One Night with her Bachelor (19 page)

But she refused to come without him. Not this time. This time was for both of them, and she wanted to bring him the same release he gave her.

She reached between them and undid his belt. His body tensed for a second, but then she carefully lowered his zipper over his massive erection, reached inside his underpants and freed him.

The truck’s cab was dark, but a little light from the headlights reflected off the snow and cut through the shadows. She couldn’t see much of him, but she didn’t need light to feel how hard and hot and big he was.

“I need you, Gabriel. I need you inside me.”

He positioned himself so he nudged against her. “Talk to me. Tell me how it feels to you.”

“I feel…” But she had no words, not for this. This was… this was… “Ecstasy.”

He rubbed his thumb around her clit and her head fell back. He switched his attention to her other nipple, teasing it so badly she clasped his penis even harder. He groaned and slid his fingers inside her. “Damn it, you’re so wet. I can’t stop touching you. Put the condom on me.”

She briefly let him go so she could grab the foil packet and rip it open, but then she stared at it in confusion. She’d never actually had to use one of these things. How was she supposed to tell which way it went?

His fingers flicked against a super-sensitive spot inside her, and a shudder of pleasure ripped through her. She was going to come… she was going to—

His fingers left her, and he grabbed the condom and rolled it down his thick length. Clasping her hips, he positioned her over himself and said, “Pull your panties to the side.”

She reached down and bared herself. He nudged her lips open and, in one smooth movement, yanked her down as he thrust inside her.

Ohhhh, thank you, God.

They groaned against each other as he showed her a rhythm. He filled her till she thought she’d burst from the incredible pressure building inside her. She rode him, used him, rubbed her clit against him as he held her tight and thrust up into her. Every movement made her breasts sway, and her desire cranked up at the unbridled desire on his face as he watched her body move. She braced her palms against the truck’s ceiling and leaned back so she could ride him harder, making him curse.

“Talk to me,” he bit out.

She wanted to be naughty. She wanted to let go of all the strictures she’d placed around her life.

“Tell me what you want.”

“I want you to fuck me.” The earthy words slipped out before she knew what she was saying. They came from a place deep inside, a depth she’d never explored before because it’d frightened her. But now she felt the power stored there. Now she understood the power her body held, and she wasn’t scared of it anymore. “Now, Gabriel. Hard.”

His hands tightened almost painfully on her hips as he slammed her pelvis down on his over and over.

“Harder. Harder.”

He obliged, and the pressure inside her exploded in a burst of white heat. Her body pulsed around him, and he gave her one more hard thrust before burying his face in her shoulder and groaning against her neck as he came.

She fell against him, completely limp and mindless with fulfillment. His arm moved behind her, and suddenly the music cut out. They held each other close, their panting breaths the only noise, the only movement in the truck. She was slick where her body still clutched his, and she didn’t want to break the spell by moving away. She craved this connection. No, more than a craving. She needed it as badly as she needed oxygen.

“Thank you,” she whispered against his neck.

His arms tightened around her. “For what?”

Judging by the laziness of his voice, he felt as languid as she did. Her lips curled in a sleepy, satisfied smile. “For reminding me what it’s like to feel beautiful.”

His palm found her cheek and tipped her far enough back that their eyes met. “What does that mean?”

“Sometimes I feel like I belong to everyone except myself, but being with you makes me feel like I’m me.” She shook her head. “I don’t even know if that makes sense.”

“Yeah, I think it does. You
are
beautiful, Molly. I know you’re dealing with a lot of shit right now, but I’m glad if I can help you forget it and remember who you are.”

She snuggled against him, and he held her close. “It’s hard to remember who I am when there are times I struggle just to breathe. I’ve never been so stressed out as during these last six months. I mean, having a new baby was stressful. Going through a divorce and Greg moving out of state, leaving me with a five-year-old—
that
was stressful. Losing my parents and Scott within two years—” She fought back tears at the memories. “I’ve experienced a lot of grief, and that’s what Josh’s injury is like. I’m grieving the life he could’ve had, the life it’ll now be so difficult for him to have.”

Gabriel tensed, his voice turning rough. “He can still have a full and happy life.”

“I know he can. I
know
. But life is hard enough. I’ve always thought my most important job as his mom was to prepare him to face life’s challenges. How can I prepare him for things I’ve never experienced? For things I can’t even anticipate? So many unexpected hardships have slammed into us over the past few months that sometimes I feel like I’m at breaking point.” She shook her head, trying to dislodge the negative thoughts. “Sorry. You don’t need to hear these things. We’re here to have a good time with each other and forget reality, right?”

He stared at her for a few quiet seconds before giving her a terse nod. “Right.”

Next thing she knew, he’d gently pushed her off his lap, dealt with the condom and got out of the truck.

Instead of rounding the hood to get into the driver’s side, he walked into the clearing in front of the truck, stopped, and stared into the dark woods. He didn’t look like a man who’d just had incredibly satisfying sex. Every inch of his bearing projected frustration. He ran his hands into his hair, tugging hard. His shoulders were so stiff they looked frozen.

He had to be freezing. He wasn’t wearing his coat—just a white cotton shirt and jeans.

She grabbed her coat from behind the seat, shrugged into it and climbed out of the truck. “Gabriel, what’s going on?”

He didn’t move. Didn’t even acknowledge he’d heard her. Fear welled up inside her, and she crunched through the snow to him. Coldness seeped through her boots and made her toes numb, but she ignored it. Touching his elbow, she encouraged him to turn and face her.

His face was tight with emotion he was clearly struggling to fight off. “Go back to the truck.”

“No.”

“Molly—”

She shoved him, and he blinked as if she’d shocked him out of a trance. “No. We just shared the most intimate experience I’ve had in a long, long time. You don’t get to shut me out anymore. That’s part of the unspoken contract you made when you had sex with me. You have to talk to me. Whatever’s going on, I want to know.”

His jaw gritted and for a second he almost looked like he would walk away. But he squared his shoulders even harder and said, “Undress me.”

She drew back in surprise. “Here?”

“Yeah, here.”

“It’s freezing. You’ll—”

He gave a low, disbelieving laugh. “I’ve been in worse situations. Getting naked in the snow won’t hurt me.”

The way he said it, emphasizing
getting naked in the snow
, implied that something else would hurt him. Her jaw was already trembling from the aftermath of her orgasm, the adrenaline of the past few hours and the cold. His behavior made every one of her nerves light up in hyperawareness. Something was so, so wrong here, and she didn’t know if she should follow his orders or try to get him back into the truck.

“You want to know what’s wrong? Why I wish like hell I hadn’t touched you?”

The words ripped through her heart, leaving her with a gaping, bloody wound. “You’re being cruel.” Her voice broke. “If you have regrets, you don’t have tell me like this.”

He grabbed her hand and put it to the buttons at the neck of his shirt. “I never wanted to hurt you.
That’s
what I regret, Molly. That’s what I’ve been trying to avoid. But you won’t understand until you undress me.”

Her half-numb fingers fumbled as she slipped open each button. When she reached the end, she shoved the shirt off his shoulders and pushed the white T-shirt he wore beneath it up to his neck. He stripped it the rest of the way off, standing in the snow in just his unbuttoned jeans and boots.

“I saw Scott’s helicopter get shot out of the sky.” His voice was rough, thick as if he were choking on it. “We always flew out in two choppers, in case something happened to one. His was flying in front of mine. Its tail boom was shot off. It crashed.”

Tears burned her eyes. She pressed her palm against her lips to force herself to stay silent. He never broke his gaze away from hers. She could see the memories haunting his eyes.

“We landed as close as we could and scrambled to rescue Scott and the others. He was alive. Badly hurt, but alive.”

“Oh God.” She’d never had an eyewitness account of her brother’s death. She’d always prayed he’d died so quickly he’d had no idea what was going on—laughing with his buddies as they flew through the air, then nothing but heaven. Her throat swelled and she couldn’t control the tremors in her jaw. But she couldn’t tell him to stop. She needed to know as badly as he needed to tell her.

“My jeans.”

Her fingers shook as she hooked them in his waistband.

“We knew we had to get out of there quickly. We had to get everyone back in our chopper. I grabbed Scott, lifted him in my arms and started running. All of a sudden, it felt like my whole world exploded in agony. Take off my jeans, Molly.”

She pushed down. They caught around his thighs, but his hard gaze silently commanded her to keep pushing. She did, and she gasped when they landed around his ankles.

No—his
ankle
. Because below his left knee, only a thin metal prosthetic went down to his boot.

“I stepped on an IED.”

She pressed her hand to her mouth, tears running hot down her cheeks. “
Gabriel
. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because of that look.”

She shook her head. “What look?”

“The one you’re wearing right now. That look of grief. Heartbreak. Shock.” His voice caught. “That look of pity.”

She tried to swallow all her emotions, but they formed an excruciating ball in her stomach. He’d just nailed every single thing she was feeling. “I can’t help it. You… you…” The thoughts jumbled in her head, and she didn’t even know where to begin. “You’ve gone through all this on your own?”

“My mom and Camila know.”

Why couldn’t you tell me, too?
She understood the need to feel in control of one’s own decisions when everything else spun out of control. But the fact he’d gone so far out of his way to help her while holding this part of himself back… it screamed of his lack of trust. It betrayed the fact he saw her as someone in need of rescuing instead of as an equal, someone capable of giving him the support he needed. “If anyone had a chance of sympathizing, don’t you think it would be me?”

His face contorted with anger. “I don’t want your goddamn
sympathy
. I don’t want you to feel bad for me. I want you to look at me the way you’ve looked at me up till now—like being with me takes you away from all the grief and disappointment instead of reminding you of it. I want you to look at me like I’m a man you want to be with, not one you feel sorry for.”

“I didn’t feel sorry for you till you said that.” She shoved her hands into her coat pockets and struggled to control her frustration. “Every time my life skidded off-kilter, Scott would grab my shoulders, give me a ferocious look, and say, ‘Never quit.’ He said it when Greg left me and Josh. He said it at our mom’s funeral and then at our dad’s. When I buried Scott next to them, I decided I would save up and have it engraved on his headstone. I know the saying was drilled into him during pararescue training, so it must’ve been drilled into you too. You’ve been trained to be big and tough and invulnerable, but let me give you a lesson I’ve learned recently. Asking for help is not quitting. Some problems are too big to take care of on your own, Gabriel. And then the bravest thing you can do is accept help from other people.”

His face didn’t even register that she had spoken. He’d blocked her out and escaped into a world she couldn’t touch. Pulling up his jeans and buttoning them, he said, “I should get you home. I have a long hike back to my cabin.”

Finished.
The conversation—everything. His tone of voice left no room for anything more. She buried her chin in her coat and trudged back to the truck.

By the time he climbed into the driver’s side, the temperature felt as if it had dropped several degrees. The heater couldn’t cut through the chill in the air. Agonized silence filled the truck’s cab as they drove back to Marietta. Heartache clenched her chest, making it difficult to breathe. He sat right next to her, but he was gone and she had no idea where.

When he pulled into her driveway, he didn’t turn off the ignition, a subtle sign he only planned to drop her off instead of continuing their conversation or coming inside to say goodnight to Josh.

She hated this, but she refused to be the old Molly, the one who beat herself up for other people’s feelings. The one who contorted herself to be what others wanted her to be. She’d thought she and Gabriel had started down a path where they could be honest with each other, where they could express deeper feelings and emotions.

She’d been wrong.

Readying herself to get out of the truck, she reached for the door handle but her fingers clenched into fists. She couldn’t leave without figuring out what had happened. “Did I do something to make you think you couldn’t trust me?”

“No.” His reply was flat but emphatic. She didn’t believe him, but she refused to fight. If he couldn’t talk to her, she wouldn’t bash her head against a wall of stubborn silence.

She rubbed at the worry-wrinkle already re-forming between her eyebrows. “That’s too bad. If I did, I could try to fix it.”