Nightfire: A Protectors Novel: Marine Force Recon

  And knives. He loved knives. He had a black titanium SOG Aegis, a Zaccara bowie, a Garrison Fighting Knife, a Gerber Fast, a Balisong and a kerambit.

  So if the zombie apocalypse ever came? Mike was so prepared.

  Chloe stood on the threshold of his door, looking at the ground. In these past six months in which Mike had been her shadow, she’d been in his place exactly twice, for two minutes each time. That was probably because there wasn’t much there.

  He’d lived here almost five years and it wasn’t as welcoming as Chloe’s place a week after she moved into her apartment.

  His place was an upscale bachelor pad with a place to sleep, a place to eat and a place to watch TV. That was it. In six months Chloe had made her small apartment up on the same floor as Harry’s apartment a little haven, the kind of place where you heaved a sigh of pleasure just as soon as you crossed the threshold. Everything there was soft and colorful and smelled great.

  Maybe with Mike’s place you could heave a sigh of relief that you’d be safe against just about anything except an RPG launched from a boat on the ocean, but no points for softness or color coordination or even nice smells.

  His Moldovan cleaning lady was a big believer in zapping germs with Lysol. No wimpy lemon polish for her. His place had no germs. They’d be too terrified of Alina to thrive.

  No warmth, either.

  Once the door closed behind them, Chloe looked around carefully, as if she’d never seen the place before. Just as carefully not looking at him.

  Mike should offer her . . . something. What? He had plenty of beer and chips. Full array of liquor, including every whiskey known to man. Frozen fries and pizza. Frozen steaks. Nachos and cheese. Some chorizo.

  Christ. No milk or tea. Come to think of it, no vegetables or fruit or even bread and jam, either. Nothing that could even remotely be considered comfort food or drink.

  What was there for Chloe here? Nothing.

  They looked at each other, then looked away.

  Man, this was so not how Mike had planned it. Because plenty of nights, awake, with a massive hard-on and nowhere to go with it, he came up with a lot of different scenarios.

  First, of course, he had to somehow get Harry to lift the Curse. He had no idea how that could work so in his daydreams and even night dreams, it just happened, like magic. Whoosh, curse gone.

  Then, he’d charm her.

  Except Mike had no fucking charm in him at all.

  His daydreams didn’t go very far. Usually, he skipped the entire beginning with the complicated negotiations with Harry and just shot straight to imagining Chloe naked in his bed. That was always his starting point.

  Now there was a real starting point and words just died in this throat.

  “I’d, ah, offer tea, except I don’t have any.”

  That made Chloe smile. Jesus, he liked seeing her smile. Her face just glowed, even when it was a small smile, like now.

  She rummaged in one of the side pockets of the suitcase and came up with a number of small packets. “Well, I must have sensed that, because I took along a selection of teas from my flat.”

  She might be looking lost, but man, she also looked so fucking beautiful. Worn and weary, with a bandage on her arm, all her makeup worn off, she outshone any woman Mike had ever set eyes on, including Nicole, which was saying a lot.

  There was just something so . . . so golden about her. The soft gold hair, the gold eyes, that beautiful pale skin now suntanned the lightest of golds. She simply stood there, looking at him, taking her cue from him. And he was just standing there, staring at her.

  Willing his hard-on down.

  Okay. Well, hard as it was to understand and hard as it was to do, Mike was going to go against every single instinct he had and be a perfect gentleman. Harry might have tacitly lifted the Curse on touching Chloe, but the fact was she’d been through violence and had been sexually assaulted.

  Jesus, every time he thought of that he wanted to go to the morgue and revive the guy he’d killed and whack him all over again. Then go to SDPD where the other fucker was, and whack him, too.

  He was used to violence. He thrived on violence. You could say he was a violence expert, always had been, as of five minutes after his family was slaughtered. He’d made it his life’s work to understand it and to master it.

  Violence was a language, the only language bad guys understood, and Mike was really fluent in it.

  But the kind of violence Mike believed in had a purpose. To protect people like Chloe, who weren’t supposed to be touched by it.

  And yet, Chloe had been touched by it all her life.

  He’d trained since boyhood for violence and he still couldn’t wrap his head around it. How Chloe’s mom’s boyfriend could take a little girl, break her arm and slam her violently against the wall. How her adoptive father could break that same arm and want to rape her. And how those two Russian fuckers could try to rape her and then throw her across a room.

  How could men do that? How could any man do that to Chloe? Just look at her, he thought, standing quietly in the room, sad-eyed and nervous, unspeakably beautiful, a spirit so gentle you instantly felt better the minute you saw her.

  Everyone felt better when she was around. Gracie and Merry, with the sure animal instinct of the very young, gravitated to Chloe like plants to sunshine. Everyone loved her.

  Including him.

  Jesus.

  He rubbed his chest.

  Get this back on the ground, you understand. Get her into your bed.

  But instead of one of his usual smooth lines, what came out was . . . “So, you want some of that tea you brought?”

  She was looking more and more lost. “Yes. Please.”

  He didn’t move. Neither did she.

  Something had happened to Mike’s brain. It had ground itself into a new gear he didn’t recognize.

  Over the years, he’d perfected his seduction patter. He had whole bits of dialogue memorized, little logic trees he followed like a bot. If she said this, he said that. But if she said that, then he’d say this.

  He also had it timed perfectly, and within half an hour, tops, he could get any woman he wanted naked and into his bed. Or hers. Actually he preferred hers, so he could leave as soon as it was over.

  Often it took only a few minutes to close the sale. It was all so familiar it had worn a huge groove in his brain, so he didn’t have to actually think about anything.

  Put the mechanism into gear and it rolled along all by itself, while he was thinking of where to leave his clothes and where was the exit, for after.

  None of this was any help with Chloe. There was no script here, none at all, because, well . . . because this was Chloe.

  Mike knew he should be heading for the kitchen because she wanted—what did she want? He couldn’t remember. Didn’t make any difference, because he didn’t want to leave a room she was in.

  Say something.

  “And, uh. We’ll get you settled in my room. Just dump my stuff out of the drawers and there’s plenty of room in the closet. Towels and . . . ah, stuff are . . .”

  Fuck. Where did he keep his towels? The cleaning lady took them away from the bathroom, did something with them, and brought them back to the bathroom. He never saw any of it.

  “In the closet in the hallway,” Chloe finished for him. “That’s where Alina keeps them.”

  Oh. Okay.

  Mike felt awful. Awkward. Hands and feet and tongue too big. He couldn’t move, could barely speak.

  “So . . . I guess I’ll just bunk down on the sofa. No problem. I’ve slept on a lot worse, believe me.”

  Chloe took a step toward him, then stopped. Her eyes searched his, looking for something. “Is that what you want, Mike?” Her voice was low, barely above a whisper. “To sleep on the couch?”

  Hell no!

  The words were on his tongue, the tongue that wasn’t working. He opened his hands helplessly, unable to speak.

  Chloe took another st
ep forward, and another. She was so close he could smell her now. Seeing her like this, so beautiful and soft and golden, feeling her body heat, smelling her . . . it was sensory overload. He couldn’t take it and closed his eyes.

  A gentle hand landed on his shoulder. “Mike? You didn’t answer my question. Do you want to sleep on the couch?”

  Mike’s eyes popped open to find her face so close to his he could see each individual eyelash. The question wasn’t teasing. She wasn’t being coy or playing games. It wasn’t an idle question. She was dead serious.

  She really wanted to know whether he’d rather sleep on his couch than—God!—with her. How could she wonder about that?

  And then something strange happened. Mike drifted outside himself for the first time in his life. He wasn’t looking at a situation entirely from his point of view.

  Mike saw Chloe, really saw her, looking past himself. Saw how scared she was, how brave she was. Saw what she felt for him right there in her eyes. Saw that whatever his answer, she’d accept it.

  Pale, bruised, Chloe was asking whether he wanted her. And even as he looked, he could see her bracing herself for rejection.

  “No.” The word came out raw, rough, as if he hadn’t spoken in days. “No, I don’t want to sleep on the damned couch.”

  Mike reached out a hand, looked at the bandage on her arm, stopped himself. His arm dropped back to his side. “You’re wounded.”

  Man, just the thought of hurting her . . . it made him nauseous. Mike was rough in his sex. He never really thought about it. Most times his brain just switched off and his body took over.

  When he thought about it, which wasn’t often, he realized he fucked the right kind of women, ones who got off on him, and a good thing, too, because he didn’t work too hard for their pleasure.

  In taking care of his own, they got theirs. Win-win.

  Right now, he was crazy excited, hard as a club. Muscles tight with sexual tension. This was familiar ground, this was right about the time when his mind switched off and his cock took over.

  But . . . suppose—just suppose he forgot himself and hurt Chloe’s arm, or was rough where she had bruises? It could happen, if he wasn’t paying attention. He felt slick hot bile rise up in his throat at the thought.

  The picture of Chloe in pain because of him bloomed bright and clear in his mind, cool and precise. Hearing her cry out in pain, pain he’d caused . . . oh Jesus. Fuck no. He’d rather tear out his own heart.

  Because he could. If he went with fucking-as-usual, he’d be entirely concentrated on his own dick inside Chloe, and experience told him he wouldn’t be thinking at all.

  And he could hurt her.

  “I can’t do this, Chloe,” he whispered, the words almost physically grating against his throat. “I just can’t.”

  She stepped back sharply. Her face closed up completely and now she looked like a little doll—porcelain and perfect and lifeless. Somehow she was far away from him, out of reach of his touch though she was only a foot away. She was utterly closed to him.

  “No problem,” she said smoothly. “I need a shower and then I’ll go to bed. I don’t need tea. I’ll just, um, go into the, um, bedroom. Right now.” Her voice started shaking, breaking up. She turned around fast, but not fast enough for him to miss the pain on her face, and he nearly burned up with rage at himself.

  He didn’t want to hurt her? How about right now, slick? You’re goddamned hurting her right now.

  This was a woman who’d had violence done to her three times. More than any woman should have to bear. And each goddamned time she’d been left completely alone. Including right now.

  Right now he was sending her to his room without even a hug. And why? Because he was a coward. The whole hurting her thing was true but was also bullshit of the highest order.

  He didn’t flail around while fucking. He didn’t bite or twist limbs. He could control himself enough not to physically hurt her. That was all a line of crap.

  The truth was he was scared shitless. There was nothing here he even remotely recognized as familiar, except his hard-on. And even that felt somehow different. It wasn’t a normal hard-on, the kind he had when an available woman was around. No, it was a Chloe woodie, through and through. Impossible to deal with, impossible to get rid of.

  He buzzed with crazy energy.

  He felt raw and unsure, like he was about to fall into some huge black hole, never to find his way back again. He was terrified this was going to change him in some unknown way, and instinctively, he was taking the coward’s way out by rejecting her. Never mind that Chloe was being hurt in the process, just as long as ol’ Mike’s butt was covered.

  Those fuckers had hurt her physically but Mike, man, he was a real champ because he wasn’t hurting her body, which would heal, he was hurting her heart, which wouldn’t. At the very moment she needed him, he was turning his back on her.

  And even realizing this, even knowing Chloe was heading back to his bedroom to deal with her fear and trauma on her own, as she always had, he hesitated, frozen like a statue. Unable to move forward, unable to move at all.

  Because this was a huge moment for him and his life was going to divide into two, right here, right now.

  She was disappearing into his room, and in a second it would be too late. He’d stay forever on this side of the divide, alone and hurting.

  “Chloe,” he said quietly. “Stop.”

  She stopped, back to him, head low.

  And then Mike said three words he had never said to any human being before. Three words he never thought he could say, three words he’d worked his whole life not to have to say.

  “Chloe.” His voice was hoarse, the words painful to get out. “I need you.”

  She turned around and he winced at the sight of her face. Ice white, hurting, without hope.

  If she wanted to rant at him, scream at him, she’d have every right. Mike wouldn’t have treated any woman who’d suffered violence this callously. So why was he doing this to Chloe?

  Looking deep into his heart, something he was extremely uncomfortable doing and did as little as possible, he understood why. It was because he cared too much for Chloe, but how could she know that?

  He sure as shit had never told her what he felt. Not in all these six months in which he’d been her shadow. He’d fixed things in her house, driven her around, carried in her groceries, kept her company when she babysat, made sure she did her weight reps right. All those good-guy things that cost him nothing but that meant he could be near her. Because getting up in the morning, knowing he was going to drive Chloe to RBK or to the shelter or spotting her in the condo gym three mornings a week, well, that made his day.

  Not one word about what she meant to him. Ever. Not one fucking word.

  No wonder she wasn’t expecting anything from him, not even now, when she needed him.

  She was looking at him, eyes wide, mouth open. Shocked. “What did you say?”

  He was shocked himself. The hand he held out to her trembled. A sniper’s hand that trembled. His hand never trembled, but it did now.

  He stepped over that chasm sharply dividing before and after and took her uninjured hand, brought it to his mouth. Her skin was smooth and icy cold. The cold of shock. Well, of course.

  She’d been attacked, brutally and violently. Her worst nightmare, come to life. Again.

  Mike hated to see her like this, the old Chloe, the Chloe who’d showed up at RBK on a wild quest, frightened and uncertain. She was even moving like the old Chloe, slow, hesitant, shaky.

  That old Chloe had all but disappeared these past six months, wrapped into the folds of a loving extended family, deeply loved by two little girls and with Mike—well, with Mike around a lot. If nothing else, building up her muscles.

  She walked well and fast now, laughed often, was a quiet charmer. Had been pretty before and was now extraordinarily beautiful.

  How it hurt him to see her back to the damaged woman who’d arrived in S
an Diego, hoping but not expecting to find a family.

  “How do you need me? What do you mean?” she asked finally. She was so shocked it took her a couple of beats to answer him. “I don’t understand.”

  Mike kept holding her hand, trying to warm it up. But also because it just felt so good in his. He reached up his other hand to touch her cheek. She flinched instinctively and his heart gave a huge thud in his chest.

  Men had hurt her all her life. Though Chloe knew in her head he could never hurt her, he hadn’t given her any reason to turn to him, to think of him as a refuge. She was feeling raw and alone, hunkered down into herself, surrounded by her loneliness like a force field. He wanted to break that force field down, shatter it.

  She controlled her wince and let him stroke his fingers down her cheek, run the back of his fingers down her neck. Skin so smooth, so soft, so chilled. “I need you every way there is, Chloe. I’m not good with words the way you are, so I can’t explain it, but I sure as hell can show you.”

  He stepped closer still, bent slightly, lifted her in his arms and carried her into the bedroom.

  Mike carried her into his bedroom.

  Chloe had never been carried as an adult woman. She’d been carried as a child, sick in the hospital. In all the thousands of romance novels she’d read, she always loved it when the man carried the woman somewhere. It just seemed to feed right into some primordial female lobe that was stubbornly resistant to modern notions of female equality.

  Chloe sighed at the scenes she read, never believing in a million years that something like this would ever happen to her. And yet, here she was, in a man’s strong arms, being carried somewhere. To the bedroom, actually.

  Mike carried her easily, without watching where he was going. The only thing he watched was her eyes.

  He was preternaturally strong and showed no sign whatsoever of making any kind of effort. He could just as easily have been carrying a glass of water, not a full-grown woman. And she’d even packed on fifteen pounds of pure muscle these past six months. Mike had seen to that.