Nobody's Hero (8 page)

He paused so long, she didn’t think he’d
answer. Then he laid his chin on her head, put the glider chair in
motion with his foot, and began to open up about the love of his
life.

“She was a tiny little thing. Barely five
feet tall.”

Oh, God
. Karla knew she could never
make herself petite for him no matter how hard she tried.

“Short curly hair, strawberry blond.” Adam
stroked Karla’s long, jet-black hair. Maybe she could cut her hair
short, but she’d never be able to dye it strawberry blond. She
remembered how much her hair had annoyed him when he’d had to tame
it before he could bind her hands and arms behind her back in the
gun technique he’d demonstrated at Marc’s house. That had been the
only time he’d engaged in any BDSM activity with her—so far. She
wondered if he’d ever use rope bondage on her again. She hoped
so.

“She liked to wear short skirts and had the
sexiest legs. That’s the first thing I noticed about her.”

Well, at least short skirts Karla could
manage, but she didn’t have a clue if her legs were sexy to Adam or
not. “Where did you meet her?”

“I was on a short leave after boot camp and
went home to Minneapolis to check on some…thing.”

She could feel his heartbeat accelerate
again, and he almost stopped breathing. He obviously must still be
affected by the memory of how sexy she was. The pain she felt in
her heart made Karla realize she might not be strong enough to let
him continue reminiscing about the ghostly rival for his
affections.

“I found her working as a waitress at a diner
in Saint Paul. I guess she could tell I was interested, because she
just plopped down in the booth seat next to me to take my order,
rubbing her…” He tensed and stopped the motion of the chair,
lifting his chin from her head and leaving her feeling cold. “We
were married a couple weeks later. November eighth.”

There was a long pause. Karla couldn’t bring
herself to ask about Joni anymore, but she didn’t want to end this
rare, intimate time together. She wanted to know so much about
Adam.

Adam cleared his throat. “Tell me about Ian.”
When she stopped breathing, Adam put the glider in motion again and
stroked her arm, up and down in long, slow strokes, keeping time
with the motion of the glider. “It does help to talk about
them.”

Karla had planned to talk with Cassie about
her loss of Ian when they’d gone on their annual campout. They’d
even planned a fire ritual to help her memorialize him and release
some of the pain. The anger. Unfortunately, the cougar attack had
put an end to their night on the mountain—and had almost put an end
to Adam’s life.

“Deep breaths, kitten. Now.”

The use of the nickname he’d used in the
bedroom earlier warmed her in places she wasn’t used to feeling
warm. His hand brushing lightly up and down her arm made rational
thought difficult. Knowing he didn’t mean anything sexual by it,
she pulled her thoughts back to Ian. She needed to let go of her
crushing grief. To let go of Ian. Tears filled her eyes and she
choked back a sob.

“Oh, God, Adam. I miss him so much. It hurts
more every day.”

He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her
tightly against him. “I know, baby. Just let it out. I have you.”
The gliding motion of the chair, his arms around her, his soothing
words all came together to break down her defenses. She’d tried to
be strong, especially when Adam had distanced himself from her.

“What are you thinking, kitten?”

“Why doesn’t it get any better?”

“Just takes time, hon. Give yourself time.
The first year is the worst. Lots of anniversaries to get through.
Talking helps. Tell me what he was like growing up. Your mom said
he got himself into a number of scrapes.”

“Yeah. And he was always so mean to me.” She
giggled and felt Adam grow tense. “He liked to tease me—and I was
an easy target, because he always got a rise out of me. You should
have heard what he thought of my pink hair.”

“Neon pink.” She felt Adam shake his head and
could hear the smile in his voice. “Most god-awful hair I’d ever
seen, too.”

“Yeah, well, that’s about what he said. You
two are a lot alike. I was trying to show I was my own person. He
just told me I was a freak.”

“Well, I’ve been called a freak because of
the kink I enjoy—but never for pink hair. Definitely different. You
sure drew a lot of attention with it.”

She didn’t want to remember attracting the
pimp’s attention at the bus station, but maybe her streaks of hair
color also had attracted Adam to her. Okay, maybe it wasn’t the
hair, but her plight. In her predicament, she’d roused his
protective instincts.

“I like it better this way.” He stroked her
hair and she felt a fluttering in her stomach. He liked her hair,
even if it was the total opposite of Joni’s? She smiled.

“What else did he tease you about?”

“That I liked to wear black clothes all the
time.”

“Black’s fine on you, but you looked really
nice in that red top at Marc’s house.”

Adam liked red on her? She didn’t imagine
Joni would wear red, not with strawberry blonde hair. Karla’s
heartbeat accelerated a bit. She needed to go shopping.

“How about when you were older?”

“I didn’t see much of him after he went into
the Army.” One of her greatest regrets. “We e-mailed each other a
lot while he was in the service.”

“You always were a faithful
correspondent.”

His words made her feel good, because she’d
certainly written enough letters to Adam while he was in Iraq and
afterward, too. For almost nine years, they’d written to each
other. She returned her thoughts to Ian.

“He changed after the war.”

“Most people do after serving in a war
zone.”

She wanted him to reveal something more about
himself, without seeming too obvious. “In what ways?”

“Too many to name. A big one is that some
come back Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.”

“Did you?”

His arm tightened, pressing into her back.
“Some. Nightmares mostly. It scared Joni to sleep with me at first
when I was home on my medical leave. Sometimes I’d lash out at her.
Well, not at her. Not intentionally, at least. I’d just lash out.
She just happened to be there.” He paused, lost in his memories.
“But they’re gone now.”

No, they aren’t, Adam
. She stroked his
forearm, remembering his yelling for someone to report during one
of the nightmares he’d had in the hospital. Marc must have been one
of them, because she remembered the name D’Alessio.

“Ian served two tours in Iraq during his
enlistment, then got out. But I was in college by then. We didn’t
see much of each other, because he was in Chicago and I was in New
York. Then he started traveling overseas for some kind of business.
Every now and then, he’d show up unannounced at the club or my
apartment in New York. I didn’t even know he was back in the States
the night he was…”

She couldn’t say the word, but continued in a
whisper, “I miss him so much. Oh, God, it hurts.” Karla buried her
face into the crook of his neck, breathing in a woodsy scent and
Adam.

He held her closer, stroking her hair. “I
know. It hurts like hell, hon, but it’s only been a few months. I
promise you, it’ll get easier with time. You can’t just blink and
expect it to be all better.”

Being in Adam’s arms sure made it feel
better, even if for just a little while.

Safe.

Home.

Adam could shoot himself for not getting her
to open up about Ian more over the last few months. He’d been
trying so hard to avoid her, he hadn’t been the friend she’d come
to Denver looking for when the walls of grief had started closing
in on her. He had experienced that same feeling when he decided to
retire from the Corps. The walls he’d put up to ignore his grief
started caving in right after the firefight in Fallujah. The grief
had nearly crushed him before he decided to start the club with
Marc. Damián joined in later, also needing a lifeline to hold onto.
His friends may not realize it, but they had helped him keep his
sanity when the reality of a life without Joni had finally sunk
in.

He pulled her closer and stroked her hair.
God, he loved her hair. So silky. Like her skin. She reached up to
cup his jaw, then lifted her head from his shoulder and turned his
face to meet hers.

“Kiss me, Adam.” Her breath against his mouth
set his dick to throbbing.

“Let’s not go there again. If I kiss you, I
won’t stop.” He reached up to brush a strand of hair away from her
eyes. “Hon, I care too much about you. I’d just hurt you.”

“You could never hurt me. Not intentionally.
You’re the gentlest man I know.”

The unsettling flashbacks he’d experienced
earlier had jarred him, and he pushed her away, speaking more
harshly than he’d intended. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know everything I need to know. Maybe
there are a few things you need to learn about me, too, Adam.” She
sat up straighter, but her gaze never left his. “I
am
an
adult—twenty-five.”

“Exactly half my age.”

“Don’t interrupt.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He grinned in spite of himself.
She was so damned sexy when she stood up to him. Everyone else
buckled under to his authority, but not Karla. Well, she’d kept her
distance from him the last few months, sensing his foul mood, but
since he’d awakened to find her lying in his arms in his hospital
bed, she’d let him know she wasn’t going to take any more evasive
shit from him.

Her declaring war on him tonight did nothing
but conjure up fantasies of getting her to submit to him when he
finally conquered her. He had no doubt he would conquer her,
either, if he allowed this to continue—which he had no intention of
doing. Karla was strong, but she was no match for him when he was
back in top condition.
Fuck
. Even though he didn’t want her
to submit to him, he couldn’t banish the image of Karla kneeling
before him, her long black hair covering her bare breasts, waiting
to do his bidding. His dick throbbed even more—directly against her
ass. She smiled. Damn her.

Damn him
. Having her sitting in his
lap was no better than having her in his bed. Exponentially worse.
At least the bed was king-sized and he could keep her at arm’s
length.
Yeah, like that worked for you before, dickwad.
No,
his body deep in sleep had gravitated toward hers earlier, until
he’d accosted her in her sleep.

“I know you want me, even if you try to tell
yourself you don’t.”

He looked into her sparkling blue eyes.
“You’re beautiful, Karla. Any man would be attracted to you. But
you need me to be your guardian, not your lover.”

“I
want
you to be my lover, Adam, more
than anything. I want you to teach me to be your submissive.”

“Hell, no.”

She pulled back, wrinkling her forehead. “Why
not?”

“First of all, I think you might
need
a submissive more than you need to
be
one.”

“I loved it when you tied me up. I felt
so…free. That doesn’t make sense, but that’s how I felt.”

Hell, it made perfect sense,
if
she
were a submissive. She wasn’t
.
Besides, he didn’t need to be
thinking about tying her up at the moment. The one time he’d done
so before, she’d managed to get her claws in too deep under his
skin.

“And I’ve seen some people in the club who
top one time and bottom another. Maybe I’m one of those.”

“A switch?” The thought of watching her
playing Domme with anyone at the club didn’t sit well with him
either—and no woman would ever top him. However, seeing her
dominated by anyone else caused his gut to churn. But being her Dom
wasn’t an image he would entertain either. She had no natural
interest in the lifestyle. She only wanted to get close to him
because of her damned hero worship—in spite of his doing his
damnedest to keep her away.

Except at this moment. What were they talking
about again? He noticed her full lips and realized how much he
wanted to kiss her right now. Damn it. She’d done it
again—short-circuited his brain.

“Adam?”

He returned his focus to her eyes.

“What?” he barked.

“So maybe I am a switch.”

He needed to put an end to any discussion
about bondage, discipline, domination, or submission with Karla
pretty damn quick. “You’re a singer. That’s your role in the
club—the only one you need to worry about.” Something in her eyes
told him she wasn’t planning to let the matter drop. Damned
stubborn woman. “I think we’d both better try to get some shut-eye,
or we aren’t going to function very well tomorrow.”

His hands spanned her tiny waist, before he
remembered he couldn’t lift her, so he took her hand and helped her
to her feet. Karla then held out her hand to him, but he ignored it
and stood under his own steam, even though the effort left his back
muscles sore and his legs shaking with the effort. He needed to
wean himself off “Nurse Karla” here and get his life back on an
even keel. The fleeting image of Karla wearing one of those skimpy
nurse’s outfits like the one Marc had wanted Angelina to wear for
the first costume night, right before the cougar attack, sent his
dick bobbing inside his sweats.

God, would he ever be able to get his life
back under control, given what had happened earlier tonight? Not
fucking likely.

Karla went to his side of the bed and turned
down the sheets for him.

“I think I can take it from here, hon. Thank
you for taking such good care of me.” He reached out and stroked
her cheek, until she closed her eyes and leaned her face into his
hand. He pulled his hand away quickly.

Keep your fucking hands off her, old
man
.