Page 137 of Hidden Nature

“Thanks. I’ve been working on it for a while.”

“Good job. Ah, the reasons against this still apply.”

“Do they, though?”

“We should talk about them. I like to think things through, weigh the pros and cons, rather than act on impulse, so we should talk about them. Later.”

Hands gripping his shoulders, she boosted up to wrap her legs around his waist and fuse her mouth to his.

“I know this is stupid,” she managed as he skirted around the dog and started for her bedroom.

“Odd. It feels really smart to me.”

“Stupid,” she said as she pressed her lips to his cheek, his neck. “It’s just that I haven’t done this since… for a few months. I’m probably overeager.”

“There’s no such thing. If it matters”—since the dark was deep,he slapped on the switch for the dinky overhead light in her bedroom—“I haven’t either.”

“Well, why—” She broke off when he dumped on the bed, and his body pressed hers into the mattress. “We’ll talk later.”

“Sure.”

His mouth took hers again, and his hands began to move.

Her system soaked in sensation like rain after a drought. For too long everything in her had focused on healing, on feeling whole again. This, this elemental need met was another kind of healing.

She was alive, a woman with appetites and desires who was desired in turn.

She reveled in it, and wanted more.

His weren’t the soft hands that had last touched her this way, but hard, strong, and sure. They demanded exactly what she wanted to give.

She shoved away the denim shirt, tugged up the dark tee under it. To take exactly what she wanted to take. To feel with her own hands that solid wall of chest that pressed against her, to dig them into the muscled shoulders, his back, the ripple of biceps.

And purred as she had over her new closet door.

He’d wanted her like this more than he’d admitted. Still, he’d have slowed his pace, gentled his touch, but she clearly wanted neither. So when she rolled, he went with her.

Those eyes, wicked fairy eyes now, stayed on his as she unhooked her utility belt.

“Not smart, not smart,” she said, but let it drop on the floor.

But when she started to tug off her tie, he pushed up to do it himself.

“The uniform kills me. Makes no sense, but it kills me. Let’s see what happens when I get you out of it.”

He made quick work of the tie, then the shirt. Then his gaze focused on the scar inches from her heart.

In the dim light, it struck him as surprisingly round, still pink around the edges. A vicious souvenir of violence.

When she started to lift a hand to cover it, he closed his hand overhers, looked back into her eyes. Because he saw distress, he followed instinct and laid a hand over the wound and her heart as he brought his lips back to hers.

This time tenderly.

She trembled, started to pull away.

“I’m not fragile.”

“No, you’re sure as hell not.” Keeping her close, he flipped open the hook of her bra. “And so far, even out of uniform, you just kill me.”

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