The Marine's Road Home

by Brenda Harlen

  Molly barked again—at him this time.

  “You’re supposed to be man’s best friend, not my conscience,” he grumbled, even as he pulled onto the gravel shoulder.

  As he did so, the owner of the stalled Jeep Renegade stepped into view, and he realized it was none other than Sky Gilmore.

  She wasn’t dressed in her usual uniform of T-shirt and jeans today. Instead she was wearing a cropped sweater with a flowy skirt and chunky-heeled ankle boots, and he couldn’t help but take notice of the long, shapely legs beneath the short hem and the sexily windblown hair that tumbled over her shoulders.

  Wishing he could have ignored the dog and his own conscience, he nevertheless pushed the door open and, with a terse command to Molly to stay, stepped out onto the gravel.

  Recognition widened Sky’s eyes even as her lips curved. “Well, hello, neighbor.”

  Her slow, sexy smile took his breath away. Every. Single. Time. That unwelcome awareness churned in his belly, spread through his veins.

  He shifted his gaze even as he took a few steps closer, to peer under the hood. “Engine trouble?” he asked.

  “No,” she admitted, a little sheepishly. “I ran out of gas.”

  “You think the gas tank is under the hood?”

  She rolled her eyes. “A lot of people will drive by a vehicle parked by the side of the road, but the hood up is a clear sign of trouble.”

  And running out of gas was a clear sign of carelessness, he thought, though he refrained from saying so aloud.

  “Your SUV doesn’t have a fuel gauge?” he asked instead.

  “Of course it does.”

  “But no visible or audible indicators that your fuel is low?”

  “Those, too,” she admitted, a hint of color staining her pale cheeks.

  “So how is it that your tank is empty?”

  “I had enough gas to get me where I was going,” she said, a little defensively. “But I had to make an unexpected detour, and then didn’t have enough to get back again.”

  “And there were no service stations wherever you went?”

  “If your only reason for stopping was to make snide comments, you can go,” she said. “I was just about to call my brother to bring me a can of gas.”

  “I can’t in good conscience leave you stranded on the side of the road,” he said, turning back to his truck.

  “I won’t be here long,” she assured him.

  “And I’m just supposed to take your word for that?”

  “You’re not supposed to do anything,” she said. “You were under no obligation to stop and you’re under no obligation to stay.”

  Whether because she recognized the word stay or just wanted to meet his new friend, Molly barked, drawing Sky’s attention.

  “Quiet, Molly,” he said.

  The surprise on Sky’s face shifted to curiosity as she turned to look toward his truck, where the retriever had her front paws curled over the edge of the lowered glass.

  “So Molly’s a dog,” she mused.

  “I never said any different,” he said, perhaps a little defensively.

  “No,” she acknowledged. “But you had to know that I’d think otherwise.”

  “I can’t control what people think,” he said, all too aware that he’d been the subject of much speculation since his arrival in town.

  “When a man mentions that a named female is waiting for him, it’s reasonable to assume he’s referring to a woman.” She offered her hand for the dog to sniff. “A girlfriend or maybe even a wife.” She rubbed the soft fur under the dog’s throat, and chuckled when Molly closed her eyes and sighed blissfully.

  “If I ever meet a woman as loyal as my dog, I might want to rush home to her,” he remarked.

  “Sounds like there’s a story there.”

  He shrugged. “Only the same sad tale that’s been told a thousand times before.”

  “Every story is unique,” Sky insisted.

  Even if that was true, Jake had no intention of sharing any details of his.

  “Would I be correct then in assuming that you don’t have a girlfriend or wife?”

  “No girlfriend or wife,” he confirmed. “But lucky for you, I do have a can of gas.”

  “Thank you,” she said, when he retrieved the gas can from the bed of his truck. “I would have called one of my brothers—or even my father, but I’m sincerely grateful that I won’t have to, because I’d never hear the end of it.”

  “No worries,” Jake said, uncapping her gas tank and inserting the nozzle. “Though I should warn you, this might not solve your problem.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Fuel injectors can fail from overheating if they’ve been allowed to go dry, so putting gas into your tank might not be enough to get your vehicle started again.”

  “Of course not,” she muttered under her breath. “Because no good deed goes unpunished.”

  The cryptic remark piqued his curiosity, but Jake didn’t ask for an explanation. Instead, he focused on his task so they could both continue on their separate ways.

  He tipped the gas can, his ears straining to identify a sound in the distance...

  A trickle of sweat snaked down his spine, between his shoulder blades.

  After six months in Afghanistan, he should be used to sweating by now. But this wasn’t his body’s futile effort to regulate its internal temperature when it was a hundred and twenty-five degrees outside. This was his body taking cues from his brain, telling him to be alert. To be ready.

  Because anyone—from the twelve-year-old boy supposedly en route to visit his grandparents in the neighboring village to the seventy-year-old grandmother on her way to the open-air market—could be friend or foe. It wasn’t just the twenty-something-year-old men with hard eyes who could be carrying weapons or wearing explosive devices.

  And anyone who let down his guard, for even a second, could end up dead.

  He focused on the sound, attempting to determine the direction of the bike’s approach. Not a bike but bikes, he realized. At least two—maybe three. He scanned the horizon, looking for the telltale cloud of sand kicked up by churning tires.

  There—he could see them now. Barely visible in the distance, but moving in their direction.

  “Am I good to go now?”

  It was Sky’s voice—the distinctly feminine and familiar cadence—more than the question that drew Jake back.

  He blinked, and the hazy, barren landscape faded away.

  Not real.

  He exhaled a long, slow breath.

  But the motorcycles were real, because he could still hear the roar of the engines, approaching fast.

  Not terrorists or insurgents, though. He didn’t have to worry about ISIS or the Taliban in northern Nevada. There was nothing to worry about here but his own overactive imagination.

  “Jake?” Sky prompted.

  “Yeah,” he finally responded to her question as he recapped the gas can. “You’re good to go.”

  She smiled then, and he felt that tug again. A distinctly sexual—and decidedly unwelcome—attraction.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  He just nodded.

  “Well—” she gave his dog one last affectionate scratch behind the ears “—it was nice to meet you, Molly.”

  The Lab dropped her chin to rest on the rolled down window as Sky turned away.

  Jake felt a bead of sweat begin to snake down his spine for real as the sound of the engines grew louder.

  Definitely more than one.

  Not terrorists or insurgents, he reminded himself.

  Probably just idiot kids racing.

  His suspicion was confirmed when the first bike came into view around the bend with two more in close pursuit. All three took the curve wide, crossing to the wrong side of the
center line, and going too fast to be able to correct their position.

  “Look out!”

  * * *

  The urgency in Jake’s tone had Sky’s head whipping around.

  She sucked in a breath as she spotted the trio of motorcycles racing toward her. She had to get out of the way, to get off the road, but her feet were frozen, unable to move, even as the bikes drew closer.

  Then Jake grabbed her arm and yanked her back, body-slamming her against the bed of his truck. The shock of the impact knocked the air out of her lungs. Her heart was racing; her head was spinning.

  The bikes had seemed to appear from out of nowhere, and if Jake hadn’t been there to warn her...

  No, he hadn’t just warned her, he’d saved her.

  Or maybe that was a little melodramatic.

  She didn’t think any of them had passed too close to the spot where she’d been standing, but he’d immediately anticipated the danger and taken action. And she’d be lying to herself if she didn’t admit that it was an incredible turn on.

  Or maybe it was the press of his hard body against hers that was responsible for waking up her hormones. Because wrapped in his arms, how could she not be aware of him? The heat of his body? The scent of his skin?

  And that awareness had her long-dormant hormones doing backflips, celebrating the fact that she wasn’t just alive but cradled in the embrace of a strong, sexy man.

  “Sky? Are you okay?” Jake loosened his hold and took half a step back, his gaze skimming over her as if assessing her for injury.

  She licked her suddenly dry lips. “Yeah.”

  “You’re shaking,” he noted, rubbing his hands gently up and down her arms.

  She nodded, because it was true. From the top of her head to the soles of her feet, her entire body was trembling. Not with fear, as he suspected, but with awareness and arousal.

  “I’m okay,” she said again.

  While her brain warned her to push him away, her body was encouraging her to take a different tack. Urging her to lift herself onto her toes and press her mouth to his.

  But her knees were still feeling a little wobbly, so she settled for leaning forward and pressing her lips to the strong column of his throat.

  He jerked back, swallowed.

  “Sky...”

  She heard the warning in his voice—and the wanting.

  And she saw both in the depths of those whiskey-colored eyes as they met and held her own.

  “Jake,” she answered softly.

  A muscle in his jaw flexed, but he gave her no indication of anything he was thinking or feeling. No hint of anything at all before he said, “I knew you were going to be trouble the first minute I saw you.”

  But even those words were hardly more than a whisper from his lips before they captured hers.

  Chapter Four

  She’d fantasized about kissing Jake.

  Maybe not by the side of the highway, but the setting didn’t matter.

  It only mattered that he was kissing her.

  True, she didn’t know much about him, but there was something between them. It had been there from the beginning, an unexpected spark that quickly ignited a flame. From the beginning, she’d wanted him. And now that the mystery of Molly’s identity had been solved, there was no reason to deny what she wanted. What they both wanted.

  Because the way Jake was kissing her, she no longer had any doubt that he wanted her, too.

  So what if he wasn’t a great conversationalist?

  He was a great kisser.

  His tongue swept along the seam of her lips, then slipped inside when she opened for him. Willingly. Eagerly. She pressed herself against him, welcoming the deeper intimacy. Wanting more.

  As his mouth moved over hers, hot flames of desire spread through her veins, heating her body, melting her bones. She lifted her hands to his shoulders, needing something solid and steady to hold on to as the earth tilted beneath her feet and the world spun around her.

  There were probably a dozen reasons that this was a bad idea. Not the least of which was that she hardly knew anything about him. It had taken weeks for Jake to even tell her his name, but despite his reticence, he wasn’t self-absorbed. While their subsequent conversations had been brief, they’d nevertheless given her glimpses of his intelligence and humor. And though he’d only once mentioned a niece, he’d spoken of the child with affection.

  Maybe the details that she knew about him were slim, but they were enough for Sky—especially in combination with the powerful chemistry between them. And she decided that kissing Jake couldn’t possibly be a bad idea when it felt so incredibly good.

  He slid his hands beneath the hem of her sweater, then over the bare skin of her abdomen, making her shiver. His palms were wide and callused, but his touch was gentle, raising goose bumps on her flesh.

  It had been a long time since she’d had a man’s hands on her, and she gloried in the feel of Jake’s touch now. When his thumbs brushed the undersides of her breasts through the whisper-thin satin of her bra, she felt her nipples draw into tight points, begging to be noticed, touched, tasted. And she knew that she wouldn’t have protested if he’d lowered his mouth to her breast right there at the side of the road.

  Instead, he pulled his hands out from under her top and eased his lips from hers. “Car.”

  “What?” she said, resisting the urge to whimper in protest of his withdrawal.

  “Car,” he said again, as a vehicle came around the bend.

  Sky recognized the white truck and its driver before he pulled up alongside her Jeep.

  “Engine trouble?” Oscar Weston guessed. “Anything I can give you a hand with?”

  She smiled to show her appreciation for the mechanic’s offer, even as she shook her head. “Already fixed.”

  A furrow appeared between Oscar’s bushy white brows as his gaze slid from Sky to Jake, before shifting back again. “Are you sure there’s nothing I can do?”

  “I’m sure,” Sky said. “It’s all good. But thanks.”

  The man gave a slow nod, sent Jake another hard look, then continued on his way.

  “Sorry about that—about Mr. Weston, I mean,” she hastened to clarify. “Not about the kiss.”

  “You don’t have to apologize,” he said. “But maybe I should.”

  “Don’t you dare,” she said.

  He seemed taken aback by her vehement response—and maybe just a little bit amused.

  “Okay, I won’t,” he agreed.

  She nodded. “Good.”

  “So are we just going to forget it ever happened?”

  Now she shook her head. “I don’t want to forget it happened.”

  Jake’s eyes held hers for a long moment before he asked, “What do you want, Sky?”

  She replied without hesitation. “You.”

  His pupils flared even as he took a deliberate step back. “You don’t know anything about me.”

  It wasn’t just a statement but a warning, and one that she should probably heed. But for some inexplicable reason, everything she didn’t know about Jake didn’t matter as much as what she did—that she felt safe in his arms. Desirable. Desired.

  For the past few years, she’d tried so hard to be the person everyone else needed that she’d neglected her own needs. Those needs were letting themselves be heard now, loud and clear.

  “I know enough,” she told him. And then she smiled. “Including where you live.”

  He swallowed. “Be sure, Sky.”

  She answered without hesitation. “I am.”

  He gave a short nod. “I’ll follow you—just in case you have any more car trouble.”

  * * *

  Sky was trembling still as she slid behind the wheel of her car and turned her key in the ignition, mentally crossing her fingers that her fuel injecto
rs weren’t damaged and her car would start. Because now that she’d decided what was going to happen next, she was eager to get there.

  The engine coughed and sputtered...then turned over and fired.

  Exhaling a grateful sigh, she shifted into drive and headed toward the sprawling log bungalow she’d always known as the Ferguson place.

  Ross Ferguson had struggled as a cattle rancher, not because he was unwilling to do the work but because his heart wasn’t in it. He’d eventually turned his attention and talent to making furniture from reclaimed wood, creating beautiful pieces and quickly gaining a reputation for himself within the local community.

  Unfortunately, there wasn’t a lot of demand for his work or a lot of money to be made, and his wife’s ongoing battle with Cystic fibrosis meant that there were always medical bills to be paid. So Ross decided to supplement his income by leasing most of his land to the Circle G—an arrangement that was, as far as Sky knew, ongoing to this day.

  But she wasn’t thinking about Ross Ferguson’s legal arrangement with her father as she pulled into the driveway. And at another time she might have stopped to admire the flowers blooming in the beds around the perimeter of the house, perennials that had been planted by Anna Ferguson years earlier. Right now, though, she was more interested in seeing the inside of the house—especially Jake’s bedroom.

  She stepped out of her Jeep, her heart pounding with excitement and anticipation, as Jake pulled his truck into the double driveway beside her SUV.

  As soon as he opened the door, Molly scrambled out, racing over to greet Sky.

  “Yes, hello again,” she said, crouching to fuss over the dog. “I came for a visit, if that’s all right with you.”

  “Molly loves when people come to visit. She barks at anyone outside the door, but a guard dog she is not. As soon as they cross the threshold, she’s all about making friends.”

  “Are we going to be friends?” Sky asked the dog.

  Molly promptly rolled onto her back, splaying her legs to expose her belly for a rub.

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” she said, indulging the animal’s wordless request.