Revealing Her SEAL (ASSIGNMENT: Caribbean Nights Book 4) (18 page)

Rachel fell into the reality of being Evan Silva’s lover with a rashness she hadn’t realized she possessed. The man was insatiable, cornering her in the kitchen after he got home from work so often that she learned the hard way to never, ever turn on the oven until after her third orgasm.

Then there was that time in the shower. A little soap and water apparently went a long way toward goosing Evan’s creativity, and since she had apparently forgotten the word “no,” things had gotten a little… kinky. Not that she minded but holy erotic encounter alert. She’d never done anything like this before.

At some point they had to do something besides have a lot of sex. Didn’t they? They’d never really laid out any parameters to what was happening between them other than Evan’s caveman-like possessiveness that was so cute she couldn’t help but indulge him.

After all, it wasn’t hard. No other man had interested her since the moment she’d met him.

She attributed the squirrely feeling that rode shotgun in her chest to having not heard anything about the injunction. There’d been zero contact with Jared Anderson or his lawyer. It was unsettling in a way that she didn’t especially like, leaving her at loose ends during the day with nothing to occupy her time but daydreams about the man she lived with.

That night Evan didn’t make it past the front door. He blew in all damp-haired, smelling of ocean and everything good in the world, and pinned her up against the wall before he’d scarcely cleared the threshold. His gorgeous body aligned with hers. She might never explore it fully because it always seemed to be his turn. It was heady to be his sole focus.

Evan got a little inventive, and somewhere in the middle of a blistering climax that had her seeing fireworks, he swung around and crashed into the entertainment center. It fell over with a clatter. Surfacing long enough to stare at the wreckage, she glanced at Evan, and the heat in his expression told her she’d do well to pretend that had not just happened.

Wasn’t like it was a work of art anyway.

He rolled them both to the floor so he could take her missionary-style. His favorite. Because he liked to watch her and she liked to let him.

This was when it was the best between them. She’d taken a huge leap in trusting him, content to let things ride out as they happened for the first time in her life. The way he looked at her when he was deep inside, his dark eyes so beautiful and full, well… it was her due reward for agreeing to whatever he laid out, whenever he wanted it.

Afterward she lay spent in his arms, still on the floor in a delicious spoon-style embrace a scant few feet from the sad, dead entertainment center.

“We should probably do something about that,” she said.

His lips brushed her ear and found what must have been a tasty spot because he nibbled on it. Which told her he wasn’t even looking at the entertainment center, and the wandering hand in the vicinity of her breast meant the casserole she’d pulled from the oven right before he got home would be very cold indeed before they ate it.

She playfully swatted at his fingers as he toyed with her nipple. “You already did something about
that
, Evan.”

God, would she ever get enough of him? Her body ached twenty-four seven, either because he’d done something to her that was so new, hard, or fast—or all three—she could barely walk, or because she missed him.

“Entertainment center,” she murmured as he stretched his lithe body against hers, sliding up flush with all the spots that welcomed him instantly. “The TV is probably broken too.”

Evan liked to watch old sitcoms. Sometimes she sat with him on the ancient couch, legs draped over his lap as he absently caressed her knee. The shows were silly, but it wasn’t about that, not for her. She’d hate to lose a simple pleasure because she had far too few in her life.

“Why don’t you let me buy a new TV and entertainment center,” she suggested impulsively. “It’s no problem.”

Wrong move. She recognized it instantly as he stiffened and not in a good way. Mentioning the fact that she had oodles of money and would never even notice the absence of five or ten grand wasn’t the best way to endear a man to her, especially not one she was sleeping with.

“I built that entertainment center,” he muttered. “I can fix it.”

She rolled so she could look at him, but his dark eyes were unusually flat. “You built that?”

It was kind of ugly and had listed to the right when it had still stood. Now it was a big pile of pressboard and TV wires, with maybe an ancient VCR buried in the rubble somewhere, never to be heard from again. Probably a blessing in disguise.

“I can build stuff,” he shot back.

So, clearly he had a bit of a complex about it. She smoothed a lock of his hair from his forehead, but the line between his eyes didn’t fade. “It was awesome. I’m sorry it got ruined.”

“It’s not awesome.” His scowl wasn’t directed at her but somewhere over her shoulder. “I could have done a better job. Might not have fallen apart when hit with a few hundred pounds of force.”

There was something running underneath the surface of this conversation that she couldn’t put her finger on. “So fix it. It’ll be better this time.”

“I’ll start from scratch.” His expression warmed as wheels started turning in his head. “Design it to be more stable, with more shelves.”

“You like to build things.” It wasn’t a question, and she didn’t need his nod to know she was right. That was the undercurrent—he hadn’t flipped out at her suggestion to throw money at this problem, but instead hadn’t liked that she’d maligned his carpentry skills.

The thought of Evan with a pencil clamped between his teeth, safety glasses over his eyes, and a saw in his hand put a nice little glow in her girl parts.

Which of course led to the most important question of the night. “Will you wear a tool belt?”

Judging by the glint in his eye, if he hadn’t been planning on it, he was now. “Maybe.”

Intrigued, she rested her head on his elbow, dinner thoroughly forgotten. “What else have you built?”

“Some stuff for the guys. A table for Tyna and Mary, the girls that live next door.” He shrugged, which meant he was embarrassed by the direction of the conversation. Why, she couldn’t fathom. “The dock at Ilhota Rosa.”

“Oh, yes. I recognize your work,” she said, tongue in cheek. The dock was a shaky, listing contraption that she’d always feared would end up at the bottom of the sea if she breathed on it too hard.

Instead of laughing or smacking her on the arm for being a smart ass, he shut his eyes for a beat. “I wanted to build things. Before.”

The undercurrents sped up, and she held her breath because all at once he felt just as rickety as his dock. And she regretted the smart-assery too. Even though she hadn’t known. Because he hadn’t told her. How could they have shared as much as they had, explored each other’s bodies so completely, and destroyed so many of each other’s emotional barriers in the process, yet there were still secrets buried inside him?

But
before
wasn’t at all difficult to interpret, despite a similar lack of explanation. His descent into alcoholism had cost him in more ways than one. And she ached for him, for the time he’d lost that he couldn’t get back. Yeah, he’d made his choices, and while he’d never explicitly tossed out a bunch of excuses, she had a pretty good idea that he’d started drinking after the shrapnel incident.

If so, she could hardly blame him for handling his rehab in his own way.

“Oh, honey. Obviously you still do want to build things. What’s stopping you?”

She stroked his hair and shut her mouth in case there was more. And she did want more. All the time. If he’d suddenly decided to open up because he’d broken his prized entertainment center, it was collateral damage she was willing to sacrifice.

When had she started to care so much about the things inside him that he hadn’t yet shared with her? She’d gotten more of him than anyone else had in a very long time, to hear him tell it. He was a recluse who didn’t like to be the center of attention, and she should be happy with what he’d chosen to give her.

But she couldn’t help it—ever since she’d agreed to do this “right,” she’d been searching for clues as to what that meant. Whether it was okay to let herself feel the warm rush of emotion that gathered in her chest every time she looked at Evan. Whether being intimate with a man, living with him, and learning his every nuance gave her permission to push him past his comfort zone when he needed it.

“I was going to go to college to be an architect. Joined the Navy to pay for it.” His mouth curved up briefly. “Didn’t happen. I became an alcoholic instead. And then came to work for Charlie. I owe him.”

And clearly he still had some conflicted feelings about his decisions, though she’d seen the bond Evan had with his former teammates. There was no question in her mind that he’d landed in the right place, despite letting go of his dream.

The fact that he’d mentioned it put a glow in places that the tool belt image couldn’t have touched.

“Does that bother you?” he asked out of nowhere.

“What, that you don’t have a degree and I do? Yeah, so much. I hate how we have nothing to talk about and you never understand me when I use big words.” She made a face at him and then kissed him for being so silly. “My degree is forty-seven kinds of useless. Otherwise I would have been able to find a way to send Jared Anderson packing.”

Her mood darkened. Maybe she should be asking if her educational status bothered
him
. One hundred and twenty thousand dollars’ worth of a law degree had certainly not garnered great results when it counted, now had it?

Eventually they got up off the floor, had some dinner, and spent some time picking up the pieces of the entertainment center. When they went to bed that night—together, because that’s apparently how they rolled now—she held him as he fell asleep, too keyed up to drift off herself.

The scrambled, panicky feeling in her chest wouldn’t go away. Because as she stroked a lock of hair away from Evan’s beautiful face, her heart hurt. Her degree might be useless, but her brain certainly worked well enough to put two and two together. She was falling for Evan Silva.

That was so not okay she couldn’t begin to describe how not okay it was.

She squeezed her eyes shut, but it didn’t go away. This train wreck had been in motion for far too long to stop it now. Her biggest mistake was agreeing to do this “right.” That had opened up potentials that she hadn’t properly guarded herself against.

Because she didn’t think she could stand losing something precious to her again.

How did she keep from losing then?

S
ometime in the middle of the night, Rachel woke. She blinked at the ceiling, bleary-eyed because she couldn’t have fallen asleep more than an hour or so ago. Worrying about the impossible situation that she’d let herself get into with Evan was doing nothing more than robbing her of a good night’s sleep.

Evan shifted in the bed next to her, murmuring. Like he had that first night, only this time she had every right to get into the middle of his nightmare. Which still didn’t grant her any special ability to understand how to handle it.

Instantly her own consternation drained from her mind as she focused on the man in the throes of God knew what. That’s what had woken her up, not a panicky stomach. Moonlight spilled over Evan from the open spot above the blinds covering the window, and she watched him for a few moments, entranced by his sleeping form.

God, what a gorgeous man. Inside and out. She hated that he was still so messed up from Iraq.

At least she was prepared for him to start thrashing, thanks to her secret middle-of-the-night foray into his nightmare world once before. When his arm crashed into the headboard, she grabbed his hand and held it to her chest, rubbing his knuckles where they’d struck the wood. Her lips found their way to the spot, not that kissing a booboo had any magical powers, but the gesture had come instinctively.

Because she liked taking care of him. Unexpectedly. It was all part and parcel of the way she felt about him, whether that made her want to jump off a cliff or not. He needed her. And she liked that too.