Ring of Fire (20 page)

“Yeah. That's not going to help them. Or me. I'd feel . . . weak. And I'm supposed to be a leader.”

She shook her head. “Honestly, men. I see the same thing with my firefighters, and I try to drum it out of their stupid macho heads. Being human, admitting to a weakness or failure, isn't weak. It takes great strength. And when someone does it, the people around him should respect and support him in his battle to overcome it.”

“Should.”
He cocked his head, looking a bit more relaxed. “Your team's lucky to have you as a leader, Chief Cantrell.”

“If you really mean that, then when you get back on active duty, you can teach your own team some lessons and start changing that macho culture. You're a different kind of man from your father, Eric. Don't be afraid to show that to your soldiers. You'll be doing them a favor.”

He squeezed her hand. “You're doing me a favor, listening to me bitch about my problems. This isn't what I had in mind for our dinner out.”

“But it's real. I like real.”

“No fantasies?” The twinkle was back in his eyes.

Cautiously, she asked, “What kind of fantasy?” Being the practical sort, she'd never had much interest in fantasies.

“If I tell you my trench coat fantasy, will you promise not to judge me harshly?”

“I'm intrigued.”

“Okay, but I warn you, you may think this is sexist.”

“If so, I'll be sure to let you know. Go on, tell me.”

“When I see a woman in a trench coat, all buttoned up with the belt tied, I imagine that she's going to strip it off and be wearing nothing but lacy undies.”

Amused, she said, “So this dress was a big disappointment?”

“The dress is great. It shows off your terrific figure. But now that I know you own a trench coat . . .”

“What if I don't own any lacy lingerie?” Which was the truth; she'd never been much into scratchy lace against her skin.

“I can be flexible. You could open the trench coat and be wearing nothing at all.”

She laughed. “You do dream big, don't you?” And one day she'd be sure to fulfill that dream. Or, since she'd survived an evening in panty hose, maybe she'd even go out and buy some lacy bits. After all, she probably wouldn't be wearing them long enough for the scratchiness to bother her.

Their waiter cleared their dinner plates and scooped up the empty wineglasses. “Can I bring you a dessert menu? Coffee, tea, an after-dinner drink?”

Eric gazed at her. “Lark? Want something else?”

Maybe that dance he'd offered a while back. “I don't think so. I'm full.” She smiled at the waiter. “Everything was delicious.”

“I'm glad you enjoyed it, ma'am. Sir, what about you?”

“I agree with the lady on all counts.”

“Then I'll be right back with your bill.”

As the waiter left, Eric said, “You're ready to go, Lark?”

“I suppose. Though we never did get that dance.”

He frowned slightly, and leaned forward. In a low voice, he said, “You look like a million bucks and the most I've been able to do all night is hold your hand. Lady, I'm seriously sexually frustrated. I'm afraid that if I dance with you, it might be embarrassing for both of us.”

Flattered, she said, “Maybe I have a solution to that dilemma. Why don't we go back to your place and put on some music?” She slipped her right foot out of her high-heeled shoe and ran her stockinged toes up his left leg, feeling his firm calf muscles beneath his pant leg. “We can dance, and rub up against each other, and when the time's right, my dress might come off.”

His eyes gleamed. “Where's that bill?”

* * *

Eric wasn't sure why it was so arousing to be with Lark in public where he could barely touch her. Maybe it was anticipation. Maybe it was self-torture.

What he did know was that he was very glad for his leather jacket, so he could hold it in front of his body as they walked out of the restaurant and through the hotel lobby, past the reception desk where an older man now sat, busy at a computer.

Eric was also glad for the chilly air outside, as it helped cool him down. At least until Lark, now buttoned and belted into her trench coat, slipped her hand through the crook of his elbow and hugged his arm against her side, where it nudged her breast.

“Stop it,” he ordered. The method he chose to enforce the command was to pull his arm free from hers and put it around her shoulders.

She put hers around his waist. “You don't want to touch my breast?” she teased.

He groaned. “I want to touch all of you, and you damned well know it.”

“Well, then, you can. After you give me at least one dance.”

“You're mean. You know that?”

“That's what Jayden says on occasion. You boys just need to toughen up a little.
Nails
.”

“Let's see how tough you are when I”—he leaned his head closer to hers and whispered in her ear—“lick that sweet, wet pussy of yours.”

She gave a start of surprise. “Eric!”

“You don't like it when I talk dirty?” He'd done it on the phone the other night and she hadn't complained.

“Uh, actually, I kind of do. No one's ever done it before and it's pretty sexy.”

They made fast work of the walk to his apartment.

Eric tossed his jacket on a chair and went to get the candles. In the bedroom, he took off his tie and tossed it on the dresser. When he came back to the living room, Lark was still in her trench coat. If she planned to tease him by stripping it off slowly, he wouldn't object. Nor would he complain about giving her a dance, or even two. He had sufficient willpower for that. Maybe he'd see if he could seduce her into begging him to stop dancing and fuck her.

He rolled up the large, faded area rug that covered a well beat-on wooden floor. “My music selection's pretty limited. Can you dance to country music?”

“You can dance to almost anything if you have the right partner.” She untied the belt of her coat. “Dancing and music are both like making love, don't you think? They can be fast or slow.” She tugged the belt through the loops and tossed it to the floor.

Strange how that one gesture could be such a turn-on. “They can,” he agreed.

“Lazy and gentle.” She began to undo coat buttons, starting at the top. “Or sultry and sensuous.” Her fingers reached the bottom but she held the sides of the coat together. “Or raunchy and wild.” She let go of the coat and shrugged her shoulders back so that the front of the coat parted to reveal her in that clingy dress.

Another shrug and, with a slithery sound, the coat slipped off her shoulders and down her arms. She shook free of it. When it dropped to the floor, she stepped forward in her high heels and sexy dress. “Turn on that music and let's see what we have to set the mood.”

His own mood was pretty much set on one speed: fast forward to sex. But that was his swollen dick speaking. Hell, he was a soldier. He had discipline. Mind over matter.

While he respected and enjoyed Lark's straightforwardness and sense of responsibility, he sure did like her sexy teasing. She was flexing her female-power muscles, and he was just the man to match her.

He started the music and stepped toward her. “Our dance, I believe.”

“Good song. Patsy Cline.”

This would be the first time he'd danced since he lost his leg. During rehab he'd worked on a number of activities from crawling through large pipes to scaling walls to swimming, but dancing had never entered into the picture. Much less dancing when he was half out of his mind with arousal.

They took the classic dancers' hold, one of his hands at her waist and hers on his shoulder, their other hands clasped. Good thing the song was a slow one, to let him get a feel for this new set of movements.

Now that the music was playing, he realized he'd heard this song before. The singer was crooning about being crazy because she loved a guy who'd left her. A sad song, he supposed, yet the music and the way she sang made it seem sultry. Or maybe that was because Lark had shifted closer so her breasts and hips pressed against him—and, due to her height and her heels, they pressed in all the best places.

What had she said a few minutes ago? Sultry and sensuous? Oh, yeah!

Fortunately, his prosthetic leg and the rest of his body—which had to compensate continually for the presence of an artificial leg rather than a real one—adjusted easily to the dance movements. He and Lark fit together, moved together, as if they'd done this for years.

“Mmm,” she said, “this is nice. I haven't been dancing in ages.”

He tried not to wonder who she'd danced with—or why that should matter to him.

“Me either. Seems like my high-tech leg's up to the challenge.”

She pulled back slightly and gazed into his eyes. “I never thought. I tend to forget about your leg.”

“Yeah?” She thought of him as whole? He liked that.

“I guess because it never seems to stop you doing what you want to.”

“It sure doesn't stop me from doing this.” He tilted his hips forward to press his erection more firmly against her belly.

“I'm glad about that.” She swiveled her hips to rub back and forth against him.

The music changed; the singer was male this time. Another slow number. By now, he and Lark weren't as much dancing as shuffling and rubbing against each other. He dropped his hand from her waist to the firm fullness of an ass cheek and squeezed lightly.

The song's lyrics penetrated vaguely, enough for Eric to realize that the guy was singing about a woman who was always on his mind. Even though, it seemed, he hadn't treated her as well as he should have, and he'd maybe lost her.

“Is country music always so sad?” he murmured against Lark's soft cheek.

“Not always, but often.”

“Why is that?”

“Don't know. Maybe it's supposed to show that all those cowboys who are supposedly such tough loners really have an emotional, romantic side. Even if they usually screw things up.”

“These songs sure make it seem like relationships are complicated. Which I guess is often the truth.”

“Not ours.” She did that hip-twisting thing again, driving him crazy.

“No.” He smiled. “Thank God. I'm glad I met you, Lark Cantrell.” By now, he'd come to terms with the circumstances of that first meeting. The benefits had been worth the bruising his ego had taken.

“Me, too.”

They kissed, still shuffling slowly in place, their tongues exploring and twining with the same slow, seductive movements as their bodies.

He slid his hand down her ass and tugged her skirt upward, inch by inch, until he could reach under it to cup that soft curve where butt cheek met top of thigh.

She squirmed. “Panty hose. I hate them. They're not sexy, and they're uncomfortable.”

“Then take them off.” He hooked his fingers in the elasticized waistband and tried to peel the skintight hose down. That task proved to be harder than it should.

Lark pulled free, laughing. “Believe me, it's not that easy. Give me a sec.” She turned away and bent, giving him a mouthwatering view, to take off her shoes. Then she reached up under her dress and with some sexy female wriggling, peeled off the stockings and stepped free of them. She gave a shimmy. “Oh, that feels better.”

Another song was playing now, with a female singer. But Eric wasn't paying much attention, and he stopped entirely when Lark shot him a gleaming-eyed glance from under black eyelashes and said, “The good thing about panty hose is that I don't have to wear panties.”

Which meant she was now naked from the waist down, under that dress.

“No more dancing,” he said.

She cocked an eyebrow in amusement. “A unilateral decision?”

“Yup. Which you provoked, so you're only getting what you deserve.”

“Don't be too harsh with my punishment, Major.”

“A hundred tongue lashings, right across that naked, swollen pussy.”

Her cheeks flushed, her black-coffee eyes glittered, and she snapped him a mock salute. “Yes, sir. Let the lashings begin.”

“Sit in that chair.” He pointed to a battered leather recliner. It was a large chair, fairly high off the ground, with a separate footstool. Moving the stool aside, he said, “And tilt it all the way back.”

Her eyes widened. Likely, she'd expected him to take her into the bedroom. But he was more versatile than an “only do it in bed” guy.

Once she had lain back in the chair, with her pretty dress and long, bare legs, he kneeled on the floor in front of her. His stump ached and the wood floor was painfully hard against his real knee, but he didn't give a damn. Being with Lark like this was worth it.

Hooking his arm under her knees, Eric tugged her toward him until her ass rested not on the center of the chair, but on the edge. He moved her knees apart, and hiked her dress up to reveal damp, swollen folds that told him she was as ready as he was.

Supporting her curvy ass, he lifted her lower body as he bent forward to meet her. Those long legs rose and wrapped around his shoulders. Her scent was heady, an aphrodisiac. And when he put his lips to her center, her taste was sweeter and more potent than the wine they'd been drinking at dinner.

She gasped and gripped his head between her hands.

Experimenting, he found that light, teasing licks made her whimper and press against him, while firm strokes with the flat of his tongue made her moan and writhe. Keeping her on the edge, he alternated techniques, flicking her clit occasionally but not lingering there. Maybe it was selfish of him, or it was that macho ego she protested against, but he wanted Lark to lose control. To surrender to him and the pleasure he was bringing her, to spiral as high and tight as she could go, before he finally sent her crashing into release.