Nashville SEAL: SEAL Brotherhood: Nashville SEALs (8 page)

Jameson.

She didn’t move a muscle, just let the view of him wash over her, felt her heartbeat faster. He was in repose, with one leg crossed over his other knee, left hand playing an imaginary keyboard on the arm of the overstuffed chair, his right bent at the elbow, long fingers moving slowly back and forth across his lips, his eyes calculating, searching something he saw or something inside him. She wasn’t sure he could tell she’d opened her eyes, but she deliciously stole the seconds watching him in the early morning light.

She hoped he was thinking about her, but realized he probably was considering all the information she’d given him. He’d been a gentleman last night. He never once made a gesture to slide his fingers somewhere dangerous or kiss her anywhere but on her forehead or on her cheek. But, his arms around her waist told her something else about the man. She’d been right to fall for him so hard. Not smart in the way it happened, but seeing him now and hearing his reaction last night to her story about Charlotte, she saw that her instincts had been correct. He was an honorable man, and it wasn’t his fault he hadn’t been a part of Charlotte’s life.

He was a protector. He’d been that way when they’d made love so many times over the course of those golden days. He’d been a careful lover, attentive, and she allowed herself the luxury of feeling fully consumed by him, nearly to the point of tears half the times they’d been together. The beauty and the mastery with the way he made her feel stirred healing everything hurt and incomplete in her soul. Mating with him—and that’s what it was—not making love or having sex, it was a mating ritual, a religious experience.

After he had left and went back on the road, she was seriously hoping to follow the circuit he was traveling and show up at some future venue when she found out she was pregnant. That changed everything. It changed her whole life.

There wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t think of him. As she brushed Charlotte’s angel-spun hair, braided it into tiny braids no bigger than the size of her shoelaces, when she tucked her under her arm and read a story to her, or when the little one stared up into her eyes, she saw him there. It was only a matter of time before she was old enough to ask,
where’s my daddy?

Lizzie figured she could always say he’d gone away, just like her father had, before Charlotte was old enough to remember him. That brought tears to her eyes. She was happy her father was able to meet his granddaughter before he passed. At the same time, she was sad that she would forever miss the relationship only a loving man like her father, could give Charlotte. This meeting was for her, after all. This was to give Charlotte the chance at a man in her life that she could call father, if he wanted that. But if he didn’t, well, then Lizzie would spare her that uncertainty and the pain of being unwanted.

There was no other way to do it but to show up.
Take a number
as she’d told him last night. She’d arranged for her Nashville friend to babysit Charlotte overnight. Her friend’s toddler was nearly the same age. Kendra’s husband had been killed overseas, and so the two of them spent time together, raising girls without fathers or husbands. They were good support to each other during the dark, lonely times.

She moved her legs and stretched her arms up over her head and noting when Jameson sat erect and took notice. He dropped his hand from his lips to the chair, seeming to take a minute to adjust to the sight of her again, and then stood slowly.

“You sleep okay?” he asked her.

She arched back and did another stretch. This time the sheet fell back from her white lace bra, and she quickly covered it up, returning a shy grin.

“I’ll go make some coffee,” he whispered, walking around the foot of the bed in his boxers. The tent in his shorts was hard to miss.

“Jameson, come here for a second first.”

“I’ll just be a second,” he whispered as he disappeared into the kitchenette. She listened to the water running and the gurgling sounds sending a fresh caffeine scent she loved even as a child.

He sat on the bed and handed her the ivory crockery mug filled with the brown steamy liquid. “I don’t have any cream. Sorry. Just the powdered stuff, and I remember—”

He stopped himself and gazed off through the lighted window. She had propped herself up in the bed, her knees bent, clutching the mug. With one hand, she allowed two fingers to trace down his upper arm from his shoulder to his elbow. He tilted his head to watch her touch him and then took stock of her expression. Their eyes made the connection they always had, but he didn’t act on the impulse she could see was there.

He sighed, and once again took a sip of coffee and stared out the window.

“Tell me, Jameson. I’ve had three years to get used to the day I’d see you again. And I’m just as unsure as the first time I thought about it.”

He nodded his agreement, clutching the mug in both his hands, his long tanned back barely visible in the early morning shadows. She found a way to touch his back without spilling her coffee and gained his attention.

“Thank you for being a gentleman, Jameson.”

His smile was lopsided. “Well, I appreciate that. Maybe you can tell me what we’re doing here.”

She waited until he looked her in the eyes again. “I think the room’s beginning to get warm.”

“Well, I agree with you there.”

“Should we talk or—” she smiled instead of finishing her sentence.

His attention was revved to full alert. He licked his lips, set down his coffee cup, and slid under the sheets next to her. She nearly spilled her mug. “I think you better take this,” she said as she held it out to him.

He set her coffee on the floor, so close she heard the clinking of the ceramic. He climbed on top of her body as she pulled her knees to the side, and leaning on his elbows, let his fingers lace through her hair. One thumb dragged along her lower lip. With complete focus, he inserted his thumb into her mouth. His chest rose with his inhale, just before he bent down, his thumbs caressing her cheeks on both sides as he took his kiss at last. His fingers gently cradled her head. They fell into the warm intensity and familiarity of what their combined chemistry had always been, and was building again. The sights and smells of the room, the talks from last night, even her years as a single mother, all floated away. She was focused on her need for this man. It was basic, like breathing, something she’d held back and hadn’t allowed herself to own. Releasing those portions of her soul felt so good, to be lost in the arms of someone who transported her to the heavenly delights as a real woman, not a plaything. Again, her emotions got the better of her. When he came up for air and looked into her eyes, he carefully rubbed the tears away.

As if reading every breath she took, absorbing every expression on her face, he let his fingers draw down to her panties. The smell of her arousal was unmistakable, seeming to drive him wild, he urgently pulled them off her, spread her nether lips with his thumbs again, and kissed her there, sucking and biting her nub as she arched backward from the pulsating pleasure he brought her. The sight of his light brown hair between her legs sent off a warm tickling sensation, a delicate feather was lightly brushing up her spine. Her skin was warmed all over, her nipples engorged and hard, craving his touch. Her ears buzzed. Her breasts ached, bulging under the confines of the lacy undergarment. His lovemaking started slow then gained gradual speed as he rose up again and searched her face, intent on the way she bit her lip. His fingers pinched her nub and he drank from her arousal. Her moan was all for him.

He lowered his mouth again, finding her opening, laving her while her rocking pelvis performed the dance for his hot tongue he inserted deep.

Suddenly, she could take no more and pulled under his arms as if she could lift him, bringing him up on top of her, begging for his cock.

“Please, I need you inside me.”

He slipped down his boxers with ease, and her fingers clutched his muscled butt cheeks as she pulled him hard against her, eliciting a resonant moan from his massive chest, his arms bracing his shoulders. She melted beneath him as he arched against her, rocking forward and back over her lower body, spreading her knees wider, and begging for his thrusting penetration.

Briefly separating, he found a condom in the nightstand easily within reach and began to sheath himself, but she pushed his hands away and finished, squeezing his cock and letting her hand wrap around him tight. She led him to her opening, her fingers still forming a ring at the base of his stem, as he slowly eased his stiffness inside her, feeling every half inch at a time. She’d closed her eyes at the sheer power of their joining, feeling that place with her fingers as his body entered hers, getting lost in it.

He whispered in her ear, “Lizzie, look at me. I want to see how it makes you feel.”

Her muscles went into lockdown, and he groaned. “I remember this,” he whispered again. “And something else,” he said, as he kissed her ear, sucked on her earlobe, and found her bud with his other hand. Pressing it between his thumb and forefinger, he shattered her.

She began to shudder and shake, rockets going off behind her eyes, the delicate hairs under her ears washed in his long, languid kisses. When she pressed her neck to his mouth, she felt the sharpness of his teeth as he bit his way down to the tops of her shoulders. He lifted one knee up, holding the back of her thigh with one massive hand, and slipping her lower leg over his shoulder. Having better access, he slowly added his forefinger to his own girth inside her, at the same time sliding his middle finger up the end of her sex, following the trail of her engorged lips to tap her sensitive anus. He did not penetrate her there, but rubbed her moisture all around her little flower in a ring. Her internal organs pulled at him again, and she pressed his buttocks, digging her nails into his flesh and gripping hard so that his granite shaft produced the dull ache against her cervix. She held him tight as her body milked him, not allowing him to move.

He began a long moan as his hips pivoted upward, his thrusts becoming more urgent, burying himself deep inside her, each plunge deeper still, until he held himself against her vibrating walls, catching the tail end of her orgasm, and riding her body until she caught her breath and began to calm.

A thin line of sweat drained down the small of his back. His forehead was filled with beads of perspiration. She blew into his face. He closed his eyes and accepted the gift of her breath. When he opened his eyes, they stared as if into each other’s souls.

How could she had even considered not seeing this man again? She reached down, pulling the sheets up over both of them. He collapsed, still inside her, and within seconds began a deep sleep.

She didn’t want to wake him, loving the heaviness of this body as he slept against her, making it hard to breathe. The difficulty of her rising and falling chest was a labor of love. His warm body covered her completely, including one of his arms clutching the fingers of her hand out to the side. She loved that his sleeping form demanded she still be his.

Maybe that’s what she’d been afraid of. What if she’d had to say no? What if he wasn’t the man she thought of as a magical memory? What if he had transformed into some other kind of predatory creature commanding her submission?

She knew she would have resisted him. But relief flooded her body. She could trust her feelings, her yearning for him all these years. Her instincts had been spot on. And just like magic, he had brought the one most perfect and precious thing into her life, Charlotte.

It was unfair to expect too much, but in the luxury of his arms and surrounded by the scent of him making her drunk with joy, she inhaled, grabbing all she could gather, and hoped these memories, too, didn’t have to be relegated to some distant archive she’d bring out only when she couldn’t hold it back any longer.

All that she could hope for had happened. He wanted to be Charlotte’s father, accepted his paternity, as she’d hoped he would. And she hoped there would be room for her in there, too. Her mind wanted to embrace the hope they could be a family. But even if they weren’t meant to be a family, he would be Charlotte’s daddy.

And that was way more of a future than she ever thought possible. She’d take it one day at a time. Whatever happened, she’d accept it with her full heart.

‡

“W
e are going
on a field trip this evening. We will gather after evening prayers. Light refreshment will be provided, and then when we come back, we shall feast before turning in for bed. You will do an hour of study before we dine, before our field trip. Wear your western clothes, but wear the ones you’ve had washed, not the new ones.”

Assad opened the Rumi book and began reading.

‘
With the Beloved’s water of life,

No illness remains.

In the Beloved’s rose garden of union,

No thorn remains.

They say there is a window from one heart to another,

How can there be a window where no wall remains?’