Solid Steel (Unseen Enemy Book 6) (5 page)

It’s called velocity and at two-hundred-and-twenty pounds or so, it isn’t your friend.

She ran the first lap in about seventy seconds, picked it up a bit for the second one. Luke’s footsteps had fallen farther behind already, but she didn’t let up, didn’t slow down. If anything, she wanted to get as far away from him as possible. It made her feel safer, somehow, to be away from that straining, sweating body.

She shot over the line, started her third lap, her breathing steady and controlled. That was when she heard Luke fall.

It sounded like he went down hard: she heard the thud as his solid body hit the track, then roll off the smooth curve and under a tree. As she spun wildly to look at him, his loud grunt shocked her. Fuck, he was
hurt
. The thought that this gorgeous, confident man could actually show pain or weakness stunned her and drove her forward.

“Luke!” She sprinted over to his inert body, saw how he was clutching his ankle. She fell to her knees next to him in the shadow of the overhanging tree branches. “Luke! You OK?”

“Urgh,” he groaned. “Yeah.”

“Your ankle?”

“Hurts.” He sat up now, grimacing. “I think I may have twisted it.”

“Shit. Really?”

“Yeah.” He stretched his leg out in front of him. “I think so.”

“Oh, God. I’m sorry.”

“Why?”

“Because I knew your body wasn’t built for this. You aren’t a sprinter. And you’re cocky as hell so I should have known you’d push too hard and hurt yourself, just to prove a point.”

“Yeah. I’m kind of a competitive dumb ass.”

She laughed, then bit her lip. “Can I see?”

“My ankle?”

“Yeah. I’ll be careful, OK?”

“OK.”

He spread his large thighs to give her some more room and she knelt between his legs, steadfastly keeping her eyes away from the impressive bulge that was clearly visible even in those loose pants. Good God, the man was huge
everywhere
, and the urge to touch him overwhelmed her. He’d feel amazing, she just knew it.

Getting her mind out of the damn gutter was an effort, but she managed it somehow. Getting back to the task at hand, Selena carefully lifted the bottom of his track pants, exposing his tanned skin. She ran her fingers over his right ankle, pressing gingerly. He flinched.

“Hurts?” she said.

“Uh-huh.”

She nodded, continued her examination. No swelling, no edges under the skin, not even any bruising or redness. She heaved a sigh of relief.

“It looks fine, actually.” She touched him one last time, liking how he felt under her fingertips. “Definitely nothing broken. Maybe you lucked out and just sprained it.”

He nodded and moved closer to her. Startled, she leaned back a bit, lifted her eyes to his. When his powerful arms snaked around her, she was too shocked to react right away, and when he kissed her, she was too dizzy with desire to react at all.

Luke’s lips were tender and slow-moving, a direct contradiction to his hard, urgent body. Selena whimpered, just a tiny sound in her throat, but he heard it.

Quick as a flash, he slid his forearms along her sides, under her arms, lifted her up and over, lowered her gently to the grassy ground. He rolled now, covered her body with his own. He gripped her hair with his one hand and held her in place, and she gave up fighting this. She just gave in to this moment, just for a few seconds. She needed this strength, this heat. Just this once and just right now.

Luke couldn’t believe it when she kissed him back, so fucking sweet and soft under him. Her fingers were curled in his shirt, tugging him closer. God, she was almost burrowing in to him, her smaller body swallowed up by his massive frame. She shuddered, held on tighter, and he felt nothing but need and want coming off her.

He kissed her again and again, the intensity and heat increasing as she responded fully. When he touched her lips with his tongue, she moaned and opened up to him right away. No hesitation, no protest.

He stroked the inside of her mouth slowly, loving the taste of her. She was minty and bright, so goddamn fresh and pure, and he was sure he’d never get enough of her. He lifted his upper body, moved up and over her trembling curves, took most of his massive weight on his forearms. His elbow brushed her full breasts and that was when she seemed to come back to herself. He silently cursed when she opened her eyes and blinked. God, he hoped she wasn’t going to pull away.

She leaned away from him. “Luke…”

“Yeah, babe?” He moved his fingers through her hair. “You OK?”

“Me?” She shook her head, trying to gather her thoughts. “What about you? Your ankle…”

“Is fine,” he said smoothly. “It always was.”

She stared up at him. “It – what? It never hurt?”

“Nope.” He grinned down at her. “I’m good.”

Selena was trying to keep up. “You… you faked it? The fall and everything?”

“Yep.” He ran one finger down her cheek, down her throat. “I wanted to kiss you but I couldn’t catch you. This seemed to be the best solution.”

“Wait. Did you plan this all along?” she asked, disbelieving. “Did you make me that deal all to fake an injury and get me down here in the dirt with you?”

“Hell, yeah, babe.” His eyes were smoky. “You’re a damn marathon runner
and
a sprinter… you think I can beat you on any track anywhere on the planet?”

“I don’t believe this.” Angry now, she pushed up against him. “Get the hell off me.”

“Hold up,” he said. “Look, what I did wasn’t exactly honest, OK, but what just happened here
was
.”

“What?”

“That kissing, babe. You meant it, I meant it, no bullshit. So I resorted to underhanded tactics and I’m sorry… but I wanted you to see what’s between us is real and honest. It’s there and I want to see what we have. Don’t you?”

She froze under him, her mind whirring as what he said hit her like a damn ton of bricks. Yeah, what had happened between them
had
been honest. It had been feeling and need and instinct; she’d just fallen in to his body, in to his kisses, like she’d fall in to a warm, blue ocean. No pretending any more, no more lying. She wanted him.

But I can’t have him.

She took a deep breath and assessed her situation. She was pinned under two-hundred-plus pounds of solid, strong man. Oh, sure, she could still get herself out from under if she really wanted to, probably with a well-placed forehead smash. But the truth was that she liked where she was just fine and anyway, she didn’t really want to hurt the guy. She just wanted to stop feeling so torn and confused. And for that to happen, she had to get away from him.

Luke peered down at her, trying to read her expression. “Selena?”

She took another deep breath, aiming for calm. “What?”

“You have anything to say?”

“About?”

“About us.”

She shut her eyes now, horrified that the sting of tears was back. “Yes. I do.”

“OK.” He shifted a bit, dropped a gentle kiss on her forehead. “Tell me, yeah?”

“I – I can’t. I can’t do this with you. Not any of it.”

“You
can’t
?”

“No. I… I just can’t.”

Her beautiful eyes opened now and Luke realized that she was inches away from tears. That shocked him and he lowered his gruff voice even more.

“But you
want
to?” he asked. “With me?”

Her head ducked down and away, and Luke gently turned her back to face him, his large palm cupping her cheek.

“Babe? You want to?”

“I – yes.” She finally just gave up pretending otherwise, and she went soft and shy with her confession. “I want to, Luke. You
know
I do. You can
feel
it. But I can’t.”

Her voice was small and defeated now, and Luke looked at her closely, totally stunned at this turn of events. God, Selena looked afraid and amazingly vulnerable and suddenly, they were having a completely different conversation than the one he thought they’d be having.

Luke’s plan had simply been to show her that she was in to him too; to get her to admit that she was running and hiding. From all that he’d heard about Selena from Griff, Luke had just figured that she was holding herself back to make him prove himself. He had no problem with that, at all. Selena was worth jumping through hoops for. Hell, she was worth tying himself up in knots for.

The truth was that Luke had been in to Selena for ages… for almost two years. No, he’d never met the woman, never even laid eyes on her before a few days before at Curves – but Griff had talked about her. He’d held back lots of details, of course, because of client confidentiality, but Luke had still been able to piece together a picture of Selena. And it was a damn beautiful picture, one that simultaneously dazzled and interested him.

He knew she was as smart as hell, and tough, and kind. He knew that she had a wicked sense of humor, and that she had a weakness for coffee cake. She’d been shipped overseas to Iraq and Afghanistan and had held her own in those testosterone-fueled and -dominated worlds, no problems. She was gentle and patient with clients, and was nothing but hardcore kick-ass with the people who were out to hurt her clients. She was fiercely loyal to Griff and the rest of Dallas Foreman’s team, and they thought of her as family. She was bright and athletic and sweet.

So yeah, the whole truth was that Luke had liked her plenty before he’d even seen her – and the fact that she was a world-class babe was just a bonus. A damn nice one, to be sure, but still, just a bonus. Luke had already been intrigued by the amazing, bewitching creature that was Selena Perez and he’d wanted to date her sight unseen.

When she’d clearly been attracted to him too, he’d thought this was all going to be straight-forward. Get her down and dirty in the dirt, have her admit that she wanted to get to know him, and off they’d go. Dinner, drinks, conversation, then who knows? Luke’s imagination had taken him to the bedroom, of course, but he was willing to wait for that to happen. The bedroom wasn’t the point;
Selena
was the point. Selena was everything.

But now here she was, openly admitting that she was in to him too, that she liked being close to him, being in his arms. She wasn’t saying that she
didn’t
want
to
be with him, or that she
wasn’t
interested
in being with him… she was saying that she
couldn’t
. That meant that she was being prevented from acting on how she felt – something was stopping her. But what?

“OK, let’s back up for a second, yeah?” he said, fighting to stay cool. “Why can’t you?”

“I just – I’m not what you want, Luke. Trust me on this, OK?”

“What are you even talking about?” he said roughly. “You’re every single fucking thing that I want.”

“I’m not,” she said quietly. “You don’t know that –” She fell silent.

“What? What were you going to say?”

She shook her head.

“Look, Selena.” He took a deep breath. “This isn’t just about getting in to your pants, so if you’re worried about that, you can stop. I mean, yeah, you’re as hot as hell and I’m not gonna pretend that I’m in this just for the chatting over coffee… but I
do
want to do this right. I want to date you, babe, get to know you. You’re way more than just a pretty face and a great ass, OK? I know that there’s way,
way
more to you than meets the eye.”

She gave a bitter laugh. “Oh, I can assure you that there’s actually far
less
to me than meets the eye.”

Puzzled, both at her words and her odd laugh, Luke furrowed his brow at her. “What?”

“Nothing. Forget it.”

She started to pull back a bit, but he tightened his grip on her, determined to get an answer.

“Selena? Talk to me, OK? I’m not going to force anything on you, I swear. Hell, you’d take me down in about two seconds if I tried to make you do anything you didn’t want to do.”

She managed a small grin at that. “Yeah.
That’s
for sure.”

“I just want to know why you can’t.” He smoothed her hair back off her flushed cheeks. “That’s all. Just tell me why. You got a man already?”

She paused, thinking about the string of bad dates she’d been on for the past two years. “No.”

“OK. You interested in someone else?”

She shook her head.

He asked the next question carefully. “Did you get hurt, babe? Did someone do something to scare you off men?”

Startled again, she met his intense gaze. “No. Luke, no. Where did you get
that
idea?”

“Griff. He said that you’ve been acting off since coming back from your six-week unexplained leave from work.” Luke hesitated. “He – he’s worried that something happened.”

Right away, he knew that he’d made a huge mistake. She was enraged now and she shoved against him, hard. He moved away this time, not wanting her to feel trapped. He sat up and offered her his hand.

Selena slapped it away, sat up on her own and glared at him. “You’re
talking
about me behind my back?” Her voice was almost a hiss. “Gossiping and speculating and talking shit about
my
personal fucking business?”

“Hey, no. We weren’t –”

“You
were
.”

“Griff’s worried about you,” he said, trying to not sound patronizing. “He cares about you, and –”

“
This
is why I didn’t say anything!” she burst out suddenly, catching him by surprise. “This is
exactly
why I didn’t want anyone to know…” She broke off again.

He waited. “Know what?”

“Nothing.” She got to her feet now, moved farther away from him. She watched as he stood up, too, her face considering. “You know, Luke, Griff’s talked a bit about
you
, too. Not much, but he’s said one thing.”

“Yeah?” He was a bit taken aback by the sudden shift in topic, but he rolled with it. “What’s he said?”

“That you’re a man of your word.” She narrowed her eyes.”Are you?”

“Yeah.” He felt hope kick up in his chest that she was going to confide in him. “Of course I am.”