrior’s façade.

  And he wasn’t willing to give that up.

  * * *

  Claire stood in the warmth of Evan’s embrace, unwilling and unable to pull away. “Who are you and what have you done with Captain America?” she whispered.

  “I’m not Captain America.” An awkward, familiar hush settled over them like a shroud. She smiled.

  “Thank you,” she said quietly, holding his gaze. “For helping me look after Reza tonight.”

  “Did he really pass out while he was walking?”

  Claire swallowed and eased a little more space between them. “He tripped.”

  The lingering warmth between them cooled a little bit more.

  “Why are you making excuses for him? He’s so drunk he couldn’t even keep himself upright.”

  “He had a few too many tonight. So what? It happens.” A harsh memory rose inside her, squeezing her heart and pressing against her lungs. She’d had this argument before, when she was too young to fight her way out of it. “Besides, I’m fine. Nothing wounded but my pride.”

  Even pushed out an exasperated sigh. “You’ve got to be kidding me. You’re really defending him?”

  “I’d take a bullet for that man,” she said, pulling clear of his personal space, the silence between them a familiar cold. “Putting him to bed after he’s had a few too many drinks is nothing.”

  “Wow, that’s a hell of a lot of loyalty you’ve got going on there, Claire.”

  She bristled at his tone. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means you’re an officer. You’re not supposed to be that close to an enlisted soldier. Your relationship crosses a lot of barriers.”

  “Don’t you dare.” Her voice was hushed. “Don’t you dare stand there and tell me that to be an officer, I have to turn my back on someone who has been family to me since the day I joined the army. You might be a shiny army brass, but you don’t know jack shit about loyalty.” She never raised her voice. She simply turned and walked away and left him standing in the hallway, refusing to be judged by him for a moment longer.

  Chapter Four

  The next morning, Claire woke up with the sheets twisted and soaked around her body, her blood slamming through her veins in the aftermath of a powerful fantasy featuring her own personal superhero. Her own body was betraying her over Captain America. Damn it. She didn’t need someone like Evan distracting her.

  Dawn was still at least two hours away but Claire knew she wouldn’t get back to sleep, so she headed down to the gym to work off some serious sexual frustration.

  On the padded mats normally used for combatives, the army’s version of mixed martial arts, she raised her arms over her head, focusing on the feel of the warm material beneath her feet. She let her concentration glide through the ether, attempting to release the tension in her shoulders as the noise from the other rooms in the gym echoed against the edge of her skull. Nothing drowned out the incessant ache between her thighs that had tormented her since last night.

  Physical activity normally left in its wake a sort of calming buzz, but this morning she was anything but calm and centered after her workout. A mix of endorphins and spent energy pulsed through her veins, slamming through her and keeping her edgy. She shivered violently, as arousal and vulnerability mixed in her blood.

  What was it Gunny Highway always said in the movie Heartbreak Ridge? Improvise, adapt, and overcome?

  Yeah, Claire was an expert at improvising new and exciting ways out of complicated relationships. Especially when it came to avoiding intimacy in her life. And Evan had only complicated things more when he’d kissed her.

  She’d kissed Evan Loehr. Again. The army’s poster child for the perfect soldier. He was all-American West Point while she was a working-class mustang, an officer who’d come up through the ranks. Evan judged her for cherishing the first real friend she’d made, not just in the army but in life, more than the rank on her chest. A man like Evan didn’t kiss a woman like her.

  And yet, he’d been the one to cross the boundaries between them. He’d been the one who leaned in and brushed his lips against hers, who’d kissed her like his life depended on it. And she’d been all for it. Her hormones had stood up and taken notice and practically shouted hooray for penis.

  Good thing her brain had veto power over her hormones. As a former enlisted officer and a soldier herself, she’d never fit into Evan Loehr’s polished world of chic officer’s wives and monthly teas with the ladies
. So why the hell had she crossed that line and tasted the luxurious sin of forbidden fruit? The first time she’d kissed him, she’d been trying to win a bet with herself, wondering whether he’d really stay stiff and rigid or relax. Now? Now she’d crossed the line into stupid. Was she just into self-torture? Was that it? She reached her arms over her head again, hoping to banish the chaos churning in her belly.

  Who was she kidding? She’d kissed him back, the sharp bite of human contact a potent compulsion. She could not remember a time when a man’s kiss had rocked her world so completely. No wonder she’d woken up aroused and frustrated this morning. Her body ached. And it wasn’t just yearning for some random male.

  No. She wanted Evan. And that simply was not allowed to happen. He’d gone too far. They both had.

  She couldn’t sleep with Evan. Even if they weren’t on the same team, she couldn’t face that kind of scrutiny. The idea that the soldiers around her would see her as a woman first and a soldier second burned in her belly. She always, always chose the mission first.

  She fell to her knees and slammed her palm against the mat, still unable to concentrate. She lowered her head onto her forearms, giving up on the tai chi and transitioning to yoga as she moved into child’s pose, seeking an elusive quiet inside her.

  She’d made a mistake last night—and while she couldn’t erase it, she could certainly learn from it. She had to push away the memory of his touch and focus on work. She’d been doing it for years, ignoring the aching loneliness that sometimes crept up on her. She’d settled for being one of the guys, on trying to be a good soldier, ignoring the emptiness of her life.

  A poignant regret slipped in and took hold, whispering that she was walking away from something good. Something powerful and seductive. There was more to Evan than she’d ever imagined. Still, she shoved away the memory of Evan’s taste and touch and focused her energy on the one thing that mattered: getting Sarah and her team ready to deploy.

  There was no time for self-pity.

  She was a soldier, damn it. And that meant lacing up her boots and accomplishing the mission. Because that’s what good soldiers did.

  * * *

  Her lips were parted just a hint. A whisper of space, teasing him with thoughts of that warm, wet mouth. A mouth that for once wasn’t cursing or ripping someone’s head off.

  A mouth that Evan was finally able to admit fascinated him.

  Arousal spiked through his veins and whipped his blood to a frenzy as he spanned the distance between them and pressed his lips to hers. Claire’s taste encircled him, ensnared him and urged him deeper.

  She did not simply open her mouth and let him kiss her. Not Claire. Never Claire. They sparred, their tongues twisting and twining and sliding against each other in a battle for more than victory.

  Claire rubbed her hips against his and he felt himself stepping backwards. “Take your pants off,” she said, her voice husky.

  He threaded one hand in her braided hair and kissed her, hard and fierce. “I feel so cheap. You won’t even offer to cuddle afterwards?” Where the hell had that come from? It was a playfulness that Evan had not allowed himself in … years. And then she slid down the length of his body, her nails scraping against his sides and … digging into his forearms until they drew blood.

  The screech of tires against asphalt ripped through the darkness. The stench of burning oil seared his nose. He tried to open his eyes. Casey. Where was she? Where was his sister?

  * * *

  Evan bolted awake, arousal wrestling with absolute grief. Grief won, crushing the lingering power of the dream beneath its heel, leaving only a sad emptiness inside him. He sat up, breathing deeply until his heart rate slowed and his mind no longer sped along that dark curving road.

  He glanced at the phone on the bed stand. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d called his parents. Months? Had it been before he’d deployed? The phone calls never lasted long and he always ended up filled with more regret and bitterness.

  It was easier not to call.

  He pushed himself out of bed before the familiar melancholy dragged him under. He’d learned a long time ago that wallowing only produced more wallowing, so he pulled on workout clothes and headed downstairs to the gym, offering a silent thank-you prayer to the budget people who’d screwed up and sent them to the lodge instead of the barracks on main post Fort Carson.

  He should have gotten some coffee before he’d headed to the gym, but it was too late now. He glanced inside the racquetball courts as he walked past, then stopped and backed up. The nightmare, the grief and the aching loneliness fell away as he stood and watched Claire writhe and twist in a graceful dance of hands and feet.

  She moved in a way that was elegant and confident and sharply arousing. There was no hint of the trembling fear he’d seen last night. No trace of the wounded woman who’d leaned against him as she’d reined her panic back under control.

  He lost himself in the mesmerizing dance of her body with the air, remembering with poignant clarity the way that body had molded to his. Funny, he’d never thought of her as controlled before but watching her now, knowing the panic that lay dormant within her, he realized she had much more control than he’d ever given her credit for. Her body was fluid, her arms and legs stretching and twisting in a graceful dance. It was such a far cry from how he was used to seeing her, he almost doubted what he saw. Her brow furrowed as she twisted into a new pose, as though she were battling demons only she could see.

  Except that now he’d caught a glimpse of those demons.

  Her trim, athletic frame belied the strength she kept concealed beneath uniforms that were too big. He wondered if she knew how much the physical fitness uniform T-shirt she wore accented the swell of her breasts.

  Claire opened her eyes. One moment she was moving, fluid and graceful. The next, she’d frozen, her eyes colliding with Evan’s in the mirror. Arousal slammed into him hard and fierce as she shifted and slouched, in effect shielding herself from his gaze. In that instant, he realized that she hid herself on purpose.

  She’d put away anything that was soft and feminine and oh so vulnerable when they’d been downrange, and she was doing the same thing here at Fort Carson.

  Claire Montoya was afraid to face the world without the rank on her chest.

  He didn’t move for a long moment as he wrestled with the fractured emotions raging out of his tight control. Claire had always known which buttons to push with him—the perfect ways to drive him crazy with frustration. Now? Now there was more between them. Something they shared beyond the scars they both carried from combat.

  He cleared his throat roughly, trying to push past the block of thick arousal gripping him. When he finally spoke, he chose the most innocuous words possible.

  “Good morning.”

  * * *

  “Good morning,” Claire said, her light words belying the powerful crush of energy that had pulsed through her veins the moment he stepped into the room. His cheeks cut sharply against the shadows beneath his dark, dark eyes.

  He hadn’t slept well and she wondered why. She couldn’t see the almighty Evan Loehr succumbing to nightmares. That would be too common of him. But she wondered if he dreamed. And in those dreams, did he let himself go or did he retain the tight control she saw now, pulsing through his clenched jaw and the tight muscles in his neck?

  The hard contours of his chest stood out in stark relief against the grey cotton T-shirt. She smiled faintly. He wore his dog tags even in civilian clothes to work out. Always a soldier.

  She pulled her rampant thoughts roughly in line, then dug her nails into her palms to keep herself grounded in the moment. A deep, primitive hunger clawed at her and made her want what she could not have. “So, ah, about last night …” Claire really didn’t have the words to put what she needed to say into anything resembling coherent conversation. Too bad her brain was somewhere between her thighs at the moment.

  He said nothing for the longest time. Then he
exhaled sharply. “There’s a storm coming in tomorrow.”

  That was it? A kiss that rocked her entire way of looking at Evan Loehr and he wanted to talk about a snowstorm. Wow, how was that for a confidence boost? She narrowed her eyes. He wanted to avoid the subject. Fine. She damn sure wasn’t about to beg him to talk about it.

  “I just got off the phone with the brigade ops officer. Colonel Danvers is talking about cancelling training because of the snowstorm.”

  Claire swore beneath her breath, pissed about Evan’s brush-off and fully irritated at the thought of the snowstorm interrupting the training timeline. “Damn it, first we waste half a day with that stupid bonfire. Now a storm? Are we ever going to get any training done?”

  “If the roads are too dangerous, they need to shut them down. Otherwise, people do stupid things like try to drive on them.” He shrugged and a shadow crossed his face, a hint of old memories. Something in his eyes pulled at her and she stomped it down, uncomfortable with the direction of her thoughts. This. This was why she didn’t fool around with people she worked with.

  “Yeah, well, there’s such a thing as being too risk averse. We’re not getting anything done.”

  “I can’t believe you’re complaining about this,” he snapped. “You can’t control the weather, Claire.”

  Her mouth worked but nothing came out for a long moment. This was an old, familiar path between them. The tension of that awkward-as-hell kiss was gone, melted into the floor like a pool of melted snow. “Really? Well, on the bright side, if they close the post, maybe they’ll cut out a day of death by PowerPoint and we can get out to the range and start blowing things up instead of just talking about blowing things up.”

  Anger flashed across Evan’s face. “You honestly think they’re going to cancel the briefings? If anything, they’ll tack on extra hours to each day to fit them in.”