Sandra Hill - [Vikings II 04] (30 page)

Against his sexy, sexy mouth she groaned and said, “Max, this is insanity. We have to talk.”

“If this is insanity, it feels bloody hell damn good. If this is insanity, then no wonder half-wits walk about with silly grins on their drooling faces.” He laid his lips over hers and kissed her deeply. In fact, he kissed her so deeply and so thoroughly that her
knees started to buckle. Luckily, or not so luckily, he lifted her by the waist and held her up with his hips pressed against hers.

She said nothing, but she did make a whooshy exhaling sound, like a woman in labor, or, better yet, a woman in heat.
Yikes!

“I have five minutes, ten at most, afore Flash and I have to be back at the barracks. My teammates can cover for us only so long,” he said quickly, letting her know he had heard her plea for talk. “So, talk or tup?

“What a choice, you smooth-talker, you!”

He shrugged. “There is a time for smoothness and a time for crudeness. Art thou offended, m’lady?” Meanwhile, he insinuated himself more intimately between her legs
right there
, and she bit her tongue to stifle a groan. “Hmmm?”

Alison had grown up in a household of men, she worked primarily with men. If she were going to be put off by a little blunt talk, it would have happened long ago, and it hadn’t. “Hardly,” she replied with a laugh.

“So, talk or tup, sweetling?” He let her body lower to the floor, sloooowly.

His question had been a rhetorical one, really, because he’d already dropped his shorts and was naked underneath. Surprise, surprise! “Do cone-domes work in water?” he asked, slipping one on.

She started to tell him a condom was no longer necessary, but surely there would be a better time than this. Without any preliminaries or waiting for her to answer his question, he lifted her again, spread her legs with his knees, and in one sweet thrust was in her to the hilt. All of her inner folds were practically doing the hula, they were so happy to have him back. And
she wasn’t the only one who was pathetically enthusiastic about it; she could swear Max’s penis was throbbing inside her.

She stood on tiptoes to fit better. Correction. He lifted her even higher by the buttocks and levered her legs around his hips. The hot water spraying over them turned tepid, but neither of them cared. Who was she kidding? It could be freezing and they’d still be hot.

As Max began to undulate himself in and out of her, he held her gaze. She couldn’t have looked away if she’d wanted. His eyelashes were black spikes surrounding clear blue eyes. His lips were parted.

She put a hand to his cheek. He turned slightly and kissed the palm. Then immediately returned to watching her.

“I want to see you peak,” he said.

“I want to see you peak first,” she said.

He appeared about to balk—even as he continued to stroke in and out of her while he spoke, talented fellow that he was—but then he said something surprising. “Make me.”

Now, how would I do that? Especially with you watching me like that.
But then she became bold. She put her hands behind her neck and bowed her back so that her breasts jutted outward.

His rhythm faltered into a jerk before he resumed his slow thrusting pattern.

“How was that, sweetie?”

He laughed. “Not bad.”

“Not bad? I’ll give you ‘not bad.’ ” She ran her hands over his shoulders, down his back, and under his buttocks. He grinned. But she wanted more of a response than that. Coming back to her own body,
she took her small, very sensitive breasts in hand and thrummed the nipples to hard points with both thumbs.

“Holy Frigg!” he exclaimed through gritted teeth and slammed into her one last time.

To say that they had a simultaneous orgasm would be the understatement of all time.
Think fireworks and earth moving. Think fast and furious with finesse. Think love.

But Alison didn’t want to think anything just then.

Max let her slide to a standing position and was disengaging quickly after checking his wristwatch and muttering, “Two minutes to go! I hate to tup and run, sweetling, but I am going to be in big trouble if I don’t get back.”

She reached over and turned off the faucets. He pulled his shorts up, and she wrapped a towel around herself. They both emerged from the shower into the bathroom, laughing, only to see a Middle-Eastern-looking guy in a Navy uniform pointing a pistol at them. The uniform, which was much too big for him, and the pistol probably belonged to the guard who had been stationed outside her door, who she prayed was still alive.

Max shoved her behind him, but not before the tango gave her a sweeping glance of disgust and snarled in broken English, “Bitch! Infidel! Whore! You die today.” He held the pistol in two hands and crouched a bit into the firing position. Clearly, he was more interested in her than Max, though he probably wouldn’t mind—in fact, wouldn’t hesitate—to take them both out.

“Nobody is dying here today,” Max said calmly,
motioning with his hands behind his back that she should move into the shower stall.

“No move!” the perp shrieked. “Go to side.” He motioned with his gun.

This guy was a loose cannon. No telling what he would do. Alison moved back to Max’s side. The room was a fair size, and the guy—Lebanese, she would guess—stood in the open doorway of the bathroom, putting about ten feet between them. She could see that the bedroom door out to the corridor was closed. No help from that quarter.

“Just relax. Just relax,” Max said, holding his palms out in front of him. His voice and demeanor were cool, but Alison saw the fire of anger in his blue eyes. “Let’s talk about this,” he told the tango.

“No talk. Today, Allah be praised, my family be avenged. Today the Jew-loving U.S. of A., the Nav-hee SEALs, the MacLean family … today they pay price for their support of Israel. Murderers, all of you!”

“Murderers? Not us,” Alison argued.

“Shhh,” Max cautioned her.

“Don’t tell me to be quiet. I have no idea who this jerk is, but he doesn’t scare me.”
Actually, he does scare me, but I can’t let him know that.

“This lady has nothing to do with you,” Max said, slowly backing up and pulling her with him, an inch at a time.

“She has everything to do … she and her cursed family. I lost my father, two brothers, and a sister in that bombing. Her betrothed rots in hell for his crime; no business he had coming to my country. No business! Her brother will suffer the same fate, too … soon as he enters his home tonight.”

“Oh, God! He must have planted a bomb in Ian’s house,” she murmured to Max.

He nodded that he’d heard her.

“How did you get on this base? In this building?” she asked, though she wasn’t entirely surprised. After all, Max had managed to get in, too.

“Carefully. I plan for five long years. You think your military the only one knows covert tactics?”

“Killing me is not going to solve anything,” Alison said.

His dark face went rigid with fury. “Do not speak to me, American harlot. Soon you burn in the fires of your Christian hell.”

“You’ll never escape alive.”

“I die glady for just cause. A family jihad—”

In the middle of his sentence, Max shoved her hard so that she fell backward onto the tile floor while he launched himself forward. The gun went off as Alison watched in horror while the two men struggled on the floor. The gun went off a second time.

Alison heard someone screaming and realized it was herself. As she crawled up on her knees, then stood, making her way over to the two still bodies, she sobbed.
Oh, please … oh, please, God, let him be alive.
Already a pool of blood was forming on the white tiles in an ever-expanding circle.

As several military men, weapons raised, broke through the outside door—apparently the tango had locked it from inside—and Flash came crawling through the window, alerted by the gunshots, Max moved slightly and raised himself up to a sitting position, gazing about groggily. The tango was dead, a bullet wound showing between his eyes. And Max
had been shot in the shoulder. Alison dropped to her knees beside him.

“Somebody hurry! Find Ian! A bomb has been planted at his house,” she yelled to one of the Navy guards. “And please, call the medics right away. Max is bleeding.” Already she was examining the shoulder wound and stanching the flow with her towel, leaving herself naked. That didn’t matter. He was probably just stunned, but still she cried, “Wake up, Max. Don’t you dare die on me.”

Just then, Ian rushed in. Apparently, he hadn’t gone home yet. Drawing Alison to her feet, he wrapped a blanket around her and drew her shaking body into his embrace. “What the hell is going on here?” he yelled. Medics followed close behind him and were soon working on a now awake and protesting Max, trying to talk him into getting onto a stretcher. She explained shakily what had happened. Before long, the tango’s body was removed and a bomb squad was sent to Ian’s home.

In the end, Max had no choice. They forced him onto the stretcher. Just before they took him out, he glanced over at Alison, probably to say something teasing. But instead, his eyes latched onto her hands, which were held protectively over her stomach. It was a reflexive action that mothers throughout time had been taking. His eyes shot up to hers in surprise, then shock, then accusation. He said nothing.
Nothing!

Luckily, he was the only one who’d noticed. Once the room was emptied, except for her and her brother, who would be joining the bomb squad shortly, Ian hugged her tightly.

It was over.

I’ve got a secret …

By the time Alison got to the medical facility two hours later, Max had already been stitched and bandaged up and was preparing to return to his barracks. Obviously, if a concussion couldn’t hold him down, a mere bullet wound wouldn’t either.

Ian had called her a half hour ago to tell her that the bomb in his home had been disabled. Without her warning, not only would his house have gone up in flames, but possibly the entire block.

Lieutenant Igo spoke with her in the corridor. “This boy Magnusson has got a lot of questions to answer. You do, too. First thing tomorrow morning. What was he doing in your room tonight? And what the hell was Petty Officer Gordon doing up on the roof? Major breaches in Navy regulations and security.
Major!
”

“Yes, sir,” she said with a sinking heart, then added, “Ensign Magnusson saved my life, sir, and that of my brother. Possibly others. I hope that will be taken into consideration.”

Her superior officer glowered at her for a moment. “Duly noted.” He walked stiffly away.

Once the doctor on duty came out of the examining room, shaking his head over his irascible patient’s complaints, he told her, “He’s all yours, and good riddance.”

Max was in the bathroom attached to the examining room. When he came out, looking wobbly and very, very tired, she started to go to him, arms open for an embrace. “Oh, Max!”

He put up a halting hand and stepped back, eying her coolly. It was as if they were strangers.

“You are such a fool.” A tiny sob escaped her. “You could have been killed, throwing yourself at that tango like that.” Now that the danger was over, a war of emotions was playing out inside her. She found herself angry with Max, but so very happy that he was alive.

His jaw clenched and unclenched visibly. “I am a Viking. We protect those under our shields. And you, wench, are under my shield, whether you like it or not.”

“I am not …” she started to say, then stopped herself at the fury she saw boiling just below the surface.

“You are breeding.” It was not a question.

She nodded, placing a hand over her tummy, as if protecting her baby from its father’s anger.

He blinked, profound hurt clouding his eyes. “Were you going to tell me?”

“Of course.”

“When?”

“Soon. Well, probably not till after graduation. Or—”

“Or mayhap you were waiting to see if I would be around. Or if you even wanted me around.” Another idea seemed to occur to him, and his nostrils flared with fury. “Were you going to kill our child? I have heard how easy it is to do that in your enlightened modern time. And a child would not fit in with your plans for a military life, now that I think on it.”

“No!” Now it was her turn to be hurt. “If I were going to abort this child, I would have done so as soon as I found out I was pregnant.”

“I should be honored that
you
decided to have my child.”

“There was no opportunity for us to make a joint decision.”

“Do not tell me you couldn’t have found a way to make contact with me these past three weeks in George-ha.”

Her face heated at his accusation, which was well founded. And he was right about something else as well. She had considered this her decision to make, not theirs.

He exhaled with disgust. “So much for all your modern marvels! I thought those cone-domes were supposed to prevent conception.”

“They do.”

He arched an eyebrow at her.

Her face heated with embarrassment. “That one time in the broom closet when you weren’t covered.”

“
What?
That was only for a second.”

“It only takes a second.”

His lips twitched and he almost smiled, but then he quickly suppressed it. “Bloody hell, I am as bad as my father. My seed is way too virile.”

She was the one who almost smiled then.

“When will we wed?”

“What? Oh, no! We are not getting married just because I’m pregnant.”

“I beg to differ. This child will have my name. Do not doubt that fact.”

“We are not getting married.

“We are, do not doubt that for one instant.”

“Be reasonable, Max.”

“Reason has naught to do with paternity.”

“Do you still think you are a time-traveler?”

“Yea. What has that to do with this?”

“It has everything to do with this. If I believe you are a blooming Viking from the eleventh century,
why would I want to marry you?” She regretted her words the moment they left her mouth.

“Indeed,” he said sadly, his blue eyes piercing the distance between them.