Her breasts were heavy and achy. And she was wet. God, Derek Pratt was making her wet. She had never, ever expected this.
“Getting laid implies a lot of shit I’m not interested in doing.” His voice was harsh yet oddly seductive. “Lying down, for one—not gonna do that. Bringing each other pleasure . . . won’t do that, either.”
A strangled laugh popped out. “No pleasure, huh? Then what’s the point?”
“Release,” he said simply. “I’ll fuck you, Sofia, hard enough that you’ll feel it for days. I’ll make you come. You’ll make me come.” His fingers slid down her throat to her collarbone, then lower, toying with the swell of her cleavage. “If you want seduction and drawn-out foreplay and someone telling you how fucking good it feels, you won’t get that from me, so feel free to ask somebody else.”
It was difficult to concentrate on what he was saying, because her brain had stopped working after the I’ll fuck you, Sofia line.
God, she wanted that. She wanted an orgasm that didn’t come from her own hand. She wanted to feel his powerful body tight to hers, his cock plunging inside her.
Her gaze lowered to the unmistakable bulge beneath the fly of his cargo pants. The sight sped up her pulse. Jesus, he was big. She wasn’t sure why that surprised her. Every other part of him was big, so why not the part she wanted now?
“What’ll it be?” His eyes remained shuttered as always. “Do you want me to fuck you, or do you want me to walk away? But you should know I’ll be walking away regardless, with or without the fucking.”
Of course he would be. He didn’t strike her as the type of man who stuck around. Who cuddled and kissed and enjoyed postcoital intimacy with his lover. This would be sex and nothing more, because that’s all a man like Derek Pratt was capable of giving a woman.
Was she insane for even considering this? For wanting it? She knew the difference between sex and love, but she required at least some intimacy from a lover. A hint of tenderness, a moment of connection. That wouldn’t happen with D, and it should bother her. It really should.
But holy hell, she wanted him. So much that her sex was throbbing painfully, clenching around emptiness, aching to clamp around him.
“Answer me, Sofia.” A command. A taunt.
She let out a wobbly breath. “I . . . want you to fuck me—”
Before the last word even left her mouth, she found herself being spun around. Her belly pressed up against the counter, and her hands instinctively flew down to brace against the hard surface.
She wanted to turn and look at him, but his solid body kept her in place. Her breathing grew labored as his big hands landed on her waist, then traveled upward, sneaking beneath the hem of her tank top. Even if she’d wanted to move, she was no longer capable of it, because his touch was distracting, hypnotic.
No gentleness in the way he tugged her shirt up and over her head. He tossed it on the hardwood floor, and then his long fingers undid the button of her jeans. There was something dangerously erotic about not being able to see him. She heard his even breathing behind her, felt the heat of his body. One callused hand splayed on her lower back while the other eased her jeans down her thighs. When the air met her bare skin, a full-body shiver rolled through her.
She heard the rustle of his clothing. He’d knelt down on the floor—his fingertips were now skimming down her legs to where the denim had snagged at her ankles. She hurriedly kicked off her boots, and when he rasped, “Lift,” she obeyed. Lifting one foot, then the other, so he could remove her jeans and panties.
Naked. She was fully naked now and he was still fully clothed, the material of his pants rubbing her bare buttocks as he stood up and ground his hips against her.
“Oh God,” she choked out.
“There’s no God, Sofia. Just the devil. Just me.”
He was right. He was the devil, doing sinful things to her body as he reached up and cupped one breast, squeezing hard enough to make her gasp. His palm brushed her nipple, which puckered in response, straining into his hand. When his fingers found that distended bud and pinched it, desire sizzled from her breast to her clit, summoning a moan from her lips.
She heard a zipper being dragged down, another rustling of fabric, then the unmistakable sound of a wrapper tearing.
He was putting on a condom.
God. She couldn’t breathe. How had things escalated so fast? They’d gone from barely exchanging ten sentences to her naked against the counter with him about to fuck her.
“You want it bad,” he remarked, and she moaned when his fingertip toyed with her opening. “Your pussy’s soaking wet.”
She was wetter than she’d ever been, in fact. She’d never felt this way before. Completely and totally dominated, and he wasn’t even inside her yet.
D’s finger slipped in an inch, then another, until it was lodged in deep. When her inner muscles squeezed around it, he made a guttural noise, and then his finger disappeared.
Sofia sagged forward in disappointment. Empty. She felt empty now. Frustration turned her hands into fists, tight to the counter. Why was he teasing her? Why—
The blunt head of his erection nudged her opening, and she realized he hadn’t been trying to tease her. He just didn’t want to waste time.
There was no tenderness, no foreplay other than that exploratory finger he’d used to test her readiness. Nothing but the sound of his breathing, her panting, and then his deep voice muttering, “Brace yourself.”
She’d barely uncurled her fists and planted her palms down when he drove inside her. So hard she gasped. So deep she saw stars.
But it didn’t hurt. Oh no, it felt . . . good. So fucking good. Her body stretched to accommodate his thick length, then clamped on tight as if to trap him inside her. Pleasure flooded her core, tingling in her fingers and buzzing in her toes. She’d never felt so full in her entire life.
He didn’t start off slow; he was merciless from the word go. Slamming into her from behind in frenzied thrusts, hitting a spot deep inside that made her pussy throb. His fingers dug into the flesh of her hips, but the tiny sting of pain only sent another jolt of pleasure up her spine. Holy hell, she was definitely going to feel him for days. His cock stretching her, his marks on her skin.
She’d never been fucked like this before. D didn’t let up his hard, relentless tempo. Didn’t give her time to adjust or breathe or move. Over and over again, deep thrusts that brought moan after moan to her lips.
It shouldn’t have felt this incredible, being manhandled this way. He was rough. He didn’t say a word. He didn’t even seem to care if she was enjoying—
Sofia moaned when he reached around her body and pressed his thumb on her clit. She was wrong. He did care if she was enjoying it. Because now he was rubbing circles over that swollen bud, slowing down his thrusts as he teased pleasure from her nerve endings.
“Oh God. Keep doing that,” she begged, shocked by the throaty pitch of her voice, the wanton need ringing there.
“You gonna come for me, Sofia?” His breath fanned over the nape of her neck. “I’ll come harder if you’re squeezing my cock.”
His wicked fingers played with her clit until she could no longer think clearly. Her vision became a blur of white dots, her body tightening with tension, pulsating with arousal, until the pressure broke apart and a blinding rush of ecstasy swept through her body.
Her surroundings faded away, the orgasm robbing her of breath. Behind her, D’s thrusts got faster again. Faster, deeper, harder . . . And then he buried himself to the hilt and went still, and she felt his chest trembling against her back as he climaxed. He didn’t make a sound, but his fingers pinched into her waist, the prick of pain mingling with the pleasure still floating inside her.
Her heart was beating uncontrollably. Her breathing was equally out of control. When D slowly withdrew from her core, she almost wept from the loss. From the emptiness.
Drawing a shaky breath, she found the courage to turn around. Expressionless eyes peere
d back at her. She wondered if he’d looked like that during the actual sex. Probably. The man didn’t advertise what he was feeling, ever, and she suspected that extended to sexual desire as well.
“I . . .” She trailed off. For the first time in her life, she had no idea what to say. She’d just come harder than she’d thought possible. Derek Pratt had done that to her, and she couldn’t wrap her head around it.
D rolled off the condom, and she got her first view of his cock. Long and imposing, still hard as a rock. He tucked it back in his pants, then walked to the sink, opened the cabinet beneath it, and tossed the condom in the little plastic wastebasket.
Without a word, he strode to the couch, reached into the front pocket of his sweatshirt, and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. He tapped the small cardboard box until one cigarette popped out, then shoved the smoke in the corner of his mouth but didn’t light it. Instead, he watched her as intently as she was watching him.
A strange wave of tension rippled through the room. Not awkwardness. Not anger. Lingering awareness.
D narrowed his eyes. “You good?”
She nodded, surprised he’d even bothered to ask about her well-being.
Nodding back, he took a step toward the front door.
“You promised to give him three hours to rest,” she called after D.
“He’ll get his rest, Sofia. We’re not leaving yet.”
No, he was just leaving her house. Leaving her.
She was more dazed than upset as she watched him walk out the door. As she heard the creak of the porch steps and the soft thud of his footsteps moving away from the house.
Her body was still on fire. Still tingling and pulsing and aching. She hadn’t expected this. Hadn’t expected to enjoy having sex with D. Hadn’t expected to want to do it again. But she did. God, she wanted to shout for him to come back and do it all over again.
But he’d gotten what he’d wanted and now he was gone, and she wasn’t even angry about it, because she’d gotten what she’d wanted, too. Except the bastard had left her wanting more, damn it. She couldn’t make sense of that. D was not a man you invited into your life or your bed, yet she’d done both tonight.
Gulping, Sofia ignored the discarded clothes on the floor and went to her bedroom, where she found an oversized T-shirt and slipped it on. Then she sat on the edge of the bed and ran a hand through her hair. Okay. She’d had sex with D. No big deal. They’d both enjoyed it, and now it was done.
With a sigh, she fell onto her back and closed her eyes, willing her body to stop tingling and her mind to quit conjuring up images of a repeat performance. It was just a onetime thing, she told her oversexed brain.
A yawn overtook her. She should probably sit up before she fell asleep, but . . . it felt so nice to lie down. She hadn’t slept last night because she’d been delivering a baby for one of the local women, and then she’d spent the entire day seeing patients and the entire night monitoring Liam Macgregor.
Crap, maybe she should sleep for a bit. Otherwise she’d be guilty of the same thing she’d accused Liam of doing: working herself to death.
She crawled up the bed and fiddled with the alarm, setting it to go off in an hour and a half. That would leave her time to check on Liam before D dragged him to that chopper.
A moment later, she was curled up on her side, fast asleep.
• • •
Sofia awoke to the deafening buzz of her alarm. Groaning, she reached over and slapped the snooze button, but the noise didn’t go away. No longer buzzing, though. It was a different kind of noise, a rhythmic rat-tat-tat echoing beyond the open bedroom window.
She shot up, cursing loudly when she realized what she was hearing.
Helicopter rotors.
D was stealing her patient ahead of schedule.
Thoroughly outraged, she flew out of the bedroom and ran to the porch, where she anxiously peered through the trees in the direction of the helipad that Morgan had insisted on building behind the clinic. Blinking red and blue lights twinkled in the dark sky as a familiar military chopper made its ascent in the darkness.
“Fucking bastard,” she muttered.
She didn’t have to go to the clinic to know that they were gone, but she did anyway, just in case the helicopter had belonged to someone else. Which was a stretch, because the only aircraft that landed here belonged either to Morgan or the relief foundation, and the latter only showed up in the mornings.
She was right—that had been Morgan’s chopper, all right. Because Liam’s bed was empty when she stormed into his room.
Laughter bubbled in her throat as she stared at the sheets, which were still stained with Liam Macgregor’s blood. Goddamn D. He’d only given her two hours instead of three.
He’d also given her the best sex of her life.
For some reason, that just made her laugh harder.
Chapter 3
Present Day
Turtle Creek, Costa Rica
“I, Ethan, take you, Juliet, to be my lawfully wedded wife . . .”
Weddings. D had no idea what the point of them was. Tax purposes, maybe? But nah, folks didn’t need a wedding for that—a marriage license and a quick ceremony at the courthouse took care of all the paperwork required for taxes.
Symbolic, then? A way to declare undying love to each other in front of an audience?
Waste of fucking time, in his opinion.
This particular wedding was taking place at night, and the bluish water in the kidney-shaped pool cast an eerie glow over the manicured lawn. Morgan’s housekeeper, Inna, had handled every detail herself—the neat rows of white wicker chairs on either side of the rose petal–strewn aisle. The tiny lights twinkling from the trees. The intricate altar she’d commissioned from one of the local carpenters.
But D was too busy pondering the reason for this circus to focus on his surroundings. He was the only person in attendance who wasn’t sitting down, but rather standing in the back, his arms folded over the front of his muscle shirt. When Ethan had begged him to wear a suit, D had laughed in the man’s face.
“I, Juliet, take you, Ethan, to be my lawfully wedded husband . . .”
The bride’s throaty voice echoed clearly and earnestly in the clearing behind the compound. Ironically, this farce couldn’t even be blamed on Juliet Mason, the thief–turned–assassin who worked for Morgan’s wife, Noelle. According to Noelle, Juliet had resisted the marriage, but Ethan Hayes was the Boy Scout of the team, and just old school enough to insist on making things official.
D swept his gaze over the very small crowd. Morgan sat in the front row with Noelle on his right, and his daughter, Cate, on his left. Isabel and Trevor had flown in from Vermont. Luke and Olivia had made the trek from Aspen with their dog, Bear, who was sitting obediently at his master’s side.
Kane and Abby’s dogs were equally calm, which meant hell must have frozen over, because the three chocolate labs were fucking menaces. They were ridiculously protective of Abby, even more so now that she was carting around a baby all the time. And, yep, the damn baby was also present for the wedding, sleeping peacefully in his father’s arms. The kid hadn’t made a peep since the ceremony had started.
Christ. How was this his life? D wanted to strangle himself for allowing it to get to this point. His résumé was extensive—he’d been an assassin, a cleanup man, a soldier, and a criminal.
And now he was a goddamn wedding guest.
Sometimes he regretted joining up with supersoldier Jim Morgan after his self-imposed retirement from Smith Group. He could have disappeared, but he was built for action, and so he’d chosen to stay in the game. Except that meant going from a solo operative to a team player, and that meant he was now surrounded by people all the fucking time. Not just his teammates, but also Noelle’s operatives, who’d not only joined professional forces with the team, but had become the wives and girlfriends of most of his men.
“You may now kiss the bride.”
The minister was beaming
like a fool as Ethan dipped his new wife and kissed the living shit out of her.
Juliet didn’t seem to mind being mauled. The tall brunette looped her arms around Ethan’s neck, her white dress fluttering around her ankles as she kissed him back.
Applause broke out. D didn’t join in. He suddenly felt a huge rush of gratitude toward Kane and Trevor, who’d married their women in private and spared everyone from attending their weddings.
As his teammates went up to congratulate the newlyweds, D eased away from the excitement. He stalked past the refreshment table, which was piled high with champagne flutes and the fancy-pants hors d’oeuvres Inna had slaved over all day.
Christ, he could go for a beer. Or a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. And a cigarette. Fuck, he needed a smoke.
His gaze landed on the stone terrace that overlooked the yard, where Liam Macgregor stood like a statue, a beer bottle in his hand and a vacant look in his eyes. The man had refused to come down for the ceremony. D wasn’t sure he blamed him. He didn’t exactly feel like celebrating himself.
He was halfway to the flagstone path that led to the terrace steps when Olivia Taylor intercepted his path.
“You didn’t congratulate them.” Her tone wasn’t chiding, but laced with disappointment. And her perceptive green eyes bored into his face, as if she were trying to tunnel her way into his mind.
He hated the way this woman looked at him. He’d met her in Manhattan a few years back, during a mission in which Luke had fallen hard and fast for the soft-spoken brunette. D, on the other hand, had been less than thrilled about her presence.
Luke’s fiancée was too damn insightful, too compassionate. She saw things that other people didn’t. And in New York . . . she’d seen him. They’d shared an awkward encounter, a hug that had left D shaken. Since then, he’d done his best to avoid Olivia whenever Luke happened to bring her to the compound, but the stubborn woman always seemed to seek him out.