SEALs of Summer 2: A Military Romance Superbundle (105 page)

A colossal step, more like it. She’d actually driven around the block. In a car. With a passenger.

And she knew without a shred of doubt that she couldn’t have done it without him.

“You
did
do something.” Tears of gratitude clung to her lashes as she peered up at him, but she suspected Shane wouldn’t care if they spilled over. The man was a rock. She didn’t think anything could shake him up, not even a woman’s blubbering. “You were there for moral support and I needed that.”

She leaned on her tiptoes and kissed him, and in a heartbeat, the gentle kiss turned into a hot, tongue-tangling make-out session in the middle of his driveway. As the need to feel his bare skin against hers overtook her, Jill breathlessly broke the kiss and dragged him to the house, ignoring his husky laughter.

“Seriously?” he said in disbelief. “Facing your fear turned you on?”

“I know, right? It’s crazy.” She shoved him into the front hall, already pulling his belt free from its buckle. “But I need you. Right now.”

He was still chuckling as he scooped her into his arms and carried her to the bedroom.

The first time she’d been in his room, she’d been confused by how small it was. A master bedroom should have been bigger, but when she’d questioned it, Shane had revealed that he’d turned the master into his office after his wife died. Jill hadn’t said it out loud, but she appreciated that. It would have felt weird having sex on another woman’s bed, surrounded by another woman’s stuff.

Though if Alana Heron had ever possessed any
stuff
, Jill had yet to see it. There were no photographs in the house, no knickknacks, no feminine touches, and that was something Jill
didn’t
appreciate.

She wasn’t sure why it mattered so much to her, though. They were sleeping together, yes. Spending time together. But Shane had made no mention of the future in the two months that had passed.

And he was leaving in a month. Jill definitely hadn’t forgotten about
that
, and she couldn’t deny that her heart ached whenever she thought about him leaving.

She pushed the troubling thoughts from her mind as Shane kicked open the door and deposited her on his bed. Before her back even connected with the mattress, there was a big, hard man on top of her, his warm hands and greedy lips taking possession of her body as if he owned it.

“You’re so goddamn beautiful,” he breathed, quickly stripping off her clothes.

His lips immediately closed over her nipple, and heat flooded her core. She was addicted to this man. When he touched her, her entire world dissolved. Nothing mattered but him, her, the frantic joining of their bodies and the pleasure they gave each other.

There was no foreplay. She didn’t need it. She was wet and hungry for him, and when he put on a condom and filled her with his cock, a sense of pure joy shot through her body. His chest was heavy against her, his heartbeat hammering against her breasts, proof of his excitement, his urgent need.

“I’m crushing you,” he murmured.

“Nuh-uh.” She tightened her grip on his neck and hooked her legs around his hips, trapping him in place. “I like it.”

Shane moved inside her, slow, sweet, and thorough. “You gonna come for me, baby?”

“Mmm-hmmm. Keep going slow like that.”

He eased his cock out, one inch at a time, then slid back in with a lazy glide. His gaze stayed fixed on hers as his hips plunged and retreated, and she got lost in his rugged features, which were taut with desire. He was so incredibly sexy. So focused on her pleasure that tears stung her eyes again.

When the orgasm hit, it wasn’t an explosion but a series of tiny charges that ignited her body and crackled along her skin. She pressed her cheek against his left pec and climaxed to the sound of his erratic heartbeat, each fast thump vibrating in time to her own pulse.

Shane came a moment later, his cock lodged inside her as his massive body shuddered. She clung to him, stroking the smooth, hot sinew of his back, smiling when he groaned loudly and went limp on top of her.

“Hell,” he mumbled. “I can’t even remember my own name when I’m inside you.”

He rolled over and pulled her against him, and she lay there in his arms, sheltered and sated and happier than she’d been in a long time.

“Do you want to stay over?” he asked gruffly.

She quickly hid her surprise. This was the first time he’d asked her to spend the night at his place.

“Sure,” she answered, doing her best not to sound too eager. “If you don’t mind.”

There was a beat. “I don’t mind. Are you hungry? I’m sure we can scrounge up something for dinner.”

Holy shit. He’d invited her to stay over, and now he wanted to cook
dinner
together? Her brain could barely make sense of it, but she sure as heck wasn’t complaining.

Jill hopped off the bed and picked up the T-shirt Shane had discarded. When she put it on, the fabric hung all the way to her knees, making her feel tiny and delicate for the first time in her life. She was tall, but Shane was taller. Deliciously taller. And deliciously bare-chested, now that she’d stolen his shirt. As he yanked on his camo pants and zipped them up, Jill ran her fingers along the hard ridges of his six-pack, and he hissed out a breath.

“Keep touching me like that and we’ll never make it to the kitchen.”

She lowered her hands to his tight butt and gave it a hearty squeeze. “You need to work on your willpower, Senior Chief.”

“There’s no such thing as willpower when you’re around.”

He dropped a kiss on her lips, then tugged her out of the bedroom before she had a chance to test that theory.

A few minutes later, they bustled around his kitchen in comfortable silence. Shane found some chicken breasts and went outside to grill them on the barbecue, while Jill prepared a salad to go with it. She wasn’t much of a cook, but salads were easy, and she hummed happily as she sliced up ingredients to toss into the huge bowl.

She was in the process of dicing tomatoes when she sensed Shane watching her. She lifted her head and spotted him at the back door, the oddest expression on his handsome face.

“What?” She set down the knife, feeling self-conscious.

“Nothing.” He shook his head as if to clear it of whatever troubling thoughts he’d been plagued with. “It’s just been a while since I’ve had a woman in my kitchen.”

Trying to sound nonchalant, she resumed her dicing. “Did Alana like to cook?”

“Yep.” He snorted softly. “But she sucked at it.”

Jill was surprised to hear that. On the rare occasion that the subject of Alana came up, Shane spoke of the woman as if she’d been the reincarnation of Mother Teresa.

“So you did all the cooking, huh?”

“Oh yeah. I always made sure to leave a shit-ton of food in the freezer so she’d have something to eat when I was overseas.” He sighed. “I can’t even count the number of times she gave us food poisoning.”

“I gave my dad food poisoning more than once growing up,” Jill admitted. “Salads, I can handle. Maybe pasta. But anything more substantial than that and your stomach might be in trouble.”

“But you make a mean cocktail,” Shane pointed out. “In fact, forget the salad and whip us up some of your margaritas instead.”

“Ha, so you
did
like them.” She’d made a batch the other evening, and had then spent the whole night listening to Shane grumble about how he preferred good old-fashioned beer.

“They were all right,” he said grudgingly. Then he flashed a rogue grin. “But not for drinking. I had more fun licking all that salty goodness off your tits.”

She stuck out her tongue. “Pervert.”

“Ah, sweetheart, we both know you loved it.” With a laugh, he disappeared to tend to the chicken, while Jill stared after him in amusement.

And dismay.

Because she’d suddenly reached a staggering realization. Yes, she really had loved that he’d drizzled margaritas over her breasts the other night, but that wasn’t
all
she loved.

She loved to see Shane smiling and laughing more often.

She loved that he refused to watch action movies because he deemed them “unrealistic”, and how he answered the phone every time one of his teammates called, even when they just wanted him to settle an argument or talk some sense into one of the guys.

She loved when the word
sweetheart
rumbled out of his mouth, and how astoundingly patient he was with her when they went for a drive, and the way he listened to her ramble on about the restaurant, and how when he was moving inside her, he looked at her like she was the only woman in the world, and—

Sweet Robin of Locksley.

Somehow, in the two short months she’d spent with the man, she’d fallen in love with Shane Heron.

‡

S
hane woke up
at 4:00 a.m. to find Jill lying beside him. In his arms. In his bed.

For one heart-stopping second, he almost dove off the mattress in a panic—until he remembered that he was the one who’d invited her to stay. That he’d
wanted
her here.

But the memory only succeeded in scaring the shit out of him. He hadn’t slept with a woman since his wife died. Actually
slept
with one. Feeling a warm body nestled against his, listening to the sound of steady breathing that wasn’t his own. He’d always believed that it required a helluva lot of trust to be able to sleep with another person, to lower your guard and allow yourself to be vulnerable like that.

Damn it, why had he asked Jill to stay?

But the answer to that was too fucking clear—because he
liked
her. Because she made him laugh and challenged him and turned him on something fierce. Jill was nothing like the eager SEAL groupies he’d been screwing these past two years. She was smart and self-assured, and the more he got to know her, the more he liked her.

A soft noise tickled his shoulder. Jill had shifted toward him, nuzzling her cheek against his bare skin as she curled one leg over his thighs. The closer contact stirred his groin, which only freaked him out all the more. Christ. Even when she was asleep she managed to drive him wild.

You gotta end it, man
.

The urgent voice in his head made his chest clench, but he couldn’t silence it. Couldn’t ignore it.

He’d gotten attached. And how fucking ironic was that? He’d spent so much time worrying that
Jill
would be the one to latch on, yet
he
was the one who didn’t want to let go.

But he had to. He was leaving in two weeks, and even if he
were
sticking around, he had nothing to offer her. No promises, no assurances. Hell, it had taken him two months to ask her to spend the night—at the rate he was going, it would be ten years before he offered her a measly key to his place.

Jill was too incredible to settle for anything less than one hundred percent, and goddamn it, he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to give that to her.

She murmured in her sleep again, and he found himself holding her tighter, running his fingers through her silky hair as she slept in his arms.

As agonizing as it was to even think it, Shane knew the best course of action was to cut ties. Sever their growing connection before either one of them got in over their heads.

He
had
to.

For both their sakes.

*

Jill knew something
was wrong the moment Shane showed up at her apartment the following night. They hadn’t made plans, but he’d called her just as she was leaving the Hampton Grill to ask if he could stop by. Even though it was past midnight, she’d agreed to see him. The unhappiness in his voice had been palpable. It had worried her, and as she let him in now, she grew even more unsettled.

Shane’s blue eyes were veiled as he stepped into the front hall, but she could tell he was on edge.

“What’s wrong?” she demanded, leading him into the living room.

She didn’t know why she bothered asking, though, because it was obvious why he’d come. Jill had felt him withdrawing from her the moment she’d woken up earlier after spending the whole night in his bed. He’d barely uttered a word during breakfast, and the kiss he’d given her when he’d dropped her off at home had lacked the warmth and passion she’d grown accustomed to.